But I miss you in the mornings when I see the sun
Something in the orange tells me we're not done
Something in the Orange - Zach Bryan
April 12, 2005
Edward woke up on the floor of Alice's room. His back ached from the hard floor and he was still sporting a residual headache from the day before, but his dreams had been vivid and sharp and for once he wished he could return to them.
Alice wasn't in bed. He glanced at the clock- it was already the early afternoon. Alice was naturally an early riser and had probably accomplished twenty tasks on his lazy Sunday morning. He trudged down the stairs, not caring that he was still dressed in the clothes he had worn the night before. It was a walk of laziness, not shame, and he quickly piled several granola bars into his hands before returning up the stairs to his own room.
The scent hit him like a ton of bricks. He realised the last time he had been in here, so had Bella. The doors to his balcony were still unlocked from where she had let herself out, but it was like she had never left. Everything smelled like wildflowers in the summer, sweet and pure.
Fuck, he didn't know what he was doing. He stuffed a granola bar in his mouth and scrubbed his face with the wash Alice left by his sink, trying to gain some clarity, as if sleep and hunger could be what was clouding his thoughts. But it wasn't, and he knew it.
He picked up the book he left on his bedside table and tried to read it. It was one of the others Bella had mentioned, a classic with convoluted descriptions that seemed to go on for pages until the words jumbled together. He could, surprisingly, see why she liked it. Once he got a grasp of what the author meant, it was kind of nice. He fell asleep again, eyes fluttering closed while he tried to keep them forced open. The book fell on his chest and his head tilted to the side, mind again lost in a dreamscape coloured in crimson and tasting of Bella.
When he woke again, it was to the sound of a knock on his door. Sun beamed into his room, birds chirped happily in the woods as they soared in the clear blue sky.
He had never been more depressed.
"Edward," Alice sang from the other side of the door. "If you're still in bed, you better get up. We're gonna be late!"
"Who cares," he mumbled, turning over and smashing his face into a pillow in the hopes that the sun would be dashed out by his efforts. But when he peaked out for a breath, it was Alice's face in front of his, her eyes wide and shining almost golden in the light. Wrong shade, Edward thought before returning to a state of faux-slumber. Alice pressed a hand to his forehead, then tapped his cheek to stir him.
"Do I have to get Mom?" she asked, the threat posed mostly as a joke with Alice smiling teasingly down at him.
"She's not my mom," he replied.
Alice was quiet for a moment, and the guilt whipped pink onto his cheeks. "You better not say that to her face," she said finally, voice quivering slightly.
Edward regretted his words but had no vocabulary to express it except through how his fists balled at his side and hands shook with the effort to not use them. Alice barely gave it pause, pushing on his shoulder to help herself off his bed. A door slammed downstairs with the marked fury of only Rose, and Emmett was thunderously bounding down the stairs after her. She wasn't going to let Edward make her late to school, or worse, elicit the wrath of Rose.
By the time Edward managed to roll out of bed and brush his teeth, his siblings were long gone and Carlisle was patiently waiting by the door, offering to drive Edward to school and a mug of coffee in hand. Edward brushed past him to the garage, dragging his backpack on the ground in a fit of anger. The air was decidedly warmer than usual and he was already running hot with anger. A few beads of sweat began to cling at his forehead while he waited for Carlisle to start the car and flick the air on.
Their drive was quiet but uneasy, and Edward could sense that Carlisle wanted to say something. He knew the man well enough to be able to tell when he was set uncomfortable by something, but it wasn't until they reached the crowded school parking lot that Carlisle deigned to speak.
"I owe you both an apology, and an explanation," he started. Edward huffed and moved to open the door anyways, but Carlisle clicked the locks closed and touched his shoulder gently, pleadingly. "First, I owe you an apology for the way that I spoke to you. I worry for Alice, yes, but you are my child as much as she is. I want you to be happy. My only explanation is that I didn't understand that Bella means more to you than… well, you know. I shouldn't have."
"Okay," Edward said flatly. The light was beginning to give him a headache, and the sun made his eyes sensitive. He just wanted to lay in bed and smoke a joint. No, that wasn't what he wanted, but he didn't know how to make what he wanted happen.
