This chapter is dedicated to Fran, who reminded me this story is worth finishing. And to you, dear reader, if you've stuck around this long - my promise to finish.

Sixteen/Eighteen

March 2006

Three taps, like morse code. With a squeal, Isabella turned to the window. Despite the drizzling rain outside, Edward was perched on her windowsill yet again, sleeves rolled up. His sinewy forearms were taut with tension. He grinned at her crookedly, but it didn't reach his eyes. Feeling stupid with happiness, she grinned back.

Isabella grabbed her crutches, which were perched against her desk, and threated her arms through them. Click, thump, drag. Click, click, thump, thump. Isabella unhooked the window open. He pushed it out and snuck in with enviable agility. He dropped a kiss to her forehead, leaving icy beads of water on her skin and on the floor behind him.

"Hi."

A bottle of something was tucked under his arm. His knuckles were ghostly pale with tension. Whatever he held in his hand crinkled as he held it up for her to inspect. The maroon and black ink had run and bled into the paper, out of a mixture of sweat and water. It was crumpled like an unwanted flyer.

"Your decision letter," Bella croaked, dumbfounded.

Discreet to a fault, she didn't ask any of the burning questions running through her mind.

"My fucking decision letter, indeed."

With aplomb, he collapsed on her bed, sinking into the mattress. He stood out like licorice against the pale, ivory bedspread.

Clumsily, Bella spun in several steps and sat next to him.

"Would you do something for me?" Edward asked.

Anything.

"Depends on what it is," Bella said testily, wrinkling her nose.

He sat up and leaned on his forearms. "Open it for me."

"Gah."

He actually laughed. "Please, Bella."

She frowned at him. "But it's so...It'll be such a special moment."

He snorted, his face darkening. "Special, my ass."

Outside, thunder rumbled, and the rain picked up its pace.

"If I don't get in, I'll be a giant fuck-up," he continued, by way of explanation. "If I get in, I'll still be a fuck-up. Just one with a powerful fucking grandfather. And I will have taken a spot from a more deserving kid."

Bella looked at him askance. "Your grades are excellent, you're a quarterback or whatever, and you play the piano beautifully," she listed earnestly, placing emphasis on the ability she loved best.

"So does every other applicant. All the kids have a perfect GPA, all the kids play sports and piano," he said. "Quoting the admissions counselor that Poppy dearest put on the phone."

She winced sympathetically, inching hesitantly towards the crumpled letter between them.

"Come on, Bee," he said, with a smile so morose she wanted to hug him. He lifted the bottle of clear liquor. "We'll get smashed no matter what."

Bella's eyes boggled.

At her expression, Edward laughed. "You've never had a drop of alcohol in your life, have you?"

Turning scarlet with shame, she averted the question.

"I don't even know what... " She swiped the bottle from him. "...Smirnoff is," she admitted with a sniff.

Edward looked at her so tenderly that her stomach flipped. "It's a brand of vodka," he explained without a hint of malice or mockery. "You do know what that is, right?"

"It is made by fermenting potatoes," Isabella said defensively.

Edward burst out laughing.

"It's not funny," she hissed, but couldn't help but smile when he did. She smacked him.

"You're too fucking cute sometimes."

Resolved, she grabbed the crumpled, wet letter. She smoothed it out in her lap, wincing at the crevices and the running ink. She saw the address next to the Harvard seal. She rolled her eyes.

"Oh, jeez. You filled out your application as Edward Cullen III, didn't you?"

"I am Edward Cullen III," he retorted cockily, kicking off his shoes as he nestled into the bed.

She mock-glared and turned to the envelope. "Arrogant little shit," she muttered under her breath, echoing her father.

He shivered disgustedly. c"You sound like Charlie."

She snorted as she tore the envelope open, but a wave of nerves overcame her and she clutched it to her, without extracting the letter within. "Fuckity, I..."

"Here." Edward sat up, unscrewed the vodka bottle, and took a sip. "It'll take the edge off."

He smirked as he held it out to her.

Isabella, wearing a pink cashmere sweater and a ribbon in her hair, stared at the vodka warily, with a mixture of fascination and hesitancy. She wanted to do normal teen things, so desperately. Steeling her resolve, she took it in her hand.

She downed down more than he did and shivered.

"Damn," Edward said, grinning lopsidedly. "Jesus, Bella."

