Author's Notes (March 8, 2012): My lovely betas (Aleeab4u, duskwatcher2153, GreatChemistry and smexy4smarties) got this one back to me like a week ago, but I'm evil and kept it from you. Blame my work life and personal projects?

Chapter music: bit(dot)ly/sotpm33-music

"SINS OF THE PIANO MAN"
CHAPTER 33: PURGATORIES AND PARADISES

Because we only want a life
That's well worth living,
And sleeping's no kind of life at all.

"In Your Own Time" by Iron & Wine

EDWARD MASEN
March 2, 2009

Hours were decades. Every moment without her laughter and being was agonizing. What would happen if she never woke, if I had failed her? I could still taste her blood on my lips.

We were hidden away in a cabin in the Carolinas. I sat at her bedside, my hands grasping hers, as if I might pull her back from death. That was what I prayed my venom would do.

I kept one finger on her pulse point, the north star of her humanity and the vestiges of my own, my guiding point. She didn't scream and writhe as I had. She was as silent as any of my victims.

"She's changing," Carlisle assured me, his hand squeezing my shoulder. "Have faith."

But she was my faith. There was no heaven without her.

Alice spoke of the future. "You're going to be so happy together. We're all going to be so happy." In her mind's eye, I saw the immeasurable joy, the laughter and contentment. "I can't wait."

I couldn't either and hoped Alice had it right this time.

I felt when Bella's broken bones mended, then turned to steel. I rejoiced over the loss of scars—and mourned their disappearance. Her heartbeat became a whisper.

Thud-thud, pat-pat-pat.

She would wake. And I would need to find a new north star to navigate by.

I would miss my human girl.

March 3, 2009

When Bella returned to me, it was on the magic of the witching hour and with the suddenness of a human waking from a night terror. She scrambled to her feet with a grace her first life had not afforded her. Scarlet eyes searched the room for danger then settled on me; though no longer brown, they were still as haunting as any moonless night.

"Edward?"

"It's me," I spoke softly. "I'm here."

"There's…so much." She looked around again.

Her mind was ever a mystery to me, but I knew of the world she saw. I remembered waking from the change—the new sights, scents and sounds. The confusion.

"It's all right. I'll help you." I held out my hand.

She moved like a wild creature and silent as the wind to throw her arms around my waist. Her embrace was a vice that all but crushed my bones, but I couldn't care. I would mend. All that mattered was she was alive and mine, the last of her line of Swans.

We stood still as only our kind could, holding each other until the sun rose. There was no need for words or even, for the moment, blood.

November 1, 2009

Bella now knew the quirk of venom, that mechanism within that made the blood call as sweetly as any siren. She was eight months into her new life, and she'd had no human contact. She didn't have to; her body knew better than to think animal blood was satisfying. Her craving for more did not abate, nor did her newborn mood swings. Any given hour was filled with happiness, sadness, boredom, thirst, anger and every other emotion under the sun.

Some days were more difficult than others. We had needed to hunt a second time this day. She sat on the mountainside after she'd had her fill, plain grasses surrounding her up to her breast, swaying in the breeze. A bear carcass was laid at her side, still and bloodless, its jaw yawning open as if it was still growling. Or perhaps it was a frozen scream. He'd never had a chance.

"Feel better?" I asked.

Her newly golden eyes cut over to me. "That's a stupid question."

"It will get easier, Bella. You have to believe that."

"Thaaat's what you keep telling me," she sang. "Of course, this is from the guy who feasted on humans for sixty years. You're such a hypocrite."

"Sometimes," I admitted, sighing. "You're not yourself. The blood's controlling you."

"Bear blood sucks. How does Emmett like the stuff?" She toed the head of the beast with her worn sneaker. The toe came away with blood, which she swiped off with a finger to promptly put it in her mouth.

There was a reason we called new vampires newborns. It was the terrible twos for blood drinkers and in truth I could not wait for her to be past it.

"It will get easier," I repeated to remind us both.

I looked away from her, across rolling hills and angular mountains. The sun was setting, casting an orange glow over all it touched; Bella's skin shone like diamonds, throwing rainbows on the grass. For one so delicately beautiful, I could sense the barely controlled agitation beneath her skin.

"Do you need Jasper? He's not far."

"He doesn't help."

"Now that's not true," I admonished as gently as I could. "You feel more at peace after he's helped you."

"It's only temporary." She waved a hand at the bear. "This isn't enough," she spat. "I'm still so thirsty. Edward, please. There's got to be something better."

"You know what the only other option is."

Pouting, she shrugged a shoulder.

