A/N: Thanks so much for all your wonderful thoughts.
Ouch! I missed two updates – last Friday and yesterday! But, RL happened, as I warned it might here and there. Sorry!
Anyway, to catch us up a bit, I'm updating today, Tuesday. There will still be updates tomorrow and Friday (barring more RL, lol).
Okay, here we go!
Chapter 15 – The Weight of Silence
September 14, 2024 – New York City, NY: 12:34 a.m.
Edward
There are many artists out there – composers, poets, playwrights – who like expounding on the human reaction to noise, specifically to sudden, loud noises. The eruption of fireworks causes loud gasps, shots ringing out cause tremors to shoot up spines. An individual flinches at a honking horn, jumps at booming thunder, etc.
But it's the human reaction to sudden silence that deserves songs composed for it.
Silence has every clamor beat. Take, for example, the sudden silence that surrounded you and me right after I recounted my memories of our last interaction. It had a dark lyricism to it; I'll give it that. Heavy and profound, barely disturbed by the city's ceaseless dings, blares, and rattles. It descended and spread like an eagle's wingspan, like a heavy weight. More accurately, it was a bulky woolen blanket enclosing us from all sides. Trapping us beneath its folds like children hiding under a makeshift tent and exchanging hair-raising camp stories beneath the cover of darkness – those types of stories that would elicit the very gasps, tremors, and flinches often reserved for loud noises.
Except that you and I were no longer children, and none of those reactions occurred within yours and my blanket of sudden silence. While the world outside the window and I stood frozen and waiting for your comments, opinions, even your well-earned retaliation, you said nothing, Izzy. You barely blinked, though your eyes remained wide and averted, glued to an unknown spot of interest just past my shoulder, so consumed that, had I not known better, I would've thought you were seeing ghosts.
And I couldn't blame you for refusing to meet my gaze or your apparent perturbation. Not only had I tracked you down when you'd once made it abundantly clear that you never again wanted to see me, but I'd just reminded you – in case you'd forgotten – of all the reasons why, of everything I'd once said and done contrary to my promise never to hurt you.
Still.
Although I couldn't and didn't fault you for your continued silence and unwillingness to look at me, my unease, the panic that had held my lungs tightly in its grip since the moment, a couple of hours earlier, when you ran away from me and up the bar's stairs, magnified.
It seemed that you and I were back in the same spot from which we'd parted almost exactly nineteen years earlier. Not physically in the same spot, no. But altered settings notwithstanding, time and space appeared to have changed nothing. They provided no absolution for my transgressions, no forgiveness, not even sufficient fond remembrances with which to build a tentative friendship.
Once, I'd made a colossal mistake; well, more than one mistake that damnable spring and summer. Yet, beyond those mistakes, I'd compounded my errors by forcing you to face me after that phone call when you'd simply wanted a clean break, when you'd already made up your mind.
The fact that I was desperate was no excuse; I'd accepted that over the years. My instinct should've been, always should've been, to ease your discomfort. Instead, I'd appeared out of the blue and remained, subjected you to a confrontation, even when you hadn't met my eyes. That alone should've clued me in to your aversion.
Again, I was repeating that mistake, if not the others.
So, if this mutual trip down memory lane was causing you distress, it was time for me to go. I wouldn't put you through that form of unnecessary and painful punishment again. Not again. Here and now, I'd be the adult I should've been then, even if the thought of performing an about-face and leaving you behind once more – a woman I hadn't seen in almost two decades, one who I…who my heart should've been accustomed to living without – made my chest painfully tight.
Perhaps, in an alternate universe, this unexpected encounter would've gone differently. And maybe, somewhere in my mind, I'd entertained thoughts of unexpected encounters meaning more than the randomness they implied.
Another memory suddenly bombarded me, of a moment in our past I hadn't thought of in a long damn time.
It was a random evening, not long after you and I first got together, soon after our ride on the ferry. We were in your parents' living room, seated side by side on your Grandmother Swan's old couch, the one we later made love on about a thousand times and in a thousand different ways. On this particular night, however, we were watching TV with Charlie – a baseball game or something – and we were pissing him off by whispering and laughing through the game, then stifling louder laughter whenever he yelled at us.
What we were really doing that night was playing a game of torture with one another every time Charlie left the room to refill his drink, pop more popcorn, take a bathroom break, or whatever. You and I groped one another mercilessly – my hands down your shirt, yours down my pants – getting the other worked up for no better reason than we could. Like I said, this was early on in our relationship, and though we hadn't slept together yet, we sure as hell were working our way up to it.
