Sixteen/Eighteen
2006
Isabella rolled into the kitchen the following morning. She offered her father a greeting glare as she wheeled to Esme by the stove. Lovingly, Esme gave her a kiss on the cheek. Esme wore silk pajamas and - even on an otherwise Saturday morning - was perfectly coiffed. Her mom was making blueberry pancakes.
"You should brush your hair before breakfast, darling," she tisked, before pouring batter into the pan with flourish.
Bella rolled her eyes, and then her chair into the space left open for it on the kitchen table.
Wearing a an argyle robe on top of an old Yale hoodie, Charlie sat at the head of the kitchen table. He nursed a cup of coffee and was expertly reading a paper copy of the newspaper. He lowered the paper to look sternly at Isabella. It crinkled.
"Good morning, sweetheart," he boomed.
"Dad," Bella grumbled. She grabbed a plate and helped herself to the freshly cut fruit Esme had laid out at the center of the table.
Esme set stack of pancakes next to the fruit. Charlie neatly folded his newspaper.
"Did you take your meds?" Charlie asked of his daughter. He asked the same question every morning, with the same kind of subdued panic. LTRAs for asthma, baclofen for her literally spastic legs.
Isabella rolled her eyes.
"Bella."
"Yes, Dad."
Esme looked warily between the two of them."What's up with the two of you?"
Isabella bit her lower lip, wanting her father to incriminate himself, but Charlie was a prosecutor and a former cop. His expression was as cool as a ripe cucumber. With surprising elegance, he cut into his pancake and took a bite.
"He grounded me," Bella grumbled.
Esme blinked. Isabella had never really given them cause to punish her, let alone ground her. "What do you mean, grounded?"
Bella glared at her father.
"You can't ground her this weekend," Esme continued, sounding tired. "It's Carlisle's birthday tomorrow."
Charlie groaned, a tortured sound. The Masen family calendar was peppered with awkward family lunches at least once a month.
Charlie considered his words carefully. "I don't think Isabella...I think she should stay in her room." Away from Edward.
Esme looked exasperated. "Why is she grounded, exactly?
"I'd like to know, too," Bella muttered darkly before unceremoniously biting down on a slice of pear.
Charlie considered his case carefully, eyes snapping sharply from his wife to his daughter. He knew there wasn't really any evidence - not weighty enough, in that moment - to convict. He stretched the truth.
"I caught Edward in Isabella's room."
"We weren't doing anything wrong," Bella said pointedly, agitatedly, to both her parents. "Just playing Nintendo."
Charlie eyed his daughter suspiciously, arching a single eyebrow. Was she that obtuse? Or was she playing coy? Would he genuinely have to explain the intimacy involved in sitting in between someone's fucking thighs? The thought alone made the pancakes swirl nauseatingly in his stomach. As he mulled this over, his craggy face changed color. Esme was obviously amused, smiling wryly.
Esme cut daintily into her pair and took it to her mouth. She chewed on it thoughtfully.
"You can't ground her this weekend, sweetheart," she said finally, toning down her amusement. Charlie glowered at her darkly, furious at all the layers of betrayal involved.
Esme treated family occasions the way most people treated inviting their boss to dinner, tending to detail with obsessive care. A part of Isabella understood. "My mother was impeccable," Esme had told Isabella once, teaching her to wrap their cutlery in serviettes. Her father, while very sweet to Isabella personally, was terrifying. Tall, handsome, and even imposing at nearly seventy, Edward Masen III had been a senator for nearly twenty years. Like his son-in-law and grandson, he had permanently relocated to Washington state to years earlier, retiring under the weight of his grief.
In self-preservation, Esme guaranteed every detail, down to her step-daughter, was perfect.
On those Sundays when the Swans hosted family dinners, Isabella dutifully wore carefully-selected and freshly laundered outfit. (That day, it was a navy-blue dress with a Peter Pan collar). Then she sat patiently - if irritably - in front of her room's white vanity while Esme coiffed her hair. For a signature finishing touch, Esme always tied a ribbon in her stepddaughter's hair. They did it daily, but Esme was meticulous on Sundays.
