A/N: Thanks so much for all your wonderful thoughts!

Most characters belong to S. Meyer. The rest belongs to me, including all mistakes.


Chapter 4 – Not Just Any Ex


September 13, 2024 – New York City, NY: 9:58 p.m.

With my arms extended in front of me, I raced up the last two steps, ready to knock down TLC's steel access door if necessary.

Of course, the reality was that there was no reason for the steel door not to easily give; it sure opened without any trouble on my way down. What's more, the door would knock me out if it came to a fight between me and a steel door. But, in such cases, reasoning flies out of the proverbial window. An individual in shock is as likely to run toward the flames as they are to run from them. In this case, I was the individual in shock, and the flame was just down those stairs.

Either way, the door burst open without a struggle, and I emerged above ground like a woman chased by Hades himself. When the door crashed shut behind me, I yelped, but I didn't allow the start to slow me. In fact, with a clarity born of desperation, I stopped only for the one-point-five seconds it took to reach down, pull off my heels, and hook the shoes' straps over a finger. Then, I broke into a mad dash.

Scurrying through the cement and mortar jungle, I made my way through New York City's streets like a rat in a maze, zigging and zagging through alleys and backstreets leading to parking lots, to the rears of buildings, then to more alleys and backstreets. Yellow cabs zoomed by like rays of sun contrasting the ebony night. Tires splashed pewter puddles, splattering everything in their wake with grimy tic-tac-toe droplets. Pedestrians swarmed the streets like bees, searching for milk and honey. Horns honked from every direction. Everything up here was hectic, precisely as it had been an hour or so earlier.

Then how had things gone so awry one level below ground?

Half a block up, my nylons snagged on a garbage bin and ran up my thighs in a pattern like cracks in the pavement. Still, I kept running. I felt exposed. Flayed open. Had a pair of sharp claws swooped down from the sky and scooped me up, it would've made sense.

Twisting and turning, I once again lost myself amid the rest of the seedlings in the big red apple until winded, and with my chest heaving, I stopped and rested against a storefront's shuttered metal roll-ups. I scanned my surroundings, prepared to sprint should I spy him turning a corner, giving chase now, two decades later. With my heart in my throat, I glared in every direction, ready to run again.

The seconds ticked by.

His copper-penny hair didn't make an appearance.

Drawing a deep breath, I hung my head and exhaled in bewilderment.

"Edward Cullen."

I walk the world alone
Since I hurt you
I face an endless roam
Each day anew…

With a series of cleansing breaths, I worked to regulate my vitals. City dwellers passed, some ignoring me, some glancing my way. I made a sight, I was sure, with my back flattened against the metal frame like a squashed bug, barefoot, shoes in hand, dress caked in dirt and sweat, hair and nylons ruined, and makeup looking more like that of a children's clown than that of a forty-year-old who'd been celebrating her birthday just a couple of hours earlier.

But Jay-sus. Edward Cullen.

One day, he disappeared from the public eye with a meager statement about having had 'enough of the bullshit.' It made huge headlines, as everything related to him did in those days. Less than four years in, he'd been at the top of his game, at the pinnacle of a career that had skyrocketed from Day One and showed no signs of crashing or burning. He was the music scene's golden child. He could do no wrong. He couldn't release a non-hit if he'd tried. Had he written and performed a song about his shopping list, it would've hit number one.

Still, when he left showbusiness behind, I'd wondered for a moment if he'd come looking…

But no. No, he wouldn't. And he didn't. What…who he left his career for must've been way more important. There was no word to me or any of those who'd once been his fellow college band members – his friends. That sort of complete vanishing act was a feat, even in the twenty-first century's first decade when the world wasn't as connected as it is nowadays. There had been no final communique. No letters. No emails. No texts.

I walk the world alone
Since I hurt you
I face an endless roam
Each day anew…

At the same time he disappeared, my life grew busy. I graduated college and moved on to building a career. When that didn't work out, I switched and reinvented. I married. I divorced. With each passing year, I had increasingly less time to…

But I did. I thought about him over the years, though much more in those first few years. There was no sense in denying that fact to myself, even if he was a subject rarely brought up aloud by those close to me. His name and image were taboo in those first years, though challenging to avoid. His moment in the spotlight had been short, but it was like a burst of starlight – lasting and all-encompassing. Even nowadays, if one mentioned Edward Cullen in conversation, only those living under rocks or born in the last decade would fail to recognize his name or be unable to sing or at least hum one of his unforgettable songs.

Yet, every now and again, in the quieter moments of life…in dreams, I remembered…our moments together on stage, our laughter, our fights, and how we made up. Our night on the ferry. I wondered…about where in this vast world he'd ended up.