"Guilt is not better in the long run."

"We can eat criminals! You did. You don't even feel bad about eating them."

I pulled her up from the ground. "We won't even discuss how much criminals have corrupted me over the years—and made me cynical."

"But—"

"I'm not going to let you have human blood. Period, the end," I said firmly. "It's best not to entertain such temptation."

She was quiet as she regarded me. Her eyes traveled down the length of my body and darkened to black. I smiled, knowing blood was forgotten for the moment.

"What about entertaining other temptations?" she asked.

September 13, 2010

"It's midnight," I whispered, as if the hour were holy. "Happy birthday, Bella."

She laughed a little and stretched where she lay atop me. Flesh upon flesh, silk upon a sinner. "I think we can stop celebrating my birthday. It's not like I'm getting any older."

"That's true," I agreed, "but your birth is very special to me. I want to celebrate you."

"I guess it is a bit like an anniversary for us. We've known each other for two years now." She grew quiet and her brows pulled together.

"What is it?" I stroked her back.

She stared at me, her eyes piercing. "Edward, you tell me everything, right?"

"I certainly try to."

After two years, I'd learned to be less secretive and trust our relationship could survive difficult truths. It helped that my venom sat in her veins. We belonged to each other.

However, I still had old secrets. It would take decades, perhaps longer, for me to share some matters. When it came to Bella, I didn't lie, but I didn't always go out of my way to divulge details. She knew enough; if she asked for specifics, I gave them, but until those moments came, I kept some secrets.

She wanted specifics this night.

"You knew my mom, didn't you?"

My hand stilled on her back. "When?" I asked cautiously.

"Oh, come on. You know what I'm getting at. Before. Before us, you knew her." There was no doubt in her eyes.

I hesitated but answered truthfully. "I met your mother once before I met you, yes."

Pain, anger and confusion flashed across her soft features. "Why didn't you tell me?" Now she was melancholy.

"It didn't seem relevant."

She raised an eyebrow.

"It wasn't," I insisted.

"So that's why you never wanted to be around her—why you avoided her at Dad's funeral and that last day… Why she thought you were an angel. Am I right?"

"I didn't tell her that. She assumed."

Bella barked a laugh. "I did too before I knew the truth." She picked at the edge of a pillowcase. "So that's that, I guess. How old was she when you met her?"

"Young—early twenties."

"I was a baby then." I didn't correct her, and she continued. "We were still in Forks, maybe. Were you there before?"

"No, Renée and I met in Seattle." I swallowed hard. We were coming dangerously close to a discussion I had no desire to have. But Bella didn't ask why her mother had been in Seattle or for details of how we'd met. Instead, she asked the question that every child who's felt unwanted desires to ask.

"Did she—was she happy when you met her? With me?" She was so afraid to hear the truth.

"Bella…"

"I have to know."

Unfortunately, she had reason to be afraid. I could tell her the truth, that Renée hadn't wanted her at all, that though she'd had a change of heart somewhere along the way, a part of her—a part she didn't like but was still there—always resented the brown-eyed girl who'd stolen her youth. I could have told Bella that. I could continue down a path of honesty and disclosure. Or I could spin a better tale. Renée's sordid side of the story was buried in Florida.

Habitual sinners are not made holy overnight. Perhaps some lies are not wrong or sinful at all. This lie could be right, I thought.

"She was happy," I said, holding Bella's gaze. "She loved you so very much."

2013

When the worst of the newborn cravings passed, Bella wanted to see the world. She was right to assume there was more to it than a handful of states. We started in Iceland, worked our way through Scandinavia, and spent weeks in the UK. With Carlisle and Esme at our sides, we visited the governing Volturi in Italy; I came away from the encounter feeling grateful I had never turned up on their radar. Their preferred form of punishment was often permanent and only questionably just.

Each country offered a new adventure for the woman at my side—new sights and scents and sounds, none of which overwhelmed once she had learned to juggle the intensity of her new senses. My only regret was that she had never seen these places as a human, that I could not give her the pleasure other humans experienced in the foods and spirits of other cultures. She said she was happy, but it was in my nature to wish I could give her more.

It was Germany Bella loved most, enough so that for the first time since she had become a vampire, we parted ways with our family to live as a couple. We found an apartment in Wiesbaden and furnished it with bare necessities and a piano. On sunny days, we stayed in and continued to work on my swan songs; on cloudy days, we explored our new environment.

Bella took up photography, climbing buildings at night to photograph the city from new and unusual angles. It helped that vampirism allowed her to be as still for as long as she desired, no matter the position; she took long exposure shots of the city while atop the domes of the Russian Orthodox Church of Saint Elizabeth. We celebrated when this series of photographs was published in a magazine, even though a pseudonym received credit. We knew the truth; that was all that mattered.

