I f Y o u C S e e I n t o M y S o u l

Chapter 5 - Caraphernelia

B ' s P O V

I woke up in a tangle of limbs, and for a brief moment, panic swelled in my chest because the chest my head was lying on did not belong to my boyfriend. Er, ex-boyfriend, rather. But when I glanced up, I found green eyes staring down at me, and my panic was quelled.

"Hi," he murmured, voice thick with sleep.

"Hi," I returned quietly, fighting to keep the smile off my face as I replayed the previous night. Almost involuntarily, I ran a finger over my lips and smiled when he smiled.

I snuggled further into his chest, which was both hard and soft, both in the right places, and he squeezed me tighter, burrowing us both into the comforter surrounding us. I buried my nose in his chest and inhaled deeply. He smelled like clean, and cigarettes, and boy; perfect.

I knew that I should be just the slightest bit concerned about the previous night, but when he leaned down and captured my lips in a gentle good morning kiss, all thoughts left my mind. I knew that I needed time to heal, and I knew that I would tell him such, but I also knew how much I wanted this. And how much I was not willing to give this up.

We pulled apart rather unwillingly, and I finally separated myself enough to realize we were in Alice's room. Edward slipped out from the bed and lit up a cigarette, standing near the window at the back of the room. Cigarette dangling from his perfect pouty lips, he pulled his discarded jeans over his black boxer briefs.

I slid slowly out of bed, stretching as I did so. My head was pounding, and my stomach was rolling, but otherwise I felt good, if not the slightest bit sore. I furrowed my brow, not remembering how I wound up in Alice's bed.

"Edward," I said before I thought, "did we fuck last night?"

He laughed, dispelling smoke from his lips at the same time. He scratched at the stubble on his chin with his thumb as he raked his eyes up and down my frame, clad only in his over-sized t-shirt. "Naw," he said finally, eyes dark and dangerous, "we didn't fuck."

Disappointment twisted in my belly, and I dropped my head with a nod. Yeah, I mean, it was a good thing we didn't, I wasn't that stupid. But I wanted to. Shit, I really wanted to. Goddamn Sage.

"Hey," he called quietly. He stubbed the cigarette out and flicked the butt out the open window. With slow steps, he crossed the room until he stood in front of me. Our eyes studied each other silently. I wanted to lick his jaw. Was that weird? Fuck, what did I care? It was a sexy fucking jaw.

He wiped at what I was sure was smudged make-up under my eyes with his thumb, a smile dancing around the edges of his lips.

"I would never take advantage of you," he said quietly, eyes imploring, beseeching me to know he was speaking the truth. And I did. Without a doubt, I knew that he was a good guy. Urg, this was too much serious conversation for a hangover.

He kissed the top of my head and left the room, leaving me alone to change clothes and whatnot. I stretched some more and took a deep breath of his shirt, wondering if he would notice if I didn't give it back. Duh, it's the only shirt he has with him. Of course he would.

I slipped into a pair of black leggings, and with one last sniff of his shirt, a deep purple hoodie with white lettering on the back that stated, "I don't puke glamour or piss glitter." I pulled my hair up into a pony tail and left Alice's room, making my way towards the kitchen where there was the hope of coffee.

"Good morning, sunshine!" Alice sing-songed as she danced around the kitchen. I grunted in response, and shuffled over to the cabinet that housed the coffee mugs. I selected the one with the kissing chickens that said "How about a little peck?" on the rim.

I grabbed the bottle of aspirin and plopped down on a chair with my coffee. Alice placed a plate of bacon and eggs in front of me, and I fought down the nausea as I picked up a piece of bacon.

"Oh!" she said suddenly, flittering across the room to retrieve what looked like my cell phone from the counter. "This thing was ringing like crazy last night."

"Why didn't you give it to me?" I wondered as I scrolled through the missed calls. Bill collector, Charlie, Phil, Phil, Phil, Sage, Phil, Charlie, Panera…

"Honestly Bella, do you even remember anything that happened last night?" She tsked and shook her head at me, exasperated by my question.

"I remember," I muttered dejectedly, pushing the eggs around my plate as they got cold. Her arms wrapped around me from behind, and I shoved away the feeling of tears as she kissed my head.

"I'm sorry, Bell, that's not what I meant," she murmured. "Just…you were a little crazy when you came back with Edward. I mean, you threw up last night, and you never do that. Ever. Edward took you upstairs after that, made you drink some water, and you just sorta passed out."

I nodded as I traced my pinky around the rim of my cup. Truthfully, I didn't want to remember what happened last night. I wanted to crawl into my bed and wrap the blankets around myself and never ever see daylight again. Well, not never again, but not for a few days.

My phone rang, separating us, and I groaned as I read the caller ID. Work. Fucking great, they were gonna ask me to work, I just knew it. I answered with a grunt as Edward sauntered into the kitchen. A short conversation later, I was scheduled to work at two.

