A/N: This is a fun little 3 shot with a fuckhot Drummerward and a Bella who loves classic rock. Hope you enjoy it.
"Why are you so damn weird?" Rosalie yawned and started filing her nail again.
"I don't know why are you such a bitch?" I smiled and stuffed the last of my laundry into my bag.
"I'm not a bitch, I'm just always right." She set down her nail file and stood up. "But seriously Bells, why can't you do laundry during the day like regular people?" She glanced at the clock. It read ten minutes to midnight.
"I don't know it's kind of nice. There's never anyone there." I shook my head and started towards the door. "Don't wait up."
I put my headphones on and started down the stairs and out into the chilly Boston air. It was only a few blocks to the laundry mat. I started humming along to my music while the few bums on the street asked me for my spare change.
I hurried the last few paces to the front door of the laundry mat. I pushed on the door. It wouldn't budge. Again. Nothing.
"What the hell?" I whispered to myself.
I saw the owner sweeping up the floor so I tapped on the glass. He knew me by now. I'd come in every week at the same time since I'd moved here.
He smiled and sauntered over to the door, opening it a crack.
"What's going on Stan? Why are you closed?" I shivered a little in the cold.
"Sorry Bella. We're not making enough money to stay open 24 hours a day. We're going to close at eleven now."
"Well that just…sucks," I huffed.
"There's one a block that way," he pointed down the road, "and around the corner. They're open 24 hours a day. Try there."
I peered down the road and contemplated whether or not I wanted to go the extra block or not. I shrugged my shoulders and decided it wouldn't be too bad.
"Alright thanks Stan." I started back down the street, following his directions. As I turned the corner the laundry mat came into view, lit up and completely empty. Perfect.
I pushed the door open and looked around. There was an older woman seated at a desk towards the back, reading the latest issue of the National Inquirer.
"Hello," she called, not looking up from the magazine.
"Hi," I said softly. I started towards the washing machines. Nobody understood why I liked doing my laundry so late. I thought it was kind of theraputic in a way. There was seldom anyone else around, unlike the rest of my day. Boston was a wonderful place to live but there were people everywhere.
I started separating my lights from darks, my wools from the delicates, putting them into piles on the tops of a couple machines.
I heard the front door open again and I looked up.
"Hey Carmen." The man walked over to the old woman and placed a kiss on her forehead. "How's your week been?"
"It's been good honey. How about yours?"
"Not bad." The man glanced over my way. I averted my eyes down. "Who's the new girl?" He said a little softer, gesturing towards me. I pretended like I didn't hear him and kept sorting through my clothes.
"I don't know. She's never been in here before."
The man kept his eyes on me and slapped his hand gently down on her desk. "Alright." He started towards the washing machines, stopping at one a couple down from me. He dumped his entire bag of laundry on the floor and started sifting through. He picked up a few shirts, sniffed them and then put them back in his bag. The rest of his clothes were stuffed into the washer. He reached into the pocket of his jacket and dug for some change, recovering just enough to get the washer going.
"Just a small town girl…" He started singing loudly along to the radio, not caring that he wasn't alone. "Living in a lonely world…" His head started bobbing up and down to the music as he pulled himself up on the washer and started drumming idly on his knees.
I decided to steal a look at him. I turned my head slightly and blinked several times. He was gorgeous.
There was a mop of messy bronze hair sticking out from under his black beanie hat, which complemented his lightly bronzed skin. He wore an unzipped gray hoodie ontop of a vintage looking AC/DC concert shirt and a black leather jacket to top it off. But it wasn't his laid back vintage style, or his beautifully messy hair, or his sublte hint of a 5 o'clock shadow that stopped me dead in my tracks. It was his piercing green eyes. Fuck. Me. Sideways.
He must have noticed I was staring because he turned his head slightly towards me and smiled. "Hi."
I panicked and started frantically sorting my clothes again, knocking a few articles on the floor in the process. I closed my eyes and winced as my most hideous pair of Granny panties rolled right in front of him.
The older woman came by just then, collecting wrappers and trash from the floor. "Oh I have those in red. Aren't they just the most comfortable things ever?" She grinned and pointed to the underwear. The man and I both looked down at them.
"Yeah," I said under my breath. How embarrassing. I scooped them up quickly and threw them into the pile.
"Oh sweetie don't be embarrassed. It's just underwear. You know I don't get young girls these days. They wear those damn thongs and g-strings and call them underwear. Those right there are underwear!" She pointed back to my Granny panties.
"Oh come on Carmen, thongs aren't that bad." The man joked, warranting a weak slap on the shoulder and a laugh from Carmen.
I smiled and returned to my laundry. After I'd stuffed all of my clothes into the machine I ran to the convenience store next door to grab some candy and water.
When I got back the man was alone on his washing machine, with Carmen nowhere to be found.