"Your happiness and sobriety are of the utmost importance to me, Edward. It's all I care about. If Bella makes you happy, then we are thrilled to have her. Just be careful with her, and be careful with yourself."
Carlisle exhaled sharply, and Edward could tell he'd been practising his speech. "Is that it?" Edward asked, still gripping the locked door.
"No," Carlisle said, patting at his pockets before finding what he was looking for. He pulled out a script and a pen and scribbled out a barely-legible excuse for tardiness, instructing Edward to hand it in to Mrs. Cope and reminding him that his truancy officer would be monitoring his attendance.
It was the last thing he wanted to hear. He stormed out of the car and up the front steps, and Carlisle watched warily and knew that, once again, he fucked up significantly with his youngest son.
For Edward, the day passed slowly. Fortunately, though, his poor mood seemed evident enough to warn away anyone who tried to speak to him. His jaw ground his teeth down, his brow furrowed deeply so age wore on his face far beyond years he had lived. Only Alice dared to approach him, and even that was only so she could pass him his lunch money and twirl away happily.
Fuck, he was even pissed at Alice, because what right did she have to be so carefree? Didn't she know that the world was grey and bleak when the sun was out? Wasn't she sad that her best friend wasn't in school?
The whole world seemed to be moving along just fine, but it was like Edward's had stopped. And he hated knowing the exact reason why. He felt weak and pitiful, to be so reliant on someone else was dangerous and set him up to a vulnerability that was unacceptable.
The day wore on and the next followed in a similar suit. He managed to pull himself out of bed just in time to lay across the backseat of Emmett's Jeep and close his eyes to the horror of the light in the few minutes it took to drive to school. His stomach felt hollow but food seemed to turn to ash in his mouth, and worse, the pressure in his head mounted to an almost explosive volume.
He threw himself into bed and desperately tried to claw his way into the cool sheets. They were so soft, but not at all what he craved. The black that hung behind his eyelids was a blessed relief from the bright sky, but not the colour he dreamed of. He could still smell her, he swore he could even though it was impossible for a scent to linger for days, and he couldn't get it out of his head. It was weakness beyond belief, but when he tried to picture steeling himself from her his whole body shook and fear gripped him.
He had never needed anyone before. Even when he was regularly imbibing in drugs, and taking it a little too far, he had never felt truly out of control. He could well and truly stop whenever he wanted to, and when it was decided he had had enough, that was it. It didn't matter to Edward that it wasn't even two weeks before that he was in Port Angeles, hands shaking and pockets full of cash. That was just a distraction, a means to an end. Maybe he wouldn't have even taken anything, even if he hadn't found Bella being stalked by a bunch of lowlifes.
But Bella he thought of with every breath. One night, and it was like she was a part of him. One night, and he didn't even fuck her. And two days away from her turned him into some kind of desperate teenager, not even horny but needy. If all she even wanted to do was hold his hand, he realised with horror that he could be happy regardless.
She hadn't called. He hadn't either, of course, but she hadn't called him at all. He kept half-hoping she'd appear on his balcony again, covered like a nun but for a sliver of pale skin on her forehead glimmering in the sunlight. He'd already fucked it up with her once before. Her first fucking date and he overslept because of his goddamn headaches, he forgot her flowers, he dragged her to a restaurant even though she didn't eat food. And he was fucking up again.
It didn't matter that she was a vampire and he wasn't, or that she was beautiful beyond words with a significant capacity for kindness even when he didn't deserve her understanding. She was all he could think of, all he dreamt of, and he didn't want to spend another second away from her. Maybe ever.
It was another sunny morning by the time he managed to pull himself together. He played dead in bed while Alice and then Esme tried to prod him awake, and finally Carlisle gave him the okay to sequester himself from the sunlight with the excuse of a migraine. He was prone to them anyways, and Carlisle left a migraine medication and glass of water at his bedside table before taking his leave. One by one, the house emptied out until Edward was finally alone.
He jumped out of bed and ran to take a shower. He even used the aftershave Alice left for him long ago, and the sting on his freshly shaved face jolted any whisper of sleep from his mind. Teeth brushed and flossed, hair blow dried and styling attempted, and a crisply starched dress shirt and pants acquired. One by one, he checked everything off his list deliberately. The keys to the Volvo hung on their ring by the garage door, and Edward only hesitated for a moment before taking them. Carlisle and Esme promised him the car was his to share with Alice, and she wasn't around to need it.
