December 2014

Twenty-five /Twenty-seven

"It destroyed her," Victoria continued snarling, inching forward so that they were nose-to-nose. Her voice was a rushed, desperate whisper. Victoria was seizing on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to say something. Bella could see the catharsis in her gun-metal blue eyes, so like her son's. Like Uncle Carlisle's. "She didn't want to have an abortion, but Edward was so insistent. It was the worst year of her life, and it was all because of you."

Time stopped, slowed, stretched.

She felt as if she had just suffered a concussion. Isabella had been 4-years-old the only time she suffered a concussion as a child. She remembered trying to stand to reach for a toy, crumpling like a piece of paper, and falling backward. She recalled that her head smacked against the hardwood floor. Befuddled, Isabella had stared into the ceiling in utter shock. It had taken Esme hours to realize what had really happened, because the blow injured her deeply before symptoms showed – before her toddler self started vomiting, before she started crying.

Bella blinked at Victoria Cullen and plastered on a smile that was as radiant as it was false. "I don't think this is the right venue to discuss private family matters," she said, sounding plastic, stiff, and sweet. Esme Masen had raised her to avoid making a scene at all costs.

Bella stood.

Bella's hands found her crutches steadily. The feeling of the plastic grips under her clammy hands was comforting. She hoisted herself up. The handgrips were anatomically designed, molded to fit the contours of her palms. Soft black ergonomic grips wrapped around a sturdy aluminum shaft, with a subtle indentation precisely where her thumb and fingers naturally rested.

When she moved, there was a rhythm that became almost musical – the subtle press of the handgrips into her palms, the slight lean of her torso, the coordinated swing of her legs. Her right leg moved with more resistance, a stiffness that required extra concentration. The crutches absorbed the unevenness, translating her intention into motion.

When she exited that powder room, Edward was looking at her. Edward was looking at her with a strange mixture of relief and panic, like she was a doctor entering the waiting room in the ER.

Edward stood and walked to her, as if entranced, crossing tables.

She was so distracted – which she never was, during a social engagement – that the tips of her toes caught on the tulle skirt underneath her dress. Her left leg seized up as it bore her weight. She felt herself losing her footing, tripping inside the tulle of her skirt. She winced, bracing herself for a fall, dropping a crutch, and then the other, and then –

Roughly, Edward broke her fall with both arms. It hurt; the bony prominences of her hips and ribs hit his arms. The crutches clattered.

"It's OK, darling," Edward crooned gently. "It's OK. It's OK. It's OK."

It was so instinctive to him, to catch her. Edward set her on the nearest chair and fetched the crutches. Bella was trembling, and her wrist ached from bearing her weight at an unnatural angle.

Jane had been pregnant with Edward's baby.

Bella looked at Edward with bewildered desperation, searching his face for an answer. How long was he with Jane? When did the abortion happen? Did he force her? Was Victoria lying? Had Jane had the baby?

Bella trembled out of shock, and they were in their bubble. Like an idiot, oblivious to the people around her, she touched his chiseled jaw, cupping it in both hands. The feeling was so familiar to her. Carlisle taught Edward to shave with a straight razor. She cupped his cheek, like the answers to her questions could seep from his cheekbones into her fingertips.

"You OK?" he asked, speaking with gentle urgency. He tilted his head to kiss her thumb tenderly. People were watching. Edward didn't like to be affectionate in public, not the way he was in private – not in this way - raw, tender, infinite, primal.

People were watching them in their raw intimacy. Putting it on display wasn't the done thing.

Edward rested his forehead against hers. In his heart, he was a musician. He breathed rhythmically for eight beats. She counted them.

Stupidly, wordlessly, she nodded.

It destroyed her. She didn't want to do it, but Edward was so insistent. It was the worst year of her life, and it was all because of you.

The information sat heavily, like a meal she could not digest. She didn't have all the information: she felt like she was peering out into the snow, trying to find shapes in the shadows. Like she was reading a blurry manuscript.

Bella's first instinct bubbled forward. Edward would never. Edward would never force an abortion on someone. The man she was marrying was like his father – gentle, sweet, good. Edward had rescued a sick kitten with her. Edward cleaned the wounds of random strangers; he carried band-aids and an antiseptic spray in his pockets because Bella always tripped. He had a really kind grin that crinkled at the corners, that he used under the cover of anonimity.

Edward would never.

Pleadingly, she kissed the corner of his mouth before kissing him on the lips. It was messy because it was desperate. She looked at him, and her eyes glistened. I'm so confused. Her blinks were morse code. I'm so confused.