She shivered, smacking her lips at the burn. It hadn't been pleasant. "Do people drink that...in its purest form?"

"Straight up?" he asked, eyes sparkling with amusement.

"Huh?"

He smiled, amused yet tender. "When people drink liquor without anything mixed in, just from the bottle... they say straight up."

"Oh. Shouldn't we drink this with something else, then?"

"I guess we can mix it with some juice. Orange or cranberry," he said, smirking. "Let me go find it. Esme's out, yeah?"

She nodded. "Just for a bit."

Edward hoisted himself off the bed. "Cool."

He walked away at a leisurely pace, whistling happily to himself. With his every fading footstep, her heartbeat started to pick up, fluttering in her throat. Fingers trembling, she started to tear the envelope with more care than the endeavor deserved, but she grew clumsily. When she was agitated, her cerebral palsy acted up and she trembled and shook. Removing the envelope was inordinately more difficult to do if she was agitated, and in any case, her dexterity was subpar.

She trembled as if cold as she pulled the letter - soggy, bleeding and abused - from the envelope. She clutched it to her chest again, heart hammering in her throat. She didn't unfold it because she believed Edward was strong enough to do it for himself.

Edward came back in, looking far more relaxed than he had seconds earlier, a gallon of tonic tucked under his arm and two glasses in one hand. He set them on her desk and kicked off his shoes.

"Esme's got such a stick up her ass," he commented with irritation, and Bella resisted the urge to take offense. "Like, there's no fucking orange juice, just oranges for her to squeeze, and no goddamned soda."

Bella shrugged noncommittally, and laid the letter on her bedspread, shifting her body clumsily towards the headboard. She wanted to take off her leg braces, but doing that in front of Edward made her feel excruciating, unbearable embarrassment.

Ignoring the momentous occasion, Edward used her desk as a makeshift cocktail bar. He poured a generous amount of vodka into each plastic cup, followed by the tonic. Smirking, he turned to her and put one cup by her bedside.

"Bottom's up, Bee." Edward swallowed his own cocktail in two gulps.

He plopped down opposite her and crossed his long, lean legs. He exuded none of the nervous energy he usually did, but Bella was rattled.

Isabella nodded toward the letter. "I got you halfway there," she said, her lisping pronounced with nerves. "I believe in you."

Oddly, reassuring Edward made her feel strong.

"Did you," he cleared his throat, shuffled his feet. "Do you know what it - "

"I didn't peek," she promised. "Whatever it is, it'll be what is meant to be."

Sighing, Edward took the folded paper and opened it. Bella, incapable of watching, clapped her hands over her face, and shut her eyes so hard they trembled. He laughed. She heard the paper crinkling, and her whole body coiled with anticipation.

"Edward?" she piped squeakily, eyes shut.

"Open your eyes, Bell."

Clumsily, she popped one open.

Edward's eyes were glassy with unshed tears.

"Oh, geez. Oh…" Bella fumbled with her words. Her heart was hammering in her throat.

"I got in, Bella."

Bella started crying, even as she smiled so widely it felt like it cracked her face in two.

Edward looked at her with a strange new expression, one so tender it was almost pained. In a wet, smiling expression that matched hers, he cupped her cheek gently and wiped off some of her tears.

"Why are you crying, Bella?"

Bella tried to compose herself, though the explosion of pride and joy was making her body difficult to control.

"I'm just very proud of you," she said, sniffly, then laughingly. "I love you so much."

True: Isabella was hopelessly in lovewith Edward. In her waking moments, she thought about him constantly. His touches made her tingle. He made her stomach flip, and she found him so unbearably attractive that her own self-esteem was in tatters. In her heart of hearts, she dreamed of the day he'd kiss her, marry her, and love her back. As pitifully embarrassing as it was, she wanted him and only him.

But above all, she loved him.

His smile answering smile broke her heart. "I love you, too," he said softly. He hugged her to him and kissed the crown of her head. "God, I love you, too."

April 2006

Elizabeth Masen-Cullen had died slowly, finally passing on the first Tuesday of April 2003. A maelstrom of snow-cum-rain and mud had caused Elizabeth's death, but Elizabeth had died on the sunniest day that season. One of the cruelest ironies of Elizabeth's death was that she had died on a day that had heralded spring. The anniversary of her death was announced by blooming cherry blossoms, and they filled Bella's stomach with dread.

