Author's Note:

Thanks for all the reviews so far! And thanks to Sunflower Fran for the rec on her page!

I do not own Twilight. Just having a little fun.

Chapter 2

After stopping at my favorite coffee shop for a much-needed cup of ambition, I walked into my office at Twilight Publishing a few minutes before eight. I had just dropped my bag onto my desk when my friend Angela stuck her head in the door.

"Good morning, Boss," she chirped with a smile.

"Angela, you are way too chipper for this early in the morning," I laughed.

"Whatever," she said with a roll of her eyes. "I just dropped by to see if you wanted to have lunch later."

"Yeah, that sounds good. I have a meeting with Cynthia Thompson at ten, so I may be drinking my lunch today," I laughed, only half joking.

"Oh yeah, I would be too. I don't know how you deal with her," Angela replied. "But better you than me!"

I laughed and waved her away, then settled down at my desk to get my day started. I had several notes on Cynthia's latest manuscript, and she was not going to be happy about it. She was a great writer, but she was flighty and scattered and it tended to show through a lack of continuity in the details of her stories. That's where I came in, and I prided myself on doing my job well. Throughout the years, I had worked my way to the head of the editing department, and I didn't have many authors I worked with one on one these days, but Cynthia had always refused to work with anyone else, and to be honest, none of the other editors wanted her so she was all mine.

Once I was sure I was ready for my meeting with Cynthia, I settled in to take care of some other things on my desk as I waited for ten o'clock to roll around. I knocked out some correspondence and scheduled a couple of meetings with new authors. I had a productive morning and a successful meeting with Cynthia, but by the time she dramatically swept out of my office, it was pushing noon, and I was more than ready for lunch, so I grabbed my purse and Angela, and we headed down the street to our favorite deli. It was a lovely fall day, so we opted to sit outside at one of the small bistro tables on the front sidewalk where we caught up on work and life while we ate our sandwiches. I shared how my meeting with Cynthia had gone, and Angela updated me on her workload and her family. She and her husband Ben were talking about having a second child, so our conversation consisted mostly of all things baby. I had always wanted a child, so I couldn't help feeling a little jealous, but I was happy for my friend. Just as we were about to head back to work, my phone chirped with a text message. I glanced down and saw my best friend Alice's name. I opened the message and groaned.

"Everything okay?" Angela asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine. It's just Alice. We were supposed to go visit Tanya this afternoon, but she's not going to make it," I replied.

"Doesn't that mean you're off the hook, too, then?" Angela asked. She knew how I felt about visiting Tanya, but I felt bad for not really wanting to go, so I always caved out of guilt.

"I wish," I said. "She'll just give me a guilt trip if I say I'm not going, and she always seems to find out if I don't go. I'll just go without her. At least that way I don't have to stay long."

I put off responding to Alice's text as Angela and I cleared our trash from lunch and started the walk back to work. Once back in my office, I pulled my phone out of my purse to see another message from Alice. Apparently, I had waited a little too long to respond. I loved the girl, but lord, she was impatient.

Bella, don't even try to tell me you aren't going to go. She's our friend and we owe it to her. - A

I'm going, Alice. I was just finishing up lunch. You have to give me time to respond before you jump to conclusions. - B

I rolled my eyes as I sent my response. As much as I would love to tell Alice I wasn't going to go and she couldn't make me, it just really wasn't worth the fight. And like I had told Angela; it actually was easier to get it over with by myself. And Alice was right about one thing. Tanya was our friend, so I really shouldn't have dreaded the visits as much as I did. I decided to finish up what I needed to do from the office and leave a little early, so a couple of hours later, I was on my way to see Tanya.

I felt the familiar feelings of dread and sadness creep in as I parked and made my way inside the Ridgemont Care facility. It was a nice place, but it was still a nursing home. I remembered visiting my grandmother in a nursing home as a child, and I never would have guessed I'd be in one visiting a friend the same age as me at only thirty-two. But, for the last six and a half years, I'd been here at least once a month doing just that. I felt like an awful person as I sat at Tanya's bedside and glanced at the clock, calculating how long I needed to stay. I spoke to Tanya for a minute, telling her I was there and let her know Alice couldn't make it, but would come soon. I kept up some inane chatter for a few minutes before I lapsed into silence. Alice was the talker when we were here together. I always felt awkward, which added to my guilt, but I couldn't help it. Instead, I sat quietly and reminisced about how we'd gotten to this point.

Tanya Denali had moved to Forks our junior year of high school. Her parents had wanted a slower pace of life, so her father had taken a position at the local hospital and moved his family from Chicago. Tanya had not been thrilled with the move, but Alice had been quick to befriend her. Alice Cullen and I had been best friends since the third grade when the Cullen family had moved to town. They had also moved when Alice's dad, Carlisle, had taken a job at the hospital, so she and Tanya had that in common. Alice had loved that she had a new friend that was into fashion and shopping with her, unlike me, so she and Tanya had quickly become inseparable. At times I had felt like a third wheel, but I always figured that was more due to the fact that I was content to stay at home and they often had to drag me along on whatever adventure they cooked up. I liked Tanya, but she and I had never formed quite the bond she and Alice shared. I could admit now that it had been a little hurtful at the time that Alice seemed to bond with Tanya, and I was somewhat left out, but Tanya and I had eventually formed our own friendship and we all three found our places in the group.