Edward whispered into her ear. "It's almost over," he swore hotly. He stroked her cheekbones so lovingly, the way he touched her when they were nose-to-nose, and they were all alone. "I want to get you out of here, and then – never again. Never again. Just us. Just you, and me, and our baby."

Gingerly, Edward half-lifted her to her seat. She was still so shocked she could barely walk. She tripped on the tulle skirt, and Edward gently tugged her along. He held her hand tightly through the dessert course; an usher tapped Edward to explain it was almost his turn in the speech roster.

Edward was summoned to a table where the Voltaires sat, to give his speech.

Oddly, though Edward was best man, they had not sat anywhere near the bride, the groom, or their families. They were quite far away from the groomsmen and bridesmaids. Pregnant Jane Walton – Jane Walton, who seemed much softer at twenty-seven than she ever did at twenty-four – sat at the table with the groom's family. Victoria Cullen sat at that table, with Aaron "Aro" Voltaire.

Aro was Alec's father. Bella recognized Aro. Aro was unseasonably pale, and he had a curtain of black hair that hung like threadbare drapes from his head.

Bella had only seen the man once before, but he was on their wedding guest list. She and Edward attended a rubber chicken dinner, a fundraiser at the Kennedy Center in New York.

Aro had been in the news recently, for putatively accepting donations that could be linked to Middle Eastern moguls and accepting favors on luxury airlines.

Aro was now the Mayor of New York City.

The stress of seeing the Voltaires settled somewhere in her upper chest, making breathing difficult.

Esme would have noticed them with hawkish precision almost immediately. Her mother was well-versed in the political art of a seating chart. For some reason, someone had decided they would sit as far away from that table as possible.

Isabella had not noticed. Isabella – silly Bella – lived in the clouds – thinking about the characters in All the Light We Cannot See and the way the lights glittered against the Hudson.

The champagne glinted under the ballroom's crystal chandeliers as Edward stood. He was proud and tall in an impeccably tailored suit, his fingers delicately wrapped around a crystal flute. The room hushed, anticipating the best man's speech. Alec was sniffling as if he were crying, and Bella winced, thinking of the cocaine high. Under the glare of the spotlight, Edward looked so different – polished, and icily charming.

Edward waited for the noise to ebb, a practiced smile playing across his lips. "For those who don't know me, I'm Edward Cullen. Alec and I have been friends since our days at Harvard, where he was... shall we say, charmingly persistent in his pursuit of academic mediocrity."

A polite titter rippled through the crowd. One of the groomsmen, who was just as high as Alec, cackled. Bella winced.

"When Alec first told me he was getting married, I was surprised. Not because he'd found someone willing to tolerate him—though that in itself is remarkable—but because I genuinely believed Alec would never commit." His tone was so smooth, so perfectly modulated, that the insult arrived like a velvet-wrapped dagger.

Edward took a measured sip of champagne. "But then he met Meghan. And suddenly, the impossible became possible. Here was a woman who not only tolerated Alec but was his match in every way." Another carefully calibrated pause. "I suppose there truly is someone for everyone."

"In all seriousness," Edward continued, his voice dropping to a more intimate register, "Alec has been a dear friend. A man of remarkable patience, occasional brilliance, and—" he raised his glass with a sardonic smile "—exceptional taste in choosing a life partner."

The speech was a masterpiece of backhanded compliments, each word meticulously chosen to sound supportive while subtly undermining. Edward embodied the aristocratic ideal: cruel humor disguised as wit, delivered with impeccable breeding.

As applause broke out among a chorus of polite laughter, Edward caught her eye, and she was grimacing. His mask cracked almost imperceptibly, and something in his expression sweetened. Bella turned away, pretending to be enthralled by the floral arrangements.

Edward turned to walk away after clapping Alec heartily on the shoulder. At that moment, Aro Voltaire rose from his seat with all the flair of an elegant peacock.

In a fatherly way, Aro clapped Edward on the shoulder. He took the microphone from Edward, who gave it in shock.

Bella couldn't tear her eyes away because it was like watching a social train wreck. Aro was evidently drunk: there was a sheen of sweat on his brow, and his eyes were glistening. Aro sounded exuberant. Someone lifted a phone to tape the encounter: an usher rushed to stop them.

