I'm surprised how many of you think Edward cheated. You're entitled to your own opinions, of course, but please keep in mind what E & B agreed to was consensual. This is why I personally do not consider this a cheat fic.

Also, some of you were thinking it was supposed to be a threesome, but Bella never intended to join in (she probably should have, though lol).

Anyway, thanks for all of the interesting reviews! Really got me thinking!

5
- because of you -

Edward calls me on his thirty-fifth birthday.

Three times in a row.

I decline every time.

But on the fourth, I cave. I worry there's been an emergency. Worry something happened to his mom or dad.

Worry something is wrong with him.

I answer but don't say hello. I keep the phone pressed to my ear, hearing his soft breath come through the line.

And then he speaks. There's nothing soft. Only hard.

"Bella."

His voice sounds cold. Brittle with rejection after an entire year to hate me for leaving him.

But I hate him, too. For what he allowed us to do. For letting it all get too far. For not trying to understand how or why I was hurting. For not being more sensitive to how I felt afterward.

Most of all, I despise him for still going on that fucking podcast tour with Maria one month after I left.

I followed the tour closely. Dissected every interaction on social media. Agonized over every photo. Nothing about them screamed "together." But of course, I wondered.

Then, on the very last day, Edward's co-host added a story to his Instagram account. They were all at a bar, celebrating the end of their tour. There were a few different videos, people toasting, beers clinking, the space loud and crowded.

And in one, in the background, I saw Edward and Maria.

They weren't even the focus of the video, but they were all I saw. Sitting together, beers on the table between them. Not kissing, not touching, but it felt intimate. Everyone else was caught up in the chaos, but they were focused on each other.

And then she leaned in and hugged him.

That was the last video. I watched it over and over and over, my pulse racing and my jealousy coiling too deep to feel anything else ever again. I screen-recorded it for no reason other than I was a masochist. I knew once it expired on Instagram and no longer existed that I'd want to watch it, dissect it, think about it.

They'd touched in worse ways before. I reminded myself of this. But they did that with the intention—the excuse—that it was for me. That hug, though… no. That hug was for them.

I don't know how long it lasted because they were still hugging when the fifteen-second video ended. I don't know who pulled away first. Or if there was a shared kiss after that embrace.

It drove me insane not knowing.

It broke my heart even further.

I'd driven him into her arms.

Literally.

The very next day, I looked into moving to LA and filing for divorce.

That was eleven months ago, and he still hasn't signed the papers.

"Bella."

I snap out of my memories when Edward says my name again on the phone.

"What?" I ask, full of attitude from remembering the past.

He sighs heavily. With his breath released, some of his animosity disappears.

"I'll be in Los Angeles next week," he says. "Meet me."

"Why?" I ask. "Because you signed the divorce papers?"

If he says yes, I'll be disappointed.

If he says no, I'll be disappointed.

This is a lose-lose situation.

"No," he mutters, an edge to his tone again. "I'm not going to do that… yet."

Yet.

It holds the weight of a promise and the warning of a threat.

"Then I have no reason to see you," I tell him.

"I still have some of your stuff," he says, and it's interesting because if he's offering to drop off some of my belongings, then he's admitting this is over.

Admitting defeat.

Maybe I've worn him down.

Other than two suitcases filled with clothes and shoes, I left everything else behind.

"You don't have some of my stuff. You have almost all of it," I correct.

"Yeah, I fucking know."

"Get rid of it all. I don't need anything I left behind," I say pointedly to hurt him. I don't need you.

He's more irritated now. "It's not my problem to get rid of your shit, Bella."

"You're making it your problem. Just leave it be."

"And continue to let it torture me every day seeing evidence that you existed?" he asks. I hope it's rhetorical because I don't answer. I can't.

For a split second, my heart hurts for him… not because of him.

I lean into that pain in another way.

"Are you making room for your girlfriend to move in?" I ask, bitterness coating my tone. He doesn't answer me. "I don't really feel comfortable with some other woman living in a house I still pay the mortgage on."

"Then you shouldn't have left," he snips.

Anger and jealousy burn through me. "I honestly can't fucking believe—"

"Just fucking stop already," he says harshly. "You know I'm not moving anyone in. You know I don't have a girlfriend."

I swallow hard. "No, I actually didn't know that."

"Well, now you fucking do, okay?"

"Okay."

Our silence expands.

"I'm driving, not flying, so I'll pack up your stuff and drop it off," he offers after a beat.

This is also interesting. "Why are you driving from Seattle to Los Angeles?" I ask, then decide I don't want to know. It's his business. The less I know, the better. "Nevermind. I probably won't be home when you come, so you can leave my shit outside."

I give him my address.

He doesn't thank me.

"Did you get what you wished for this year?" I cruelly ask.

"Not yet," he says, clipped.

It holds the weight of a promise and the warning of a threat.