We had all had a decent relationship, but things had changed when we went to college. Alice and Tanya had remained as close as ever, but I had expanded my horizons and didn't spend quite as much time with them as I had back home. It also didn't help that Tanya had taken her quest for Alice's older brother Edward to extremes, and I had had little patience for her antics. It had always been obvious that she had a crush on him, always making sure she was around the Cullen house as much as possible when he was home from college during our high school days, and it had been embarrassing to watch from the beginning. Later, when we were all in Seattle, she became relentless. Alice loved the idea of her best friend and her brother falling in love, so she had constantly pushed Edward to ask Tanya out. Edward, being four years older than us, had been starting his career and resisted his sister's matchmaking efforts for a few years until Alice and I had graduated as well. Tanya had dropped out of the university a couple of years prior and gotten her real estate license instead and I had always wondered if she had done so in an effort to make Edward see her as more of an equal instead of just his kid sister's friend. Regardless of her motives, though, she'd finally succeeded and gotten Edward's attention at Alice's and my graduation party. I hadn't known at the time their drunken flirting had turned into anything more until their drunken hook up at my wedding a couple of months later.

I laughed to myself as I remembered my shock when Tanya and Edward began dating and eventually married. I had known Edward, and the other Cullen brother, Emmett, most of my life, and I would have bet money that Edward would never have fallen for Tanya. Let's just say she had never been subtle about using her charms on the opposite sex, while Edward was quiet and had never dated that kind of girl to my knowledge. But obviously I was wrong, because despite the tragedy that had befallen them, Edward remained devoted to Tanya and their daughter, Maggie.

I shook myself out of my thoughts of the past and looked back at Tanya sadly. Regardless of our history and the fact we had grown apart as friends long ago, it was hard to see her like this. Her once vibrant strawberry blond hair and voluptuous figure were dull and shapeless. She looked as though she were simply sleeping, but the reality was much harsher. Tanya had been in a near fatal car accident while out showing houses to a client and had suffered severe brain trauma. While not on life support, she had been in a coma and essentially brain dead ever since. To make an awful situation even worse, Tanya had been thirty-five weeks pregnant when the accident occurred. The doctors had delivered the baby via emergency c-section and Edward had raised their daughter on his own for the last six years.

Glancing at the clock again, I saw I had been there for about a half an hour and deemed that sufficient. I murmured a goodbye to Tanya and made my way back out into the sunny September afternoon. As I was exiting the lobby, I heard my name and turned around to find the man who'd just been on my mind coming toward me. His bronze hair was in its usual state of disarray, and I would have had to have been blind or dead to not notice how handsome he looked in a dark gray suit with a black shirt and no tie. He flashed me a crooked grin as he reached out and pulled me into a hug.

"Hey, Bella, it's good to see you," he said as he wrapped his arms around me.

I inhaled and couldn't help noticing how good he smelled, and I quickly pulled back. "Hi, Edward. It's good to see you, too," I replied.

"What are you doing here? Where's Alice?" he asked.

"Well, it's pretty obvious what I was doing here," I teased. "And Alice couldn't make it. She had to meet with a new designer she wants to carry at the boutique, I think. What are you doing here? We don't usually run into you on Thursday afternoons."

"I had to come sign some paperwork on some changes to Tanya's care, so I just stopped by for a minute," he explained.

At the mention of Tanya, I noticed he looked tired suddenly. I couldn't imagine being in his shoes at such a young age, but for as hard as it must be on him, Edward handled it admirably.

I was about to say my goodbyes when Edward spoke up again. "So, I'm off for the afternoon, and Mom picked up Maggie for me. You want to grab some coffee with me?"

"Sure," I said with a shrug. "Just tell me where and I'll meet you there."

Edward mentioned a coffee shop nearby and we split briefly as we each drove our own vehicles the short distance. During the drive over, I had a brief moment where I wondered what I was doing. Edward and I were friends, but we never hung out alone and I wondered if this was weird but decided that there was nothing wrong with two friends having coffee. I pulled up at the coffee shop a few minutes later and saw that Edward was already there. We met at the door and Edward asked for my order and told me to grab a table while he got our coffee. I claimed a table near the back corner of the shop and Edward joined me a few minutes later with our drinks and a couple of chocolate chip cookies. I raised my eyebrow at the cookie and Edward shot me a sheepish grin.

"Just don't tell Maggie we ate cookies without her," he said with a chuckle.

"Well, I guess your secret is safe with me since you've made me an accessory to the crime," I teased as I broke off a chunk of my cookie and popped it into my mouth. "So, what have you been up to lately? How is Maggie?"