"I can't let the evening pass," Aro slurred drunkenly, "without acknowledging the very generous contribution this wonderful young man made to the Democratic Committee of New York, and to the Voltaire for New York Super PAC. All in all, we can thank Mr. Cullen for 250,000 dollars of donations."

Bella's mouth fell open in horror. Edward looked unamused at Aro's embrace, at the announcement, at the smattering of hesitant clapping.

It was another breach of trust, and she felt like there had been a lot of them over the past month. They always ripped through her like unpredictable bullets. She'd been bleeding quietly for months.

Edward looked directly at her, saw the disappointment in her face. Edward shook Aro's hands politely, with a stiff smile and perilously glinting eyes.

Edward circled back to her table, and his lips were a tight line.

Edward angled his entire body towards her, and he rested his forehead against hers. She winced and pulled away. "I'm sorry," he murmured, and it was like a mantra and a prayer. Bella could not stomach it. "Bella, I –"

"You're always sorry," she muttered darkly, and a tear slipped down her cheek. Her anger was hard to pin down: she was always irritable these days, always starving, always freezing.

Anger. The revelations turned in her head. Edward had become a millionaire by investing in a drone surveillance company, with a man Bella found perverse. Edward had donated a quarter of a million dollars – without any apparent party allegiance.

Jane had been pregnant.

Bella gazed distractedly at slushy, hail-like snow pummeling their town car with soft thuds. The streets were slick with greying, thickened snow that would turn into ice by morning.

Jane had been pregnant.

Edward and Bella sat inside a heated town car, and she was wearing his jacket because she was freezing. Her thoughts had been so sluggish for so long. All she could think about was the hunger clawing at her stomach. People remarked on her figure. She was finally a size 0: there wasn't a trace of baby fat on her skin, and her cheekbones were as sharp as the straight razors Edward used.

"Bella."

Edward was scared and anxious. She could tell just by looking at his eyes, at the way he was fidgeting. Edward tapped his feet, and the kinetic energy moved his entire leg with violent energy, like pebbles ricocheting inside a pressure cooker. "Is everything OK?" he repeated, and his eyes – and God, his eyes were so beautiful – searched every inch of her face.

Now that the shock was over, she felt awash with suspicion.

It destroyed her. She didn't want to do it, but Edward was so insistent. It was the worst year of her life, and it was all because of you.

Her voice was eerily steady, detached. "I'm only going to ask you this once. Have you ever cheated?"

Edward winced like she had slapped him. Edward was so achingly sincere, and he touched her face. It was so clear that he loved her. "I have never done that to you, and I would never do that to you."

Glaring, she inched away.

"Your grandmother said you got Jane pregnant." She articulated it, and she was surprised at how cleanly she said it. At how self-contained the pain was, at how dull her suspicion felt. All along, she had expected the other shoe to drop.

Jane had been pregnant.

"I ran into your grandmother in the powder room," Bella explained.

Her voice was emotionless with exhaustion. They were hanging by a thread, and Victoria Cullen slit it.

Not because of what Edward had done, but because of what he hid.

Edward stopped fidgeting, and she could see the horror spread, marring his features. Though he was gorgeous, there was something hideous about him at that moment. His eyes widened, he grew pale. He opened his mouth. He exhalted. Sweat built along his forehead. The silence slowed and stretched.

It went on forever, and that was confirmation enough.

Bella made a strange sound, like a wounded animal croaking, gasping. Her dull, tired suspicion turned sharp, and it slit her open.

Bella clawed at him with both hands, digging her fingers into his biceps like she wanted to draw blood. "Uh-tuh lee-stuh buh ma-uh-n ee-nuff tuh uh-duh-muh-tuh," she growled, and she was so fucking furious, and she was so angry that it spilled out of her and she didn't know how to contain it.

She shook him hard, tugging him back and forth because she was so fucking angry.

Edward admitted it quietly, with a hint of defiance in his voice, tinged with remorse. "She had an abortion."

"Nuh sh-i-tuh," she spat. She did not know if she believed him, and she was so angry. She could feel her skin prickle and heat with exertion. She was so furious that her rage flowed into her arms, and she was shaking him, and he wasn't even trying to stop her. She was beyond crying.

She shook him hard, and the driver was eyeing them from the front with wide-eyed silence. Edward lifted the privacy screen with the push of a button.

"Whe-nuh?"

"I'm sorry," he pleaded. "I'm so sorry."

"When?" she repeated.

