O' Lady, Be Good!

A True War Story is Never Moral

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 03:49:18 GMT

A True War Story is Never Moral
by attica
Rating: PG-13 Status: One-shot/Complete
Summary: There was only life and death, and occasionally, a little niche in the middle for anything else that happened to slip between the cracks. That was it.

“In the midst of evil you want to be a good man. You want decency. You want justice and courtesy and human concord, things you never knew you wanted. There is a kind of largeness to it, a kind of godliness. Though it’s odd, you’re never more alive than when you’re almost dead. You recognize what’s valuable. Freshly, as if for the first time, you love what’s best in yourself and in the world, all that might be lost.”

-The Things they Carried, Tim O’Brien.

- - - - - - - - - -

She heard the stories – it was bar talk, the kind you swig your liquor to and then nod your head to when you were half gone. Meaning it wasn’t the type of talk you would have in broad daylight of clear mind, if there ever was such a thing. Sometimes it came up and there would just be this real gritty silence, like salt roughly scraping at their lips, and then real bitter laughter. The ironic kind. Usually the laughter came from Ron. And Hermione, she just drank her beer – not as to say she didn’t have anything to say, it was just that everybody already knew. It was kind of twisted that way. Everybody somehow just already knew.

Sometimes Harry got letters, or calls, to speak to little crowds about what happened, which is funny, because he turns each one of ‘em down. She always heard about them at work because of some dissatisfied executive bitching about how Harry Potter suddenly turned mute. It wasn’t that at all. It’d been just a few years, and the world kept on living, and so they did too. That didn’t mean they fell asleep all calm-like every night, or that it’d been completely wiped clean from their memory. Every day she looked at her face and she remembered. War wasn’t something easily explicable, she always thought, when she would get letters to speak, too. They only asked her after Harry had turned them down. And so she turned them down, too, and the whole wizarding world came to this thought that they were just being so high and mighty about everything. Their scars were medals, and it fed them right. And they could never tell them so otherwise.

The story was that Malfoy – you remember him – he stayed on the Dark side. Supposedly. Then, at the last minute, right from behind, he started killing his own friends, in a mad rampage. Just green fire in his eyes, and spells shooting from his wand, and she heard he was just the right monster for it. And then everybody was dead. Or, at least, nearly. Except Voldemort, though, because it’s obvious the old bastard just doesn’t die very easily, and somehow Draco Malfoy loses his leg. Just like that. That was before Potter came to his senses, of course, and saved everybody’s asses – even the ones that shouldn’t have ever been saved, the ones that just jumped into the wagon at the last minute. And the story goes, Potter, after killing Voldemort, just stands there, all bloody and sweaty, looking like a real-life hero. It truly was a scene. Malfoy was on the ground, screaming in agony, clutching at his thigh, and his leg is gone. Just – blasted off. Simply not there.

Potter stands there, just watching him, his pathetic little form writhing and shouting. His eyes are like stones – opaque, smooth. Inside there’s a storm churning – it’s always been there, she’s always known this – and his face isn’t wreaked with the destruction he’s just seen, the destruction that almost seems to swallow him up like a mouthless pit of fire. His hand is absolutely steady and calm at his side; it doesn’t twitch one bit. Doesn’t quiver. It’s still, almost disturbingly still, just like the rest of him is. Or like the way everything is right after a war, that eerie and muffled silent instance that comes with being surrounded by death and destruction, as if they had just gotten their ears blown right off. Sound comes back slowly, in oozes and trickles.

Malfoy is pleading – though not at Potter, maybe more to God, or maybe to nothing at all. Nobody will ever exactly know just to who or what. Maybe he was just screaming just to scream, on account of how he’d just lost his leg. Point was, Potter was trying to figure if he’d be better off living with only three limbs, or better off not living at all. But the truth was, Malfoy had just killed off his friends, which had done Potter some very good, so what was the right thing to do? And as blood-soaked as he was, he didn’t even know if he could figure it out without fainting.