I can't recall how you and I got on the subject, but we'd been alone in the room when I'd asked you how it was that Emmett was so unbothered by Rose's wild flirtations with me the night of our ferry ride, before the ferry. You'd laughed so happily and so carefree that even picturing you teasing me in that memory twisted my heart in the present.
'Edward, because that's a raw grain of truth from an alternate universe! If we lived in a universe where Emmett didn't exist, Rosalie would've probably fought me for you when you joined the band. But we don't live in that universe, and Emmett knows we don't. So, he doesn't care that Rose was flirty with you.'
'I have two follow-up questions,' I'd said, pushing back my glasses with mock gravity. 'I'll start with the one of least importance.'
'Go ahead,' you'd played along.
'Okay, and remember that I'm basing this question on what you just said.'
'Duly noted,' you'd agreed with a chuckle.
'Izzy Swan, are you or are you not…a fellow believer in alternate universes and therefore in an alien life form?'
Your dark, impish eyes sparkled with barely restrained humor, cheeks aglow from the effort you had to put into swallowing back your chortles.
'I mean,' you said, practically choking on your stifled laughter, 'I've never really-'
'I'll spare you from that one since I can read the answer in your expression,' I smirked, rolling my eyes in faux exasperation. 'This one is much more important anyway.'
Pressing your lips together, you nodded and waited.
'In this alternate universe of which you speak, from what I've gathered, am I correct in assuming, Izzy Swan…' I grinned, 'that you'd fight Rosalie for me?'
You surrendered to peals of laughter, throwing your head back and your frame against the cushioned couch. At the same time, your melodious amusement chimed like the music to a song in and of itself. Your hair spread across the back cushion like whimsical orbits, their trajectory leading to your beautiful place. And this is why it all came to me so easily back then, why I simply stared, already composing lyrics in my head to accompany your symphony because here's the fundamental truth about you and me, Izzy, the one I never got to tell you:
Throughout our entire relationship, there was always a part of me, the larger part, that was perpetually mesmerized, unceasingly amazed that this breathtaking individual actually said 'yes' to me on that ferry. Moreover, not only were you mine, in that immature manner of believing one possesses that which one adores, but you actually wanted me to be yours.
That night on that couch, I realized, without a shadow of a doubt, that I could happily spend eternity in any universe, watching you laugh.
But…
But there was yet another underlying truth I never confessed, one that followed us around- at least followed me stealthily every step of our relationship. It skulked around corners, lying in wait, concealed around bends, hiding until that damnable spring and summer when it was aided and abetted out of its hellhole:
Doubt.
That night on that couch was probably the first time Doubt peeked its head out from its haunt, not too far out, just enough to let me, if no one else, feel its presence. Because there was a part of me on that couch that, though mesmerized by your laughter, would've thrilled to hear an answer to the question mixed in there. Even a playful claim that you'd go against an entire horde of invading aliens for me would've felt good to hear.
I went on to pose that question in various ways throughout our relationship, couching it in all manner of terms, when what I really wanted to know…what I always wondered—was if you ever loved me half as much as I loved you.
Isabella Marie Swan. Izzy. Bella. By any name, you were indelibly etched into the fibers of my being. I would've gone against an army of invading aliens for you.
What I wouldn't go against were your wishes.
So, that night, when you answered me with laughter, I didn't push. From what you'd told me on that ferry about the debacle with your parents, I knew you were deeply affected despite your claims otherwise. I decided then and there that if that alien horde ever attacked, I would fight it off, banish it until you were ready to fight it with me.
I'd love you enough for us both until you were ready and able to love me back.
So, that damnable spring and summer, when I not only forgot that it was my job to fight the horde but I introduced a whole different host of aliens into the mix, I had no one but myself to blame for how horrifically the fight ended.
But none of that mattered that night on your grandmother's couch.
Instead, I told myself I saw your answer in your sparkling gaze, even if you weren't ready to verbalize it. And I happily draped myself over you, wrapped you in my embrace, and kissed you with abandon. Because I could. We got so lost in one another that we both missed Charlie's return into the living room:
'Oh, what the-?! Hey! Edward, get off my daughter! And that's my mom's couch! Jesus Christ, you two! Have some respect for a dead woman!'
Now, almost twenty years later, again you were less than an arms-length away. So damn close I read every shade of brown and amber swirling in your dark gaze even if it remained steered clear of me. So close I smelled the sweet scent of your skin, made out the curled definition of every strand – thick and rich, and once my privilege to touch, to wrap around my fingers and ground myself with while I pushed inside you.