Esme pulled out a navy-blue ribbon from a drawer and tied it around Isabella's half up-do. Then she helped Isabella finish the look with two little pearl earnings - a Masen heirloom.
Placing a hand on each of her shoulders, Esme gave her a gentle squeeze. "Perfect," she said, punctuating her statement with a kiss to her daughter's hair. The girl looked almost angelic without looking child-like.
Bella snorted.
"You look like a doll," Esme said softly. She had always found it befuddling that Isabella was so oblivious to her own beauty. Even now, she was all eyes and delicate, striking features.
"You do know I'm not a doll, right?" Isabella grumbled, sinking into her chair.
"Don't slouch," Esme said sternly before flitting out of the room.
Bella rolled her eyes but sat up. She felt like anything but doll like as she rolled towards her crutches, feeling clunky in the KAFOs. If anything, she figured she'd look like a Neanderthal. Sighing, Bella threated her arms through the crutches and hoisted herself up to a standing position. Click, thump, click, thump.
She walked to the bay window and plopped down on the window seat. Lazily, she picked up her copy of Artemis Fowl. She'd used a piece of string as a bookmark, hating to dog-ear book pages.
She heard their car pulling up before she saw it. Snapping her book shut, she peered up to the top of the driveway. Carlisle was driving, shoulders stiff, managing to look both exasperated to distraction and deeply bored. On the passenger seat, Edward Sr. was clearly in the middle of a long tirade, his entire body convulsing with the force of his speech.
Carlisle looked like he was in the throes of agonizing boredom, desperately willing time to pass. Bella attributed the exasperation to whatever Edward Sr. was spewing, but that look of boredom had been permanently etched onto Carlisle's face since his wife's funeral.
Carlisle stopped the car underneath the carpot, sighing. He pinched the bridge of his nose, covertly rolling his eyes.
Bella could only imagine what Edward was being subjected to, and her heart squeezed for him. She touched her fingers to the glass gingerly. Edward Sr. was clearly nowhere nearly close to being done, though the car had stopped. He turned on his seat to continue bereating Edward, facing him directly.
Isabella giggled, clapping her hand to her mouth. Carlisle saw her giggle; he caught her eye, and winked.
Carlisle said something, and the three men got out of the car. Bella's eyes shot to Edward. His shoulders were stiff, slumped with tension. His hair was wild, luxurious locks tangled from having been tugged at out of stress. Keeping his eyes on the pavement, he shuffled to the door behind his grandfather. Bella wanted to hug him.
Even through the heavy oak door at the front, Bella could hear what could only be described as muffled barking from Edward Sr.
"Mom!" Bella yelled. "Mo-ooom, they're here."
Esme popped out of the kitchen, looking impeccable. "Don't yell, darling," she said to Isabella through a carefully-plastered smile. "It's unbecoming."
Esme swung the door open. The smile vanished from her eyes at the scene before her. "Daddy!" she said congenially, though her eyes grew increasingly panicked.
Wordlessly, Edward Sr. pecked his daughter on the cheek and walked into the living room. His gaze softened when it fell on Bella, and he offered her his gentlest version of a smile. "Hello, darling," he said, in his deep baritone.
"Hi, Uncle Edward," Bella piped back.
Carlisle and Edward followed suit, each wearing their own particular mask of dejection. Carlisle looked, as per usual, like he was counting down the minutes until it was polite to leave. Tiredness was etched into the increasingly deep wrinkles on his face.
Carlisle kissed Isabella's forehead in greeting. "Hi, Bella, angel."
"Happy birthday, Uncle Carlisle!" Bella offered cheerfully, mustering every bit of enthusiasm in her body. There was something fundamentally depressing about celebrating somebody that was so evidently going through the motions "because it's what Elizabeth would have wanted." Carlisle wanted to appreciate it, the sorrow in his eyes seemed to scream. He just wanted to be with his wife more. That knowledge seemed to follow Carlisle like a dark cloud, settling around them like a thick fog.
"Thank you," Carlisle said, and Bella was reminded of Eeyore.