It was at that moment that she came – his best friend, the brains behind everything. And she runs to Potter and hugs him right ‘til he nearly does faint, and stares at Malfoy on the floor. Her eyes are wide with awe but it quickly smoothes away into something else indistinguishable, less jagged. And the funniest thing is, they’re there for minutes, and they’re just expecting him to die from the pain. Then he turns delirious. He holds out his hand to her, right out to her, and he says her name. Her real name. Hermione. And she doesn’t flinch, not a part of her moves, she feels like stone. She steals a glance at Potter – the only one that seems to be awake and conscious for this moment along with her, standing rigidly straight like a blade of grass on a still afternoon – and he says nothing. His lips stay tightly pursed, and his hands never move.

Death is too kind, he finally says. All the while, it seems as if his lips barely move at all. A three-limbed Malfoy. Wouldn’t that just be a laugh?

As strong as everyone saw her as, she felt queasy when it came to the war, and the wounded. She wants to look away, but her eyes stay glued on him, his sweating face pinched in agony, his spazzing, incomplete limb. There is a sweet revenge that makes her fingers feel a little fuzzy at the tips, watching him. Squirming like a worm, on the dirt.

She remembers when he used to tell her how dirty she was.

Harry, she says. She doesn’t want to sound sympathetic. Because she isn’t. She doesn’t know what she is, honestly, all she knows is that the stench of corpses is getting to her. It’s been days, and she feels lightheaded – the entire time she’d been fighting through a thick fog, seeing only flashes of lights. Green there, white here, red in the distance, almost always accompanied by a bloodcurdling scream. The worst was when they didn’t scream. That meant they hadn’t seen it coming.

She can feel the dirt caked underneath her fingernails, so deep in that she almost doesn’t think she’ll be able to ever get it out, with the smoke seeping into her open wounds, the dried blood in her crevices. Her hair is filthy. She smells dead, absolutely reeks of the stench of death, and she would’ve thought so, too, if she hadn’t felt her pulse thumping in her veins. Her body feels numb, if not too heavy to carry with only two feet that drag against the dirt, but she feels the blood coursing inside of her. This is what it must feel like. She realizes this. When you’re certain you’re nearly dead, the only way to be sure was to focus in real close to what is inside you. Her blood running. Her heart pumping. All it is is a muffled thump, like a fist against glass submerged in water, thump thump thump.

Just wait, he tells her. Wait, Hermione.

She wants to ask him what she should wait for. What she is waiting for. After all, Malfoy doesn’t succumb into silence, he just screams and groans and squirms. As she stands there and does what he says – wait – even after all she’s seen, she can’t help but feel filthy. There’s something wrong with this. And this was saying something, as these past few days all they had done was cross the borders of right and wrong. What they had thought was wrong soon turned into right. What had been right soon fell away in flanks and fragments, only to be found at the bottom of an abandoned lake, along with the severed thumbs and limbs and dead bodies. She was watching suffering. Right now, at this very moment, she was watching someone in the deepest pain they could possibly imagine.

She realized that Draco Malfoy did not fear death. He feared pain. She wondered whether this was what Harry realized, long before she had come along.

She didn’t have the stomach for this.

Harry, she says again. I think I’m going to be sick.

She lurches, like someone had just turned her stomach inside out with a fist, but there’s nothing there. She hasn’t eaten for days. Not food, anyway. Just dirt, and smoke, and her own blood. But she feels her mouth line with a coat of sour saliva – bile – and her lips crack. Then she tastes the blood: runny, and metallic.

- - - - - - -

She still gets that taste in her mouth from time to time. She tries to wash it away with coffee. A lot of the time, with beer. And then she grabs a fistful of nuts from the bowl, pops them into her mouth, chews, and swigs down beer again. As she does exactly that, she catches a glimpse of the scar she has on her arm. It looks like a star. With different points in different directions. She likes to tell people she doesn’t remember where she got it from – she had been too tired, had been on the verge of passing out, she’d just been hit in the back with another spell. It blacked out her memory.

She’s lying, of course. When somebody tells you they don’t remember where they got something, say a scar, they’re lying. They always are.

