The route to Bella's house was so familiar to me now, the road to my home. Esme's house would always be home to me as well, but the place where I felt the most content, the place where I was complete was wherever Bella was.
My hatred for Rosalie briefly clouded my thoughts. I knew I should have felt shame for hurting her, that the right thing would be to feel remorse, but I didn't. I felt some satisfaction, but I mostly felt anger, the need to protect Bella from that harpy.
She wouldn't be there to meet Bella. I could hear her thoughts as I left, she had no intentions of meeting Bella.
Good.
I came through her window as I always had, settling myself back into her rocking chair, waiting for her to wake.
She looked so peaceful, so content. She was dreaming and dreaming of something that made her smile, something I hoped that I had caused. I wanted to spend the rest of my life making her happy, making the smile come back on her face.
I smiled at the thought, of giving her everything she dreamed of and more. Trips to Paris and Rome, walking with her past stores, seeing her interest in an item and instantly buying it for her, just to make her happy. No jewel would be too expensive, though they would pale in comparison to the stunning clarity and depth of her eyes.
No jewel nor gem could match her eyes.
Perhaps she would one day want flowers. I would fill her room with flowers, any kind that she wanted. I hoped freesia, as it smelled like her, though roses had such a heady scent, one that begged for seduction.
I sighed. I couldn't be thinking like this. It wasn't safe.
She moaned then, the sound taking my breath away thanks to my wayward thoughts. She turned onto her side, displeased at waking up.
"Oh!" She sat up, blinking a few times at the movement.
She was a mess, a delightful mess, but a mess all the same. Her hair stuck out in all different directions, as if I had run my hands through in a hundred times during the course of the night, as I wished to, as I wanted to with the entirety of my being.
"Your hair looks like a haystack…but I like it," I told her, alerting her to my presence.
"Edward! You stayed!" She was so happy at the thought, her smile so wide, her voice so delighted. She ran across the room, jumping into my lap.
A thousand fantasies flowered in my mind.
She stiffened, looking up at me as if she had done something wrong and was awaiting admonishment. I laughed, hoping to show her that it was alright for her to demonstrate affection, indeed, it was welcome, in moderation, of course.
"Of course," I told her, my hands disobeying my mind's command to keep to themselves and starting to rub Bella's back, drawing circles on her back, enjoying the warmth and the softness she radiated.
She relaxed, her head resting against my shoulder, her breath so warm on my skin.
I wanted us to stay like this forever. Forget my family, they had forever, after all, surely they could wait another day, or two, or perhaps a week…
"I was sure it was a dream."
"You're not that creative," I told her, my ego getting the best of me.
"Charlie!" She exclaimed, jumping out of my lap and ran to the door.
I wanted to groan at the sensation of her leaving. I wanted to grab her around the waist, drag her back to the rocking chair, or perhaps the bed…
I sighed. I had more self control than this.
"He left an hour ago, after reattaching your battery cables I might add. I have to admit I was disappointed. Is that really all it would take to stop you, if you were determined to go?"
Her lips pursed as she considered the rhetorical question, looking at me longingly, then frowning.
"You're not usually this conflicted in the morning," I noted. I opened my arms to her. Please come back, I silently pleaded. Please make me feel warm again.
"I need another human minute," she admitted.
"I'll wait." I'll wait forever. I've got the time.
After an eternity she finally came back, her face so radiant upon discovering that I was still there, still with her. She came back into my arms and I held her there, finally realizing what it was like to be complete, to have the awareness that something was missing but it didn't matter anymore, that I was whole now.
I wanted to spend forever like this.
She stared up at me, frowning at something. "You left?" Her pout was so pretty, I wanted to tell her that I would kiss her and make it all better.
It wouldn't be that much of a hardship if I had to get out of these clothes…
"I could hardly leave in the clothes I came in-what would the neighbors think?" I teased.
She pouted even more.
"You were very deeply asleep, I didn't miss anything." My eyes shone as I thought of her declaration. "The talking came earlier."
She groaned. "What did you hear?"
"You said you loved me."
She blushed. "You knew that already," she murmured, burying her head in my chest.
"It was nice to hear, just the same."
"I love you," she whispered.
The words would be forever imprinted on my body, tattoos invisible to everyone but me. I would carry them forever, knowing they were there, that they were the beautiful truth that no one, certainly not I, deserved, but were granted by an angel anyway.
"You are my life now."
I rocked her back and forth, hoping she realized the sincerity and verity in my vow. She was everything to me, everything that I was looking for, everything I realized I was missing.
"Breakfast time," I announced to her. I wanted her to be herself around me and she needed to eat. She hadn't eaten since dinner.
