Chapter 25

On the way to the parking garage, Bella found herself standing outside the little church near her dorm again, staring at the giant black sheet of glass, wondering. She was dying to know what that stained-glass window looked like from inside the building.

From the outside, it was impressive mainly in size, dwarfing the east end of the church. The building was constructed of unassuming tan brick, its focal point clearly the stained-glass window she assumed was centered over the altar. Her parents weren’t particularly religious, so she had been in only a few churches before. Most of them were silent, gloomy affairs, filled with dark wood and high stained glass that filtered in little light.

But this window was enormous, and relatively close to the ground compared to the others she’d seen. She imagined that it let in a lot of light. She had the feeling it was beautiful, even though she couldn’t see any of the colors from the outside. She could only see the dark reflection of the glass between the leading. A huge likeness of Christ was superimposed over a thick, stylized cross, but he wasn’t hanging upon it like the figures she’d seen on crucifixes. He was simply standing, fully dressed in robes, arms outstretched in a welcoming gesture. Instead of thorns, a halo surrounded his head. Its roundness was echoed in a secondary circle around the cross, itself dotted with small globes containing symbols she couldn’t read.

From an artistic standpoint, she found it quite interesting. She would be taking an art history class this semester, and she knew cathedrals and religious artwork would be a big part of the course. She was curious to know how old this stained-glass window was, and what it looked like from the inside the church.

A glance at her watch told her she had a little time to kill before she had to be at work. The church parking lot was relatively empty, so she figured the Sunday service wouldn’t start for awhile yet. Next thing she knew, she found herself slowly ascending the stairs to the heavy wooden front door. She took a breath, wrapped her hand around the iron handle and pulled up the latch. The door opened in well-oiled silence, and her heart picked up its pace as she stepped into the foreign entryway.

She looked around, but saw no one. She tiptoed in on sneakered feet, silently climbing another short set of stairs that led to the back of the church. She was surprised to see that the interior was light and airy. The room was painted white, carpeted in deep crimson, and decorated with comfortable-looking sofas and chairs. She crept along the carpet, looking around in cautious awe at her surroundings.

She soon reached a set of doors that had been propped open in welcome. She peered around the corner and down the long, carpeted aisle into the sanctuary. When her eyes met the stained glass window at the end, she let out a gasp.

It was beautiful. Breathtakingly, stunningly beautiful.

She found herself slowly walking down the center aisle of the sanctuary, barely cognizant of the warm maple pews passing her on either side. Her eyes were transfixed upon the enormous image over the altar, its colors resplendent as the morning sun shone through them with uncanny brilliance.

The entire background was comprised of vibrant royal blue glass in slightly varying shades, a perfect backdrop for the golden cross upon it. The figure of Christ was robed in shades of white, green and rich scarlet; the circle around him was scarlet as well, overlaid with white globes containing symbols she still didn’t recognize. She wasn’t sure, but she thought maybe they represented his disciples. She’d heard the Christmas and Easter stories, of course; Mom had always managed to get her to a church for such occasions.

But here, looking at this amazing piece of art, she felt a reverence she’d never felt before in church. She wasn’t sure if it was the deep, glowing colors, or the serene, all-knowing look the artist had captured to represent the features of Jesus. All she knew was that for the first time, she actually felt like she might be in the presence of something greater than herself.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

She literally jumped at the sound of the voice behind her. She’d been so lost in her studies of the window that she’d failed to hear the soft pad of feet approaching on the thick carpeting. She whirled around and found herself face to face with a rather short, bespectacled man wearing a huge grin and a white cassock.

“It’s amazing,” she finally uttered after her heart stopped knocking against her ribs.

“Sorry if I scared you,” the pastor said, still smiling, not looking particularly sorry at all. “I figured Daisy and I made enough ruckus just breathing, let alone walking, to give you some warning.”

Bella flashed him a confused look before she realized what she was seeing. All at once, she took in the obvious: his amiable eyes were crinkled into unfocused slits behind their lenses of thick, myopic glass; and in his left hand he grasped a leather-wrapped bridle securing a large, liver-colored Chesapeake Bay retriever at his side.

“I’m Pastor Tim,” the man said, holding out his hand in her direction. She took it and he instantly grasped her hand tightly, giving it a warm shake.

“I’m Bella,” she managed to say.

“Nice to meet you, Bella,” the pastor boomed. “Are you going to stay for the service today? I promise, Daisy and I don’t bite. Well, she doesn’t, anyway,” he added with a mischievous grin.

Bella let out a weak laugh and knelt down to scratch the placid guide dog behind her ears.

“She’s beautiful,” Bella said.

“So I’m told,” Pastor Tim replied. “She’s my eyes, though, so I’m a little biased.”

“I’m sorry,” Bella told him, not knowing what else to say.

“Don’t be. I’m blessed to have such a beautiful pair of eyes, don’t you think?”

She couldn’t be sure, but it looked as if he’d just given her a wink.

“Daisy is a blessing,” Bella agreed. The pastor was so uncannily open that she decided to take a chance and ask him the foremost question on her mind. “So, have you seen this stained-glass window? I mean, before. . .”

“Before I went blind?” the pastor was kind enough to finish for her.

“Yeah.” Her voice was sheepish.

“No, I’ve been blind since I was a young man. Diabetes,” he explained. “Took part of my leg, too. Couldn’t take my spirit, though. The Lord made sure that stayed intact.”

“Wow.” Bella’s reply was barely audible, but she had the feeling Pastor Tim heard her.

“My parishioners have described the window to me in detail, and it’s all the more beautiful when I see it through their eyes. I’m lucky to still have my mind’s eye, too. And the imagination can be a powerful thing - more powerful than reality, sometimes.”

Bella was a little stunned by the profundity of his simple statements. “You’re right,” she agreed softly.

“Well, I just wanted to welcome a newcomer to the church. I hope you’ll stay and hear the message today. It’s a good one, if I do say so myself.” He gave her that same infectious grin, and she found herself wishing she could stay and hear more of his words.

“I’m afraid I have to work,” she told him. “I just wanted to steal a look at that window from the inside. I didn’t mean to intrude.”

He tutted and waved a dismissive hand. “You can never intrude in the house of the Lord. It’s your house. It’s everyone’s house, if they only let it be.”

Bella nodded, thanked Pastor Tim again, and hurried out of the sanctuary. She knew he meant his words of welcome, but she was beginning to feel like she had overstepped; like she didn’t belong in this place, no matter how warm and inviting it felt.

She pushed the front door open and barreled out onto the concrete landing - straight into a parishioner who was just arriving. The woman’s wide-brimmed hat was knocked from her head as Bella whizzed by, and the wind picked up strands of her neat silver bob, blowing them into the air.

“Oh God, I’m so sorry!” Bella apologized, bending down to retrieve the woman’s gauzy summer hat. The breeze lifted and carried it away before she could grab it, and she stumbled after it, her sneakers scraping the pavement.

“Oh my!” The woman exclaimed, watching the young girl scramble. “Don’t trouble yourself, I’ll get it.”

But Bella had already seized the brim. “Got it!” she pronounced, waving it in the air as she stood upright. The woman was laughing and smoothing her sleek bob with one hand when Bella handed her the hat.

“Thank you, dear,” she said with a benevolent smile. Bella smiled herself, at the woman’s elegant demeanor and English accent. She was the type of woman Bella thought she might like to be when she was older - smart, stylish, almost regal.

“You’re welcome,” Bella told her, then turned to leave.

“Aren’t you going to stay for the service?” the woman asked as she reached for the now-closed door.

“No, I have to work,” she begged off.

“Oh, that’s a shame. You should come back some time when you can. Pastor Tim is a delightful man. I was dead chuffed when I discovered him. He’s not all stuffy and holier-than-thou like so many other reverends. He speaks straight to the heart without even trying.”

“I’m sure he does,” Bella agreed.

“I hope to see you again, then.”

Bella looked into the kind-hearted eyes of the British woman and thought that maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing to come back here sometime. She watched as the woman waved her hat good-bye and opened the door of the church.

“Pastor Tim,” she called in greeting, stepping into the entry.

“Good morning, Charlotte,” was the last thing Bella heard as the heavy door swung shut behind her.

　

# # # # # # # # # # #

　

“Remind me again why I do this.”

Emmett glanced over at Edward, but the latter was still staring morosely off the terrace, his eyes unfocused in the direction of the Sound.

“What, relax at home with a beer on a Sunday afternoon?” Emmett countered, taking a swig from his Heineken. “Because it’s the law.”

That one nearly cracked Edward’s face with a grin, but not quite.

“No, why I fuck women for money,” he clarified bluntly.

“Ah,” Emmett replied, as if he didn’t already know the cause of Edward’s ill humor. “You just said it yourself - you need the money. And you don’t fuck them. Not all of them. You merely entertain them, however they desire. You provide the much-needed and appreciated service of companionship - nothing more, nothing less.”

Edward did grin this time. “I like how you toe the company line. Rose would be proud.” He glanced over and gave Emmett a suspicious look. “Does she have a recording device jammed in your shoe?”

“Possibly,” he answered with a grin. His smile faded and he gave Edward a questioning look. “You wanna tell me what this is about?”

Edward frowned and took a hefty swig of his own beer. “I just need you to remind me why I started doing this. Tell me everything I said to you in the bar that night, when you talked me into following in your footsteps.”

“Hey, I didn’t have to talk very long,” Emmett protested. “At the time, you were ready to sell all your bodily fluids and probably your first born for money.”

“Exactly. Remind me why.”

Emmett sighed before taking a deep breath and launching into the list. It had been awhile since he’d had to do this, but apparently Edward needed to hear it one more time.

“Well, you’re looking at one of the main reasons. This view. This house. Your mother’s house; your grandmother’s house. La Casa Cullen - the only physical thing that remains of your family’s history. It’s not a mansion, but it’s all you have, and in this location, the property taxes alone could bleed a man dry.”

Edward nodded. “Go on.”

“You didn’t have a clue what was really going on with your grandmother when you were away at school,” Emmett continued with another sigh. “She even managed to hide it from Alice for awhile. Then the two of them hid it from you - how much she was forgetting. How Alice had started paying the bills when Emily forgot. But even she didn’t know just how bad it was until Emily wandered off and left the stove on after lunch one day. She nearly burned the whole Goddamned house down. If Alice hadn’t come home from school when she did, both Emily and this place would have been gone.”

Edward took another mouthful of beer and swished it around in his mouth, enjoying its mild bite. “Continue.”

Emmett shook his head, wondering why Edward made him do this. Why he did it to himself. But for some reason, he needed it, so Emmett droned on.

“Well, as I recall, you were just graduating from Juilliard at the time and had planned to audition for a position with a traveling symphony. Instead, you came home to find the house, and everything else, in shambles. The Alzheimer’s had done more damage to Emily than you or Alice ever guessed. Your grandmother had neglected to keep up the insurance premiums on this property, and on herself. Unbeknownst to you, she’d taken a second mortgage out on the house to cover the college tuition and expenses your scholarships didn’t. And then there was the first mortgage that she’d taken just to pay for the expenses of raising you and Alice for the past fourteen years.”

“And why did she do that?” Edward interrupted, gazing morosely out over the water.

“Christ, Edward,” Emmett mumbled. Why was he forcing him to bring up such painful shit? He swallowed another mouthful of beer before he spit the words out. “Because, after your parents and your aunt and uncle died together in that car crash, there was nothing left. Emily sold the building they’d constructed for their new medical practice, which paid off the loans they’d taken out to build it, and not much more. And then, when she started forgetting things at work, she was let go from the law office where she’d been a clerk most of her life.”

Edward was still gazing out over the Sound, his eyes and thoughts far away. He was only half-listening to Emmett’s narration of his family’s painful past. For some reason, he kept thinking about his third piano recital at the age of eight, when he played last on the roster because he was already better than the older students under his instructor’s tutelage. His parents had been bursting with pride. Dad never even mentioned him going into medicine like he had. Instead he started calling Edward, Junior “my future concert pianist.”

Emmett drained his bottle and looked sideways at Edward. “Is that enough?”

Edward shook his head. “All of it.”

