Shooting Stars

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And then you shot across my sky like a meteor.

Suddenly everything was on fire; there was brilliancy, there was beauty.

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Friday, September 2, 2005

10:20 p.m.

Bella

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Why on earth would a school bother starting classes on the Thursday of a holiday weekend?

Actually, I suppose my question really was: If you must start school on the Thursday before a holiday weekend, why bother assigning homework?

I tossed Romeo and Juliet aside, giving up any pretense of reading it. It was a play I enjoyed but I was beyond ready to be distracted. I checked my clock for the tenth time, wishing Edward would hurry up and get here. When I heard the tiny plink against my window I ignored it. Edward didn't waste time throwing stones at my window. He just came through it, so suddenly and silently that it seemed as though he'd simply materialized beside me.

I sighed. My angel vampire.

The plinks continued, however, and with a burst of irritation I rolled off my bed and went to investigate.

Edward was standing down in my yard, his hand pulled back in preparation for tossing another pebble. He'd changed his clothes since I saw him last; he was now wearing black slacks and a blue dress shirt, and was twirling a rose in his other hand.

I threw up the window. "What are you doing?"

He gave me my favorite crooked smile. "But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun…" I sagged against the windowsill as he continued on through Romeo's speech to Juliet, ending smoothly with: "See how she leans her cheek upon her hand. Oh, that I were a glove upon that hand that I might touch that cheek!"

I faintly quoted Juliet's next line: "Ay me!" For the first time, I really understood how she felt.

He twirled the rose again, smiling up at me. "Might I entreat my lady to come out with me tonight?"

"Yes," I said positively.

He chuckled. "You don't want to know where?"

"Don't care." I shrugged. "I'll be with you."

"Back up."

Well, that was a weird response. I did, and in the next second he was in my room, touching my face with his cold fingers. I shivered, and he pulled his hand away.

"Sorry. It's chilly out."

"I didn't shiver because I was cold," I muttered.

He laughed. "Oh Bella. I love you."

"I love you, too."

We stood smiling at each other for a moment, then he roused himself to action. "You'll need a hoodie or a jacket. Or both. And are you wearing warm socks?"

What? "Where are you taking me?" I asked suspiciously.

"I thought you didn't care," he teased me.

"Well, now I'm curious," I replied, as I changed my socks.

Hey, I've lived in Forks for almost eight months. When someone says to wear warm socks I take them seriously. In fact, it made me wonder if I should put long underwear on under my jeans. I held the thin pants up questioningly, and he nodded. "Might be a good idea."

Ten minutes later, he had me so bundled up I felt ready for the Arctic. "Hop on," he said cheerfully, presenting his back to me.

I took a step back. "Um, we could just go out the front door?"

"Where's the fun in that?" he wanted to know. He stood waiting for me.

I heaved a longsuffering sigh and climbed on, burying my face in his neck. I couldn't contain a squeak when he jumped out the window, and I felt him chuckle. Annoyingly smug vampire.

He hadn't run long, a little more than ten minutes perhaps, when he began to slow. I opened my eyes as he jogged through the trees into our meadow.

It was beautiful. There were small, white lights threaded through the trees, and in the center was spread a plush comforter topped with a huge pile of pillows, next to a small table with an oil lamp, and a cooler. He helped me down and darted away for a second, returning with the rose he had been holding earlier in a slender crystal vase. He presented it to me with a flourish and I took it carefully.

"Um, thanks. I'm surprised it survived the run."

He smirked. "I put it inside my shirt or it probably wouldn't have."

"Oh. Well, thank you." I buried my nose in it for a second. I could smell his scent mixed in with the fragrance of the rose. It was the best smelling rose ever.

"It's an American Beauty rose." He ran a cold finger down my blushing cheek. "It seemed appropriate."

"You're biased, I think."

"And you don't see yourself very clearly."

I rolled my eyes at our usual interchange.

"You don't, Bella," he insisted. He traced the features of my face with gentle fingers, then wrapped me in his arms. "You're beautiful. Inside and out."

I threaded my fingers through his hair and tugged his face down so I could kiss him. We had skirted along the edge of his carefully-set limits for several minutes when I tried to pull myself closer to him. For a glorious second I thought he was going to let me, but then he broke away and rested his forehead against mine, his breathing ragged. "Ah, Bella," he sighed.

After a moment, he disentangled himself from me and went to rummage through the cooler, asking in a perfectly normal voice, "Do you want tea or hot chocolate?"

"What?" I set the vase on the table and flopped down on the pile of pillows, shamefully out of breath.