The last week of Elizabeth's life was etched into Bella's memory like a strobe light. It was the first week she had ever spent away from Esme. In the week that followed, as funeral arrangements were made, Isabella had crossed from a child into an adolescent in Esme's eyes. Bella had been tasked with helping Esme make an inordinate – and frankly intimate – number of choices. Choices that nobody else in the family – not Esme, not Carlisle, not Edward Sr., and certainly not her Edward – had been in a state to make.

It was Bella who fished out the names of florists, organists, and caterers out of an ancient Rolodex. It was Bella who gently prompted her mother to choose between white lilies and white chrysanthemums, and later, between smoked salmon and brie-and-fig tartlets. Since then, Bella had marveled at the fact that the bereaved were tasked with the most mind-bogglingly stupid choices – not least picking flowers for the funeral and a caterer for the wake.

It was Bella who had picked the hymns that were played at Elizabeth Masen's funeral ceremony. It had felt like such an intimate task that Bella had felt unspeakably, awkwardly rude –but Esme had collapsed sobbing at the idea of picking the music for her sister's tragically early funeral. Elizabeth – the first to insist that Bella call her Aunt Lizzie, to welcome Bella wholeheartedly Esme's daughter - had been a pianist. Perhaps because of it, thirteen-year-old Bella had felt humbled to tears by the last task she'd undertaken.

Bella remembered the funeral with painful clarity - even as her Aunt Lizzie began to fade from her memory. Esme had coiffed her hair into a half-updo with a black ribbon and gifted her a pair of pearl earrings. It had stuck Bella as a strange priority that day. She remembered the cherry blossoms by the graveyard, coupled with the smell of fresh air and petrichor. The swell of terror and anxiety she felt when the hymns' notes began to swell, followed by goosebumps. Most of all, she remembered it as the first day she had heard the word—and ever felt - crippled.

The hassle of getting Bella and her wheelchair into the Church, back out of it, and then across the dew-soaked graveyard lawn, had felt so disruptive. The effort it took felt like awkward pauses in what would have otherwise been a poignantly solemn day. Bella was sure that some of the tears that she'd shed that day were out of hot embarrassment. If Carlisle had been nothing but the perfect, kindest gentleman that day – helping Charlie carry Bella in and out of the church – Edward had been vicious in his grief. He'd made scoffing, sneering sounds whenever Esme was delayed getting Bella accommodated.

People tripped around Bella and her wheelchair throughout the first thirty minutes of the wake – so after thirty minutes, Bella had wheeled and parked her chair awkwardly in a corner, sweating. She felt like a radioactive intruder at the thought of lining up with Lizzie's bereaved blood relatives – her father, her sister, her husband, her son. Wishing desperately for some kind of book, or a doll to comfort her, she gnawed at her sleeves instead. Bella had marveled with crushing sadness at the fact that she was both invisible and stood out like a neon sign. Bella counted almost each of the wake's 240 minutes; she spent them parked in a darkened corner between a fern and Elizabeth's Bosendorfer piano, legs both spasming and dangling, overlooked and yet stared at in fascination. Not even one of the wake's guests had approached her, apparently rendered speechless by politely, if thinly, veiled pity.

Only fifteen-year-old Edward and one of his friends – a boy that had blurred in Bella's memory – were too young to skillfully hide their pity.

"Who's that?"

"The crippled girl?" Edward had clarified, in a voice too emotionless to sound cruel.

"Dude."

"She's my Aunt's stepdaughter," Edward had replied with nonchalant acidity.

"Doesn't that make her your cousin?"

"We don't think of her that way. I barely know her."

Retrospectively, it should not have felt like a bullet to the stomach, but Edward had cut two wounds open in one breath. Up until that point, she had been schooled at a relatively small, cozy Montessori-style private school, with the same batch of peers. Any taunting had been over by kindergarten. Now subject to a new kind of isolation, Bella was strangely and painfully oblivious to any tittering.

With more grace and dignity than anybody that age should have mustered, Isabella swallowed back her pain. She bit back the desperate urge to tug furiously on Esme's sleeves to tattle on Edward. She swallowed back the impulse to burst into loud, dramatic tears. Instead, she skillfully maneuvered her wheelchair out of its hiding place, to begin attempting to thread through the throng of guests.

Edward started to fade as the date of March 31st approached, like an anvil sinking into seawater.

