Drabble written for jenni_cn on Livejournal with the prompts Edward, Emmett and music

Just like any teenager, Edward used music to drown out his thoughts and the world. Unlike any other teenager, he was actually a century old and he was drowning out the thoughts of the countless others that clouded his brain. He had found that using music that sounded like the person helped; Wagner for Esme, Hank Williams for Jasper… it seemed to mesh the lyrics and thoughts into one, leaving the melody as the one thing remaining, lyrics and voices gone.

The hardest person to drown out was Emmett. Just like the rest of him, Emmett's thoughts were impossibly loud.

Edward didn't feel intrusive listening to Emmett, as he never thought anything he wouldn't say, but the booming voice occasionally overwhelmed everything else, including the ability for Edward to think anything on his own.

It had something to do with stimulation. The more excited Emmett got, the louder the thoughts rang. A particularly close Superbowl game one year had gotten to the point where both Edward and Jasper had to physically leave the house until it was over; Edward's head had been throbbing painfully and Jasper had been so overwhelmed with Emmett's nerves that he was shaking uncontrollably.

It was at its peak when he and Rosalie were being… intimate. There wasn't an errant thought that he didn't put into action and those actions were deafening and Edward had to hear each move three times; once when Emmett thought of it, the actual action itself, and then Rosalie's mental reaction. And then several more times when their minds thought about it again later.

Emmett roared at him from all directions.

Though sometimes Emmett's internal monologue was a welcome distraction, especially through the monotony of high school. Spanish class was the worst on the infernal torture. Twenty people thinking broken, nonsensical Spanish, which was poorly accented even in their own minds almost hurt, until Emmett broke through with his thoughts of how to beat Jasper at multi-board Risk for once or simply singing loudly to himself. It was enough of distraction. Edward didn't need to kill these students to stop their butchering of a wonderful language. Everything was quiet in comparison.

Edward would never tell Emmett that he thanked him more then he cursed him.

He heard from Emmett's thoughts that he knew anyway.

Emmett yelled it at him all the time.