Emmett huffed a sigh before continuing. “What more is there? You came home to a very ill grandmother, a dependent teenaged cousin and a fucking mountain of debt. You told me you met with a financial wizard who started throwing around ideas like Welfare and state-funded hospitals and foster care for Alice until she was eighteen, or could be declared an emancipated minor. When he told you that the bank was about to foreclose on the house if you didn’t come up with the past few months' back payments, you nearly hauled off and the slugged the guy.”

A wan smile flitted over Edward’s face. “I couldn’t let them take this house,” he said quietly.

“Right. You couldn’t. So you did what you had to do to save it,” Emmett told him emphatically, giving him a reassuring squeeze on the shoulder before reaching into the cooler between them and extracting another beer. He popped off the top and took a draft. “You got your grandmother the specialized care she needs, in a nice place, with a staff who knows what they’re doing. You saved the family home so Alice could stay here with you and finish school, instead of being carted off to those distant relatives of hers in the Midwest who don’t have two nickels to rub together. You paid off your own student loans and even managed to pay part of Alice’s tuition so she won’t be in such massive debt when she graduates.”

Emmett paused and stared at his friend until he turned weary eyes his way.

“You manned up, Edward. You took care of your family and yourself. Maybe it wasn’t the perfect way, but you were desperate. I presented you an opportunity, and you took it. Don’t beat yourself up over this anymore. You can still do other things with your life when your escort days are through, you know.”

Edward nodded slowly, his face still tainted with bitterness. “Don’t get me wrong, Emmett - I’m grateful for your help. I don’t know what I would have done to keep my head above water back then. I was drowning. You threw me a lifesaver.” He paused and sipped more beer. “Problem is, the lifesaver is starting to strangle me.”

Emmett nodded, trying to understand. He, himself, had enjoyed his escort days immensely, for the most part. But when he considered that none of the women who hired him ever made him feel like a man the way Rosalie did, he realized why the business was getting to Edward.

“So, who is she?”

Edward was as startled by the question now as he had been last night, when his client demanded to know the same thing.

“What makes you think it’s a she?”

“Sorry, I wasn’t aware you were batting for the other team,” Emmett replied with a twinkle in his eye. “Damn, why is it always the gay ones who make the best escorts?”

“Shut up,” Edward retorted with a roll of his eyes. “Although you’re right, Laurent is our number one requested guy, and he’s more ‘bi’ than a bicycle.”

Emmett suddenly shot up in his lounge chair, a light bulb seeming to go off in his head. “It’s that girl from last weekend, isn’t it? The little pale one with the big, dark eyes.”

Edward felt his face grow warm, but chalked it up to the beer and too much sun.

“Ha, I knew it! I know your type, man. Sweet and unassuming on the outside, take-no-prisoners on the inside. Am I right?”

Edward couldn’t help but smile. “You do know me well. And her, considering you met her for all of ninety seconds.”

“Yeah, but she had that look in her eyes, like she already owned you and she knew it. And you were so clearly whipped. I should have known. Shit. Don’t get whipped by a client, man! That’s the number one rule, you know that. You let one of them in, and the next thing you know, you’re the one getting screwed.”

Edward only grinned some more, then shrugged helplessly. “I like her. She’s different from anyone I’ve ever met. The minute I leave her, I want to see her again. Do you know how long it’s been since I met a girl I couldn’t wait to see again?”

Emmett shook his head sadly. “Yep. You’re screwed.”

“Never, that’s how long,” Edward continued, undaunted. “I can’t remember the last time anyone made me feel that way. At Juilliard, I was so focused on my career that I didn’t want to take the time to maintain an actual relationship. That’s why I kind of enjoyed the escort business at first. No-strings sex was something I’d tried like hell to have all through college, and finally I was not only getting it, I was getting paid for it. It was like winning the lottery twice.”

Edward’s grin faded. “But it didn’t take long to realize what a hollow victory it was. When the novelty wore off, so did the satisfaction. Before I got in this business, I never imagined the day would come when sex would just be routine, like brushing my teeth every morning. But that’s exactly where I was when I met Bella. I was at a point where I expected nothing. Wanted nothing. She couldn’t have caught me more off guard.”

Emmett was still shaking his head. “You poor bastard,” he said with a sigh. “You’re so fucked.”

Edward nodded in futility. “Fucked.”

“You’re not doing anything stupid, are you?” Emmett asked in a warning tone. “Like trying to see her on the side?”

Edward’s eyes flickered briefly to Emmett’s, then back out over the water. “I don’t know. I might be.”

Emmett’s groan was loud and foreboding. “I’m gonna pretend I didn’t hear that. And if Rose asks me anything about why you’re acting screwy lately, I will plead total ignorance.”

“Am I acting screwy?”

“A little. Maybe no one else notices.”

“My date last night noticed.”

Emmett’s look was one of mild horror. “Don’t tell me. . .”

“Okay, I won’t tell you that I almost couldn’t get it up. I was so fucking tired, and I couldn’t get Bella out of my head, especially one week to the day after I was with her. . .”

“I am not hearing this.”

“Bella was a virgin. Did I tell you that? She was a fucking virgin and actually paid my sorry ass to be her first. How fucked up is that? It’s, like, inconceivable to me. And yet that’s what she wanted. I was who she wanted. And she still wants me. She still sees something in me. . .”

Emmett groaned in defeat. His friend was far more gone than he ever suspected.

“How old is she, anyway? She looked young.”

“She’ll be twenty in a couple of weeks,” Edward admitted, feeling a little sheepish.

Emmett groaned more loudly. “She’s still in college? That is trouble, my friend. With a capital ‘T.’ She’s too young.”

“She’s not that young -”

“She’s too young,” he reiterated sharply. “Forget about it. Call her up in a couple of years after she graduates and see if there’s still something there. Maybe by then you’ll have your finances in order enough to quit the business. But you’re crazy if you’re considering trying to keep something going with this girl right now.”

Emmett could see his friend’s reluctance to follow his advice. He turned sideways in his chair, leaning in to look Edward straight in the eyes. “I’m serious, man. You need to let this one go.”

Edward’s face had an expression Emmett had never seen before, a strange combination of desperation and determination.

“That’s the thing,” he said, his voice pulled tight as a drum. “I don’t think I can.”



# # # # # # # # # #

　

Alice Cullen stared at the book store queues in utter dismay.

"Disgust" was more like it. She couldn’t even see the ends of the lines at first. They snaked through the store like dancing Chinese dragons on a congested parade route through Chinatown. She thought she’d found the end of one until a large, pasty-faced girl glared at her and barked, “Get to the back of the line! No cuts.”

Alice hoisted her basketful of books higher on her hip and followed the string of people like a trail of breadcrumbs until she was almost out the front door.

“Shit,” she muttered to herself, settling in for the long haul to reach a register. Edward was right - she shouldn’t have procrastinated.

Edward was always right, much to her annoyance. Well, about most things. She would never agree with his decision to be an escort, even though the mountain of debt their grandmother had accrued looked insurmountable back then. She always thought there had to be a better way, especially with the talent he possessed. Even when Edward pointed out to her that he was making five times more money as an escort than he would have as a symphony pianist, and received a car and wardrobe allowance to boot, she kept trying to come up with a better idea. But she was only a teenager in high school, working as many part-time hours as she could manage in order to pitch in. She didn’t have any easy answers.

But Edward thought he did. He even tried to tell her it was his dream job - it was every man’s dream job. Alice knew better. She might have believed him if he’d been some womanizing man-whore all his life, but he was always quiet and even a little shy, never quite realizing just how attractive he was to the opposite sex. He was so absorbed in his musical ambitions that everything else, including girls, came second. That’s why it killed her to watch him cut himself off from his lifelong dream just to take care of her and their grandmother, and to save that stupid old house. He’d treated his budding music career as if it were a limb he’d had to sever to get out of a trap, leaving it behind without so much as a single look back.

But she saw that phantom limb haunting him still, the ghost of it lingering in his wistful eyes. The pain of his sacrifice made her angry sometimes - made her wish horrible, irrational things. She often found herself hoping her grandmother would die soon, and then hated herself immediately afterward. But the truth was, so much of the woman she loved had disappeared already that the shell remaining seemed to exist primarily as a cruel joke on all of them. If Edward weren’t paying for Emily’s nursing home care, he might be able to handle the mortgages with a regular job instead of the quasi-illegal one to which he’d resorted. She knew why he was so attached to the house, and everything in it. It was all that remained of the family they’d both lost too soon.

Alice finally set her heavy shopping basket on the floor with a thud and an irritated sigh. She heard a soft chuckle in the queue to her left. She looked across a couple racks of U-Dub apparel to see a cute blond-haired boy giving her a lopsided grin. He nodded down at the floor where his own overflowing basket of books lay, then gave it a kick as his line inched forward.

“I decided I’d save my weight-lifting for the gym,” he drawled in explanation. His accent earmarked him as a recent Seattle import from the south.

Alice giggled. “I’m saving my weight-lifting for. . . never,” she replied.

He let out a short, deep laugh at that. “At least you’re honest about it.”

She shrugged and gave her own basket a kick after the person ahead of her moved up. “If we ever decide to take up soccer, though, we ought to be pros by the time we get to the register.”

The blond boy’s grin deepened. “I like how you think.”

“I like how you talk. Where are you from?”

“Texas. Houston, originally,” he added.

“Really? Cool. Are you a freshman?” she asked hopefully.

“No, a junior. But I just transferred here from Texas Tech, so I kind of feel like one.”

“Well, I’m new to U-Dub, but not to Seattle. Maybe I can show you around sometime.” Alice never believed in beating around the bush, and she already liked this Texas transplant, with his easy manner and easier smile.

“I’d like that,” he said, his cheeks coloring slightly. He looked a little bashful, and it nearly drove her mad with attraction.

“I’m Alice, by the way,” she called over the clothes racks, leaning through the t-shirts and offering her hand. “Alice Cullen.”

“Jasper Whitlock,” he replied, reaching through some sweatpants to grasp her hot little fingers in his. “It’s a pleasure.”

She squeezed his strong hand for a moment before letting go. “It most certainly is,” she said under her breath.

“Come again?”

“Oh, I hope to,” she answered with a grin.

Twenty feet ahead, Bella Swan’s ears had perked up. Amidst the babble surrounding her station, she was sure she had heard the name “Cullen.” Absolutely positive, in fact. She craned her neck and looked down the line, and the line of the register across from hers, vainly hoping to see Edward in the throng. But she realized quickly enough that she would have recognized that gravity-defying hair of his, sticking up above the mops of tamer, shorter heads around him. Her brief surge of excitement quickly died and she continued to scan books with the bored precision of a robot.

Alice and Jasper each reached their registers at approximately the same time and gave each other knowing grins across the aisle before lifting their baskets in unison.

“The finish line!” she exclaimed, which made Jasper emit one of those deep chuckles that already made a little zing of excitement shoot through her veins.

She slammed the heavy shopping basket atop the counter and gave the cashier a triumphant look. The girl’s brown eyes widened for a moment, and then she let out a laugh as she looked into Alice’s exultant face.

“Hey, reaching this cash register has been the ultimate triumph, like completing the Boston marathon. It’s practically the pinnacle of my weekend,” she said. “Which doesn’t say much about my weekend, does it?”

She let out a rueful laugh, and the cashier joined her. When she began to lift her books from the basket, Alice quickly dove in to help her.

“Oh, you don’t need to do that,” the brown-eyed girl said, shooing her hand away.

“Are you kidding? You’re the one standing here doing heavy lifting all day. Let me get them. Besides, I’d better get used to hauling them around campus, right?”

“Right,” the cashier agreed. She let Alice retrieve the books and hand them to her one by one so she could scan them.

“Teamwork,” Alice told her with a grin.

The girl bit her lip and grinned. “Yeah. Thanks.”

“De nada,” Alice replied, digging through her purse for her wallet. She handed her student I.D. to the cashier, who ran it through the sensor and then checked the signature on the back. Suddenly the girl’s dark eyes widened, and she stared up at Alice with a stunned expression.

“What - is it declined?” Surely not. Edward didn’t let things like exceeded credit limits happen.

“No, it’s fine,” the girl answered, staring at the card again, then Alice. “It’s just - you aren’t related to Edward Cullen, are you?”