I pulled myself up onto my washing machine, mimicking his position on his. He jumped down as his washer stopped and transferred his clothes to a dryer across the walkway. I started munching on my licorice.
We sat in silence for another few minutes, with nothing but the sound of the machines and the radio in the background.
"Can I bum one off you?" The man slid across the machines so he was sitting right next to me, his legs dangling over the edge.
"What?" I said, confused and stunned that he was talking to me.
He smiled and nodded to the huge bag of licorice that I was eating from.
"Oh yeah. Sure." I titled the bag his way and he took one out.
"Thanks." He started chewing on it and stealing glances in my direction. I was starting to feel self conscious. Did I have drool running down my face but was too dazzled by him to notice?
"I'm Edward." He held out his hand and laughed.
"Bella." I shook his hand and turned towards him.
"Nice to meet you." He nodded, flashing a brillant crooked smile.
When I noticed he was done with his candy I titled the bag his way once again without a word. He took a few more strands.
"So what-" He started.
"Edward!" Carmen called from down a dark hallway. "Can you come lift something for me dear, it's too heavy."
"Yeah be right there." He shrugged and hopped down, running down the hallway. He was gone for a long time and in the meantime his dryer had come to a stop.
I pulled out my tattered book, flipped it to a random page and started reading.
He had one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced, or seemed to face, the whole external world for an instant and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself.
I zoned out and started imaging Edward in Gatsby's place. It was like Fitzgerald was perfectly describing him. I had gotten so lost in the story that I didn't hear him come back.
"What are you reading?" He asked as he started emptying his clothes from the dryer.
"The Great Gatsby."
He chuckled and tilted his head up in thought. "Everyone suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known." He quoted the book perfectly.
I smiled as he threw his laundry bag over his shoulder.
"Are you taking off Edward?" Carmen called, coming back into the main room.
"Yeah. Next week?"
"Same time, same place sweetheart."
He glanced back at me one more time and winked before walking out the door.
The beep of my dryer going off startled me back into reality. I sighed deeply and started gathering my stuff.
"He's such a nice boy…" Carmen said softly to herself.
I finished stuffing my clothes in my bag and walked up to the desk to throw away my trash.
"Does he come here every week?" I tried to sound casual enough.
"Every Thursday at about midnight."
"Oh. Okay." I started towards the door. "Thanks."
"See you next week honey…" She started idly folding clothes on her countertop.
A million thoughts started running through my head as I walked home. He definitely wasn't like any guy I'd met since I'd been here. He seemed funny and nice and smart. And plus he had on a classic rock band t-shirt so he had to have decent taste in music. I smiled a little inside knowing that I'd see him again next week.
My smile had spread to my face by the time I walked into my apartment.
"What the hell took you so long?" Rose said, completely irritated.
"I told you not to wait up."
"Eh. I was bored."
"You were bored sleeping?"
"Yeah its not the same when I don't have a masculine muscly hottie sleeping next to me."
"Rosalie how long has it been since you've been off the sex?"
"Two days."
"Sweetie if you're already having problems, it's going to be a long road." It wasn't that Rosalie was a skank per se. She was just thoroughly entertained by men and they were thoroughly entertained by her. It wasn't unusal for her to have a different guy here every night. We were polar opposites in every way, but we were miraculously best friends. It didn't make sense to anyone, especially us.
"So where were you secretive Sally? I know you weren't at Stan's. I walked down there when I got bored and it was as closed as your legs always are."
"I did go to Stan's…at first. But he said they were starting to close at eleven so he told me about a place a few blocks away. I went there instead."
"Was the place really that good with laundry?" She laughed a little.
"What are you talking about?"
"I've never seen someone so giddy and smiley after doing laundry."
"Oh I am not." I hadn't even realized the permanent smile that was plastered on my face. I looked down to avoid suspicion.
Rose started laughing even more. "Wait a minute I know that look." She jumped up and ran over to me. "Did you meet a guy?" She teased.
"No." I tried to wipe the grin off my face.
"You did too slut. Tell me all about it." She sat down on the couch and pulled me down with her.
"He was the only other one there doing his laundry. And he was…gorgeous. Kind of that nice bad boy look to him. And he's actually read a decent book. I mean he directly quoted The Great Gatsby back to me."
"Wow he speaks Bella. So did you ask him out? Kiss him? Screw him ontop of the washing machine?'
"No."
"Why not?"
"Well first of all he got an eyeload of my ugly gray underwear."
"Ew. Those ones big enough to be a national monument?"
"Yep."
"We need to get you some new lingerie sweetie."
"Yeah but Rose I don't wear lingerie."
"So. He doesn't have to know that." She shrugged her shoulders and stood up. "What's his name by the way?"
"Edward."
"Bella and Edward sitting in the mat. F-U-C-K-I-N-G…" She sang as she bounced into her room and closed the door. "Night skank!"
"Night bitch!" I called, wandering into my room. I could barely sleep. I already had butterflies in my stomach about next Thursday.