"Once upon a time there was a boy who loved a girl, and her laughter was a question he wanted to spend his whole life answering."
― Nicole Krauss, The History of Love
39
I had wondered if there was something in particular that would mend me in a more instantaneous way. The odd thing about sudden death was that – its suddenness. The hurt attacks you in one foul swoop, but the recovery process was nothing like that. There was no quick antidote that suited the manner in which you were poisoned to start with. I was finally doing a reasonable job of un-jumbling my mind but, as a whole, my body often felt like scrabble pieces when the board got knocked. Out of place, missing consonants and vowels to make complete words.
On the weekend of Edward's birthday, a few more letters fell into order for me. It wasn't Edward who would proactively mend me. That was a responsibility that another person should never be burdened with. It's neither fair nor wise to rely solely on another to get by. He was never that for me – a wordsmith I used to make me feel better. No, this was love. Love in its simplest and truest of forms. And that was what would mend me.
Perhaps the antithesis to death was not life, it was love. Because what was life without love anyway? You wouldn't be truly living. Piece by piece my body would begin to feel whole again. Loving Edward and loving my family and letting them love me back would give me my triple word score. A full board of letters in place, with none left to play.
Second to Edward's passion for saving lives was his passion for music. Lucky for me, his birthday weekend was a small slice of music heaven at home in Seattle. Bon Iver on Thursday night, Coldplay opened by The Lumineers on Saturday night – his actual birthday. He thought Bon Iver was sold out, but I had tickets. I'd found all their CDs in his wall of music one afternoon. He had so much music in his house, yet he never played any around me. Of course I knew why; he was holding back. He knew I loved music as much as he did. He also knew my iPod still terrified me a little. I was getting better with it; I just didn't know if I could listen to "Skinny Love" or "Fix You" without destroying a small forest's worth of Kleenex. I wanted to though – to listen and enjoy it again, not destroy forests. I would do it for him – with him – and I wouldn't be afraid of the tears if they came against my will. Concerts and music were just one more piece of our normal brilliance that I wanted to share with him. I wanted him to play his guitar for me and educate me on all of his favorite old school albums.
I didn't tell him where we were going that night. We walked from a nearby burger joint to the theatre.
"You're shitting me?" he said when we turned the corner to join the queue for entry. "Bon Iver?"
"Uh-huh." I smiled. He just looked at me speechless, then kissed his happiness into me. It was becoming our thing – conveying everything through the joining of our lips.
He held me from behind during the show and sang along with sweet whispers in my ear. I didn't cry, though I almost wondered if I had, if it wouldn't have really been from sadness but the good that had come out of it.
Saturday was a little different. I couldn't help the tears that slipped out when "Fix You" built to its chorus. It gave me chills live, and the chills were too much for me this time around. Edward held me as tight as he could, anchoring me to him.
"I love you," he whispered amongst the noise of the crowd, kissing my earlobe.
The day had been pretty perfect. Perfectly perfect, even. I had cooked him breakfast and didn't burn a thing – I was back to my old form in the kitchen with a great eggs benedict. He'd looked at me with wonder in his eyes when he'd opened his presents. I'd scoured Seattle's best music stores for some of the classics on vinyl, knowing that when his parents visited on the Sunday they were finally gifting him their old record player. I bought myself a sexy little red underwear set to wear under my outfit for the concert, knowing it would look good against his gunmetal grey bedding once we returned home.
Before we got to the underwear, there was decadent cake to deal to. I had made him my infamous lemon-lime white chocolate cake, complete with candles. He blew them out late that night, the buzz of a great show and a couple of beers mellowing between us. He gave me a face that was some sort of smirk trying to turn serious.
"How do you feel about being with an older man, Bella?"
"Oh, you're so old, Edward. Three whole years – such a sugar daddy."
"I quite like the idea of being your sugar daddy. Gives me an excuse to spoil and protect you. In a completely non-chauvinistic, non-demeaning way of course."
"Of course!" I laughed. "Quit your rambling, old man, put some cake in that gob." I picked up the slice he'd just cut and pressed it into his mouth, icing going everywhere. I licked it off my fingers as he tried to chew and swallow the huge piece.
"Jesus, that's sexy," he garbled, a couple of cake crumbs flying as he was transfixed on my mouth.
"Oh my God, swallow before you talk." He was laughing again and I was sure he was going to choke.
"Shuddupandkissme."
That was an invitation I could never refuse. He swallowed his mouthful as I licked the icing from his lower lip, tugging at it lightly with my teeth before searching out his tongue.