Bella noticed it in the smallest details: in the exhaustion around his eyes, in the grogginess dripping from his every movement, in the hoarseness in his voice. Like he was always waking up from naps that never quenched his exhaustion. All he wanted to do was sleep, he told her last year. He came in late to most of his classes. At lunchtime, he looked drained– he sat up against the wall as his eyes began to droop, looking like he was desperate for the day to end.

Bella was so worried she was exhausted, too.

Much to her protests, Edward's admission to Harvard was a secret between them. Bella wasn't sure if she was messing with his grandfather or feeling like he didn't deserve his spot. It was probably a mixture of both reasons.

March 28, March 29, March 30. Edward stopped going to school: Bella was intercepted by an army of people that only acknowledged Bella's existence in relation to Edward: Lauren Mallory, Heather Barnes, Stephanie Reynolds, Edward's army of football buddies, and a Spanish substitute teacher whom Bella hated virulently. If the stories were to be believed, the woman in question was a pedophile. Bella gave the same stone-cold answer across the board: "Edward has the flu."

Bella was careful to mention it to his teachers: Mrs. Norman and Mr. Grady. "It's the anniversary of his mom's death," she told them solemnly, in a tone that elicited no further questions, five minutes before class in every case. Bella texted him once every day and received no answer. It was a single phrase that she finally felt free to say with striking regularly. All that she felt there was to say, and all that she needed to say.

I love you lots. I'm here if you need me.

I love you too, came back his answering texts.

March 31st dawned as a gorgeous, cloudless spring day.

March 31st was the day Elizabeth Masen-Cullen had died in effect, if not technically: it was the day their car had crashed and flipped in an intersection on the outskirts of Chicago.

Edward had been driving.

Bella's stomach sank as she woke, thanks to the alarm clock. Esme – her mother – was nowhere to be seen. For Bella, sleep came either heavily or fitfully: sometimes, her legs and back became so stiff with muscle spasticity. Sometimes, the spasticity was so intense it became painful, and Bella woke throughout the night. She slept with pillows in between her legs, and a large body pillow cushioning her back. A shot of anxiety and grief, emanating from the pit of her stomach, kept her from lingering in bed. Pushing down on the mattress with her hands, she sat up. She didn't have the core strength to sit up straight unsupported, and she invariably slouched a bit. Her slouching became more pronounced when she walked.

She rubbed at her eyes warily, then found her wheelchair. It was a lightweight, manual wheelchair with a blue titanium frame. It had a single footrest and a thick calf strap. Using her hands for help, she sat up as best she could and placed each leg on the floor. As they always did, her legs spasmed at the movement in a quick staccato. She waited for her legs to settle, and then she pushed up into a standing position, transferring swiftly, belting herself into the wheelchair.

Bella rushed through her morning routine, managing to wrestle her legs into her clothes. Once she had coiffed her hair into a half-decent ponytail, she rushed to her mother's room. Esme looked uncharacteristically unkempt: ponytail messy, eyes bloodshot and red. She wore sweatpants – ones that Bella only saw three times a year - and a knit cardigan. The expression on her face broke Bella.

"Mama," she said gingerly, wrapping her in a hug that lasted minutes. When they parted, Bella pressed a kiss to her Mom's hand. "I love you, Mom."

Esme gave her a watery smile as she cupped her cheek. "Let's get you to school, kiddo."

Esme apologized as she served Bella cereal for breakfast – for which Bella was nothing but thankful. Bella skipped all the platitudes: there was nothing to say. She helped Bella transfer into the car, and they drove in companionable silence through the light morning traffic. Esme wore sunglasses: to shield her eyes from the sun or to hide them from the public, Bella would never know.

"Have you heard from Edward?" Esme asked abruptly, midway through a Barry Manilow song Bella found a poor choice for the occasion. Bella hoped she was hallucinating Esme's emphasis on the word 'you.'

"No," Bella admitted, her anxiety clawing at her stomach. "He hasn't answered any of my texts. Where has he been?"

"I called Carlisle," Esme admitted, clearing her throat. "Edward's at my father's."

Edward had three bedrooms: one at his Aunt Esme's, one at his father's, and one at his grandfather's. Bella wondered if Edward fled his father's house on purpose, and was secretly brimming with fury at the fact that Edward felt the need to be away from his father. Bella suspected – in fact, she knew – Edward was running out of guilt, and the oppressiveness of his father's grief.