"She's good, getting big," Edward replied. "She outsmarts me daily, but she keeps me on my toes. Between her and work, I stay pretty busy."

"I haven't seen her in a while. I'm glad she's doing well," I told him. I saw Edward's daughter along with Emmett and Rosalie's kids periodically, but when our gang got together every couple of weeks, the kids usually all went to stay with their grandparents, Carlisle and Esme.

"Yeah, it has been a while. The kids were actually at our last game night a couple weeks ago since Mom and Dad were busy that night. We all missed you, by the way." Edward said.

"Thanks. I missed you guys, too. It's just been weird since the divorce, you know?" I regretted that I had pulled away from my friends a little since I left Jake, but he had been part of the group, when he could be bothered to come anyway. Being there on my own made me feel like I was a fifth wheel of sorts, even though I knew that wasn't true.

"I guess I can understand that," Edward said. "But there's no reason for you to feel that way. You're our friend, not Jacob. And he wasn't around that much anyway. How are you doing with everything, though? It's been almost a year, right?"

"Just over a year since everything was finalized, actually," I nodded, "and I'm good, really. As awful as it may sound, I've realized that I was more heartbroken over the time I wasted than I really was over Jake. I mean, we grew up together and when we became more than friends, it just seemed so effortless that I thought it was meant to be. But I've come to see that we were just comfortable with each other, and I mistook that for love. I did love him, but I'm not certain I was ever in love with him." I smiled sadly thinking how pathetic I sounded.

"I'm sorry," Edward said, "I hate that you feel like you wasted those years. I never realized you were unhappy."

"Oh, I wasn't exactly unhappy, I've just realized that there's a difference between contentment and true happiness. I've felt lighter and happier in the last year without him than I ever did with him. That's what makes me sad. I guess I just wish that I had realized it sooner and either never married him, or at least made the change on my own terms instead of having to catch him with another woman. But anyway, enough about that mess. How are you, Edward? I mean, I know Tanya's condition has to take a toll on you."

A look I attributed to sadness washed over Edward's face before he responded. "Yeah, I guess you could say that. This certainly isn't how I pictured my life turning out, you know? But I'm okay, really. I worry more about the toll it takes on Maggie."

"How so?" I asked. "I mean, I guess it would be hard for her, but since she's never known anything different, I guess I hadn't really thought about it bothering her much."

"Well, I definitely think not knowing any difference has been better than losing a mother she knew, and up until recently there hasn't been a problem. I've always taken Maggie to see Tanya at least once a month, but the last few months, she's gotten more vocal about not wanting to go. I think she's gotten old enough to finally realize what she's missing if that makes sense. Plus, I think the nursing home just makes her uncomfortable."

"Wow, I guess that would be hard for her to see her friends and cousins with their moms and understand what she doesn't have. But Edward, you are doing a great job with her. I can only imagine how hard it is to do this on your own, but she's a great kid and you're her hero." I reached across the table and squeezed Edward's hand. He looked so weary for a moment that I wanted to reassure him of what a great dad he was.

"Thanks, Bella. I just wish sometimes that things were different for her, even if different still wasn't 'normal'," he said.

Before I had a chance to wonder too much about Edward's remark, he changed the subject and we chatted a while longer before he glanced at his watch and said, "Oh, it's getting late. I need to get Maggie from my parents."

I realized that we had talked longer than it seemed and stood to throw away my coffee cup. After we exited the coffee shop, Edward stopped at my car and pulled me in for another hug.

"It was really great to see you, Bella. Tomorrow night is game night. Say you'll come?"

"I'll think about it," I told him as I returned his embrace.

"You better," he said and pulled away. "See you soon."

With that, he gave me a final wave and got into his truck, and I waved back as I started my car, then headed for home. I pulled into my garage a short time later and debated what I wanted for dinner as I changed out of my work clothes. Once I was comfortable in a pair of leggings and an old t-shirt, I pulled out some leftover pasta and stuck it in the microwave. As my food heated, I found myself thinking about Edward. Even though I'd known him since we were kids, the four-year age gap between us meant that he hadn't been around much in all the time I'd spent at the Cullen home with Alice. He and Emmett had always treated me as sort of an honorary little sister, which generally meant they found me as pesky as they did Alice. We'd all long since grown up, though, and the age difference had lost any significance it may have had when we were kids. The Cullen siblings and their parents were extremely close, and I was still treated like part of the family, just like I'd always been. Spending time alone with Edward had been nice, though. It was easy to talk to him and I felt comfortable and strangely excited with him. I wasn't sure what to make of that last emotion, so I shrugged it off as I grabbed my dinner from the microwave and a glass of wine and carried it into the living room. After dealing with a difficult author that morning and the dreaded visit to Tanya that afternoon, I planned to veg out on the couch with my carbs, alcohol, and HGTV. So that's exactly what I did.

Author's Note:

Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Chapter 3 will be up in a few days.

Keep the reviews coming, please!