He was quiet, and his blazingly green eyes were rimmed with tears. "Remember how I missed your birthday the year we started dating? September 2011." Edward said. "I – I took her to have it. I was there in the room when she had the D&C. I was there. It happened – " he gulped. "It happened right around your birthday."

"She was fourteen weeks along," Edward continued, and his tone was pleading, and Bella felt dizzy with rage and pain because he was such a fucking liar. "She... Conception happened right before my birthday that same year."

She dug her claws in sharper, wanting to hurt him as much as he had hurt her, and she cried. "Th—uh-tuh's sow-sow-nuds so-fucking…" she sobbed, and her voice was so shrill she winced. She shoved him away. That's so fucking convenient, she thought.

That Jane got pregnant just a week before she and Edward got together.

There was one last thing she needed to know.

Her words were garbled, mixtures of growls and sobs. It surprised her that he understood any of it, as much as it might have once made her feel cherished. Edward understood her when she could barely speak. "Duh-uh-id Jay-nuh wan-tuh the buh-buh-ee? Arrr eee-ooo suh-rrr she - "

"I didn't want it," Edward said somberly, but couldn't hide the aggravation in his eyes, not at this line of questioning. "I didn't fucking want it. I didn't want it so much that I was right fucking there at the Planned Parenthood Clinic when they scraped it out of her."

Doubt gnawed at every neuron in her brain. She didn't believe that he didn't cheat. More importantly, it horrified her. She wasn't against all abortions, not on principle. She found Edward's attitude to that abortion callous, cold. Even despicable.

Edward had not assume the consequences of his actions.

Isabella wondered if his baby was running around shook him again, more forcefully than she ever imagined. Her rage fueled her, and she was able to shake him – all 150 pounds of him – so roughly that eventually she felt faint. She felt like her blood pressure dropped, and she swayed. She saw stars and bright lights.

"Bella?" he had the gall to ask, and the concern on his face irked her. "Bell? Sweetheart?"

She inched away.

When they reached Esme's townhouse, Bella was beyond feeling embarrassment. She didn't care that she made a fucking scene in the backseat. She lifted her crutches out of the car, one after the other. The driver opened the door.

Her first steps were tentative, a careful test of impossible terrain. Her right leg moved with a jerking, spastic motion - muscles fighting against themselves, competing signals from her brain creating chaos. The knee wanted to bend but couldn't quite coordinate, trembling with an internal struggle. Her left leg was slightly more cooperative, but still unreliable. The muscles seized and released unpredictably. Her thighs felt like bunched electrical wires, tangled and misfiring, sending conflicting instructions. There was no smooth transition between muscle groups, just a series of sharp, disconnected movements.

Two steps.

Three steps.

Bella was careful not to trip, even though her muscles were a jumble of mixed impulses and signals. "Baby, I'm sorry," Edward pleaded after her, and it was also fucking familiar. "Bella," Edward whispered, pleadingly. His voice was impossibly meek.

She could feel the tears flowing down her cheeks leaving trails of salted residue. She wobbled forward. Edward was taking steps behind her, careful not to jostle her or scare her any further. He walked patiently behind her, and the tempo of his steps was at odds with the frentic sound of his voice. "Bella, I'm so sorry," Edward said desperately. "I never - all of it was for you."

Wordless with pain, Bella whipped her face towards Edward. She couldn't speak – the sobs inside her throat were constraining her windpipe. The feelings inside her rose into a crescendo frighteningly like hate.

"Bella," Edward repeated, pleadingly, his voice cracking. "It was all for you."

Her frustration grew to a rolling boil, and she wanted to hurt him, as though she couldn't contain the hurt inside her own body.

Esme's building had been remodelled and refurbished in 1980s. Bella rarely thought about her mother's ex-husband, one Charles Brandon, but the eighties – and the Wall Street trader that purchased the place – were inescapable in the foyer.

The elevator ride from the underground parking lot to the penthouse was excruciating. She could hear Edward pleading her name, apologizing like a litany, like a prayer.

"Please. Bella. Please. I'm so sorry."

The elevator doors slid open to reveal the penthouse door.

Her legs wobbled unsteadily, but she put one crutch in front of the other regardless. Click, thump, click, thump, drag.

Edward held the door open, and then Edward followed behind her. The world was whirling around her. She felt stifled by Edward: she loathed him.

It was an hour past midnight, and Esme's apartment was silent. The cacophony of the city outside was inaudible, and the furniture was draped in eerie, warm yellow light.

"Can we talk about this, darling? Please?" Edward looked ready to fall to his knees.