He stopped at the market in town, carefully surveying the parking lot for sight of Carlisle's black Mercedes or Esme's white BMW. Carlisle was supposed to be working until midnight, and Esme was going to Seattle for a decorating consultation, but he wasn't going to fuck any of this up by getting caught if someone changed their plans or had to swing by to pick up a loaf of bread or a carton of milk. Edward perused the limited flower selection before finally settling on one that contained both dahlias and lilacs, two of the flowers he remembered her liking. He tried to think of something else he could bring her but was falling short of ideas in a human grocery store, so he checked out and forced himself not to run his fingers through his hair because no matter how nervous he felt, it was nothing compared to the electricity of her lips on his. Her hands would be the only ones allowed to muss up his carefully coiffed hairstyle.
There was no car in the driveway, thank God. Edward had been operating under the assumption that Chief Swan was on duty on a weekday morning, but there was always the chance that he'd be home, and with Edward's luck he figured that would happen to him. Not so, though, and he pulled up and grabbed the bouquet before bounding up the stairs and knocking softly. He was sure she'd have heard him coming a mile away, and the door opened with only the first rap of his knuckle.
It wasn't what he was expecting, though. The person who opened the door was a man, an inch or so taller than Edward, with blond hair and an edge that wasn't even offset by the welcoming smile he sported.
"Edward," the man greeted, opening the door as if he would ever walk by him like that. "It's nice to finally meet you. Bella's showering, but would you like to come in?"
Panic gripped him. Bella had warned him before, the reaction humans were supposed to have to vampires. He thought he was immune to it, or she was simply exaggerating because even if her teeth were eerily sharp how could anyone be afraid of Bella? She was so soft and warm, so dazzlingly enrapturing that he couldn't help but fall into her. This man, he was her polar opposite. Edward couldn't help but stare at the crescent scars that peppered his arms, glowing stark in the sunshine.
And then Edward remembered him. He had appeared in the school parking lot one afternoon several weeks earlier and Bella jumped into his arms and ran off with him without a second thought. Bella clung to his waist on the back of a sleek motorcycle and bounced at his side as she towed him to the diner where everyone they went to school with could watch. And there he was again, occupying Bella's home with ease, lingering while she showered.
Edward dropped the flowers and fled.
He didn't even remember driving, couldn't recall the path home or stopping at the traffic light or even if he managed to control his speed because the next thing he knew he was in the garage, breathing hard like he had just run a marathon. He dropped the keys in his pocket and darted across the lawn to the house, running up the stairs two at a time until he was safe in his room and rational thought could return to him.
It didn't, though. He couldn't seem to think of anything other than Bella and the man who was in her house. Edward closed his eyes and called the memory forth again. The ease of which she existed at his side, her soft smile while she listened to him whisper to her while they walked into the diner. The way she could hold him without worry. The way he could lift her from the ground and crush her in his arms.
And she was showering. What had they been doing? She didn't sweat, he knew that much, so why would she need to shower unless…
Anger pent up for days couldn't be tempered with deep breaths and centering his thoughts on Bella because the very idea of her with someone else was so nauseating he didn't know whether to vomit or cry. He was blinded with rage, and looked down in surprise to see his fist curled, shards of glass embedded in the skin and pearls of blood dripping down his arm. He looked up. The mirror above his dresser was shattered, and he stared at his broken reflection in horror. His features were scattered, a mess. Everything about him was a mess.
He needed to go. It was time. He knew it was coming, always knew it was going to happen because he still had a backpack stuffed with nonperishable food under his bed. He crammed another one with clothes- the useful kind, underwear, socks, jeans. He tore at his collar with his good hand, suddenly feeling suffocated and he realised that he was sobbing. Tears were streaming down his face and he choked on the grief of abandonment.
He just had to leave. She deserved better. Edward was a mess, and he knew it, and Bella was an angel with the patience of God for even entertaining the idea of putting up with him. Even the people who said they loved him enough to adopt him knew he wasn't good enough for her, and it only took him a few weeks from that ultimatum to recognise the validity.
He threw one bag over his shoulder and clutched at the other before he heard the sound he had been longing for only a few hours before, and looked up through blurry eyes to see the vision he dreamed of.