My head hit the table with a thud. I groaned at the pain that splintered through my head and flipped Alice the bird when she giggled at me.

"Fuck." I whipped my head towards Alice, my eyes wide. "Al, how am I supposed to get to work? I don't have my fucking car."

"I could-" Edward started, but Alice interrupted him with a quick roll of her eyes and, "Take the bug."

I laughed loudly at her, stopping when I realized she wasn't laughing with me. And my head fucking hurt. "You're serious?"

She looked hurt for half a second before she smiled. "Duh. You need a car; I have a car that I don't drive. You drive me everywhere, so think of this as me repaying you."

"Alice," I said, not finding this funny, "You can't be serious. You want me to drive your bright ass yellow Beetle? Me?"

Edward tried again. "Bella, I'd be-"

"Stop your bitching Bella, it's only temporary until you get your car back," she rolled her eyes again and spun on her heel, flouncing out of the room. Grumbling, I turned back to my coffee, and was met with Edward's smirk.

"What?"

"I was trying to say that I'd be more than happy to give you a ride, ya dumbass," he shook his head and sat down at the table with a heaping plate of food. Honestly, it looked like the amount Emmett would eat, not toothpick-skinny Edward. But whatever floats your boat and all that shit.

"Why didn't you say anything before, douche?" I groused. I was stalling, I was stalling big time because I so did not want to have the conversation about what we were and what happened last night, and I knew it was coming.

He threw his hands in the air, eyes wide and incredulous. "Seriously? I tried."

I frowned and slumped in my chair. I really wanted to roll my eyes at him, but doing that would only make my headache worse, so I decided against it. …At least until the room stopped spinning.

He sighed, and I kept my eyes on the kissing chickens on the coffee mug. I knew that sigh; that was the Are we going to talk about this? sigh. I'd gotten it plenty from Alice and Jacob, especially from my dad and even a few times from Sage. Very few.

He cleared his throat and shifted forward in his seat, strong forearms resting on the table. "Look, Bella, I…we need…this…"

"I need time," I whispered almost inaudibly. My eyes stayed trained on the kissing chickens, unable to look at his face and see anger, hurt, disappointment, any of those.

He exhaled in what sounded like relief, and I glanced up to see his moss green eyes fixed on my face. He gave me that smirk, the one that made me want to jump across the table and firmly attach his lips to mine; I just barely restrained myself.

He nodded, standing up to put his plate in the sink. "I've got time, Bella."

I ran a finger over a chip on the edge of the cup. "It's just…I like you, Edward, but I feel like I don't really know you. I feel like there are so many things we don't know about each other, and even bigger than that, I'm just not ready right now. I need time to get over Sage, and fuck, I need time to heal. And in that time, we should be friends, and we should really get to know each other, and when I'm ready…I'll let you know."

He winked and dropped a kiss on top of my head as he passed, stopping at the foot of the stairs. "I've got time."

The smile on his face could have lit up the moon.

!#$#!

The first thing I did when I walked through the front door was unbuckle my belt. Fucking hated wearing the damn thing, but it was part of the work uniform. I kicked my shoes off and dropped the keys to the Bug on the table near the front door.

The house was abnormally quiet, I noted. My dad must have had to work night shift, and Cailee…well, I didn't have a fucking clue where she was. Sighing, I trudged upstairs and locked the bathroom door behind me. Washing the Panera stink off of me was one of my favorite things to do.

After my shower, I pulled on a pair of boy shorts and an oversized t-shirt and sat down at my desk. I was hoping to have heard something from Sage by now, but it seemed he was avoiding me as much as I was avoiding him.

I searched through various social networks before deciding that he was definitely laying low. I shut my laptop and lie down in bed, dialing his number. I hesitated for a few minutes before I called myself a pussy and finally pushed the damn button. It rang.

And rang.

And rang.

I shook my head at myself. "So fucking stupid." After the sixth ring, I was about to throw the damn thing across the room when someone picked up the phone.

"Hello?" It was definitely not Sage. It was a female voice and she sounded incredibly breathless.

I lost all air and squeezed my eyes shut against the tears. "Hello?" She said again. I nearly choked on my gasp for breath. Then she spoke again, but to him in the background. "Sage, there's no one there." And then him… "Then just hang up baby, nobody's on the phone."

And I finally realized, as the call disconnected, that to him, I was nobody.

I had let him save me, let him fix me, and given myself to him, and he had taken all of it and turned away from it. Because I was nothing, and I meant nothing to him.

As tears ran down my face, I highlighted a new name and pressed the send button.

I couldn't bear to be alone.

Ayee, a short chapter, but at least I got one out. Hopefully I'll be able to update a little sooner next time, but I don't know with the way I've been working lately. Crazy busy as of late.

Chapter song is Caraphernelia by Pierce The Veil ft. Jeremy McKinnon.

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Much love! xoxo