Her eyes grew very wide, her beautiful, slim hands clutching her throat in terror. A sickening feeling ran through me like ice water.
"Kidding!" She laughed. "And you said I couldn't act!"
I frowned, the thought of killing my beautiful Bella more than I could stand, the thought that she thought me capable even worse, even if she meant her sentiment in jest. "That wasn't funny."
"It was very funny and you know it." She looked carefully at me and I gave her a smile, letting her know that she was forgiven.
"Shall I rephrase? Breakfast time for the human."
"Oh," she said, "okay."
I placed her over my shoulder, wanting to wrap myself in her warmness, finding that any time spent out of her arms was time wasted.
"Edward!" she exclaimed. "Put me down!"
I ignored her, setting her in a chair.
"What's for breakfast?"
I hadn't planned that far in advance.
"Er, I'm not sure. What would you like?"
Not that I knew how to cook. Esme bought food, occasionally made appearances at the grocery store and we were made to bring food, but all of that was for show. Food held no attraction for us anymore and I'd forgotten what it was like to have preferences.
I had never even really seen Bella eat. Was she allergic to anything? I saw her eat lunch, but lunch was different from breakfast and…
"That's all right, I fend for myself pretty well. Watch me hunt," she told me.
She grabbed a box of cereal, pouring it into a bowl and adding some milking. She sat back down, frowned, then looked up at me with uncertain eyes.
"Can I get you anything?" she asked. Her tone was so polite it was charming.
I rolled my eyes though, wondering how in the world she could still see a shred of humanity in me, enough to make her forget that I was a monster who drank only blood to survive. "Just eat, Bella," I told her.
It was fascinating. She ate with such grace and civility that was so foreign to me. There was a grace in the way we hunted and fed on our prey, but it was so savage that it could hardly be classified as civility. It looked so normal, so completely ordinary that I longed to share it with her, to sit with her and cook her breakfast and enjoy it with her. But the smell of food repulsed me and I had no means to digest the food anyway.
She swallowed, distracting me with the movement of her throat until I heard her voice.
"What's on the agenda for today?"
"Hmm…" I wondered how to phrase this correctly. "What would you say to meeting my family?"
She gulped, her face unsure. Maybe this finally sunk in the idea that I was a monster, the thought of meeting a whole coven of vampires. Maybe she finally understood that we were to be feared and kept at a distance. Maybe I finally pushed too far.
"Are you afraid now?" I asked her.
"Yes."
"Don't worry," I said, smiling, thankful that she finally saw reason, that she had some semblance of self preservation . "I'll protect you."
"I'm not afraid of them," she explained. "I'm afraid they won't…like me. Won't they be, well, surprised that you would bring someone…like me…home to meet them? Do they know that I know about them?"
Figures. Only Bella would be afraid that vampires, creatures capable of killing her and drinking her blood, creatures that weren't supposed to exist, wouldn't like her.
"Oh, they already know everything. They'd taken bets yesterday, you know, on whether or not I'd bring you back, though why anyone would be against Alice, I can't imagine. At any rate, we don't have secrets in the family. It's not really feasible, what with my mind reading and Alice seeing the future and all that."
"And Jasper making you feel all warm and fuzzy about spilling your guts, don't forget that," she reminded me.
"You paid attention," I commented, touched that she would remember the details I told her about my family.
"I've been known to do that every now and then," she said deprecatingly. "So did Alice see me coming?"
I shifted, uncomfortable. Alice maintained that Bella would one day be a vampire, that I would be the one to make her so. I would be the monster to take away her humanity…the very essence of Bella.
"Something like that," I told her, unable to look her in the eye.
She stared at me, trying to find the source of my discomfort.
"Is that any good?" I asked her, partly to change the subject and because I was curious. "Honestly it doesn't look very appetizing."
"Well, it's no irritable grizzly…" she quipped, taking another bite while I glowered at her mention of my diet.
I stared out the windows, thinking about how much Bella meant to Charlie, how he saw her as the only family he really had. So he loved her.
I turned back to her, smiling at her. "And you should introduce me to your father, too, I think," I told her, marveling how the sentence still made sense even though it was just the end of my thought.
"He already knows you," she said.
"As your boyfriend, I mean."
The word, which had so much frivolity attached to it before, when I heard it used by silly school girls with absolutely no concept of love, suddenly had meaning to me, emotion. It left me giddy, a sense of belonging. I was Bella's boyfriend.
She stared at me, frowning, as if in suspicion. "Why?"
"Isn't that customary?"
"I don't know," she admitted. "That's not necessary, you know," she said after some thought. "I don't expect you to…I mean, you don't have to pretend for me."