Bella sighed. "Is Carlisle … OK?" It felt like such a woefully inadequate word. Carlisle was so heartbroken – albeit functionally – on a regular day.

"He took the day off from work, but he's, erm… He's hanging in there."

It wouldn't be all right, Bella thought suddenly, but they would be. It was what Elizabeth would have wanted.

"Can I - would it be OK if you drove me to see Edward tomorrow?"

Isabella had never been to the second floor of the Masen Washington state residence. In fact, she had rarely even been in the living room – there were stone steps that led from the entrance into the intimidating heavy oak doors. Even after all these years, there was no ramp around the staircase. It felt like Edward Sr.'s thinly-veiled rejection of Isabella: Esme was Isabella's mother in every way – even legally –, but former Senator Masen had never actively taken the role of Isabella's maternal grandfather. If anything, he embraced a coldly avuncular role in her life.

Isabella was nothing but surprised when Senator Masen greeted them by the car. Unlike everybody else in his family, Edward Senior looked impeccable: he wore beige chinos and a sporty pullover that made Isabella wonder if he'd been playing golf.

"Thank you for coming," he finally said, after Bella fumbled through her explanation. "I think it's very kind of you to be here for Edward, sweetheart."

It was the first time he called her sweetheart, and Bella was startled at the term of endearment. She offered a small smile and stared down at her lap

Esme helped Bella out of the car and into her wheelchair and pushed her to the portico. Bella's legs were wobbling from the sheer exhaustion of physiotherapy. Warily, Bella stared at the imposing stone staircase that led into a Georgian-style manor and a columned portico. Business-like, she turned to her Mom. She'd been thinking about how to approach this barrier for ten minutes. "I think I can just crawl up the steps, Mom," she said matter-of-factly, and Esme gasped as if Bella had suggested wallowing in mud, clutching at her neck.

"No, Bella."

Her Edward's grandfather and namesake cleared his throat awkwardly. Embarrassment looked strange on his otherwise imposingly aristocratic features. "May I carry you upstairs, Isabella, dear?"

Ten minutes later, Bella was hot with embarrassment: seventy-year-old Edward Sr. huffing breathlessly, almost dry heaving. She chanted "I'm so sorry" until she was finally settled in her wheelchair.

"I should be apologizing, dear," Edward Senior said, with astonishing dignity for a wheezing man. "My home should be accessible to you. You're part of this family."

Bella shook her head awkwardly. "Don't worry, - I mean.."

Edward Sr. lifted a hand to stop her.

"Truly, dear. Now," he said in his usual commanding tone, pointing to the second door from the right. "That's Edward's room."

Bella's embarrassment faded almost instantly, and she wheeled towards the room. Swallowing back the heady awkwardness of the past fifteen minutes, she looked up meekly. Edward Sr. gave her a meaningful look.

Bella pushed the door open gingerly, then startled – squeaked – at the sound of Edward's roughened roar of protest. "Leave me alone."

Clumsily, she pushed the door open – "Fuck off," Edward half-demanded, half-begged hoarsely - and she wheeled in.

It was already 2 pm and Edward's room was dark; sunlight streamed from the hem of the curtains, drenching in the room in an eerie, gray light. Wrinkling her nose, Bella was hit by the scent of dried sweat and grime – the fetid smell of self-imposed isolation. As the door shut behind her, Bella realized there was no room for her to turn; there were piles of old clothes on the floor. Bella half-gagged at the sight of an ancient grilled cheese sandwich by his bed. It, too, was wafting a squalid odor. Bella's stomach turned as her heart broke.

She wished desperately that she could have wheeled closer, past the littered cans of Arizona tea and discarded protein bar wrappers – past the molehills of clothes. Hearing her wheelchair whirring, Edward had half-turned in bed. His hair and his face were greasy, and the stubble in his cheeks had thickened. Blinking at her with utter bewilderment, his eyes were bloodshot and glassy with sleep.

"Bella?" he croaked.

She wanted to hug him, she wanted shake sense into him, she wanted to weep. Was this what it felt to love someone?

"Hey," she said, her smile sheepish and her voice gentle. She hugged her waist.

Finally convinced Isabella was not an apparition, Edward sat up with a stretch. He placed two bare feet on the floor. He was wearing nothing but boxers, and Bella's eyes widened. Chirst, he was hot.

"How – why? Why the fuck are you here? How the fuck did you get up here?" Edward asked her roughly.