Edward shuffled into the living room next, hands in his pockets. Bella met his gaze. This isn't the worst bullshit we've endured together, she thought, offering him a wry half-grin - more in solidarity than in sympathy.
He seemed to get the sentiment, and grinned back. His smile was so endearing that Isabella reciprocated with a smile of her own.
"Where's your husband, Esme?" Edward Sr. half-barked, turning to plop down on the seat.
Esme wore her brightest smile, but it didn't reach her eyes. "He'll be down in a minute," she said sweetly. "Would anybody like something to drink?"
"I'll have plain Seltzer with - "
"A lemon wedge," Esme finished for her father. She spun on her heel to fetch the drink, which she would serve in a fine cut-glass tumbler.
As she departed, a thick tension settled into the room. Nobody spoke, but Edward Sr. continued to eye his namesake through narrowed eyes. Edward Masen III had never been a doting "poppy." In that moment, he was Chairman of the Investigations Subcommittee, and Edward had been called to testify. Isabella was reminded of grainy pictures newspaper clippings that captured that searing gaze. To his credit, Edward didn't break eye contact. As if on the receiving end of that piercing stare, Bella tugged nervously at her dress collar.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8…
Edward started to fidget. At first, it was a soft tapping of his foot against the hardwood, but it became an increasingly violent staccato. His entire body bounced with his knee. Every tap seemed to irritate Edward Sr., whose glower grew darker with every beat.
Gently, Isabella tapped his hand.
As if on cue, his entire body relaxed. The spell broke; Edward broke eye contact, looking at Bella instead. Carlisle released the breath he'd been holding.
Esme returned with her father's drink, flitting to his side with a coaster. Otherwise a perfect hostess, Esme would have normally tried to assuage the tension, but it had been their constant companion for nearly two and a half years. Like her father, she eyed Isabella and Edward curiously.
The tension only thickened when Charlie Swan virtually stomped into the room a minute later. He gave Edward a now-customary glare in greeting, clasped his brother-in-law's hands sympathetically, and nodded respectfully at his father-in-law. Even now, after nearly a decade of marriage and nearly fifteen years with Esme, Charlie cowered before his father-in-law.
Esme looked at Charlie expectantly after he sat down. Charlie gave a long-suffering sigh and looked at Edward. How somebody so beefy had fathered such a strikingly delicate beauty, Edward would never know.
"I hear congratulations are in order," he said flatly, in anything but congratulations. "Cornell. That's quite an accomplishment."
Edward Sr.'s lips thinned.
"Thank you, sir," Edward replied, his lips twitching. His eyes sparkled mockingly. Calling Charlie "sir" felt awkward as fuck, but the beefier man had told him to "cut the Uncle Charlie bullshit" the first time he caught Edward sleeping in his daughter's bed.
"Of course, Cornell is not Harvard," Edward Sr. said delicately. "He'd be the first Masen grandson to not attend Harvard since 1867."
His grandson swallowed thickly, starting to bounce his knee. Bella reached for it.
"Cornell is an Ivy," Carlisle retorted sharply.
"Certainly better than a Quaker liberal arts college followed by Rutgers," Edward Masen sneered. "Your poor father, God rest his soul, was beside himself. A Cullen enrolled in the school since its foundation and you toss centuries out out the window for Swarthmore."
Bella almost felt like patting Carlisle's knee, but Edward was holding her hand. He'd grasped it, studying it, as if the lines along her knuckles held answers to an exam.
Carlisle rolled his eyes and sighed exasperatedly. He'd been subjected to some variation of this conversation for nearly thirty years.
"One would think Masen Hall would suffice, but with his disciplinary record, I'll be forced to debase myself with a phone call."
"Masen Hall?" Charlie enquired.
Bella had already heard Edward complain about Masen Hall at least twice.
"Right," Edward Sr. continued. "You wouldn't know about that either, I suppose. Not all families have the means to donate to Universities."
Carlisle rolled his eyes, and Charlie turned purple.