"Tea or hot chocolate? It's so chilly I thought you might want something warm to drink. I wasn't sure which you would want so I brought both."

"I'm not at all cold." Who could be cold after a kiss like that?

He obviously took my meaning because he flashed me a grin and said, "Behave." He held up the two thermoses inquiringly.

"Tea, I guess."

He handed it to me, then pulled something out of the cooler and blew out the lamp. A second later I felt him next to me wrapping me in a blanket.

"It's warm," I breathed, surprised.

I felt him shrug. "I didn't want you to be cold. I have a few more—I was hoping we could stay out here all night."

"I wish we could. I have to be home before Charlie though." I horrible thought struck me and I almost spilled my tea. "Crap! Edward, what if he runs home to check on me? He'll have a fit if I'm not there." He would panic; I knew him. I could picture myself trying to sneak home in the wee hours and finding the house wrapped in crime scene tape.

Edward's thumb made soothing circles on my back. "Relax, love. Alice called him and got permission for you to spend the night, and after we left she packed a bag for you and drove your truck to our house. He's glad you're not home alone, actually."

I sighed in relief and capped the thermos so I could lay down next to him. "Then yes, I would love to stay out here all night with you." He chuckled and I stared up at the sky in wonder. "There are so many stars. I don't think I've ever seen so many."

"According to Alice, it'll be clear for the next twelve hours or so. It's partly why I picked tonight to do this."

"I guess it helps that there's no moon, too."

"Almost none. There's still the tiniest sliver of it, over there." I looked where he pointed and didn't see anything. "The new moon starts in the morning, not that we'll be able to tell then."

"What, you won't be able to see it with your bionic vision?" I teased him.

"Since I can't see through the earth, no, silly girl." He slid his arm under me and pulled me closer so my head rested against his shoulder.

"Doesn't seem to be very impressive then… hey, what's the other reason you picked tonight?"

I felt him kiss my head through my hat. "It's not a school night…" kiss "your father is working the overnight shift…" kiss "and this."

He turned us so I was looking up at the sky again just as the first streak of light flashed across it. What must have been hundreds of others followed over the next few hours, becoming as frequent as one or two a minute. I watched in fascination, vaguely aware when Edward got up and wrapped another blanket around me, and drifted off to sleep still seeing streaks of light across my closed eyes.

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~'* ~'* ~'* ~'* ~'*

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Saturday, September 3, 2005

1:56 a.m.

Edward

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Bella's eyes fluttered shut for the twenty-fourth time in the past seventeen minutes, this time staying closed. Another meteor burned overhead, brushing its light across her peaceful face.

My beautiful Bella.

I traced my fingers over the arch of her brow, down the curve of her cheek. Not touching her, since I didn't wish to wake her, but hovering millimeters above her skin, seared by her heat.

She is so vital. So fragile. So precious.

She is everything I'm not.

I shifted to my back, careful not to dislodge her head from my shoulder, and stared up at the sky, watching the bits of rock and dust incinerate as they entered our atmosphere. The time she spent sleeping had become a torturous mix of fascination, desire, and grief. The first two I felt constantly—sleeping or awake, together or apart, Bella was my obsession—but if sufficiently distracted I was able to suppress the grief. However, while she slept or when we were apart it seeped up out of my innermost parts until I felt as though I would sink beneath it, never to resurface.

I turned my face towards her and pressed my lips to her head, breathing in her scent, exhaling my own, until our scents melded and I could taste the perfect mixture on my tongue. Remove the blood and it was what we would smell like if Bella were a vampire, and we married and lived together for so long that our interwoven scent was embedded into all our belongings.

But Bella will never be a vampire and it is reprehensible of me to wish for it, reprehensible even to wish that she had been one when we met. She is perfect as she is.

I forced myself to keep breathing slowly, deeply, of our scent and focused on the smallest nuances of aroma and flavor, burning them into my perfect memory.

This had been such a good summer. Bella had insisted on getting a job, but we spent virtually every moment she wasn't there together. Alice was also enjoying having more time to spend with Bella now that school was out, and since Jasper naturally wanted to spend time with his wife the four of us had been doing quite a few things together. One of them was the summer concert series in Port Angeles—we were there every Wednesday that there was enough cloud cover. Bella would get food from a vendor and we would lounge on a blanket, listening to the music and looking at the mountains as the light dimmed and the water turned a beautiful silvery blue. If Jasper felt the crowd wasn't enthusiastic enough about a group or song he liked he would liven them up, while Alice and I waited to see how long it would take Bella to notice. After a few weeks it barely took her any time at all. She would roll her eyes, Alice would giggle, and Jasper would assume an expression of wounded innocence— and I was so happy. I've never been as happy as I was the past few months.