Stung, Bella steeled herself. Edward had become her best friend. He had been kind, funny and open – so gentle - for months. She had almost forgotten what this Edward was like: this spoiled, angry boy that went around either trying to hurt or fight people.

Almost.

"Your grandpa carried me up."

Edward blinked at her; Bella could almost hear the cogs turning inside his head.

"I think I strained his back," she continued. Her embarrassment pooled in blush in her cheeks, her voice a horrified whisper.

"It was the most horrifying ten minutes of my life," she finished in a deadpan.

The half-smile he gave her made Bella feel like she had won a prize.

"I don't think you strained his back," he said. His voice was so hoarse. "You weigh like 10 pounds."

Bella snorted.

"I'm starting to regret coming up here," Bella continued, keeping her tone light and her smile gentle as she tested her luck. He hadn't kicked her out – and the fact that he had not made Bella feel giddy with possibility. "Your room is disgusting," she said, wrinkling her nose.

Bella saw his entire body curl in anger, his green eyes grow ferally piercing. His Adam's apple bobbed. Bella could feel the retorts flaring in his throat. My mom is dead. I killed fucking mother. Who gives a shit if my room is a pigsty? Get the fuck out of my room. You're not my fucking mother. The retorts died as Bella curled into herself, hugging her arms to her chest, her doe eyes huge, feeling herself grow pale.

It seemed to douse the fight out of Edward.

"Sorry," he finally said, defeatedly, his voice gentling.

Still hugging her waist, Bella tucked her hair behind her ears. They stared at each other for a long moment.

"If I could, I'd open the window," Bella finally said meekly, still curled into herself.

"I'll fucking do it," he muttered moodily. As he stood, his bones cracked. Groggy but stiff, he bent at the waist to pick up the litter. His movements were unusually slow. "Sorry about the mess. You can't get through it."

"Thanks," Bella said softly. She watched as he pulled the curtain open, wincing at the stream of sunlight. He cracked the window open, muttering to himself. Sighing, Bella bent at the waist, glad she was belted to her wheelchair. Clawing at the nearest pile of dirty clothes, she pulled it gingerly into her lap, then pushed herself into a sitting position by using her armrests as leverage.

"Don't. I'll get the goddamned laundry," he growled. He gathered a pile in his arms with the energy of a boiling kettle. Bella watched as he stuffed it into a plastic hamper that overflowed with dirty laundry. Then he held out his hand for the pile in Bella's lap. Bella gave it to him.

"I'd offer you the bed, but that shit's gross," Edward mumbled, shifting awkwardly in the now-cleared space.

Bella's voice was meek but firm. She looked up at him through her eyelashes. All at once, she felt emboldened and terrified. "Why don't you toss the sheets in the washing machine?"

He sighed deeply and ran his hand through his hair. Bella knew he was biting back some kind of retort. Still taut and groggy, he stripped the bed in swift, almost violent movements. The dirty linens were half-tossed next to his overflowing hamper. "Happy now?" he half-snapped, huffing.

Bella moved her chair for the first time, edging towards the desk. She looked at him meaningfully, her tone light despite how solemn her expression was. "You could take a shower, Edward," she suggested, careful to keep her tone playful but firm.

Edward took in a sharp breath. "I'll put the fucking clothes in the laundry first, Your Highness," he said angrily, lifting the basket and half-stomping out of the room.

Bella carefully hid her heavy relief as she wheeled towards the bedside table. The rancid grilled cheese was still on the table. Tears stung her eyes as she saw the pile of brick-sized books on it: two were well-worn and dog-eared copies of A Game of Thrones and its sequel, A Clash of Kings. It was the Song of Ice and Fire box set she gave him for Christmas, which Bella had sworn up and down he'd enjoy. Edward had eyed the books warily at the time, claiming fantasy was "for freaks that wank to anime characters." The sight of the books made Bella's heart want to burst.

Some kind of commotion – a door slamming, two yelled phrases – reached Bella on the second floor. She winced.

Despite that, Bella was bright-eyed and happy when he returned. "You're liking the books?" she asked enthusiastically. The furious grimace on Edward's face melted.

"They're fucking great," he admitted wryly. Bella's answering smile was so bright and self-pleased that Edward's own lips turned involuntarily into a half-grin. In a second suspended in time, he looked at her tenderly.

Then the bubble burst.