"The family made a considerable donation to Harvard in the 19th century, after Reconstruction. My great-great grandfather went into business with a Vanderbilt in the railway industry. Incidentally, Vandetbilt made their fortune with steamships. Not unlike Carlisle Cullen I."
At this, he shot Carlisle Cullen V a dissapointed glare, but the object of his scorn looked like he'd never really given a shit about the family lineage. He never looked much like his son, but at that moment, they looked exactly alike.
"Daddy, I read in the paper this morning that they gave the chairmanship of the Senate Committee on Energy to Senator Watkins," Esme said.
Esme's comment was as enticing as a red flag in front of a bull, and the former Senator's nostrils flared. "The party is going to the dogs. Mitchell thinks giving him the chairmanship is going to appease that band of radicals, but – "
Isabella touched Edward's knee gingerly again to get his attention. When he met her gaze, she tilted her head infinitesimally towards her bedroom. Butterflies exploded in her stomach when he nodded gratefully and squeezed her hand. Like a rubber band snapping, Edward used to alternate between looking despondent or defiant. Bella found his in between completely endearing.
Edward Sr. took a sip of his tonic to soothe his throat before continuing, and Isabella saw her chance.
"Can Edward and I go hang out in my room?"
"Keep the door open," Charlie grunted. Uncharacteristically, Edward Sr. looked gobsmacked.
Bella blinked twice before wrinkling her nose at her father.
"The terrace," Edward corrected quickly. "We can go hang out on the terrace."
Esme looked panic-stricken. "But – "
"We'll bundle up," Edward said pointedly. "She's not going to freeze to death on the goddamned terrace."
Bella snorted, fighting back a giggle.
"Watch your mouth," Carlisle snapped.
Frankly, she liked that Edward cursed in front of her. Most people didn't.
Edward Sr. was looking at them so intensely Bella felt a fresh wave of self-consciousness. Feeling awkward and slow, she threated her arms through her hand crutches. She felt Edward's hand on her lower back, in a touch so respectful it was almost faint. His legs were much longer than hers and he was a fast runner. Despite all of that, he walked at her pace without an iota of impatience.
"Thank the fucking lord," he said once they were out of earshot. Bella laughed.
"Yeah, the lord," she deadpanned, though her eyes were bright.
"Fuck me, I guess you're right. Thank you."
He rushed ahead of her when they reached the kitchen door, then seemed to think better of it. "Wait," he said.
He squeezed past her lithely before she could utter a word. He returned to her with an armful of blankets and his own coat.
"Come on," he said, offering her a crooked grin that made her stomach flip. Again, he stepped past her carefully and held the door open so she could waddle through. He draped one of the blankets across a wicker chair. She eyed him funnily as she sat down, then almost melted as he wrapped her up with a second blanket, and then dropped down to his haunches to wrap her legs with a third.
"Thank you."
"I don't want you to get cold. It's so fucking cold I bet you could probably skate on the fucking pond."
Bella's shoulders fell and she looked down awkwardly at her useless legs.
"Fuck, I meant you as in… You know, like one could probably skate on the fucking pond." He pinched the bridge of his handsome nose. "You know, you as in oneself."
"I understood what you meant," Bella reassured him, trying to perk him up with a smile. "Obviously, I can't."
He stood up in a single movement and plopped down next to her. He seemed lost in thought for a moment, and Bella sat back in companiable silence. She stared out into the property, barren gray hues.
"It's not obvious," he said thoughtfully after a minute.
"What?"
"You and the skating," he said after a beat.
Bella snorted.
"They have these skating aids for little kids at the ice-skating rink – "
She hated verbalizing – she hated acknowledging – her obvious limitations. "Oh, dear god. Just shut up."
"I think it could – "
Brusquely, Bella interrupted him. "This conversation and that conversation -" at this, she gestured wildly at the house behind them "—both suck."
"Both started because I'm an idiot or a fuck up, or both," he said, with a dark laugh.
Bella's iciness melted, and she turned her whole body towards him. "Edward."
He scoffed out a sound that mirrored a sob. "In the car, he basically said I'm the most embarrassing asshole to be born to the Masen family in ten fucking generations. The Cullen one, too, for that matter."