I smiled at her, marveling at her own ignorance. "I'm not pretending."
She washed her dish in the sink, biting her lip to keep herself from smiling. I wanted to kiss her again, but I wanted to hear the answer to my question first.
"Are you going to tell Charlie I'm your boyfriend or not?"
"Is that what you are?"
"It's a loose interpretation of the word boy, I'll admit."
She looked down. "I was under the impression that you were something more, actually," she said to the table.
Something more.
She thought I was something more.
Words couldn't express how happy I was.
Still, there was still Charlie to deal with.
"Well, I don't know if we need to give him all the gory details." I reached over, lifting her chin. "But he will need some explanations why I'm around here so much. I don't want Chief Swan getting a restraining order put on me."
"Will you be?" she asked oh-so hopefully. "Will you really be here?"
"As long as you want me," I assured her.
I walked, slowly, around the table to touch her again. So fragile! It would take me forever to get used to the spun glass of her bones and even then I doubted I would ever not think about it, marvel at it.
"Does that make you sad?" she asked me.
I couldn't answer. Eventually, this would end. She would grow up, she would find someone who could give her everything. Someone who could offer her a human life. She would leave and I would stay. Maybe she would ask to stay in touch through letters or email, but those would eventually end. She would leave, I would leave and this would just be a brief moment in eternity. She would eventually not want me to be around.
Eventually, I would be alone. Without this angel God sought to torment me with.
"Are you finished?" I asked her.
"Yes," she said, jumping up.
"Get dressed, I'll wait here."
She nodded, going upstairs, giving me a chance to look around.
The house was so cozy. From what I knew of Chief Swan he had this house built when he married Bella's mother. They stayed together for a couple of years, before she decided to leave, but he still stayed in this house. It was cheerful, whoever painted had chosen bright, warm colors. It was so warm, so quaint that I loved it.
There were pictures of Bella everywhere. Bella as a little girl, Bella as a young teenager. It was enchanting. She was a beautiful child, then a beautiful woman. I allowed myself a bit of fancy, imagining having a daughter, with Bella's eyes and my face, Bella's beautiful hair, a rich chocolate brown. She would have my long eyelashes and my musical talent, but Bella's tenacity and independence, our intelligence.
I wanted so much to meet this child.
"Okay," Bella announced, "I'm decent."
She came down the stairs as she said this, completely oblivious to me. I held my arms out, steadying her when she ran into me. I looked at her, the khaki skirt hugging her curves, the dark blue of her blouse becoming my favorite color. I pulled her closer to me.
"Wrong again," I whispered. "You are utterly indecent-no one should look so tempting, it's not fair."
"Tempting how?" she asked. "I can't change…" she offered.
I sighed. Completely oblivious. "You are so absurd," I told her, kissing her forehead.
"Shall I explain how you are tempting me?"
I traced my fingers down her spine, something I'd wanted to do since I caught a glimpse of the skin of her lower back as she slept.
I decided to kiss her again. No, decision was the wrong word. I went on instinct, the need to feel her lips against mine.
Heaven. I was enveloped in heaven, the softness of her lips welcoming mine, her scent…
She fainted.
"Bella?" Oh god, had some venom managed to touch her? Had I hurt her?
"You…made…me…faint," she said breathlessly.
"What am I going to do with you?" Finding it cruel that my kiss was all too brief. I wanted it to be much, much longer. "Yesterday I kiss you and you attack me! Today you pass out on me!"
She laughed, still in my arms. It was a small, but still nice, consolation prize.
"So much for being good at everything," I sighed.
"That's the problem. You're too good. Far, far too good."
Okay, that was a better consolation prize.
"Do you feel sick?"
"No-that wasn't the same kind of fainting at all. I don't know what happened." She shook her head, looking at me sheepishly. "I think I forgot how to breathe."
"I can't take you anywhere like this," I admonished her.
"I'm fine. Your family is going to think I'm insane anyway, what's the difference?"
She did have a point.
"I'm very partial to that color with your skin," I blurted out.
She blushed, looking away. I wished I could hear her thoughts-know if it was the right thing to say.
"Look, I'm trying really hard not to think about what I'm about to do, so can we go already?"
"And you're worried, not because you're headed to meet a houseful of vampires, but because you think those vampires won't approve of you, correct?" I had to be sure.
"That's right," she answered.
"You're incredible," I told her. Truly, there was no other word for it.
I drove her truck, telling myself for the thousandth time that I was going to have to make some modifications to this thing, or, even better, get something more suitable for Bella. We drove past the houses, past normalcy, into the forest.
To my home.