Alice’s eyes narrowed. Edward only used the surname “Cullen” when he was escorting. He didn’t like to use his real name, though he never said why. Alice figured it was his way of removing himself slightly from what he was doing, though he’d often said that he should just change his name to “Cullen,” to match that of his only surviving relatives. Either way, if this girl knew him as Edward Cullen, then she knew him through Renaissance Escorts.

Alice gave her a quick once-over. She didn’t know what Edward’s clients were usually like, but she couldn’t imagine that this girl was typical. She was young and attractive, if a bit awkward. What would she be doing hiring a date?

“Edward is my brother,” she replied. She figured this was a good test. Anyone who really knew Edward would know he was an only child, though Alice always considered him her brother. She was barely five when their parents died. She had only a few faded memories of them, but she had tons of memories of ten-year-old Edward moving into Em’s house with her, being her playmate and later protector, just like a brother would.

“Brother?” The cashier’s forehead crinkled and her face fell. “Oh. I’m sorry. I think it must be a different Edward Cullen, then.”

Alice’s interest was piqued. “Maybe,” she said. “How do you know him?”

The girl’s eyes flashed with something that looked a little like embarrassment. “He’s a friend of mine, that’s all,” she said, averting her gaze as handed Alice her I.D.

“I’m meeting a friend.” Edward’s words from the other day echoed in Alice’s ears. She studied the cashier again with interest. She wasn’t even sure what Edward’s type was, but if he had one, this girl might be it. Pretty, but not fussy; hard-working, honest-looking.

“Did you meet him Friday morning for breakfast?” Alice asked point blank.

The girl’s eyes popped open again. “Yeah. Did he. . . mention me?”

Alice glanced surreptitiously at her nametag. “As a matter of fact, he did, Bella.”

The girl’s cheeks turned bubble-gum pink and her lips stretched into a bashful smile. Geez, what was with all these self-conscious, shy types? Alice was surrounded by them. She took a quick peek over her shoulder to make sure the other bashful one, Jasper, hadn’t escaped during her conversation. He seemed to be lingering at the end of the counter, checking his bag, doing a book count. Shit, she didn’t have much time - she didn’t want that one to get away.

She turned curious eyes back to Bella, wondering how she’d met Edward, and exactly what she meant to him. He obviously meant something to her. But Edward had that effect on most women without even realizing it, the oblivious fool.

“Listen. Edward isn’t really my brother, but he might as well be. I love him to death and I want nothing more than to see him happy. And the other morning, when he was leaving to meet you, he actually looked happy for the first time in a long time.”

Bella looked even more pleased, if a little flustered; and Alice realized that this girl was one-hundred-percent gone over her cousin.

The question was, how did he feel about Bella?

Alice whipped her neck to the side to make sure Jasper hadn’t left; he was ambling toward the door. She turned back to face Bella, then scrambled in her purse for a pen and some paper.

“This gum wrapper will have to do,” she muttered. “Give me your phone number, would you? I’d like to talk to you some time about Edward. If that’s okay,” she added hurriedly.

Bella’s eyes were round and fawn-like once more. “Sure,” she said, then rattled off the numbers. Alice scribbled furiously and jammed the paper and pen back in her purse.

“Thanks, Bella. It was great to meet you. I’ll call you soon!”

And with that she was sprinting for the door, not caring how forward that might look to the laid-back Jasper Whitlock.

Bella stood gaping after her, wondering what had just happened. The loud smack of another customer’s books hitting her countertop diverted her attention from the aftermath of Hurricane Alice. She had no choice but to return to the drudgery of her job and hope that particular storm would revisit her soon.

　

　

Chapter 24

Junior is a no-show.

Edward tries to remember if this has ever happened to him before. He recalls a few times when Junior was reluctant to rise to the occasion, but eventually its baser needs eventually won out over any reservations Edward may have had about the object of its affections. Junior has always reigned victorious, because it is still only twenty-four years old, and its needs are often more powerful than the feeble protestations of Edward’s mind. In the battle of wills between penis and brain, the smaller organ generally has had no trouble exerting its will over the larger.

But now, a third party has charged the battlefield, and its arsenal of weapons is proving far mightier than those of its rivals.

In tonight’s fight for supremacy, the clear winner is Edward’s heart.

His date is unaware of the war being waged beneath the surface of Edward’s coolly handsome exterior. He looks a bit tired, she thinks; that must be the problem. She knows it’s not her. She has been assured more than once that she is attractive, even beautiful. She doesn’t need to hire a man to get a date. But she’s in between boyfriends right now and she’s bored. Paying an escort to do her bidding gives her a kick. She enjoys being wined and dined and treated like she’s the most special woman in the world, and even the best of men have trouble keeping up that level of attention after awhile. She knows all too well why the idiom “familiarity breeds contempt” exists. So she hires an escort when she wants the respect afforded only from a stranger.

Edward figured this out within the first half hour of their date. He has not lost his touch at reading between the lines; at least, not with most women. He has found the majority of them to be transparent, to varying degrees. This is why he’s had so much success as an escort.

He has been quite successful so far this evening, only too happy to flatter and amuse and seduce this woman, because these are the things at which he is adept. He is comfortable skating along the surface, telling her what she wants to hear. He has drawn out this part of the evening as long as he could, because he knew eventually she would not be satisfied with merely the surface. And sure enough, his seduction has worked - she wants more.

She is all over him like a cheap suit, replacing the expensive one she peeled from him like the skin from a juicy apple. She wants to take a bite, and she wants to be bitten in return. But he finds only poison in her, leaving a bitter taste in his mouth and a limpness in his bones. She puts more effort into her ministrations, continuing her exhortation to bring him to life; but her charms and skills are not enough to undo the spell of the fairer one who came before her.

He watches her honey-colored head bob between his legs, and the color reminds him of his mother’s hair. He groans, but not in the way his date desires. He grabs a hank of the offending strands in his hand and pulls, interrupting her efforts to resuscitate the limp carcass of Junior that flops next to one thigh.

She sighs in mild exasperation and slithers up his body, letting her impressive tits hang in his face. He knows it is a landmark day when he remains unfazed by a rack like this.

“Who is she?”

He is surprised to hear these words leave her lips. He looks into her eyes, and sees a glimmer of empathy, maybe even pity.

“Who’s who?” he answers, ineffectually playing dumb.

She’s not playing. “The girl who’s fucking with your mind so that I can’t fuck with your body.”

Startled, he lets his guard drop, and she glimpses the real guy under the glib surface. Edward sees something real in her, too; something he could like, under different circumstances. He wants to tell her the truth, but he can’t say the fairer one’s name out loud. It would be sacrilege. He has already changed hotels, because he knew he could not entertain this woman in that suite, especially not one week to the night after her. He has done everything he could to remove this situation from that one; to make this a separate world unto itself. But he cannot divide himself in two, no matter how he tries.

His date sees this. And yet he still cannot defile the truth by sharing it with her.

“I’m just tired,” he says. At least that much is not a lie.

“Occupational hazard?” she asks with a sardonic laugh.

The ghost of a grin haunts his lips. “I didn’t sleep well last night. I’m sorry.”

His date lets her hazel eyes roam over his lovely, somewhat tragic features, and she feels sorry for him. That’s a new one for her, and certainly not what she paid for. But something in her won’t give up on this one. He’s a good guy - too good for this gig. Yet here they are, and she is going to make the best of it.

“You know what? I’m going to give you a pass. I’ll do all the work this time. You just close your eyes and dream. Imagine whoever you want,” she says, her voice softening. She leans down and kisses him softly along one high cheekbone, and though his brows knit, his eyes flutter closed. He is only too happy to lose himself in illusion. He succumbs to the lure of his own imagination, and Junior follows.

“That’s it,” his date coos, planting a kiss on the opposite cheek. “Close your eyes and dream, sweet prince.”

　

# # # # # # # # # # #

　

“So, when did you stop liking Adam Sandler movies?”

Bella looks across the car seat at Mike in surprise. “What do you mean? I love Adam Sandler.”

“You didn’t laugh once during that movie,” he replies with an accusatory quirk of his brows before shifting his eyes back to the road.

“Sure I did,” she argues. “You just didn’t hear me.”

He lets out a laugh of his own. “I know what your laugh sounds like. Besides, every time I looked over at you, you had this totally preoccupied frown on your face. Kind of like now.”

Her frown turns to a scowl. “Shut up. I did not. I thought the movie was funny. I was laughing on the inside. I’m sorry if I don’t howl like a baboon so the whole theater turns and looks at me, like some people I know,” she shoots back with a grin.

“Nice. Real nice, Bella,” he replies, putting his hand over his heart as if he’s been wounded. “At least people know where I stand. You never have to wonder what’s really going on with me - I just let it all out there. What you see is what you get.”

She smiles then. “That’s true. That is actually one of your nicer qualities.”

He gives her an exaggerated look of stunned surprise. “I’m surprised you found one. Seems like back in the day, I could never seem to do anything right.”

“That’s not true,” she denies, although when she thinks back, she realizes maybe it is kind of true. She’d never known exactly what was missing in their relationship, so she expressed her overall dissatisfaction in subtle ways, constantly nit-picking and pointing out even the smallest of Mike’s flaws. He didn’t deserve that, and she ended up disliking herself more than she ever did him.

She looks at him now with latent guilt. “I’m sorry for the way I treated you then. I was pretty immature. I didn’t really know why I was unhappy, and I took it out on you. That wasn’t fair, and I’m not proud of it. I am sorry about that.”

His surprise is genuine this time. “We were both immature then,” he says with a shrug. He suddenly laughs and adds, “Man, if this car could talk! Think of the stories it would tell.”

He waggles an eyebrow at her and makes her giggle. He is still driving what used to be his dad’s Civic, but now belongs to him, a going-off-to-college gift. She is fairly certain that every single time he took her out on a date back then, he’d lured her into the back seat and tried to wrestle her out of her clothes.

“You were relentless,” Bella remembers, side-eying him and shaking her head. “I almost gave in a couple of times.”

“Don’t be fooled - I’m still relentless,” he says with a grin. “As soon as we get this sucker in the parking garage, it’s on like Donkey Kong.”

He lets out a wolf howl and Bella laughs in earnest, swatting away his roaming hand before it can creep over the center console and give her thigh a squeeze.

Mike likes that he has her laughing, especially after the movie failed to do so. If he can make her happy, maybe he can make her feel other things, too. He’s half elated, half frustrated that Bella Swan still provokes the same feelings in him she always has. She is as warm and real as ever, and twice as pretty; but that same vaguely stand-offish vibe she has always emitted is stronger than ever, surrounding her like an invisible force field. He wants to charge through it with the heroic fervor of Luke Skywalker brandishing his light saber, but he fears that instead of arriving on the scene too early, this time he has come too late.

Han Solo has already beat him to the punch.

They are quiet as they pull into the parking garage near their dorms. Bella feels the silence as an easy one, but Mike’s interpretation is that of tension. He is about to ask her questions to which he’s not sure he wants the answers.

He debates taking her hand as he walks her to her room, but she is moving briskly ahead, not at the leisurely, romantic amble he would have liked. He hurries along with her, the pace making him blurt out his query with much less nonchalance than he wishes.

“So who was that suit guy who showed up to take you home last night?”

Bella is frowning slightly again. She barely glances at Mike out of the corner of her eye before answering, “Just a friend.”

Mike lets out a derisive laugh. “Well, he was pretty over-protective of you, for being just a friend.”

Bella slows down slightly and gives him a curious look. “You think so?”

“Yeah. He was looking at me and Riley like we were the lowest forms of human life. I mean, come on,” he scoffed. “Like I’d ever let anything happen to you, or take advantage of you.”

“No, I know you wouldn’t,” she agrees quickly. “I guess he’s just worried about me.”

Mike can see she’s fighting a smile. So she likes that this other guy came across like some crazy, possessive freak. Great.

“Yeah, well, he went overboard,” Mike tells her. “Where did you meet that guy, anyway? Dude was kind of creepy.”

“Creepy?” she exclaims. Then she laughs like he’s an idiot. “Edward's not creepy at all. He’s about the sweetest guy I’ve ever met,” she says defensively, and Mike feels a little nauseous.