"Now get away from there," Edward said threateningly in the next breath.

Compulsively, Bella reached for the top drawer. Edward was too far to stop her, and Bella got an eyeful. The shiny box of Trojans gutted her.

"Damn it," he snapped. He lunged in between her chair and the table, slamming the drawer shut, so hard the entire table wobbled.

"Sorry," she said immediately. She wheeled away. "So sorry."

"Can you fucking not snoop, Isabella? While I take my fucking shower?"

"I won't," Bella half-lied.

Edward eyed her warily, then rubbed violently at his face. His eyes turned into slits, and Edward stomped into the ensuite bathroom and closet. He slammed the door behind him forcefully, and Bella was left standing awkwardly inside his bedroom. Sighing, she transferred – pivoting and standing like a newborn foal - from her wheelchair to his bare mattress. She curled into a ball underneath his dark blue comforter. Trying not to think about the fact that she was possibly the last of a dozen girls to curl under Edward's comforter, she reached for A Game of Thrones.

Isabella was so engrossed that she barely noticed him come out. She looked up at him with feigned nonchalance, feeling a bit defeated when she saw him wearing pajamas. Edward finished roughly toweling his hair. The room had grown cold, and he shut the window. He crawled onto the bed next to her. Bella turned so they were nose to nose. He smelled fresh, like peppermint. Bella snuggled closer. His hand found hers.

Isabella's hands were small, and her fingers were delicate, but her palms were roughened from years of pushing her chair. His much larger hand was also softer.

"I'm just so fucking tired," he admitted to her. His eyes were drooping closed.

Emboldened, Bella stroked his face gently. "It's OK," she whispered. "It's OK."

Edward's eyes closed, and Bella kissed his forehead. Her kiss felt like a goodbye, but she kept stroking his face. It wasn't your fault. You're worthy of love, she wanted to tap in morse code. You can be so kind and lovely.

"Edward?" she asked softly. "Have you had a proper meal?"

He harrumphed his irritation, eyes still shut.

Bella kept her voice low, in a co-conspirator's whisper. "I think we should eat something."

His eyes popped open again. "Fuck. Are you hungry? Fuck. Did you want to – hang out or something?"

She shook her head lightly. "I mean, not right now, but yeah… I kinda wanted a favor."

He grimaced in mock irritation.

"I wanna go see Eight Below. Not right now, not today, but like… I want to go see it."

"What the fuck is Eight Below?"

"It's a movie. It's about these eight huskies in Antarctica."

His irritation became tinged with fondness, and he looked at her with that strangely pained, tender expression.

"Bella, you cried through that Penguin Empire movie. Through the whole fucking thing. Even when there was nothing to cry about."

Bella let out a peal of laughter. "March of the Penguins," she corrected.

"Whatever," he mumbled through a widening smile.

"Please?" she begged. "I have nobody else to go see it with. Do you want me to go to the movies with Eric Yorkie?"

"Christ, don't go to the movies with Yorkie. He'll assault you."

Bella slapped him playfully in the arm, hiding her indignation.

"Can we go see it tomorrow?" she insisted in a whiney voice, keeping her tone low. "Please?"

"Yeah, whatever. We can go see penguins."

"Dogs," Bella corrected tartly, and he let out a hoarse chuckle.

Feeling brave, Bella kissed his roughened cheek again. "Thank you," she whispered. "I'll let you sleep."

She lifted the comforter off her body and wrapped it snuggly around him. She struggled to sit up and then she transferred into her chair. The little motor on it, a power assist, began to whir.

"Wait!" Edward yelped suddenly, and Bella smiled furtively. She had known in her heart that this would happen. She knew he would offer to carry her into the car. She knew that – if she asked – he would join her for a late lunch of chicken pot pie and hot soup.

"Yeah?"

"I'll carry you downstairs," he offered, albeit groggily.

"Don't be silly," Bella said. "I'll just crawl down carefully."

"Fuck, no. Just give me a second." With enviable agility, he stood He walked into his closet and came back out wearing a hoodie and a pair of crocs.

"I thought you said crocs were for old people at the beach," Bella pointed out tartly, arching a single dark eyebrow.

"Fuck off," he said. "I don't want to slip carrying you downstairs or something."

Bella smiled. "Just – careful with your back."

"I know."

Bella wheeled to the top of the landing and lifted her arms, waiting for him to carry her down.