Over a century on earth had taught me that pleasurable moments are only temporary, that happiness ebbs and flows so that we may know it to be happiness at all. Knowing this does not make tragedy any less painful, however.

It was days before Christmas, and I was still working on Bella's gift. With her not being fond of extravagant displays of affection, I was always forced to be creative. This would be the year of the sculpture. I'd been taking classes under her nose for three months.

On my way home from the latest class, Alice called from Beijing.

"Ni hao," I answered cheerfully. "What do the stars have in store for me today?" After a few years of living with Alice, I'd learned to accept, and perhaps even enjoy, her meddling. A little.

But this day was not for teasing or mundane weather forecasts.

"You need to hurry," Alice said, not bothering to return my salutation. "A delivery guy is making his way to your apartment, and I don't see it ending well with him and Bella. I was just curious what Bella was up to, and— Oh, Edward, hurry. Please. She'll be heartbroken if she does this!"

It didn't matter that Wiesbaden's streets were busy, I ran as best I could, faster than a normal man, risking exposure. But I was not fast enough.

I smelled blood as soon as I entered the building. Venom rushed to my mouth, but I swallowed it without thought. A mistake had been made, and Bella needed me. This was about more than human blood.

The inside of our apartment was sprayed and spattered red in some sickly, postmodern murder I was all too familiar with. A man's body lay face down on the floor, his limbs bruised and broken; one leg was twisted to the side at an unnatural angle. The smell of his death was only surpassed by the scent of his blood.

Bella glanced up at me from where she sat beside the body. Gone were the golden eyes I knew so well; they had been replaced with crimson guilt. Her hands and mouth were also stained crimson, and her hair was stringy around her face, the strands sticky and matted.

"Edward… What have I… What have I done?"

I listened to the thoughts throughout the apartment building; no one had heard anything. "You made a mistake," I said, kneeling before her.

"It's a little more than a mistake. I killed him."

I nodded. There was nothing I could say to make this better, and there was no denying the damage that had been done.

"He just smelled so amazing."

"Humans will do that."

"His family—Edward, he has pictures of kids in his wallet. Four of them—a baby, too." She put her face into her hands. "God, I'm a monster."

I nudged her chin so she would look at me. "We are monsters," I corrected. "But we can and do rise above that if at all possible." Helping her to her feet, I nodded to our bedroom. "Go have a shower and begin packing. I'll take care of this."

"But this is all my fault. It should be my responsibility to take care of it."

I shook my head. "There are some things you shouldn't know how to do well. Disposing bodies is one of them."

With heavy hearts, we departed from Germany by nightfall. We left a devastated family in our wake.

July 9, 2014

The Cullen coven had several core tenets, one of them being that one family member's mistake was the whole family's mistake. There was no judgment when blood was spilled, only acceptance and rehabilitation. It was for that reason that I returned with Bella to Carlisle and Esme's waiting arms. With my past, and with her being the primary catalyst of my own lifestyle changes, there was little I felt I could do to help her. Unfortunately, no matter what any of us did, something had broken inside of Bella.

"I took someone's dad away," was all she would say on the matter. Nothing we said could make her accept her mistake and move forward.

She stopped writing. Her books and camera collected dust. I sat alone at my piano, uninspired and lonely, often watching her from our bedroom window. She'd sit outside for hours, Lucky at her side, her fingers clutching the dragonfly fossil I'd given her years ago.

"Can't she just get over this already?" Rosalie grouched.

So much for acceptance.

"Says the woman who never gets tired of her own reflection," I retorted.

"Let's be nice, everyone," Esme reminded us.

"Did the dude really smell that good?" Emmett asked. "I mean, I've had my fair share of mistakes, and if it was anything like those… You can't help it, man. They're just too tasty for their own good. She has to know that."

"Emmett."

"Sorry, Esme." He glanced at me. But, really, man. She doesn't need to feel guilty.

We were all at our wit's end for different reasons. I sought Jasper for help, as I had several times since he and Alice had returned from Beijing, but he made no promises other than to try harder to bring Bella out of her depression.

"Tuned my mandolin and banjo," he said to her one day. "Why don't you come on inside, and we can jam? Alice's been taking up the fiddle. She plays a mean 'Soldier's Joy.'"

Bella offered Jasper a small smile. "Thanks, that does sound nice, but I just wanna be alone. For now, anyway."