She bit down on her lip to keep from screaming. What the fuck was there to say? She wanted to bellow it out, but her windpipe was constricting with hate. Her CP was acting up, and she wished she could run. She wished she could kick him, that she could hit him again.

They were sharing a room. She opened the bedroom door, and her steps were clumsy. She felt like she was waddling, even though the crutches were bearing all her weight.

As best as she could, she slammed her door shut. She leaned on one crutch and rested her weight against the door to lock the door. "I love you," Edward croaked and called through the wood panelling. It sounded so sincere for such an empty claim.

Love was trust, and there was no trust between them. She wasn't even sure she knew him. "I know I fucked up, but I love you."

Isabella's father liked hunting, and she knew that some animals were able to run – run and hide – for miles after an initial bullet wound, even two. They left trails of blood and started to limp, weakened, before the final shot.

Isabella could have survived one shot, two shots.

The third shot killed her.

She curled into herself and cried.

A migraine hit sometime before dawn.

Isabella's stomach churned, a nauseous wave threatening to spill over. With each retching heave, the pain intensified, a vicious cycle of agony. She curled into a fetal position, desperate to shield herself from the onslaught. The world narrowed to a single, pulsating point hammering against her temple.

The migraine distracted her, and she fell asleep fitfully. She counted each throb the way she might have counted sheep.

Hours passed.

She woke up to the same eerily yellow glow. A digital clock glowed red, and it told her it was 3:00 AM. Her feelings throbbed hotly under her skin. She was thirsty and still nauseated. Her pain had settled into an ache in her chest. Her pain sharpened, dulled, expanded, and shrank with her every racing thought. She shattered.

She couldn't sleep. She twisted and turned. She was terrified. She couldn't cry anymore, and her anxiety was bubbling like an illness in her blood, threatening to spill out of fresh wounds.

Bella called Rosalie several times, but Rosalie didn't answer. Rosalie didn't answer.

There were shrill noises in the kitchen. Those noises woke her, forced her to open her eyes. She'd been dozing under gray and wintry light. The digital clock told her it was eleven.

All night, she had twisted uncomfortably in tulle, silk and handcrafted flowers that crumbled like papier-mâché. The dress was pungent with sweat. She shifted unsteadily and forced herself to sit up. She fumbled to reach for the frame of her wheelchair. Clumsily, she transferred her body onto it.

She was thirsty. She was so parched, in fact, that her lips felt like they were about to crack.

Groggily, she unlocked the doorknob. Through a slit, she peered into an empty, eerily quiet hallway.

She spoke to a God with whom she had an intermittent, distant relationship. She kept her prayer short. I can't face him. I can't face him. I can't face him or anybody fucking else. Please. Please. Please.

Her prayers went unanswered.

Edward was right there, and he looked like her mirror image. Hair disheveled, eyes bloodshot, still in his wedding tux, still wearing priceless cufflinks. "Baby, please," he croaked, and tears spilled down his cheeks. "It was all for you."

That would have infuriated her if she had the energy for it.

"I can't," she said hoarsely. "I can't."

She was so dehydrated that she couldn't even cry. She tried to ignore him, just because it was Too Much. She knew she had to make a decision. She'd been mulling it over for longer than she cared to admit, especially to herself.

"You need to drink water," Edward said abruptly. He shifted forward and poured her a glass. She hesitated to take it. Her tremors were out of control, and… God. Edward had always taken care of her so devotedly, so adeptly. Tenderly but firmly, he steadied her wrist while still gripping the glass.

When that failed, he brought it softly to her mouth, and she took a sip.

Edward's gesture made a sob explode from the pit of her stomach into the barrel of her throat. She spat and coughed out water. She returned to her room, and Edward trailed after her anxiously. "Can we talk?"

She shut the door.

Hours passed. Her mother asked shrill questions through a shut door. Her mother knocked on the door. Three sharp knocks, so unlike Edward's. Bella mumbled back answers.

Bella showered. Bella slept. Her headache, like her hunger, ebbed and flowed. Edward knocked on the door again. Edward called her on the phone. He knocked.

Bella dozed fitfully.

Edward knocked again, and she was surprised to hear his voice. "It's me," he pleaded at the door. "It's me. I know I fucked up. I know I don't deserve your forgiveness, but… I love you. I'll spend the rest of our lives making it up to you. I have to leave now, but...God. I fucking love you. I love you more than anything on this fucking planet."

She knew Edward had to return to Springfield on the 24th by the latest. It was the 23rd, and he had already missed his morning flight.