But then last week I had a wake up call. We had just arrived in Port Angeles and were halfway to the pier from the car when we smelled another vampire.

What I heard in his mind was unnerving. He was following us because he was incredibly curious about Bella. I was walking with my arm around her, but he saw it as a sign of control, not affection, and didn't realize what she was to me. He wondered why she was with us, what made her so special that we had singled her out; and went so far as to wonder if her blood was so extraordinary that we kept her alive so we could milk her for it, like she was no more than a dumb beast. He hadn't seriously considered pursuing her or attempting to take her from us—the area was teeming with humans and he'd known he had no chance of besting us in a fight if he chose to follow us. Even if we hadn't outnumbered him, Jasper's scars had caused braver vampires than this one to think twice about attacking him.

I had wanted to destroy him to prevent him being drawn back by his curiosity, but given our surroundings we had no choice but to just warn him away. Alice pulled Bella into a shop to browse while Jasper and I confronted him. With menacing attitudes (and a healthy dose of terror from the empath) we informed him he was in our territory, and we would give him only one opportunity to leave.

If it was possible, I think he would have wet himself. He was so frightened that I don't think he will ever return to the Pacific Northwest, but I must admit that it scared me as well. The incident was too close to one of my worst fears—that Bella would stumble across the path of a nomad while she was alone and unprotected, smelling of me, or of me and Alice. Any vampire would find a live human redolent of vampire to be a curious thing. Or perhaps an inquisitive vampire might wonder at our repeatedly laid scent trails to her house and follow them to her front door or her bedroom window. What if it happened when we were all far away, hunting, and Alice didn't see it until it was too late?

Bella was, and remains, blissfully unaware of what happened. I decided not to tell her as I don't want to frighten her any more than she already has been by her brushes with my world—because whether she admits it or not, she is afraid. While she doesn't seem to remember it in the mornings, she still occasionally dreams of James, of him hunting her and hurting her, and whimpers pleas for me not to avenge her. As if that would happen! If he'd succeeded in killing her, his destruction would have been my only goal and purpose, my only reason to still exist.

In the past nine days, Alice and Jasper have staged two "interventions" trying to convince me to change her. They even brought Esme in on the second one, and had Emmett call me from Africa. I wish they wouldn't pressure me this way, because it's so tempting.

I stared at her face, the gentle curve of her lips, her dark lashes resting against her cheeks, and thought of how it looks when she's animated. How she teases me and challenges me to think outside the box. How she likes to spend time with my family—well, most of them! How her warm hands feel on my skin and tangled in my hair. How she kisses me and tells me she loves me. She pulled me out of the rut I'd been in for decades, since before she was born, and infused me with life and happiness and…

I ran a tender finger down her cheek. It's so incredibly tempting. The thought of my Bella, preserved in her perfect state, never getting sick or injured, and with me forever… I turned my head away from her and stared sightlessly at the sky.

I refuse to allow myself to be that selfish.

What she has already been exposed to due to my selfishness and greed is bad enough. I've always known that my presence in her life puts her in danger. If the threat was myself then I could manage to justify being with her. I have learned to govern my lusts around her and it would be a controlled risk. But the greatest threats are no longer from myself and I cannot control them. I can try to kill them or frighten them away, but what if I were to fail? How can I take such a chance with her?

From the beginning I've tried so hard to make this work, to be able to stay with her, but I'm finally being forced to acknowledge that it's not a situation which can go on indefinitely. With every day that passes, the statistical probability of her coming to harm grows.

If I know I'm not going to be able to stay with her forever, is it a kindness to remain with her now? Or is it cruelty? Why can I never do the best thing for her? Why is it so hard to know what the right thing is?

She shifted against me, muttering incomprehensibly, and I began humming her lullaby to soothe her back into deep sleep.

I try not to burden her with my worry and guilt. When I spoke with her last spring about going to live with her mother, all I succeeded in doing was upsetting her. For weeks she spent her nights tossing and turning as she relived both the incident with James and the conversation with me.

Bella must subconsciously know that I've been thinking about this again. While sleeping this past week, every single night, she asked me to stay with her. Some nights it's the only thing she says.

Edward, stay.

Stay with me.

Please, Edward.