Swallowing hard against those memories, I dug my hands in my pockets. In another universe, our proximity was something I was used to. In this universe, two decades later, I no longer was. I couldn't trust my hands not to reach for you.
When the silence became too much to bear, I broke it, determined to say what I came to say…and leave the rest up to you.
"So, you see why for me, at least, our end wasn't that phone call. And yes," I sighed, "I knew it was wrong of me to go looking for you when you'd already said goodbye. I knew it. My head knew it," I clarified, pulling a hand out of my pocket and pressing it flat against my chest, all while your amber eyes remained stoically on that spot just beyond me, your brow creased, and your breathing labored.
"But my heart…my heart couldn't accept it. For months, I'd set us on the back burner, telling myself that once the craziness died down, once I had more time, I'd make it up to you. To us. I took you for granted, Izzy, and my head knew I had no right to ask for one more chance that day. Yet, my heart asked, and you justifiably stood your ground." My nostrils flared with emotion, and as I buried my hand back in my pocket, the rest seeped out barely above a whisper. "When you asked me never to contact you again, respecting that request was…hard – the hardest thing ever. But after how badly I'd messed up, it was the least I could do."
Your eyes snapped away from the wall and shot to mine, round and anything but stoic. But they weren't darkened by the fury I expected, by the resentment I would've understood. Instead, they startled me with their almost frantic expression – like a deer who'd already been caught in the crosshairs and now struggled to comprehend how the hell it ended up bleeding.
"Izzy, what's wrong?"
Instinctively, right or wrong, my hands shot forward and reached for you, but though you pivoted quickly toward the windows, I caught the sudden devastation in your gaze. Your breaths were louder and audible, yet your anguish somehow topped it. Moreover, the window's dark reflection mirrored everything: your expression and actions. Your eyes may have been on the city's lights, but you were as far from seeing them as if the entire city had gone black. Lifting a hand, you pressed it hard against your mouth, stifling sound.
But that's the other thing about silence: it conceals nothing.
Hovering anxiously at your back, my hands trembled, literally burned with the need to touch you. To comfort you.
"Iz- Bella, I'm sorry. I didn't want to upset you, and I'll leave if you want me to, but-"
You cut me off, shaking your head vigorously. "No, I never- Edward…you can call me Izzy," you said, your hand at your throat now. "I should've never…it was so childish to ask you to stop."
"It wasn't," I assured you. "I was wrong, and I did and said things that-"
"I said things, too." Your voice broke. "I said…I told you not to reach out to me again. Ever again. But I didn't know you'd still…I thought…"
My brow furrowed. "What didn't you know?"
Here came another stretch of silence, this one somehow heavier, worse than the preceding ones, carrying on silent wings all those words once left unspoken. It tasted of the tension of gathering winds, of wildly scattering leaves, of the moments before a lightning strike.
"Iz, what didn't you know?" I asked again.
You spun back to me suddenly, the distress in your eyes clouding them, annihilating the natural brilliance I'd never forgotten. And you shot off each ensuing sentence back to back, without pause, as if the words were flames caught in your throat, and you had to set them free.
"Edward, why did you drop off the face of the Earth at the height of your career? Please tell me. Please. Because I thought- I thought you had it all, Edward."
I dared a half step that brought us so close you had to angle your head to hold my gaze.
"You thought I had it all?"
"Fame, fortune, celebrity," you enumerated. "You released hit after hit, touring from city to city worldwide. You…you got engaged to Janey Ventura …" When you shut your eyes briskly and reopened them, I caught the tail-end of an emotion that gutted and bewildered me in equal measure. Because it didn't make sense.
It didn't make sense.
"When that ended, there were others, and you looked happy, Edward."
For a few seconds, I managed nothing beyond erratic blinking.
"Happy?" I leaned in closer, and when your warm breath washed across my face, I held my breath, steeling myself against the almost overwhelming memories because you'd said something. And I had to clear up. "Happy? Izzy, Janey was my first attempt to try to get over you and move forward. And she knew…she'd been there when you and I were together. She knew what that looked like. But she said she was up for the challenge, that I was part of the overall adventure," I scoffed. "We had shitty reasons for being together, and luckily we realized that. We saw what a massive mistake we would've made had we-"
"And then you quit. The media announced you'd quit. That you were done. That you walked away in the middle of a tour, broke all your contracts, and announced that, quote-unquote, you 'couldn't give two fucks who sued you.' Then, you disappeared. Why?"
"Why?" I echoed, and still, the desperation in your voice made no sense because the answers to your questions were obvious.
Weren't they?