“Edward? What the fuck kind of name is that?”

“It’s a classic name. You know, like the name Michael. Except he’s not into being called Ed or Eddie,” Bella says with a lip-curl of distaste. “You can hardly blame him for that.”

She is practically marching up to the entrance of McMahon Hall now, Mike stomping alongside her with matching militant zeal. This is not at all how he wanted this night to end. When he’d called her earlier to see how she was, he thought offering to take her to a movie would lift her spirits and make her feel better. He figured her request to see “something funny - so funny it’s stupid” was a good sign. Maybe they could have a laugh, reminisce about the past, and then talk about their present and future. They have done exactly that. But clearly they have different ideas about the present, and where they want the future to take them.

By the time they reach Bella’s door at the end of the hall, Mike is feeling repentant.

“Look, I’m sorry I made a crack about that guy. He’s obviously important to you, so. . .” he trails off, not sure what else to say. If she wants to date some creepy older suit-wearing guy, who is he to stop her? This Edward dude probably has money coming out of his ears. Mike is lucky Bella was willing to share the tub of jumbo popcorn at the movie.

“It’s okay,” she answers. She looks melancholy now; he’s not sure why.

He gathers his courage to blurt out the other thing he wants to say.

“So, is it serious between you and this Edward guy? If it is, just say so. If it’s not, well. . . I’d like to see you again. Even if it’s just as friends. I’ve missed you, and I had a good time tonight. I’d like to do it again.”

Bella looks into Mike’s earnest blue eyes, as bright as the sky on a cloudless day. She wants to tell him that what she and Edward has is as serious as it gets, but how can she be sure? Instead, she tells him the truth.

“I don’t know what I have with Edward. I know what I want, but I don’t know if it can work.” She frowns and looks down at the ugly gray carpet, then the ugly plaster wall, then the ugly silver door handle clutched under her fingers. Finally she lifts her gaze back to the blue. “I think we’re a lot better off as friends, Mike. But I’d like to do this again, too, if being friends is okay with you.”

Mike’s heart is heavy, but it hasn’t sunk completely. He gives her a grin far more cocky than he’s feeling.

“I think I could do the friend thing with you.” He’s not sure this is true, but he’d like it to be. And if this thing with suit-guy doesn’t work, it wouldn’t be so bad to be the one helping her pick up the pieces, would it?

Bella smiles, and Mike tries not to see the relief in her expression. “Thanks,” she says. “For taking me to the movie - for being a good friend. I appreciate it.”

He smiles and tells her, “No problem,” even though it is kind of a problem, but one he hopes he can deal with. They share an awkward hug that he desperately wishes was more, but he’s too much of a pussy to kiss her when she basically just told him, “I really want the suit dude, but if you wanna hang around in the wings just in case, I’d be cool with that.”

He’s still mentally calling himself a pussy as he walks down the hall. The word reverberates in his head all the way back to McCarty Hall.

Bella gets ready for bed, then lies down, sniffing the pillows for any remnant of Edward’s musky scent lingering there. She checks her phone for messages, but sees nothing new. It is near midnight. She knows, deep in her heart of hearts, what Edward is doing right now. She knows.

She thinks back to what she and Edward were doing one week ago tonight, right now. He was shattering her world irrevocably with every touch; with the thorough and systematic invasion of her body, mind, heart and soul. She can only pray that no matter what he is doing now, he is not changing someone else the way he did her.

She re-reads the series of text messages between them from earlier this evening.

Hi. How are you feeling? Better, I hope.

Slowly but surely. You witnessed the worst of it - got the brunt of it, too. I’m so sorry about your shoes. Unforgivable.

Nothing you could do would be unforgivable, least of all that.

I’ll remember you said that. BTW, I loved your addition to my poem. Can’t believe you read that tripe. You really have seen the worst of me now.

I’ve seen the best, too, and it showed in that poem. Stop putting yourself down. Pisses me off.

Duly noted. So you’re a poet, too, Mr. Cullen. Your verse made me cry.

Why?

Because it touched me. Because I want it to be true. Because I want you. I want “we.”

She remembers there was a pause between messages then. She waited what felt like hours for his reply.

You kill me when you say these things, he texted at last.

Kill you, how? In a good way or bad way?

I don’t even know. You don’t hold anything back. No games. I’m not used to it.

Bella pauses as she’s reading, because she has just realized she is honest with Edward in a way she was never able to be with Mike. She wonders why. Maybe it’s because she has nothing, and everything, to lose with Edward.

I’m not interested in playing games with you. Well, some games might be fun. But you know what I mean.

I do know what you mean. And I realize I want it all with you. . . The games. The truth. Whatever it is. However I can get it. But I don’t know how to do that without hurting you.

Bella had paused then, because she didn’t know how he could do that either.

Just give me your truth in return, she finally texted.

The truth is, I miss you. I will miss you tonight like crazy.

She wanted to remind him it was their one-week anniversary, but it hurt too much to point out the obvious.

Ditto, she replied. Like Crazy.

She feels crazy now. She puts the phone aside and stares at the ceiling, trying to shut off her brain. Trying not to think about what she knows he is doing right now. She squeezes her eyes shut and relives her night with him instead. She can almost feel the warmth of his touch, the hypnotic trance of his eyes locked with hers, the heat of his breath on her face, the intensity of him moving over her and inside her. She recalls the pain and pleasure of him filling her to overflowing, pushing her to her limits and then beyond.

But this time, she imagines ecstasy overwhelming every other sensation as he thrusts deeper and harder and faster inside her. She realizes she is touching herself, stroking in time to Edward’s movements in her mind. Her hand and Dream Edward pick up the pace, attacking with a frenzy that makes her belly tighten and a fire ignite within, growing until it engulfs her completely.

She cries out softly as she comes, but she is not worried about anyone hearing her beyond the thick walls of her tiny room. She is not really here, anyway.

She is miles away, in a bed of sumptuous silk, with her dragon slayer, her poet, her prince.

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

Chapter 23

The Search For Me

I have an idea plaguing me--
A notion of the ideal “me”
Found in some idyllic place
Lost in your idyllic face.
Why do I think you hold the key
To the new and improved me?

The sage would tell me, look within
And give myself a different spin.
But I’ve taken myself for a drive
And still I haven’t yet arrived
At the place I want to be
Living in that brand new “me.”

I view your two-dimensional face
And see much deeper than that space
I know that you will fill my need
And plant the seed
That hunger feeds
Driving me down to my knees
And ridding me of my disease.

Fill me, change me--
Make me whole.
Cast me in a brand-new role.
Shed me in a different light,
Let me see through your insight.

This is my unspoken plea
When I meet you in 3-D.
You take my hand and lead me there
Open me and lay me bare
Make me leave my search behind
And look instead within to find
The “me” that’s lived here all the while
Revealed in your divining smile.

I lie and gaze into the green
And realize how wrong I’ve been.
I see my reflection in your eyes
And know the folly of my lies--
The foolish tales I told myself
To protect me, hidden on my shelf.

I only need now to be brave
And give in to the thing I crave--
To let you see imperfect me
And find the beauty I can’t see.

Suddenly I know what’s true--
I see the “me” who touches you.
The me who makes you sigh and come
The me who makes you come undone.
I like the “me” I am with you.
Surprisingly, you like her, too.

You like the “you” you are with me--
We bring each other clarity.
There is no room for falsity
Amid such naked honesty.
In you I found much more than “me”
And you discovered more than “he.”
It took one fateful night to see
The pronoun trumping all is

“We.”

　

Edward sat at Bella’s desk, reading the poem again. He’d already read it several times this morning, having given up on the notion of sleep after a long, restless night. Every time he did, the words stabbed again, in different places, each more sensitive than the last. As poetry went, he didn’t think it was half bad, though he didn’t know much about that particular mode of expression. He didn’t really care if it was good or not. It was about him - about them. It made him ache inside again, stirring up those same maddening, bittersweet feelings he’d fought all week. After his fifth time studying the poem, he thought it might be the most beautiful thing he’d ever read.

Bella thought otherwise. At the bottom of the page, she’d written:

Geez, Swan. Rhyme much? You sound like friggin’ Dr. Seuss. Give up and go make some green eggs and ham, Swan-I-Am.

Every time he read this, Edward chuckled. Then he’d look over at Bella’s pale, shiny face as she sweated out last night’s poisons in her sleep, and he wanted to shake her and tell her how fucking amazing she was, and ask her why she didn’t get that. Why had she looked for validation in him, of all people? And more incredible, how was it that she seemed to have found it in him?

He thought back to that evening one week ago and tried to remember exactly what he’d said or done that made such an impression on her; that bolstered her fragile ego enough to make her write these words about their fateful meeting. Her inability to view herself clearly had frustrated him from the start. He had only spoken the truth; made her try to see what was real instead of imagined.

And now she imagined they were a couple.

Were they?

He had certainly behaved like a jealous boyfriend last night, coming to her aid like some demented knight in rumpled suit clothes. He wasn’t sorry he’d come. He didn’t trust those two idiot college boys as far as he could throw them. They were equally suspicious of him, but thankfully he seemed to intimidate them a bit. His tall stature and ability to give a menacing glare from under heavy brows had gotten him out of fights a few times before. Back then, he’d been concerned about preventing any injury to his pianists’ hands. And now he couldn’t afford to get arrested and put Renaissance Escorts in jeopardy.

But he suspected that nothing would deter him from protecting Bella.

He shoved his chair away from the desk and got up to roam the claustrophobic room once more. He checked his shoes, sitting on the windowsill next to the air conditioner - still damp. He’d cleaned them up in the small dorm sink as best he could. He would have fun explaining this one to Rosalie. She was fairly generous with her employees’ wardrobe allowances, since it behooved her to make sure they looked as well-put together as possible. Surely this wouldn’t be the first time she’d had to replace an escort’s fine Italian leather shoes for such occupational hazards as being vomited upon by drunken clients.

Bella’s little friends had certainly found it amusing when she unloaded all over the sidewalk in front of him. Edward, on the other hand, was more relieved than annoyed. He preferred that she purge some of the alcohol from her system before it did any more damage. But the idiots escorting her home found it hilarious, which incensed him. How could they find humor in Bella being so sick? He supposed they were merely enjoying him and his shoes getting the brunt of it.

At least the blond kid had the good sense to look guilty about his laughter afterward. Edward surmised he must be Mike, the ex-boyfriend. He looked innocent enough. But the other, darker kid, not so much. Edward peered into his bloodshot eyes, then narrowed his own.

“What is she on?” he demanded as he drew a moaning and apologetic Bella into his arms.

The kid’s dilated pupils widened. “What do you mean? Nothing, man. She just had a little too much to drink.”

“Is she stoned?”

The kid’s face went sheepish, and Edward had his answer. He turned to Mike.

“What did she drink?”

“I’m right here, you know,” Bella interjected, wiping her mouth. “It was just jungle juice.”

A glance at the color of vomit seeping into his socks confirmed her statement.

“It was Everclear punch,” Mike admitted, shoving his hands in his pockets. “I tried to get her to stop earlier.”

“You should have tried harder,” Edward barked. God, he sounded like Bella’s father. He grimaced and turned his attention to her. “You feel a little better now?”

She nodded, but her words were woeful. “I can’t believe I barfed on you, Edward. Oh my God. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. . .” She buried her face in his shirt and grabbed his tie, wrapping it around her hand and tugging, pulling him closer. His arms tightened around her, his hand finding the back of her neck, rubbing and soothing.

He bent down and whispered so that only she could hear. “It’s okay, baby. I’m gonna take you home now.”

He was grateful that she was coherent enough to remember where that was, and to assure Mike and the pothead she’d be safe with him. Once they arrived in her tiny single-bed dorm room, he’d instructed her to brush her teeth before he took his turn at the sink. He proceeded to wash out his socks and shoes, his back turned so that Bella could get undressed for bed.

“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” she taunted over his shoulder. He glanced up in the mirror in time to watch her pull her t-shirt over her head and unhook her bra, throwing both over a vinyl blow-up chair that sat in one corner. And there they were, those perky little tits he’d fantasized about for days. They seemed to taunt him, too. He was mesmerized by Bella’s drunken dance as she pushed her tight jeans down, cotton panties going along for the ride, until she wriggled free of them and tossed them on top of her other discarded clothes.