Now, I knew.

Honestly, I should've guessed he settled in New York City. I might have guessed if I allowed myself to attempt it. But attempting it, wondering too deeply, they'd been clear paths to madness.

A shudder rushed up my spine, followed by another and another – the physiological effects of shock wearing off. I hugged myself, now wondering just how the hell my birthday night, a night that began surrounded by family and friends in a swanky hotel party room, ended with me alone, wet, and shivering on a dark street. The Fates couldn't have played a worse trick.

However, they do say it's not a good idea to tempt fate, don't they? An angry voice erupting to my left made me suspect I'd done just that.

"Why don't you come closer and tell me that to my face?"

I blinked in shock at the woman standing just a few feet away, and my heart pounded with fright.

"Excuse me, but I didn't say-"

"How 'bout I punch you in the face, instead? How's that?"

My head swiveled sharply to my right. Another woman stood there, appearing just as furious as she volleyed the threat past me and to the woman to my left. It seemed I was standing in the middle of a standoff.

The woman to my right took two eager steps forward, holding something glinting in her hand. "Try it, see if I don't cut you, mothahfucka!"

The woman to my right curled a finger in invitation. "Bring it!"

"Uhm, excuse me, I'll just get out of..." I ran off swiftly and with my head down, breathing a sigh of relief as I left the fighting voices behind. Unfortunately, my reprieve was short-lived. A voice rang out behind me. Instinctively, I peeked over my shoulder.

"Hey, pretty girl, why you got your shoes in your hands? You lost or something?"

The grin that greeted me was yellow-toothed and lewd. Facing forward, I cursed under my breath and picked up my pace.

"Need a foot rub?"

"No thanks!"

"You sure?"

"Very much so!"

"How 'bout a bed? That hair of yours can be our blanket; keep me nice and toasty…"

For the first time in a long time, I cursed my attention-grabbing curls. Ignoring the question and the suggestive follow-on, I broke into a sprint. Meanwhile, the offeror laughed heartily, the sound following me. Thankfully, with each pounding step, the laughter receded.

By then, I'd had more than enough of the city's dark labyrinth. What I didn't have was a cell phone on me, nor money left for a cab. The lone streetlight where I now found myself was on the blink, and the skyscrapers in the distance did a poor job of reflecting light down here. I scanned the streets, hoping for a payphone, though I wasn't even sure those existed or if Adam Levine had wholly made that up in his song. Then again, that song was over a decade old. If payphones still existed in this city, they weren't around here. With anxiety quickly morphing into panic, I took a chance on a couple strolling toward me, hand in hand.

"Excuse me."

The couple stopped. Both took me in none-too-furtively from disheveled head to bare feet. Their wariness was understandable, considering I'd jumped out at them with my pointy heels gripped in one hand and looking like I'd just gone through a car wash, minus the car and one that used dirt instead of soap. But the couple soon smiled, if more out of curiosity than friendliness.

"Can we help you?" one of the men asked.

"Yes. I hate to bother, but do either of you have a cell phone I can borrow to make a quick call? I…" I swallowed, "I forgot mine back at the hotel and-"

Without waiting for me to finish, the first speaker reached into his back pocket and produced his cell phone.

"Here you go, honey. Call whoever you need."

"Were you hurt, sweetheart?" his partner asked.

"Do you need help getting off the streets?"

It only took a few seconds to get what they thought I was. Funnily enough, the sob that rose to my throat was caused more by their unstinting kindness than by being mistaken for a sex worker. When I choked back the sob, the couple's features twisted into mutual expressions of dismay. I laughed at my latest predicament, which only made their concern grow.

"Can we assist in getting you to someone who can help?"

"No. No, I promise it's not…I'm not a… It's just been a long night. You see, I'm from out of town, and I ran out on my fortieth birthday party at The Pierre, and not because it wasn't a great party," – here, I broke down in earnest, racking, blubbering sobs that must've made only every other word intelligible – "but because of who was missing, even though consciously, I didn't even know that's why I ran out. Then I stumbled into a dive bar, and guess who happened to own it?"

They stared at me, blinking in bewilderment.

I forged on. "The bar was owned by none other than the person who was missing from my party, also known as my ex-boyfriend. The ex-boyfriend!"

"Ahh," both men sagely uttered.

"Quil, this episode begins to make sense," the phone owner nodded, smiling knowingly at his partner. "There's an ex involved."

"Pay attention, Embry. She didn't say 'an ex.' She said, 'The Ex.' It's a world of difference, babe. Now, go ahead, sweetie," the first guy, Quil, prodded delicately. "You unwittingly walked into a bar owned by The Ex. Then what happened?"