"Because I may have had it all in terms of my career, but I had nothing, Izzy," I stressed emphatically, even closer now, your labored breaths on my lips. "After I left your room that day, I was angry," I admitted in a hiss that flared my nostrils, even as I swallowed back the painful lump in my throat, "and for a long while, that anger led me to pretend, even to myself, that yeah, I did have it all, and that if you didn't want me, I didn't need you." I shook my head self-deprecatingly. "That stupid outlook led me to quite a few mistakes, but I was fortunate that the destructive energy burned itself out before those mistakes could worsen. And I am fortunate, Iz," I nodded, "because since quitting the industry, I've been…content. I've met a lot of fellow performers over the years for who that's not true, who burned out in horrific ways. A lot of them are who we welcome at The Last Call."
"Edward. God, Edward…" You gazed at me with an open awe that I had no clue how to interpret in relation to our conversation. In relation to our past. "You never stopped being an amazing individual, did you? You never stopped being…the good guy."
Swallowed thickly, my heart rampaged – half of it struggling not to make more of those words than what they were. While the other half… the other half found itself again wondering if unexpected encounters were more than chance encounters.
"I don't know about that, Iz. For a while there, I sold my soul to the devil. Until I realized that everything I was doing to prove to one specific person what a mistake she'd made…" I offered you a wistfully apologetic smile, "it probably had the opposite effect, that is, if you were paying attention. And I further realized that whether you were paying attention or not, there was no point in my leading a life I didn't want," I shrugged, my hands still buried deep in my pockets, "even if the life I'd once wanted was no longer an option."
With a hitched breath, you spun away, but I reached for your wrist and spun you back toward me, lifting your chin with a finger and leading your troubled gaze back to mine. You didn't resist. With my heart thundering, I weaved our fingers together.
It was a simple, innocuous touch nineteen years after the last time I touched you, after the last time I made love to you. Yet you sighed, and my knees threatened to buckle. Despite the physical and emotional changes we'd both experienced throughout the years, our hands still fit like pieces of a puzzle, like the two halves of a whole you'd once compared us to, the closest you ever came to calling us…to loving me how I loved you. For a few seconds, both of us merely stared at our joined hands.
"It was all almost two decades ago, but I'm sorry," I breathed, and you shook your head.
"I…"
"I'm so damned sorry for everything. I'm sorry I hurt you when I swore I wouldn't. I'm sorry I forgot, even for a moment, that you were the priority, that you weren't merely a thousand times more important than the music – that you were the music. I'm sorry for my shameful behavior toward you throughout that entire spring and summer, on that phone call, and in your room that day. And Jesus, Iz, I'm so sorry I missed your twenty-first birthday."
"Edward-"
"I want to thank you, too, Izzy."
Your head snapped up, your eyes bewildered. "Thank me?"
"Because even though you and I didn't work out, once I quit being angry, I at least had a frame of reference for what happiness should feel like, and I knew it wasn't what I had."
You searched my eyes, then opened your mouth in a couple of false starts. When you managed to speak, your voice was a strained whisper.
"Edward, you didn't sell your soul to the devil. You may have rented it for a bit, but you never sold it…unlike me."
"You? No, Iz. You were right-"
"Edward, stop. Please…" – pulling your hands out of mine, you held one up, palm out, while raking the other through your scalp before fisting the hair at your crown – "…stop. From the beginning, you set me on this pedestal from which I always knew I'd fall- but that's no excuse for what I did."
A sliver of ice abruptly raced up my spine. Why were you so upset?
"What you did?"
"I asked you to stay away, but I thought the reason you did, the reason you never reached out again, was because you realized that, in the end, music career or not, you and I weren't meant to be."
"Except that was never what I thought, Izzy," I reminded her. "You told me that someday, I'd come to that realization. But I never did. I've been content, yes, but I've-"
"I…I thought she'd been right."
The ice in my spine spread into my extremities.
"She?"
"Edward, please don't apologize, and please, please, don't thank me."
"Iz, I don't understand-"
"I didn't tell you…and shenever told you…"
"Who is she?" With my heart clawing its way up my throat, I leaned into you and dropped my eyes to your level, locking your beautiful, guilt-ridden gaze in mine. And the silence, that lyrical yet unspeakable silence, filled every corner of my cranium. It made deafening bells ring in my temples. Yet I forced myself to ask.
"Iz, who never told me what?"
When you answered, that ice swooped in and turned my heart into a blue glacier threatening to shatter like the splintered shards that landed between us less than an hour earlier.
"Me, Edward," you said slowly, sounding defeated, your beautiful face crestfallen and your shoulders slumping. "Neither Heidi nor I ever told you."
A/N: Thoughts?
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