His eyes were glued to the mirror, staring at her naked ass bent over the bed while she pulled the covers back and retrieved a loosely-folded tank top and boy shorts from next to the pillow. Instantly he imagined pushing her onto the mattress and taking her from behind, spreading those sweet cheeks and plunging in deep, hands stroking her back and her thighs and that perfect round ass while he fucked her.

He squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them to concentrate on wringing his socks out to dry. By the time he hazarded another glance in the mirror, Bella was dressed, though not enough to purge all sexual thoughts from his mind. Those thoughts were even harder to ignore when she staggered up to him and threw her slender arms around him, pressing her breasts to his back, her abdomen to his ass.

“You came for me,” she mumbled with a sigh between his shoulder blades.

“I’ll always come for you.”

She giggled a little and worked one hand over the front of his pants until she found the beginnings of his erection. Junior quickly came to life under her insistent probing.

“I can make you come again.” Her hot breath seeped through his cotton dress shirt and scorched the skin beneath.

“I know you can,” he said, suppressing a groan as he ran his hands down her forearms. With effort he pulled her hand free from his groin, then turned to face her, clasping her fingers between his. “And when you’re sober, we can explore various methods to achieve that. But for now, you’re going to take some aspirin and get some sleep.”

Bella scowled and squeezed his hands tightly, pushing her torso against his. “That’s crazy. I want you now. And I know you want me.” She looked imploringly up into his face, her eyes drifting a bit before she forced them to focus on his. “In fact, now is perfect. Maybe when I’m drunk, it won’t hurt. I want to feel you inside me when it doesn’t hurt. I want to come, too. With you.” She reached up on tiptoes but could still only reach his neck, so she planted a kiss there. “Fuck me and make me come, Edward,” she whispered.

He let the groan escape this time. He tried to pull back, but it was no use. He didn’t want to. He let go of her hands and grabbed her face instead, holding it steady, perhaps trying to infuse her with some sobriety. She stroked his forearms up and down and emitted a sort of purring noise that nearly caused him to lose every ounce of restraint.

He took a deep breath and told her, “I want to do exactly that. You have no idea how much. But I will not take advantage of you when you’re like this. Trust me, you’ll thank me later.”

“Its not taking advantage when I want it,” she insisted. She leaned in again, raising up on tiptoes, hands clasping his neck to pull him closer. “I want you. And the doctor said the only way it would get better for me is if I have more sex, and I don’t want to use those stupid things she gave me. I want your fingers and your mouth and your dick instead. I want you. Don’t you want me?”

“Christ,” he swore in exasperation at her intoxicated wheedling. “You know I do. But I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about with this doctor business. It sounds like we need to have a serious discussion, tomorrow. When you’re sober. All right?”

Defeated, Bella released his neck and dropped to her heels. She pouted and let her bleary eyes settle somewhere in the vicinity of his stomach. “Fine.”

She had dutifully taken two aspirin that he’d shaken from the bottle he found in her medicine cabinet, then let him lead her to the narrow twin bed. She insisted that he climb in with her. Still fully dressed, he lay on top of the covers, spooning her, gently rubbing her temple, then her shoulder, until she passed out.

He had barely succumbed to slumber himself when Bella suddenly lurched from the bed and ran for the sink. The aspirin, and some remnants of jungle juice, had decided to exit her stomach without warning. He approached her retching form with tentative offers to hold her hair back, but she waved him away with one hand, moaning “Don’t look at me!” between heaves.

He perched on one corner of the bed and waited helplessly until she was finished. He observed her gargle some mouthwash, then dig a can of bleach cleanser and a sponge from under the sink. The minute she began to scrub its porcelain bowl, he took over.

“Let me do that. Get some rest,” he ordered softly.

She nodded and shuffled back to bed, where she promptly passed out again for a couple of hours.

Thus began a fitful night for both of them. Bella’s sleep was intermittent, punctuated by trips down the hall to the girls’ bathroom, and fits of vomiting at the sink when she couldn’t make it that far. Edward cleaned up after her, soothed her, and tried to quell his own queasiness at the faint odor of vomit permeating the room, and of alcohol dissipating from Bella’s skin. He slept little, too worried about the possibility of her asphyxiating in her sleep to give in to unconsciousness.

They both found some peace around dawn, when Bella’s stomach gave up the ghost after a few last dry heaves. Edward made her drink some water, though she was afraid to put anything in her stomach.

“I don’t want you to get dehydrated,” he admonished.

She shook her head wearily. “I can’t believe you’re still here.”

He smiled and gave her a gentle kiss on the forehead. “Where else am I gonna go?”

They both slept a little then. The sun was kind enough to slumber beneath a thick blanket of gloom, letting little of its light creep around the room-darkening curtains. When Edward finally awoke, he was stiff and exhausted, but unable to lie in the cramped bed any longer, even with Bella at his side.

He decided to peruse the room then, taking note of the music posters on the walls, the paperback books on the shelves, and the photographs of her family and a few friends collaged on a corkboard over her desk. Bella was a perfect blend of both her parents: the dark hair and eyes of her father, the petite nose and kind-hearted smile of her mother.

Edward was still grinning at this when he looked down at the desk calendar, only to be flooded with sudden relief. There was his good luck charm, tucked into one corner. He pulled it out and viewed the familiar artwork and poem with the same melancholy yearning he always felt, tempered only slightly by the passing of years. He would never stop missing his parents; never stop wishing for their good advice. He’d certainly made some bad decisions in their absence.

He sighed and tucked his mother’s painting back into the desk calendar for the time being. That’s when he noticed the loose piece of notebook paper, its edge sticking out from under this month’s page. Curiosity won over guilt, and he pulled the paper out to see what was written there. The poem looked lengthy, so he sat down at the desk to read it.

And now he sat here for a fifth time, a fifth reading, still waiting for Bella to sleep off her hangover. He wondered why she had overdone it so much. Was she really that desperate to fit in? He didn’t understand it, as willful and strong-minded as she could be. She didn’t seem the type to give in to peer pressure. Yet the poem in front of him belied her insecurities. He remembered how nearly terrified she’d been at first last weekend; how he’d had to coax her out of her crippling self-consciousness. But once he had, she had been a different girl. Bold, confident - as sure of him as she was herself. Maybe more so.

How had he brought that out in her, when he constantly fought to keep his own self-worth out of the toilet?

“What are you doing?”

Bella’s quiet voice pierced his thoughts, and he turned to look at her. She was sitting up in bed, arms wrapped around her knees, hair so askew it resembled a wig, face drained of color.

“Just noticing you found this.” Edward picked up his good luck charm in explanation.

“I’m glad I did. It’s beautiful. Did Emily paint that? No wonder you were worried about losing it.”

“My mother painted it, actually,” he replied, getting up and seating himself on the corner of the bed, opposite Bella.

She looked surprised. “The signature said ‘E. Masen’ - I just assumed that stood for Emily.”

“My mother’s name was Elizabeth.” His smile was wan as he said her name.

“Was?” Bella’s forehead creased with concern.

Edward nodded. “She died when I was young. Both of my parents did. Car accident.”

“Edward. . .” Bella’s face was stricken now. She didn’t know what to say. She was so exhausted that no adequate condolence could seem to form on her lips.

“I know. It sucks, you’re sorry, I’m sorry. But it was a long time ago. I’ll save that story for another day. Right now, I’m more interested in how you’re doing.”

Bella tried to muster a smile, though her lips felt glued to her teeth. “I’m kind of shitty, actually.”

“No kidding.” His grin was gently teasing.

“I feel like I’ve been run over by a Mack truck, repeatedly. And now there’s a guy swinging a sledge hammer inside my forehead, over my right eye. Repeatedly.” She put her hand to the spot and closed her eyes.

“I see you have some crackers and peanut butter,” he noted with a nod at the mini-fridge and storage cart sitting next to it. “You should try to eat something and take some aspirin.”

Bella moaned loudly with a grimace. Edward only chuckled and said, “Humor me. I think maybe you can keep some crackers down now.”

“Maybe,” she said doubtfully. But after he brought them to her, along with a glass of water and two more aspirin, she forced herself to eat. The saltiness of the crackers tasted surprisingly good, so she had a few more. She eyed Edward’s encouraging face and was amazed all over again.

“Why are you still here? Why did you stay with me all night and subject yourself to my marathon puke-fest?”

He let out a small chuckle. “Because I’ve been there myself, more than once. And I wasn’t about to let you choke to death on your own vomit in the middle of the night. I’ve grown kind of partial to you this past week.”

Bella smiled in spite of herself, and Edward was relieved to see a bit of color seep back into her cheeks. “Well, I’m still mortified beyond all measure, but I’m glad you were here. Even when I wished you weren’t. If that makes sense.”

He nodded and gave her that half-grin that could cure just about anything, except the pounding headache consuming most of her brain power at the moment.

“So, you’ve officially seen me at my worst, I think it’s safe to say,” she told him. “I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t want to stick around for the rest of this show. You know - me, being jealous and insecure and stupid, while you go about your job like a responsible adult. I guess I just proved that I don’t handle what you do for a living very well. Which makes me both immature and a hypocrite.”

Bella frowned and rubbed her forehead some more. Did she really just admit all that? Apparently she wasn’t done spewing - she’d just switched to the verbal version.

Edward sighed and reached out to touch her, his hand grasping her calf, just below the knee. The heat of his hand was a welcome distraction from the throbbing inside her skull.

“I don’t blame you for any of your reactions, and I don’t think they make you immature. Just human. I found out how human I was last night, too. All this time I wondered how you would get past worrying about what I was doing; and I failed to realize that I would worry just as much about you. You gave me a taste of my own medicine, and it was a bitter pill to swallow. I didn’t like seeing you in that state, with those two morons helping you home. I wanted to kill them both for letting you get like that.”

Bella shook her head. “Don’t blame them. I did it to myself. Neither of them forced me to get high or drunk. Mike tried to get me to slow down. But when I realized that the pot made me forget about you for awhile, I decided that the alcohol would work when the high wore off. I wanted the oblivion, so I wouldn’t have to imagine what you might be doing with someone else.”

Edward’s eyes closed briefly as the truth he’d tried to avoid boxed him about the ears. He took a deep breath. “I knew this wouldn’t be good for you. Impossible situation. . .” his voice faded and he dropped his hand from her leg.

“So what did happen last night?” she asked, her own voice hoarse. “On your date.”

“Nothing. She hooked up with her ex-boyfriend. Turns out he’d hired a female escort to make her jealous, too. We all had a twisted laugh over it and went home.”

Bella nodded dully. “So I worried for nothing. Got fucked up for nothing.”

Edward nodded with her. But then she added, “This time.” And he could not dispute the afterthought.

“You probably already slept with other girls this week, before we met up again,” she continued in a lethargic drone. “I saw your schedule, remember?”

His nod was barely perceptible; he couldn’t quite make his eyes meet hers, and she had her answer.

“So really, it doesn’t matter anyway, because the deed is done,” she said matter-of-factly. “And it will be done again. And either I deal with it, or I don’t.”

Edward let out an anguished breath. “You shouldn’t have to. You don’t have to. Say the word and I’m gone. This is no good for either of us. Maybe, if I figure out another way; but in the meantime. . .”

Bella felt too sick to be consumed by the panic again. In fact, she was beginning to feel oddly pragmatic about the whole ordeal.

“Maybe we’re looking at this all wrong,” she said. “Maybe we should forget the idea of any kind of normal relationship. I could just continue to hire you, and you’ll be all mine for that space of time, until the next time. I can’t afford the fancy hotel, obviously, but surely you have cut rates for cheaper dates. Just some fast food and a quickie in a Motel 6 or something. I don’t care about the trappings, just the time with you -”

“Stop,” Edward cut her off, staring at her in horror. “Don’t even. . . Just stop. Whatever we have may have started off as prostitution, but it’s not going to continue that way. Not with you. No.”

“Fine. Then let’s just be fuck buddies for free. We’ll see each other whenever we get the urge and our schedules allow. You can teach me how to get good at sex, and I can, I don’t know, tell jokes or do your laundry or something.”