Her anger waged battle against any sense of decency or pragmatism.

She shifted from the bed onto her wheelchair.

Bella opened the door after unlocking it. She didn't look up.

Edward fell to his knees right in front of her. He put his head on her lap. "Thank God," he whispered.

She wasn't wearing her engagement ring: she had tucked it away in its velvet box. She was terrified of giving back the ring in its velvet cocoon.

She felt as frightened as she would at the prospect of losing an eye, an arm, a leg.

At the corner of the forest in Wharton Bay, there was a conjoined tree. Bella thought its strangeness was beautiful. "It happens sometimes," Mr. Maynard had explained. "Sometimes, the branches of two trees grow close enough to touch. The bark on the touching branches wears away, and the layer below touches. When that happens, the two trees fuse."

Edward was grafted onto her. Marriage had felt like a logical, natural next step – like a legal formality to acknowledge something that had felt bone deep and true for half her life.

It felt so unthinkable.

"I need time," she said throatily, and tears spilled down her cheeks again.

"I'll give you time," Edward said imploringly. "I'll do anything."

She felt a sharp pang of irritation, and she was so emotional that she grew angry.

"Why didn't you tell me these things? About Jane, and Aro, and fucking Felix? Why didn't you tell me?"

In her lap, Edward stiffened.

"I knew it – I knew you wouldn't agree," he said quietly. "That you wouldn't understand. And I didn't want to lose you. You're the only thing that matters."

His words speared her because they confirmed her greatest fear. Her mother's words had been prophetic less than they were evil, and they'd stuck with her all this time. You're mismatched. There's darkness in him that you will never understand, let alone love. He'll marry you eventually, and you will be deeply unhappy because it's a terrible match. His world will eat you alive.

Her mother's reasoning had seemed wrong. Her predictions seemed to be right.

"I don't think – I don't think I can - " Her whole body trembled. "Maybe it's – Maybe it's not –"

"Don't say it," Edward said roughly, and his cheek rested on her thigh, in complete submission. The fabric of her sweatpants was soaked with his tears. "Please don't."

The words came out jumbled, and snotty, and her nose was stuffed. "We grew up together, but now – maybe we need to grow up apart." Tears spilled down her cheeks, and her voice was surprisingly gentle. Surprisingly articulate.

The pain had become familiar. The shock had become a part of her.

"I've been wondering for a while – I – We – We – Life brought us together, but maybe – Maybe I – Maybe we weren't meant to last forever. I haven't been – I – We want different things, and – and I don't know you."

The words were out, and their truth was emancipatory.

"You know me," Edward said hoarsely. "You've always known me better than anyone else on the planet." He was crying, too. He lifted his head to wipe at his nose with his sleeve. He couldn't look at her. "Don't do this. Please. Please, love."

"We haven't been happy," she said, and she felt emboldened. Free. She cupped his cheek, and her whole arm was trembling. She guided his gaze towards her. She held his gaze, feeling a bittersweet wave of grief rising. His eyes pierced her, and it burned.

"I love you. I think I always will love you. I can't imagine not loving you."

That made her cry, and her tears accelerated. "But that can't save us," she croaked.

For a split second, she was scared. He'd risen to his feet, and he was feral and wounded. He tugged at his face and glowered at the ceiling as if forsaking God.

"Why can't you forgive me?" Edward asked her, imploring and accusatory all at once. "You've forgiven your goddamned parents, all three of them. And you can't forgive me?"

The answer flowed out of her in a perfectly articulate cadence even as she cried. It was excruciatingly healing. "Because I trusted you more than anybody in the entire world. I trusted you more than I've ever trusted all three of them put together."

Her breathing became uneven to the point of hysteria after that. Edward looked like she'd slapped him.

"If you don't trust me," he said, regretful, defensive, and pained all at once. Edward's blazingly green eyes were rimmed red, and his tears were spilling down his cheeks. "If this is how you feel, then maybe we shouldn't get married."

His eyes turned ice cold.

Bella closed her eyes. She hadn't been sure this was what she wanted – not with surefire certainty. She spun her wheelchair sideways, towards her bedside table. She took the little velvet case.

Gingerly, Isabella pried his shaking fist open. She placed the box on his palm and folded her fingers over his. He made a fist. Wetly, brokenly, tenderly, she kissed his knuckles. She wondered how a breaking heart could pound as loud.

Edward tore his hand away, and turned on his heels to walk away.