Their mutual understanding and gentleness helped end my inane crying fit. I continued much more rationally – well, a bit more rationally.

"So I ran out of the bar and almost ended up in the middle of a street brawl!" I waved a hand behind me. "Then some guy followed me half a block, laughing at me and, I think, propositioning me."

"Honey, in these parts, he was likely propositioning you."

"Yeah, sweetie."

"And I haven't seen Edward since I was twenty-one."

"Edward? That's The Ex?"

"Since you were twenty-one?"

"Yes, and yes."

"Go on."

"It was just a shock, you know? Like I said, I'm forty today, and he and I once promised one another we'd spend every birthday together. As a matter of fact, we assumed we'd spend the rest of our lives… Anyway," I sighed, shaking my head, "that didn't happen and…and in the end, there was a lot left unsaid."

For a few seconds, the three of us stood around silently. Quil, the cell phone owner, spoke up.

"Well, damn. What a birthday, honey. By the way, I'm Quil, and this is my husband, Embry."

"Nice to meet you both, Quil and Embry. I'm Bella. And thank you for understanding."

"Oh, we totally get it, sweetie. You have had quite a night," Embry confirmed. "You celebrated your fortieth, ran out on your party, ran into The Ex, ran out on him-"

"Well, I didn't run out on him as much as I panicked."

"Yeah, but Embry, who doesn't spiral at the sight of The Ex years later?" Quil offered.

"Exactly!"

"Mm," Embry hummed noncommittally.

"And I walked into the middle of a fight and got propositioned!" I reminded them. "Don't forget I was propositioned!"

"Yeah, but that didn't happen until after you ran out on The Ex, so you can't really blame your reaction at that bar on the fight or the proposition that had yet to occur."

"True, babe. True," Quil agreed, tapping a finger thoughtfully against his lips.

Again, we stood around silently for about half a minute.

Embry then prompted, "Go ahead and call your friends, Bella, but if they can't come for you, we'll get you back to them. Won't we, Quil?"

"Damn right, Embry."

"Thank you," I said with feeling, offering them a grateful smile. As I tapped Rosalie's cell phone number, the two men continued a quiet, post-narrative discussion.

"Poor darling. Crazy seeing her ex like that! Embry, can you imagine if I ran into Ephraim out of the blue after all these years?"

"Quil, baby, you'd spiral."

"I'd totally spiral. Then I'd spit in Ephraim's face."

"I'd help you."

In the middle of the couple's shared laughter, Rose picked up the call.

"This better not be a fucking scam call because that's the last thing I need right-"

"Rose, Rose, it's me!"

"Jesus Christ, Bella, are you okay?"

"I'm fine."

It was true. Embry and Quil, who were openly eavesdropping on my call, had given me more than a cell phone and two pairs of ears to listen to me pour my heart out. They were a timely dose of present-day humanity.

And now that Rose knew I was neither dead nor dying, she laid into me.

"What the hell, Bella? Where on earth are you?!"

"We've been worried sick!" Alice yelled out.

"I'm…uh, guys, where am I?"

"You're at the corner of Avenue D and East 6th, sweetie."

I repeated the address. Alice echoed it aloud on her end.

"That's about fifteen minutes from here," an unknown voice replied.

"Bella, Al and I are already in an Uber driving around and looking for you. The driver says you're fifteen minutes away. Are you okay with waiting alone, or do you need us to call the cops?"

Quil leaned closer to the cell phone. "Rose and Al, hi, sweeties! We'll wait here with her!"

"Yeah, she was wrung out a bit when we ran into her, but she's fine now! Take your time, lovelies!"

"Yeah, guys, Quil and Embry will wait with me. No need to get the NYPD involved."

"Bella, who the hell are-? Know what? Never mind. Al and I will be there as soon as we can!"

"Okay. See you in a few," I said, ending the call. Then I chuckled. "Boy, I'm in trouble when they get here. But thanks again, guys. I was beginning to fear there were no more nice guys in this city."

"Oh, you'd be surprised at how many of us nice guys are running around the Big Apple."

"Nice guys running around the Big Apple," I mused. Yeah, maybe there were clues I'd find him here all along. And speaking of Edward.

"Now, Bella, sweetie," Quil said, crossing his arms against his chest, "while we wait for Rose and Al, why don't you tell Embry and me a bit more regarding all this left unsaid between you and The Ex…"


A/N: Thoughts?

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Song inspo for this chapter: All Too Well by Taylor Swift 3

And I know it's long gone and that magic's not here no more
And I might be okay but I'm not fine at all

'Cause there we are again on that little town street
You almost ran the red 'cause you were lookin' over at me
Wind in my hair, I was there
I remember it all too well

"See" you guys Wednesday!