Edward’s horror had only escalated. “I’m going to chalk this up to some strange substances still being in your body, because the shit you’re saying does not sound like you. We just proved last night that we are completely incapable of being just fuck buddies. And what is this crap about me teaching you to ‘get good’ at sex? I wasn’t lying when I told you you’re a natural. I have no complaints about our night together. I wish you felt the same.”

Something snapped inside her at his words. “I want to feel the same. I do feel the same - you were amazing. The sex, and everything else about that night, was incredible. I just wish I was woman enough to have enjoyed it.”

Hot, embarrassed tears began to form at the corners of her eyes, and she wiped them away before Edward’s tentative hand could touch her. He ran his rejected fingers through the spikes of his unwashed hair and took a deep, exasperated breath.

“’Woman enough?’ What the hell are you talking about, Bella? I thought you were through with this self-deprecating bullshit. You are not lacking in any way, as far as I’m concerned.”

“Then why do I need these stupid things?” she exclaimed. She pulled out the drawer of her nightstand and grabbed a pink plastic bag from within, then threw it into Edward’s lap. Perplexed, he opened the bag and stared at its contents. He didn’t quite comprehend what he was seeing until he spied the tube of lubricant at the bottom.

“What the hell are these?” he demanded.

“What do they look like?” Her cheeks were flushed this time, with a strangely defiant embarrassment.

He glanced again at the varying sizes of clear cylindrical appendages and thought that they might possibly be helpful in preparing someone for anal sex, though he had a hard time believing that was Bella’s intended use.

“They look like the least sexy sex toys I’ve ever seen,” he announced.

“Bingo,” she answered flatly.

He waited for some clarification, but receiving none, he continued. “And why do you have these?”

“Because my vagina is too small,” she retorted. “I went to the gynecologist this week because I couldn’t figure out why I was still chafed two days after we had sex. She had to use a special instrument to examine me because my opening was so narrow. She basically told me that I won’t be able to enjoy sex until I get, you know, stretched out.” She was beginning to feel humiliated talking about this with Edward, especially when he had that bemused smirk on his face. “So she gave me those things. To practice with.”

For Edward’s part, he was trying very hard to hold in his laughter. She obviously didn’t find this subject amusing at all, and would probably have a hard time understanding why he did. He decided he’d try to explain himself as gently as possible.

“You just lost your virginity last week,” he reminded her. “I think maybe you have some unrealistic expectations of your body. There’s nothing wrong with you, or your vagina. Trust me on that, okay?”

“That’s easy for you to say,” she grumbled. “My tiny vagina is probably fun for you.”

He tried to suppress a grin. “It doesn’t suck.”

Bella was now having a hard time smothering her own smile, because she was beginning to realize how silly she sounded. “Well, I want to have fun too, you know,” she countered feebly.

Edward leaned in and took her chin in his hand, forcing her to look at him. “Do you remember the first time I made you come? On the couch?”

He was using the honey voice on her, and she melted accordingly. She nodded.

“Did you have fun then?”

She bit her lip and tried not to roll her eyes at the absurdity of the question. “Yes.”

“Do you remember how many fingers I had inside you when you came?”

His eyes were flames, and she the wax beneath them. She tried to recall the answer to his question, but all she remembered was the sensation of being stroked to a frenzy, inside and out, until she exploded in waves of ecstasy.

“Not exactly,” she finally admitted.

“I had three fingers inside you,” he murmured, continuing to melt her with his intensity. “You cried out at first, but then the pain went away, and the pleasure followed. And that will happen again, I promise you.”

“With you?” Her heart was beating fast and her skin was damp with sweat again. She was simultaneously turned on, still sick, and increasingly aware that she was in need of a shower.

If he noticed, he didn’t let on. “If that’s what you want.”

“Of course that’s what I want.”

“Then I’m yours. When you’re feeling better,” he added with a wry grin.

She let him kiss her, though she was sure her breath was as foul as a gym sneaker. His wasn’t exactly moonlight and roses, either, and that made her smile. She remembered their morning after, and his insistence on kissing her then.

“I guess that brings us back to square one,” he said ruefully as he pulled away.

“So much for progress,” she agreed.

“Well, you’ve made great progress over the past twelve hours, I’d say. That’s good enough for me right now.”

She nodded in agreement, though she knew nothing had really been solved. Edward sighed and ran his fingers through his hair.

“I should probably go and let you recover. I think you’ll feel better after a shower. I can bring you something to eat later, if you’d like,” he offered.

She couldn’t bear the thought of him dropping off some take-out, dressed to the nines again for whatever date he had lined up tonight.

“No, I’m okay. I have the feeling I won’t be very hungry today. I have some soup and stuff in case I am.”

He gave her a nod and another quick kiss, then got up off the bed. She hated the way the mattress sprung upward, as if his weight had never been there, pinning it down. She watched him walk to the air conditioner, then saw that his shoes were sitting on the sill.

“What are your shoes doing there?” she asked with a laugh.

“I thought they’d dry faster,” he replied, giving her a grin over his shoulder.

“Dry? . . .” she questioned. And then, a memory crashed through her brain with the subtlety of a hundred sledge hammers. “Oh my God, I barfed on your shoes, didn’t I?”

“Just a little,” he said nonchalantly as he picked them up and inspected them. Then he sat down on the bed again to stuff his bare feet into the shrunken leather and tie the laces.

“Oh, geezus. I was hoping that was just a nightmare. But I really did that, didn’t I? I puked on those beautiful designer shoes. Kill me. Kill me now.” She pulled the covers over her head and fell back on the pillows, Edward’s muffled laughter accompanying her dramatic gesture. She felt his body leave the bed again, then heard him walk over to the closet. She pulled the covers down just enough to see him pull two bedraggled socks off of a hanger and stuff them in his pocket.

“The socks, too?” she wailed. “I puked on your poor feet.  Oh, that's disgusting. I’m so sorry. Please kill me,” she begged again.

“I told you,” he said, sauntering over and bending down to kiss her nose. “I’ve grown rather fond of you. I’d prefer to keep you alive.”

“Prince Charming,” she mumbled from beneath the sheets as he turned to leave.

“What was that?” he asked, pausing at the door.

“Call me later,” she said.

“Answer your phone.” His face was stern.

Hers was contrite. "I will."

“Feel better, Bella.” And with that, he was gone.

She had little time to miss him before falling into a headache-soothing sleep. She awoke sometime in the mid-afternoon, sweaty and dehydrated. But best of all, she actually felt a little hungry. She knew she’d reached a turning point, and for that she was grateful. She stumbled out of bed and stretched a bit, then grabbed her shower caddy and bathrobe in order to head down the hall to the showers. But as she passed her desk, a brightly-colored piece of paper caught her eye. She already knew what it was before she stopped to inspect it.

Edward had forgotten to take his good-luck charm. Or maybe he had left it on purpose once more, promising his return. She smiled as she ran her finger gingerly over the heavy watercolor paper and its fragile four-leaf clover.

Then she realized that her latest botched attempt at poetry was sitting on the opposite corner of the desk, atop the calendar, when she distinctly remembered stuffing it in between the pages after having given up on it a few days ago. Peering at the sheet of notebook paper, she noticed several new lines written at the bottom in a familiar, elegant script, directly below her own harsh critique.

I like this poem, Swan-I-Am.
It’s better than green eggs and ham.
It speaks a truth that’s hard to say
When circumstance gets in our way.
I like the “me” I am with you
And I’m still shocked you like me, too.
A better man I’ll never be
Than the one I am as part of

“We.”

Bella smiled all the way down to the showers. But once she closed the curtain and stood under the spray, she let the tears flow freely.

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

Chapter 22

“See that guy over there?”

Sylvia Wainwright is slurring and trying to point somewhere across the hotel ballroom, but her index finger keeps changing directions so that Edward has no hope of following its suggested path.

“Over where?”

She draws loops in the air. “That table over there. Two over, three back. Black hair, black suit, black shirt, black tie.”

“Is he a bank robber?”

“Ha! Possibly. I don’t give a fuck, I still want him. He’s the one I told you ‘bout - the one who got away. ‘Cept Amy Wisenbaum just told me at the topless bar that he and his girlfriend are having problems. I’m not surprised - look how slutty she’s dressed. She looks like a goddamn hooker. Sorry, no offense.“

“None taken,” Edward says with a brittle smile.

“Yeah well, she’s toast. The minute she goes to the bathroom, I’m makin’ my move.”

“Good for you. So where’s the topless bar? I wasn’t aware this hotel had one.”

“Huh? Oh! Tapas bar. I said tapas. You know, hors d’oeuvres?” She gives him a look indicating that he must be a total moron. “The snack table,” she elaborates with a roll of her eyes. “Are you sure you’ve done this escort thing before? I mean, I knew you were young, but come on.”

Edward feigns an apology. “I’m sorry if I’ve fallen short of your expectations.”

Sylvia’s green eyes roll once more, and she has trouble making them focus once they return to their normal position. “You’ve been fine. Better than fine. You look amazing. Like fuckin’ sex on a stick. The look on that bitch Heather Mears’ face when she saw me walk in the room with you was worth every penny. Now, just don’t cramp my style when I go talk to David, and there’ll be a very nice tip in it for you later.”

“David. . . ?”

“The bank robber.” She looks over at her former paramour, and Edward thinks he’s detected a bit of drool glistening at the corner of her mouth. “You’re pretty ’n’ all, and you definitely did the job here tonight, but THAT, right there, is a real man. Damn if he doesn’t look hot as hell dressed all in black,” she sighs.

Edward glances over at swarthy, hirsute David in his too-tight suit and thinks that the man vaguely resembles a gorilla stuffed into a sausage casing. “I wouldn’t even attempt to compete,” he assures his date with a sweet smile.

“You’re a smart boy after all,” she says condescendingly. With effort, she shifts her gaze back to the gorilla, and comprehends that the chair next to him is empty.

“Holy shit, now’s my chance,” she exclaims, pushing up from the table and swaying a bit. “Wish me luck!”

“Good luck,” Edward replies dutifully. He winces as she grabs at the edge of her panties through her loud polyester dress in order to pull them out of her butt crack, then wobbles away on her platform stilettos.

He breathes a sigh of relief and immediately searches for his phone to see if Bella has called, even though he hasn’t felt its telltale buzz through the breast pocket of his jacket. He’s relieved when he sees her number and realizes that he forgot to put the phone on vibrate after he turned off the ringer. He’s even more relieved when he hears her message.

He glances over at Sylvia, whose ironed blonde head is bowed close to the gorilla’s, and he figures he can slip away unnoticed for a few minutes. He leaves the hotel ballroom and finds an exit to the outdoor courtyard with better phone reception, then speed-dials Bella’s number.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

The music is so loud that Bella’s entire body is vibrating.

She’s hollered at Mike to inquire what the Resident Advisor thinks about this, but he hollers back that “he’s totally cool with it.” He then points to a guy lounging in one corner of the room, nursing a bottle of Fat Tire and a laissez-faire attitude. Bella shrugs and accepts the requisite red plastic cup filled with jungle juice. She takes a sip - hmm, not bad - and decides she’s ready to drink the Kool-Aid.

The music is good - sounds like The Black Keys, she thinks. It’s not some club-style techno-crap, so she decides to chill and enjoy it. Besides, this saves her from having to make too much small talk, which she’s not very good at. She can simply smile and nod at Mike’s new roommates, to whom she was just introduced, but their names were indecipherable above the din. And then Mike is off, playing the host with the most, chatting up each new stranger as if he or she was his long-lost friend. Bella has always envied his ability to do this. He is clearly in his element in this kind of social setting, while she still flounders like a fish out of water.

Like most dorm parties, the festivities have spilled out into the hallway and over to the next room. Bella wanders into the hall, looking around for Jessica, or anyone else she might know. She wonders why she didn’t make any lasting friends freshman year. She’d been so worried about keeping her grades up that she spent most of her time studying. Over the summer she’d lost touch with the few girls she’d befriended, and now it felt a little like she was starting over this year.