I feel like there's a hole tearing open in my chest. I don't want to leave her. More than almost anything, I want to spend her life with her. I've always known there was a possibility that she would grow beyond me and want me to leave, but until recently I'd never seriously considered that I might have to leave her while she still wanted me with her.

It hasn't been long enough. We've been together barely six months! If I'd known in the beginning how brief my time with her would be, would I have still wasted time trying to stay away from her? Or would I have managed to do the best thing for her and never approached her at all?

I shoved away my grief and my guilt. She had enjoyed my surprise tonight and been happy. I shouldn't waste whatever time I had left with her by being miserable. I replayed the night's events, lingering on our kiss and the fascination on her face as she watched the meteor shower. I felt a smile tip the edges of my lips. This night definitely was going on my top ten list. I reviewed what was already on there—all of it time spent with her—and considered which event should get the boot to make space for tonight.

She shivered, immediately distracting from my ruminations. "Penguins," she enunciated clearly.

I carefully slid my arm from beneath her head and retrieved the last two blankets, swaddling her in them while she muttered about the sun being warm and rolling on the deck of a boat and then, as I nestled her close to me again, she murmured my name.

"Shh, Bella."

"Edward… stay."

I nudged her knit cap out of the way and pressed a kiss to the skin over her temple, wishing I could cry. "I love you, Bella."

I lay with her pressed against me, her breath warm and moist on my neck, and tried to be happy.

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~'* ~'* ~'* ~'* ~'*

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Saturday, September 3, 2005

9:24 a.m.

Bella

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When I woke there was still light in my eyes, but this time it was the shimmer of Edward's skin dancing over my face. He smiled at me, his face smooth and untroubled.

"Good morning."

"Mm, morning," I mumbled. I tried to stretch and realized I couldn't. Edward had me so completely swaddled in blankets that I felt like a huge burrito. I couldn't even move my arms. "Um, help?"

"Maybe I should keep you this way, completely at my mercy," he suggested, a mischievous gleam in his eye.

"I'm always at your mercy." A shadow crossed his face, and I cursed myself for saying that. "I didn't mean… I just meant, I love you. Of course I'm at your mercy. I like being at your mercy. Just not as a blanket burrito."

He smirked. "Maybe I like you as a blanket burrito."

I was relieved to see the darkness was gone from his eyes. "Maybe I don't like being one."

"Maybe I just want to unwrap you." He gave me a smoldering look, and even though I was certain he was joking my heart skipped a beat. He started laughing and I scowled at him.

"Very funny, Edward. I wish you couldn't hear my heart so easily."

He cradled my face in his hands. "Your heart is the most beautiful sound I have ever heard in my entire existence."

My hands itched to touch him. "Please unwrap me?"

He kissed me lingeringly. "Maybe."

I craned my neck up to kiss him. "Please?" I whispered against his lips. "Unwrap me?"

Before I knew what was happening, I was standing up with the blankets at my feet, and Edward was on the far side of the meadow.

"You, Miss Swan, are dangerous," he called out.

I sat back down, shaking my head to clear it. "Whoa. Head rush."

In less than a second he was back on the comforter with me, his hands on my shoulders. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'm fine." I scooted closer to him, rolling my eyes as he wrapped me in a blanket before he let me lean against him. "No more burrito-ing," I said sternly.

He chuckled. "Don't worry. I've learned my lesson."

I huffed a laugh. "Good."

We sat quietly in the peaceful meadow, surrounded by the reflected light from his skin. It was beautiful.

After a long time I broke the silence. "Edward, last night… thank you. I loved it."

He replied in a voice that was almost shy, "Well, you won't let me buy you presents so I have to get creative."

"I don't need presents. I have you."

His arm tightened around me, and the shimmers danced about us as he moved his head to rest it against mine. He said regretfully, "I should get you back to the house."

I wanted to stay here with him forever. I reached for his free hand and threaded my fingers through his. "Not yet."

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When you were gone, when the meteor had fallen over the horizon, everything went black. Nothing had changed, but my eyes were blinded by the light.

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A/N: What happens when you add Edward to a fluffy one-shot? You end up sniffling in a tissue, that's what. The run-in with the other vampire in PA is (obviously) a figment of my imagination- however, I do believe that Edward was constantly calculating risk, over-thinking everything, and always had a Leaving Bella contingency plan. He was just waiting for the tipping point to implement it. Not that it was easy for him to leave, just that he always was prepared to sacrifice himself for Bella's (perceived) benefit. I also think that when his face is completely smooth and expressionless you need to be very suspicious about what he's hiding. ;) Thanks for reading- please review!