"I know you do, but I can't just up and leave you when you're feeling like this. Why's this still got you so blue?" In his mind's eye, I saw Bella glare at him, and he shrugged. "Nobody's perfect, you know. Nobody's been asking you to be, neither. Only one of us close to godlike behavior at this point is Carlisle, and he's an anomaly."

"It's a little more than being imperfect. A man is dead because of me."

"And all the moping in the world won't bring him back."

"I don't need you to tell me that."

"See, I think you do. Now, Edward, he's too nice to you. He wants to give you exactly as you want, but the problem is you don't know what you need."

"Oh, really? Why don't you enlighten me?"

"I was going to. You need to go and do something good in the world." When Bella said nothing in reply, Jasper snorted in annoyance. "Well, fine then. I feel how it is. I'll leave you to yourself."

With that, he turned on his heel and went back to the house. He looked at me as he entered through the back door.

"You better get hold of that girl. You and I both know that kind of depression is a surefire way to slip again and create one hell of a nasty cycle."

August 18, 2014

There were times in my past when I'd sat in place for weeks on end, only moving when the thirst demanded I feed from humans, blood bags or animals. I had never seen another vampire do this, though, until Bella. Most days, she sat outside, still as stone, letting the elements ravage her, all while refusing our help. We were in Canada, but Bella was stuck in a bloodstained apartment in Germany.

What had I done bringing her into this life? She had been so pure and innocent. I had ruined it for her and made her into a murderer. Accident or no, I knew all too well that no matter how thoroughly you washed your hands, blood remained, demanding atonement. She was a true vampire now, and she would never be the same again.

But then she was here, and I was here, and that was the crux of it. Ages stretched before us, and we needed to make the best of them together. I decided that if she wouldn't take Jasper's advice to heart, I would do so for her and hope she'd follow my lead. I'd make her if it came down to it.

I sat in front of her in the grass. Lucky rolled over on his back between us until I rubbed his exposed belly. "We're going away for a little while," I told her. She looked up but said nothing. "We'll be doing some aid work with Carlisle and Esme."

"I ca—"

"You can, and you will." I pulled an envelope from my back pocket, opened it up and pulled the papers from inside. "The Bauers are taken care of. His wife and children will never want for anything."

She stared at the papers, her mouth turning downward. "Except him. This isn't the Dark Ages. Money can't replace a father and husband, Edward."

"No, but all we can do is try to make amends. You of all people know how important financial security is." I tucked the paper back into my pocket. "I began my swan songs as a way of making things right. You have to find something like that."

"But I wasn't supposed to be like you," she whispered. "You weren't supposed to let me kill anyone. It wasn't supposed to be like this."

Both anger and guilt rippled through me. "I can't watch you all the time. I shouldn't have to, and you wouldn't want me to." I stood and looked down at her. "One thing I won't let you do is wallow any longer. I've done enough of that for both of us in the past. I've packed your bags. We leave within the hour."

"I don't want to go."

I bent and kissed her cheek. "That's irrelevant this time."

February 11, 2019

The truth about aid work is there is always someone, somewhere, who needs help. There are towns that need doctors who don't believe in voodoo, children who need mosquito nets to protect them from malaria, people who need clean water and food. There is always civil unrest somewhere or a natural disaster striking.

The fragility of humans had never been lost on me, but I became more aware of how delicate they were, how serendipitous it was for Bella to have been born where and when she had been, to have survived me twice, to have even lived long enough to enter this world of ours.

I'd made Bella go into aid work to help her rise out of her depression, and indeed it was successful in doing that for her, but it did more than that, too—for both of us.

"You did well," Carlisle said.

"Thank you." My fingers were coated in blood that was still drying. I turned my hands back and forth in wonder. "You know, the scent doesn't appeal to me at all."

Carlisle smiled and touched my shoulder. "How can it when you see they need you so? Your needs become secondary and seem paltry in comparison." He looked back at the sleeping boy whose intestines were, against all odds, packed inside his body again. "He'll survive."

But I was still afraid for the boy and so sat beside his cot through the night, while the other aid workers believed I rested. The boy woke at dawn as sun streamed into the medical tent. His mouth opened wide when he looked at my skin.

"Shh," I whispered, a finger to my smiling lips. "Our secret?"

He nodded with a sleepy smile.

Through our experiences, we discovered Bella had a gift. Given her ability to keep her thoughts from me, I'd always wondered if that might manifest as something more. But it wasn't her ability to shield herself from me that evolved.