"You know he doesn't actually think that," Bella said emphatically, her eyes huge.
"Why wouldn't he think that?" Edward asked, shoulders slumping. "I should be in prison. I fucking – "
He groaned.
"Don't even go there, Edward," Bella said sharply. She reached out and grasped his chin, her grip firm. She met his gaze. Her doe eyes were fierce. "It was an accident. And your grandpa..He's just… you know, a cantankerous old man."
"Cantankerous?" Edward laughed. "Did you literally use that fucking word in a fucking sentence?"
Bella's entire body flamed with blush. "I.." she squeaked in a teeny voice. "I…Shut up. Yes. I'm glad I can make you laugh
"It's not funny," he agreed. "I mean, it is funny, but it's mostly… cute."
"Cute?"
"Yeah. You are too fucking cute, sometimes."
"Cute?" she asked. She lifted hand to her face. The tip of her nose was scarlet.
"Fucking adorable," he confirmed, touching the tip of her nose with his pointer finger.
Esme interrupted them with three taps on the kitchen window. Bella yelped, jumping, and Edward – uncharacteristically – blushed.
"Um… Where are we going?"
It was the last Friday of the semester. Bella had half-expected him to not to drive her home, though he had done it diligently every day of the term -- save for a hiatus two weeks earlier. He drove his grandfather's old Mercedes, which now felt as familiar to her as an old sweater.
"Come to the mall with me," he said, without taking his eyes off the road. His eyes had lit up.
Bella's stomach flipped, but she hid it expertly. "You realize I'm not Lauren Mallory, right?"
He cast her a lightning-quick sideways glance, his lips curving. "Smartass."
Bella sat up, pushing down on the seat with her hands. "What are we doing at your girlfriend's house of worship?"
"Lauren's not my girlfriend."
"Sorry. Girlfriends, plural."
"I haven't had a girlfriend since I was fifteen," he said.
"I'm sure a couple of girls would beg to differ," Bella said dryly, her tone so playful it hid the ache and the jealousy.
Edward had the decency to look mildly ashamed. "Can we stop talking about this?" he said irritably. "You're going to ruin your surprise."
"Sorry."
They reached the boxy building, decorated for the Christmas season as it was.
Edward circled around looking for a place to park and pulled out the sticky tag from his glove compartment when he spotted a free parking space. He got out lithely to fetch her chair. Bella watched him layer up and reassemble her wheelchair from the rearview mirror. He wheeled it towards the passenger seat and helped her into it.
"Some of these motherfuckers don't even have the right fucking tag," he told her angrily.
"It's OK," Isabella crooned, comfortingly. She tilted her head back to peek at him playfully, aware the ends of her hair were so long they fell past the backrest. Edward tugged softly on the ribbon in her hair, but it held its shape.
"It's really not," he grumbled. "But come on. Let's go."
Edward watched attentively as she rolled up the ramp and followed suit. He kept his fingers lightly on her shoulder, standing behind her almost protectively. He
He gave her directions. Bella listened carefully as he guided her through the mall.
It wasn't Bella's favorite place to be, especially on busy days. By the time they exited Kohl, her stomach was completely knotted. She tried to ignore the staring, which varied from pitiful, to covert, to irritated.
She let out a huge breath when they reached the elevator.
Standing behind her, Edward rubbed circles on her shoulders. She tilted her head up to look at him, and tilted his towards hers.
"We're almost there, I promise," he murmured sweetly. He captured a strand of thick hair and twirled it in his finger.
"'S okay. You know, just... Malls." She wrinkled her nose playfully, to little avail. His mood was souring.
"Do you want me to push the rest of the way?" he asked her softly, almost meekly. He knew she liked to do things for herself.
She arched a single eyebrow, keeping her expression light. "I'll keep you posted."
After dozens of outings with her, Edward didn't like malls either.
"Nana, what's wrong with her?"
Groaning, Edward pinched the bridge of his nose, and a blush bloomed accross Bella's cheeks. He turned to not-so-covertly glare at the duo approaching them: a blue-haired old lady and a little boy.