But that was what she wanted, wasn’t it? A clean slate? A do-over? That’s what her night with an escort was supposed to be about - doing something daring and out of character, something completely out of her comfort zone. That’s what she thought she’d needed: a chance to break free from her shy, self-conscious mold and emerge as someone with the bold confidence of experience.

Someone new.

But as she looks around at the girls wearing too much make-up and too little clothing, she can’t help but feel that this is not who she wants to be, either. Maybe she just isn’t cut from free and fun-loving cloth. But this is a depressing thought, so she props the corners of her mouth into what she hopes is a friendly grin and tiptoes around the bodies of people sprawled across the hallway, trying to carry on conversations not possible inside the rooms. She is managing all right, she thinks, until her sneaker catches on the toe of the last body, causing her to trip and fall forward.

“Shit!” she exclaims, trying to catch herself on the closest white plaster wall. But there is another body in the way, this one walking toward her, so that her hand hits his chest and propels him backward. Like dominoes they fall to the dull industrial carpet below, Bella trying to keep a grip on her red plastic cup, but failing most spectacularly.

“I am so sorry,” she apologizes, still on all fours, staring down at the empty cup in front of her. She is afraid to look sideways at her victim and survey the damage, but she cringes and shifts wary eyes to the form lying next to her. Sure enough, his t-shirt - vintage Beastie Boys - is doused with bright red jungle juice.

“Oh my God,” she moans, sitting back on her haunches, defeated. “I can’t believe I did that.”

Her victim slowly pulls himself up to a sitting position and looks down, gingerly pulling the sticky wet cotton away from his skin. He looks up at her ruefully and manages a tight smile. “It’s okay. I’m sure it’ll come out.”

Bella looks at him, and he at her. They both know it will not come out.

“I’ll buy you a new one,” she offers. “It’s the least I can do.”

He grins more affably than the occasion warrants and says, “I don’t think you’ll find one. But if you do, let me know.”

“Yeah, right.” She gives him a look that she hopes conveys her distress over the situation.

“Don’t worry,” he says. “It just gives the shirt character.”

She shakes her head. “You are being way too nice about this. Go ahead and yell at me.”

“Will it make you feel better if I do?”

“Probably.”

“Then, goddamn it, watch where you’re going next time, will you?” he answers with mock severity.

“That was not yelling,” she says with a laugh.

He shrugs and the good-natured grin returns. “I have a hard time being mean to pretty girls.”

Bella blushes, then realizes for the first time that her victim is rather nice-looking. Blue eyes, light brown hair, toothy smile. She is being complimented by a cute boy only ten minutes after arriving at a college party. Maybe things are changing for her after all, despite the fact that she is obviously still as clumsy and awkward as ever.

“At least let me try to get the stain out of your shirt,” Bella offers guiltily. “Maybe if you wash it right away, it’ll come out.”

“Maybe,” he agrees. “My room is right down the hall. You want to come with me and find out?”

Bella sees that he is pointing only a few doors down, within easy distance of the party, so she throws caution to the wind and follows him to his room. When he opens the door, a wall of pungent-smelling smoke hits them both in the face.

“Whoa!” he comments as he carves a path through the haze. “Don’t smoke the whole stash at once, you guys.”

Bella hesitates in the doorway, but her victim pulls her gently into the room and closes the door behind her. “Our RA is cool, but I’d still rather keep certain activities on the DL, if you know what I mean,” he explains.

She nods and peers into the smoke while he introduces a small group of people sitting in a circle, passing around a colorful glass bong that looks like something her mom might have used during her much wilder youth. Bella forgets their names as soon as she hears them, but she remembers her victim’s name.

It is Riley Biers, and he has taken off his t-shirt in order to scrub it out in the sink. He has a nice body. She tries not to stare, but it’s difficult because he is smooth and hairless and carved nicely in all the right places. His build is lean, not terribly tall, but still well-put together. She would be attracted to him, she thinks, except for one thing.

He is not Edward Cullen.

Riley is smiling at her and commenting that he thinks the stain is actually coming out of his t-shirt, and she’s glad. But she is now imagining how Edward looks standing at a sink: taller and broader in the shoulders, stronger chin and sultrier eyes. Hairier, muskier. More manly. She resents him a little for ruining this for her, this first time that a very cute college boy has taken his shirt off for her two minutes after they met. Worse yet, she resents Riley for not being someone else.

Riley is oblivious to this, of course, and is chattering about his major as he wrings out his shirt and fishes a hanger out of his closet to hang the wet garment up to dry. He pulls a clean t-shirt off the closet shelf, this one proclaiming Bob Marley’s Exodus; and Bella realizes she’s already forgotten Riley’s major.

“So,” he says as he pushes his head through the neck hole, “you wanna get baked?”

He nods his head toward the circle of potheads taking turns holding their breath before exhaling in satisfaction. Bella has always avoided drugs, even weed, because she worries they will make her do stupid things, and with her luck she will no doubt get caught and expelled from school and possibly thrown in jail.

She presses her lips together and sets her chin defiantly. After all, her luck has been changing.

 “Absolutely,” she says, and joins him in the circle.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

“Where are you, Bella?” Edward mumbles into the phone, his tone equal parts worry and annoyance. She will not hear this because he has already hung up, and the message he did leave her was decidedly more upbeat than he was feeling. His relief that she’d found his good-luck charm was lessened when he was unable to thank her and make plans to see her again. He realizes that it is entirely unreasonable of him to expect her to be waiting around for his call. She is a teenager and it’s Friday night. He did tell her she should be having the college experience and enjoying herself. And she should.

But he can’t help but wish she were enjoying herself with him instead.

Edward is not enjoying himself at all, though he is admittedly grateful that his date has no interest in him other than using him to get the man she really wants. He wishes this were the modus operandi of all of his clients. But he knows his luck will not hold for much longer.

As if on cue, there is a commotion behind him on the courtyard. The glass door has opened and the low hiss of an argument meets his ears. He can guess what he will see before he slowly, unwillingly turns around.

“You had your chance a long time ago, remember? I’m the one who wrote and called you every goddamned day when we went to two different colleges. You’re the one who chose to step out on me with a dozen other guys instead. You made your bed - lots of beds, from what I hear. Now go fucking lie in them. Or lie in them fucking, as the case may be.”

They have stopped under the nearest tree and stand facing each other in the ambient outdoor lighting, oblivious to Edward’s presence. The gorilla is clearly angry, sneering in the imploring face of his ex-girlfriend. Sylvia begins a drunken rebuttal that is half pleading, half self-righteous.

“I was young! I was lonely, and you were clear across the country. I didn’t know what I wanted,” she wails. “Besides, you expect me to believe you were faithful that whole time? That’s bullshit. I know it is. Does the name Heather-fucking-Mears ring a bell? Huh? You could have had anyone, but you had to go and bang my high school nemesis instead?”

“Well, at least she was there for me when I lost my football scholarship and had to go home with my goddamned tail between my legs. You didn’t give a flying fuck. You didn’t even call me - you sent me a lame-ass email instead. That hurt, Syl. As close as we were. . . that was low.”

The gorilla looks wounded now, and Syl is ashamed. “Oh baby, I know. I know. I was such an idiot. I didn’t know what to say to you after all that had gone down between us. I knew how much that killed you, losing that scholarship. I came home that next weekend to see you, but Heather had already beat me to the punch. I stopped by your house and your brother told me you were out with her.”

“What? He never told me you were there!”

“I made him promise not to tell you. I was so upset with you for turning to her that I didn’t want to give you the satisfaction of knowing I cared. But I always did. I still do.”

She is sniveling; Edward can see that her mascara is beginning to bleed out around the edges of her eyes so that she resembles an ancient Egyptian painting. The gorilla’s expression is mawkishly contrite, and Edward realizes that he must be as drunk as Sylvia.

“Oh, baby,” is all the eloquence he can muster before he mauls her with a kiss. She returns it with fervor, trying to get a grip on his greased hair while he crushes her to him and paws her ass.

Edward averts his eyes, amused and relieved at this turn of events, but not wishing to witness this particular reunion any further. He takes a sip of his martini and decides he will discreetly make his way back inside the hotel, but as he nears the door, an attractive brunette in a cleavage-revealing dress strides purposefully through it. She looks around until she spots the couple groping under a tree. Her face screws up in anger and she marches toward them.

“What. The FUCK. Is going on here?” she demands.

As soon as the gorilla extricates himself from Sylvia and turns a guilty face toward his accuser, the brunette hauls off and slaps him right across one thick, stubbly cheek.

Edward changes his mind and looks around for a place to sit. He finds a nearby stone bench, then settles in with his martini to watch the fireworks.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Bella cannot stop giggling.

She is very, very relaxed. She can’t remember the last time she felt this sort of happy, somnambulant buzz. She could get used to this. She looks over at Riley, and the rest of his roomies and girlfriends, and they all look as buzzed as she feels. They are cool people, she thinks. They have all just finished a highly philosophical and profound discussion about politics and global warming, though she can’t remember exactly what was said. She’s pretty sure it was deep, though.

But the weed has run out, and they are hungry. A search of their room reveals it to be bereft of munchies, so they journey out in search of food.

“I think Mike has snacks in his room,” Bella offers helpfully. “And some killer Everclear punch.”

They eagerly follow Bella down the hall to the heart of the festivities, where they scavenge a brand-new bag of tortilla chips and begin passing it around. As she’s munching, she looks around for Mike. She spots him across the room, sitting on the bottom bunk bed, talking with Jessica. She feels no animosity toward her old frenemy how, and she waves a chip at them both, while Riley asks her, “Who are they?”

She realizes that someone must have turned the volume of the sound system down, because she can actually hear him above the dull roar.

“Old high school friends,” she replies. “Come on, I’ll introduce you.”

Riley follows Bella to the bunk bed, where her pals look up at her in blatant surprise. She introduces them all, and is very proud of the fact that she has remembered everyone’s full names, even Riley’s. They all nod and smile in greeting, though the pair who are high are mostly oblivious to the incredulous stares from the pair who are not.

“Good to meet you,” Mike says, rising from the bunk and giving Riley a slap on the arm. “So you live down the hall, huh?”

Riley nods. “Neighbors. Thanks for having the party, man. It’s nice to get to know everyone on the hall.”

“Yeah, of course,” Mike agrees. “You guys want something to drink? Jess, you need a refill?”

Jessica hands Mike her nearly-empty cup. “Yeah, thanks.”

Mike looks at Riley and motions across the room to the cooler and the plastic-lined garbage can filled with spiked punch. As soon as they leave the girls alone, Jessica grabs Bella’s wrist and pulls her down to the bunk bed.

“Ohmygod! Are you stoned?” she demands.

“Um. . .” Bella stops to think a moment, and then realizes that she most certainly is. “Yeah. Very.” She giggles a little at the acknowledgement.

“No way!” Jess exclaims, as if the evidence and accompanying confession still aren’t enough proof. “I didn’t know you smoked pot.”

“Neither did I.” Bella punctuates this with a giggle-snort.

“That Riley guy is cute! Does he have any more stash on him?” Jess asks hopefully.

“No, they ran out.” Bella waves in the general direction of the group now inhaling most of the snacks sitting atop Mike’s desk.

“Damn. Must have been some good shit, from the looks of you.”

“I feel good,” Bella admits. She suddenly realizes that the pot worked - she actually forgot about Edward for a little while. But now that she has thought of him, and looked at her watch, she is beginning to wonder and worry about him, despite the marijuana’s calming effect on her nervous system.

She’s grateful when Mike returns with her punch. She is thirsty, but mostly she’s anxious for something else to help obliterate thoughts of what Edward might be doing right now. She chugs down half the glass in a few hasty gulps.

“Whoa, slow down there, slugger!” Mike warns her, his blue eyes round with concern. “It’s early - better pace yourself.”

Bella scowls, and Riley laughs.

“She’s a big girl. She can take care of herself,” the latter says, giving Bella an encouraging squeeze on the shoulder.

“That’s right,” she agrees. Didn’t she just say the same thing to Edward earlier? And he’d given her the same disapproving stare that Mike is leveling at her right now.

She grimaces and drains the rest of her cup, then shoots him a defiant look.

“I’m ready for a refill,” she announces, handing Riley her glass. He chuckles and trots off to the juice-filled garbage can, while Mike and Jessica gape at her like she’s an alien.