As time passed, Bella found she was drawn to the grieving, even those who outwardly seemed fine. It was a heavy burden she felt in her chest—that gnawing, aching hole of sadness caused by loss. Her presence and touch were a panacea to the pained. When Bella came near, all thoughts and pains of loss drifted away, became locked tight into some other part of the brain, so all that remained was peace. I'd never heard Bella's thoughts, but I knew this compartmentalization was how she had survived and ultimately accepted Charlie's death. Much healing could be found in a small respite.

Eventually, our entire family became part of the aid work, finding each of us was gifted for one role or another. Alice told us where we were most needed. Esme and Emmett made sure there was food for the hungry. Rosalie helped with care for women and children. Carlisle and I healed the sick when possible. And Bella and Jasper soothed those losing and lost. These things were more important than blood, even if our bodies still demanded it.

We found eternal purpose through helping the ephemeral, the music I composed took on more notes of a major key, rather than minor.

The day came when finally I had saved more lives than I had taken.

April 3, 2022

"Would you let me blindfold you?"

I looked up from my sheet music. "I think I prefer when you're the one with the blindfold."

Bella ducked her head and let out a laugh. "Really, though," she said a second later. "Would you let me?"

"I suppose." I would do most things that would get this woman naked.

"For several hours?" she asked.

"Hours?" I echoed. "What exactly are you planning to do to me?"

She patted my knee. "You'll find out soon enough."

It took one blindfold, five hours of driving, and seventy-five dollars for Isabella Swan to marry me in Las Vegas. I wondered what my mother would think of my marrying in a gambling establishment, but mostly I believed she would have loved Bella.

January 27, 2026

In the beginnings of our relationship, there had been many times Bella had frightened me. It hadn't merely been the potency of her blood or the difficulty of revealing what I was that had been frightening. I had feared losing my autonomy, of being responsible for caring for another when I was barely able to care for myself.

There was no fear these days, and I knew better now than to think Bella couldn't take care of herself—and sometimes even me—when the need arose; we had both grown more capable, more compassionate.

In place of the fear, there was a never-ending desire to watch her grow, to see and feel her happiness, to love her hard and soft. The truth that remained static and always would was that there would never be enough time with her.

November 4, 2038

Making sure to give the Quileute reservation a wide berth, we secretly returned to Forks for the first time in nearly thirty years. We began at Charlie's house. Bella had leased it to tenants for the past couple of decades, but there was no one living in it at present. It needed work—probably more than it was worth, but we would spend the money to make sure it was restored. Esme would enjoy the challenge.

Bella pressed her cheek to Charlie's old bedroom wall. "I can smell him here."

We left flowers at Angela and Ben's graves then slowly made our way to Charlie's. With a sigh, Bella bent and placed the modest bunch of flowers beside his gravestone.

They were yellow and white daisies, a simple arrangement for a man who'd had simple pleasures. She stood and stared for a long while, not bothering to move or breathe or blink, until tiny, crystalline beads of humidity gathered on the flower petals. In a cemetery in the dead of night, there was no need to pretend to be human.

"Do you think it was real?" she asked, her soft voice carrying on the wind. Her brows were furrowed, dark against her luminescent skin.

Stuffing my hands in my pockets, I smiled at her. Over the years, I'd discovered Bella had an ironic habit of posing questions in a way that assumed I could read her mind.

"Do I think what was real?"

"The light. And seeing Charlie. Everything I saw when I died."

"Ah." She'd asked this question many times. I still didn't know the truth and said as much. I'd been in the minds of the dying, of course, but they always slipped into darkness. If something lay beyond that darkness, it was not made known to me.

Bella tucked hair behind her ears, but the wind made quick work of pulling it free. "I've been reading about it again," she said. "Near-death-experience stuff. I think—" Her words choked off. "There are just too many medical explanations for what happened to me—firings in the brain, lack of oxygen. I was dying; my body was just going through the motions. I don't understand it all, but…" She sighed, frustrated. "I don't know what I'm getting at."

I was quiet for a time as I chose my words carefully. "You don't have to know if what happened was real or merely a psychological reaction."

"I'll always wonder, though. Forever."

"Perhaps. But knowing the truth won't alter the pain of any regret or separation," I told her. I took her hand and brushed my thumb over her knuckles. "What you can know is that whether Charlie is watching over you or has simply returned to the earth, he would want you to live and love and flourish. He wanted so much for you, Bella."

Biting her lip, she nodded. I could see venom hovering on the edges of her eyelids. "Thank you," she whispered.

I kissed her forehead and hoped that if Charlie was watching over her, he was pleased with me, too.

"Come." I pulled at her gently, knowing if I didn't she'd stay here for far too long. "We have a plane to catch."