"Poor girl must be handicapped," the grandmother guessed. "She can't walk."
Edward ground his teeth together.
"I hit Mall bingo," she stage-whispered playfully. He snorted bitterly.
The little family inched closer and closer. Edward shifted closer to Bella, cupping her shoulders protectively. She couldn't see his face, but she could feel his hostility. Soothingly, she threaded her fingers through his.
The elevator doors dinged open, and Edward took a step backwards to let her spin the chair around. He held the door open while she rolled in backwards.
Please don't get in here, please don't get in here...
The little boy walked into the elevator, staring as avidly at Isabella as if her legs were shooting fireworks. She shifted awkwardly in her chair, tucking her chin into her scarf. The grandmother followed jumpily, almost afraid of knocking into Isabella.
Edward's hands found their way back to the front of her shoulder's, long fingers brushing her clavicles. She reached up to squeeze his hand, intertwining her fingers. She held his hand as they descended. The elevator dinged. Dropping her hands to the wheels, Isabella rolled out.
"What's wrong with her legs?"
Edward bristled, but Bella just sighed, spinning the chair in the boy's direction. This kind of thing literally happened every time she went out in public.
"Hi," she said, surprised at the kindness in her tone.
The boy stared at her with enormous eyes. Bella forced a curt smile. "Do you have any questions for me?"
"Bella..." Edward said tersely.
"I...uh. Why are you in a -- a"
"In a wheelchair?" Bella supplied kindly.
"Uh-huh. A wheelchair," he repeated. "You can't walk?"
"I can't walk."
Edward made a strange noise of protest.
"Why?"
Bella sighed, so deeply she sent strands of hair flying. She was all too aware of the bodyguard behind her, feeling his tension.
"I had an accident when I was a baby," she said. "And so my legs don't get the signals that my brain sends them. Not correctly, anyway."
That, she supposed, was a fairly good explanation of her cerebral palsy.
"What kind of accident?"
"That's enough fu -- questions, kid," Edward barked, in a tone that was remniscent of his grandfather, but Isabella ignored him and inched a little closer to the kid.
"When I was born, I was very tiny. Sometimes when that happens, babies get hurt."
It was the story she'd told countless kids his age.
"Why?"
That, Bella mused, was the million dollar question. "Uh..."
Edward edged closer towards her. "Oh-kay. That's enough questions."
"We don't really know," she answered, somewhat truthfully. Edward had heard her weigh the many possible causes.
"We have to go now," she said, with a polite kind of finality.
The grandma was dabbing the corner of her eye. "Godbless you, honey," she said.
Bella half-grimaced, half-smiled, then waved at the little boy.
She tilted her head up backwards, surprised her head knocked against his taut stomach.
"Push me the rest of the way?" she asked chirpily. The hard set of his face relaxed infinitesimally as he nodded.
His hands shot to the handles on her chair. They were moving much faster than she ever did by herself. Pondering how much and how often he slowed down for her, she loved him impossibly more.
"You were being too fucking nice," he told her tersely. "You're too damn sweet for your own good."
Bella just sighed. "To the kid," she pointed out, raising her voice so he could hear her.
"I wanted to tell them both to fuck off," Edward half-spat. "I'm starting to think this whole thing was a bad idea."
"Waaaait, wait, wait, wait. Pull up for one second."
He slowed down gradually and angled towards a Banana Republic, away from the throng of Christmas shoppers.
She peeked up at him through her eyelashes, blinking her enormous doe eyes, but he didn't meet her gaze. He swallowed thickly, Adam's apple bobbing.
"You know this kind of thing happens all the time," she said, laughingly. "Don't let it ruin my surprise. Please?"
His lips were a hard line.
"Pretty please?"
His lips twitched.
"Come on. Drive Miss Daisy," she whined playfully, and he did just that.
Of course, she regretted the fact that she had to cheer him up when she realized where they were headed. She could hear the sound of blades scratchinv against ice, despite the loud Christmas music blaring undearneath a sparkling disco ball.
"Oh my God, Edward..." Her voice grew high-pitched with slight hysteria.