She smiles with satisfaction and waits for Riley to return with her next cup of oblivion.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

“What the hell?” the gorilla sputters after his girlfriend’s assault.

“You keep your filthy hands off of him!” Sylvia screeches at the brunette.

“You’re a fine one to talk!” she snaps back. “The minute I turn my back, you mack on my man? Where the hell do you get off?” She is squared off across from Sylvia, hands on her hips, barely-covered boobs heaving with indignation.

“He was my man way before he was yours,” Sylvia declares. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll step off before I really get pissed.”

“Me, piss you off? Are you effing kidding me?” Cleavage-girl turns to the gorilla. “And you! I leave you for five minutes and you go off with the first woman who throws herself at you? This is what I mean to you?”

“Give it up, Monica,” the gorilla says wearily. “You can drop the act. The jig is up, okay? It worked. You’re off the hook. Off the clock. Whatever you want to call it.” He adds to her as an aside, “You hit me, for chrissakes! That was not part of our agreement.”

Sylvia’s brows furrow. “What are you talking about, David? ‘Off the clock?’”

The gorilla’s mug is sheepish. “Monica isn’t really my girlfriend. She’s just pretending.”

Monica gives him a warning look, like he’s made a mistake, admitting this.

Sylvia’s eyes narrow. “Pretending,” she repeats. “And why would she do that?”

The gorilla hangs his head. “Because I paid her to. To make you jealous.”

Sylvia stares at him, then abruptly bursts into laughter. “No wonder she looks like a hooker!” she gasps between giggles, then turns to an annoyed Monica and adds, “No offense.”

“Go ahead and laugh,” the gorilla retorts. “It worked, didn’t it?”

“Yep. It did,” she agrees, still grinning. “I’m just laughing ‘cause great minds think alike, baby. You know that guy I came here with? Brick?”

“I thought you said his name was Brock.”

“Yeah, whatever. His real name is Edward.”

“The pretty boy? Yeah, that fits. He doesn’t seem like your type.”

“He’s not. But he is Heather’s type. And you should have seen her face when I walked in with him. She’s been eating her fucking heart out all night. Just retribution, if you ask me.”

“So, wait. You’re saying you hired him, too?” The gorilla is equal parts incredulous and elated.

Sylvia nods, and the two share a kind of conspiratorial shame over their actions.

Monica pipes up then. “Isn’t that him, over there?” She points at Edward, and they all turn to look at him where he lounges on the bench some feet away. He grins and raises his glass.

“Shit. You’ve been out there this whole time?” Sylvia exclaims. “Why didn’t you say something?”

Edward shrugs. “It seemed rude to interrupt.”

Sylvia rolls her eyes, Monica laughs, and David looks him over with an air of judgmental superiority. Edward rises from the bench and goes to introduce himself, and they all indulge in a phony sitcom-style laugh over the zany antics of the evening. The gorilla and Sylvia finally thank their paid escorts, bid them good-night and go back to the party.

Monica and her cleavage turn to Edward, eyeballing him appreciatively. “Well, the night is young and our work here is done. Wanna get a drink?”

Edward’s smile is polite, but thin. “Thanks for the offer, but I have something I need to take care of.” He pulls his phone out of his jacket and waves it in explanation.

Monica shrugs and tells him she’ll be at the bar, if he’s interested. Edward checks for messages, then frowns because there are none. He speed-dials the same number again and mutters anxiously under his breath.

“Come on, Bella. Answer me.”

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Bella has never been the life of the party before. But apparently Pot +190-Proof Grain Alcohol = A Very Funny Bella, because she has just told some silly story that has everyone laughing. This is fun, she thinks. But she wishes she could remember exactly what she said.

“I think you should switch to water or soda for awhile,” she hears Jessica say in her ear, though she is having trouble focusing on her.

“Good idea,” Mike chimes in, then disappears, ostensibly to get something innocuous for her to drink. He appears very shortly, red cup in hand, but this time it contains only water. He and Jess encourage her to drink all of it down, though she is feeling very full.

“I have to pee,” she announces afterward.

“I’ll go with you.” Jess takes her arm and helps her up, and she is surprised at how difficult it is to simply walk a straight path through the room and down the hall to the community bathroom. She has the same trouble once she is in the stall. The toilet-paper roll has taken on a strangely vivid and surreal appearance as she yanks on the paper and watches it unfurl like a party streamer in her hand.

“You are so funny when you’re drunk,” she hears Jessica’s disembodied voice float from under the adjoining stall. “Like I’m so sure that you hired an escort to take your virginity. Where did you come up with that one?”

Bella’s stomach turns violently. “What? What are you talking about?”

“That story you just told about giving up on guys our age and hooking up with a male prostitute instead. That was hilarious. You made that fantasy guy sound really hot, though. I don’t blame you for wanting to make up a perfect first time. God knows my first time last year with a drunk guy in a frat house was anything but.”

Bella has just enough sobriety left in her to be horrified. How could she have blurted out something, anything, about her night with Edward? - the most cherished, and private, night of her life thus far. She cringes and rubs her face in her hands, wondering how much she revealed. At least no one seemed to take her seriously, right?

“Are you okay in there?” Jessica’s voice is now further away, near the sinks. Bella hears water running, then towels being yanked from the dispenser. “I can hold your hair if you’re going to barf.”

“No, I’m fine,” Bella lies. She stands up and thinks that maybe she will turn around and hurl, but then the feeling subsides.

She makes her way to the sinks while Jessica shakes her head sympathetically in the mirror.

“You are going to be so sick tomorrow. It’d be better if you’d just puke up some of that punch right now.”

“I’m fine,” Bella insists with a scowl, drying her hands.

“Okay, whatever. You need to drink more water, though. Let’s get you another glass, okay?”

Bella nods and begins to follow Jess out the bathroom door when she hears a tinny, musical sound.

“My ears are ringing,” she laments.

Jess rolls her eyes. “I think it’s your phone.”

“Oh.” Bella stops to think where she has left her phone, then remembers that she always puts it in her back pocket when she doesn’t carry a purse. She fishes it out and looks at the number, and her stomach reacts once more.

“Edward?” she answers tentatively.

“Bella! Thank God. I’ve been worried about you. Why haven’t you answered my messages? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m great,” she says, trying very hard to sound normal, though right now she’s not sure what that sounds like. “I’m sorry, I’m at this really noisy party. Is everything okay?”

“I don’t know. You tell me. You sound weird. Are you drunk?”

“Yeah, just a little,” she lies. “I’m drinking water now. I’ll be fine.”

“Where are you?”

“Just at a dorm party. Remember, you said I should be going to those, right?”

“Which dorm?”

“McCarty. It’s right across from my dorm, McMahon. It’s no big deal. I’ll make it home fine, if that’s what you’re worried about. Mike will probably walk me there if I ask him.”

“Who’s Mike?”

She’s not sure, but it sounds like Edward’s voice is growing more strained with every question he fires at her.

“My high school boyfriend. He just transferred here this year so he threw a dorm-warming party. Dorm-warming. . . Damn, that’s hard to say. Try to say that five times fast!” she exclaims with a giggle.

“Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” he orders.

A thrill shoots through her despite the heaviness she feels in her bones. “You don’t have to do that, Edward. I’ll just go home and sleep it off. Edward. . . ?”

She listens for his reply, but he is already gone.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Edward is trying not to panic. It does no good to panic. But Bella didn’t sound merely drunk. He is positive she’s ingested something else, and he’s determined to find out what it is. If one of those idiots dared to slip anything into her drink. . .

He hurries through the hotel with as much grace as he can muster, calling ahead to the front desk to bring his car around. He is shanghaied briefly by the amorous attentions of Heather Mears on his way past the ballroom, but he begs off as politely as he can under the circumstances and races to the lobby.

He is seething as he drives. He knows the UW campus well enough, having been to a couple of parties in the vicinity before; and he accompanied Alice for orientation last year. Parking will probably be a bitch, but he’ll figure something out. He won’t rest until he sees for himself that Bella is okay.

He hopes he’s overreacting, and she’s just imbibed too much. He suspects she might be stoned too. He hopes that’s all it is. He can’t consider the more harrowing possibilities.

He’s angry that Bella’s friends have let her get so wasted, but he knows his irritation goes further than that. In truth, he’s mad at himself for letting her turn his world upside down in the space of one measly week. And he’s pissed at her for making him care so much.

He’s still not sure how she did it. Why her? What’s so special about her? She’s pretty, but no bombshell. Smart, but infuriatingly naïve and foolish at the same time. She’s reckless. Immature. She will be nothing but trouble for him.

But she sees into his soul like no one ever has before. And he sees hers. Pure, good. Untainted.

Yet he still thinks to himself, This is crazy, as he pulls into a public parking garage near campus. She’s making me nuts, showing up at a college party still dressed in a suit, like some lame, overprotective older brother come to drag her away from her no-good hoodlum friends.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” he mutters aloud to himself as he strides out of the parking ramp, loosening his tie and removing his jacket as he goes. But he rolls up his sleeves and keeps on walking, following the signs to McCarty residence hall.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Bella is sleepy now.

I'll just lie down now, she thinks, so she weaves down the hall, back to Mike’s room. She climbs into his unoccupied bunk bed and rests her head on the pillow. This is the last thing she remembers, until she hears loud voices shouting into her face to wake up. Hands are grabbing at her, pulling her out of the bed. She protests feebly, telling them that she just wants to sleep now. But she hears Mike’s voice, closer than the others, saying that he’s going to walk her home now so she can sleep in her own bed.

She woozily agrees that this is a good idea, and she feels herself propped up by warm hands and arms on both sides. She is able to focus enough to see that Riley is helping Mike, and they have a firm grip on her as they pull her to her feet.

The room spins, and she thinks she might be sick; but then everything steadies, and she feels better now. They ask if she is able to walk, and she scoffs, “Of course!” Her feet don’t want to cooperate at first, but they eventually find a rhythm with Mike’s and Riley’s, and the three make their way to the elevator. Once inside, she sags against the wall and closes her eyes. Her stomach lurches upward as the elevator descends, but when it opens to the first floor, everything settles again, and she’s good to go, she thinks.

She feels better when they are outside in the cool night air. She is able to walk pretty well on her own then, rather than being dragged or carried by the boys on either side of her. She’s getting her bearings, though she still feels strange. She hears Mike mumble worriedly about the campus police. Riley replies that he thinks they won’t get busted as long as they keep Bella walking a straight line.

She’s vaguely offended by this, but too tired to protest. Instead, she gamely allows them to guide her down the sidewalk. They’re just about to take a short-cut across the grass when she hears it.

“Bella?”

Honey. Molasses. Her name sounds as sweet as syrup, ringing clear as a bell through her drunken stupor. A relief so profound and complete washes through her that she feels as though she might collapse.

“Edward,” she manages to slur. She looks over, and there he is, approaching with the grim determination of a knight in shining armor.

“Do you know this guy?” Mike asks her warily.

Bella can only nod and grin stupidly.

“Is this your brother?” Riley asks worriedly, looking up into Edward’s snarling countenance.

“She’s an only child,” Mike informs him.

“He’s my broker,” Bella says with a giggle.

Edward’s face relaxes slightly, and he manages a twisted half-grin at her in return.

“I’m a friend,” he tells the two college boys. “I’m here to take Bella safely back to her room.”

Mike still looks distrustful. “I’m her friend, too. And we were doing just fine getting her home.”

“Some friend,” Edward shoots back. “I think you’ve done enough already.” His venom hits the mark, and Mike shrinks back slightly.

“Bella, do you want to come with me?” Edward asks, holding out his hand.

She works hard to focus both of her eyeballs on that beautiful, long-fingered hand, and she remembers the first time he held it out to her. He made everything okay then, and he will now.

“Yes,” she says, with as much conviction as she can muster.

She reaches for his hand, and he grabs hers tightly. He pulls her away from the two boys, who let go with reluctance. She takes a couple of stumbling steps forward as he grips her shoulder firmly with his other hand. She smiles up into his severe features, made even more striking by his glower of concern for her under the moon’s rays.

“My dragon slayer,” she murmurs.

And then, the bile finally rises and she is sick, all over Edward’s shoes.