He stopped to the left of the bleachers, close to the entrance. Bella's eyes grew huge as she took the ice-skating rink in. He walked around her and dropped to his haunches.
He looked at once like a little boy, eyes lit up, and deadly serious. "Do you trust me?"
"Yeah, I... But -- "
"I promise I won't let anything happen to you. I even cleared it with the manager last week. Promise."
He looked at her so earneastly her resistence waned. She nodded uncertainly once, watching warily as he headed to the desk. Bella watched -- both admiringly and horrified -- as as he took off his shoes and slipped on bladed, black skates. He walked towards her easily, as if balancing on a single blade didn't pose a problem. Her stomach sank.
"You have to put these on." He lifted a white pair by the shoe-strings.
She looked at him warily. She looked down at her shoes. She had a handful of normal shoes, but these were of the custom orthopedic variety.
"Edward."
"Bee."
Huffing, she grabbed the skates. It took her a while to wrestle each foot into the skates. She had both feet in the skates and put them in her chair's single footrest. She looked up.
"You're kidding."
It was an ice-skating aid: a large, plastic artic seal, with it a sturdy tail arching upwards, tall enough to reach past Edward's abs.
"Come on," he said, so excitedly Bella's trepidation melted.
Slowly, she wheeled towards the opening to the rink. Glaring pointedly at the people around them, Edward carefully situated the seal, so that one half poked the dry land and the other stayed on the ice.
"Get as close as you can."
She squealed as she stood, knees buckling, but he kept her upright. Virtually hugging her to his chest, he spun her around in a single motion. She patted the air behind her, squealing when she felt the grainy plastic.
Once he was sure she was comfortably perched on the seal, with one leg on each side, he grabbed on to the tail and skated to the center of the rink. She let out a peal of a squeal, her whole face lighting up at the sensation of the ice under her feet. Her squeals turned to laughter, and he visibly relaxed his entire body.
"Just one more sec, angel," he said, almost goofy with glee. His eyes were so bright. Bella's stomach flipped.
He looked, well... He looked kind of beautiful.
He folded her chair and pushed it away from the entrance. A woman with a nametag took it, waving at Bella. The manager, she supposed. He'd really given this a lot of thought, and that made her want to cry happy tears.
He grinned crookedly as he skated back towards her, as gracefully and effortlessly as he did everything.
"Come on, gorgeous," he said, his grin growing goofy and she squealed.
He spun them around the rink until her squealing turned to laughing, so hard she was afraid she'd fall of her little seal. He looked more relaxed and happy in those forty-five minutes -- both shorter and eternal at once -- than he had in the past two years. His happiness was so dear to her that it warmed her up.
And that happiness made her feel like maybe she wasn't so broken.
She was stiff, wobbly, and giddy when he finally parked her seal by the exit. They were the last two to leave the rink in their time slot, because he'd anticipated it to the manager. Oddly, she didn't feel self-conscious. Was that what it felt like to be drunk?
I simply must go
But, baby, it's cold outside...
He retrieved her wheelchair and edged her seal as close to it as he could. Then he stood in front of her, eyeing the space between her chair and her current perch warily.
Uncertainly, he moved closer and bent at the waist.
"How can I help y -- Careful!"
Stupidly, she wrapped her arms around his neck. He laughed, lifting her with an arm wrapped solidly around her back.
"Thank you," she said, burning. "That was the best surprise of my life."
Grinning, he looked uncharacteristically at a loss for words. His eyes were so bright they looked almost glassy.
"Your nose is all red," he said. He touched his finger to her dainty nose, to where it turned up at the tip. Unthinkingly, he bent down and kissed the spot.
Bella's eyes crossed, and a blush bloomed accross her cheeks.
Realizing what he'd done, he let out an awkward breath and looked down at his hands. He chuckled breathily.
"Let's -- " He grunted.
He was literally holding her up; her legs were wobbling because she couldn't find her balance on a flat surface with crutches, let alone a single blade. He skirted to her chair, plopping her onto it with surprising care.
"Let's go home, Bee."