- - - - - - - - - -

It’s a test. Either it always is or it always isn’t, but she can never tell these days. All she knows for sure – a fact, as tangible and real as her living room couch or the potted cactus her mother sent her a week ago – is that she can tell whenever one of them wakes up to nightmares of what happened. There’s a deadness in the eyes, with the black bruising underneath, like a shadow of something weighty and heavy and simply massive. Something unmeasured. Something that just couldn’t be.

They’d tried to get back to their old lives. They got frustrated with the anchor they seemed to be carrying with them everywhere they went, so they tried jumping into denial. One night, Harry got drunk. He did this purposely – he drank just until the heaviness that came with the mornings and nights seemingly began to lift off, ever so slightly, like heels jumping off of his shoulders to fly. And then he kissed her. She remembered the sloppy way he did it: his cool hand pressing against the nape of her neck, his palm smooth and flat like an old, worn stone from a river, his fingers digging into her skin. It was like kissing a bottle of beer. His motions were liquid if not completely forceful, the way he didn’t let her breathe, he just sucked the breath right out of her. He stunk of alcohol, and it stung the insides of her nose. It made her dizzy.

He’d forgotten she was there. He’d forgotten she had been there with him, standing right in the midst and the eye and even at the edge of the war. He’d forgotten that her innocence had been ruined, too, and that she was still bitter over the fact that she could never get it back, not ever.

She didn’t say a word, because she understood. He was a little rough because of what he was trying to escape; he was a little clumsy because of all the alcohol in his system. She tried to close her eyes, tight, suppressing the visions of flashing lights: green, white, red. She tried to ignore the sudden itch she had underneath her fingernails. The dirt was still there. She never kidded herself. It would always be.

It hurts. Of course it does. Neither of them know what they’re doing – not now, not then. They were still so young, so undeserving, so dumb. He’s not doing this because he loves her. He’s doing this because he needs release. He’s doing this because he doesn’t know what he’s doing, he’s so drunk, and he won’t remember it in the morning – but it means something, in the way that now, everything meant absolutely nothing. Not since the war. He’d just like to feel. This was the first attempt. He found bravery in the amnesia of liquor, just like he used to find bravery in faith, and hope, and goodness, and justice.

He didn’t believe in any of that anymore. There was only life and death, and occasionally, a little niche in the middle for anything else that happened to slip between the cracks. That was it.

- - - - - - - - - -

She was a pretty nurse. Sometimes, late at night, he would think about her. Her soft brown hair, which was always pulled back, and her white cotton uniform – always flawlessly ironed, not a single wrinkle or stain in sight. She had long, slender fingers – he considered them sinful. She would tug on his bandages, which would be rough and scratchy and dry, and feel his pulse, which at times operated like a dim light in the distance, flickering and faint, yet continuous. Sometimes she would lean onto him when she was trying to fluff his pillow, and he would just breathe her in. She smelled just like softness, if that made any sense. He’d never smelt anything like it before; the only smells that had been permanently burned into his memory were these: vodka, whiskey, smoke, rotten corpses, and silk. For a time he felt as if the smells of the war still haunted him, awake or asleep. Sometimes, he would even smell blood. The pools and pools of it. And he could never figure it out – nor did he want to – so he kept it hidden as best he could, behind the storage of his memories and his secrets, underneath the weight of his mistakes.

Her name was Franchesca. Frannie, for short, which was the name the other nurses called her. Her legs were slender but shaped by muscle, and her wrists were tiny and almost breakable if he hadn’t seen their quickness and felt their strength. She smelled like softness – if there ever was such a smell – and quiet rainy days.

He wouldn’t talk to her. Sometimes she asked him questions – whether he was thirsty, if he wanted his pillow fluffed, if his chest still hurt – but he would only respond with silent gestures or one-worded answers. For two years, he never spoke more than two words to her, which was funny, because most of his nights – especially on rainy nights – he would think about her. The way her hands would feel on his body, the way her skin would taste compared to how it smelled.

One night that all changed.

She left a book on his bedside table. Accidentally or purposefully, he would never actually know, but he remembered just seeing it there and being curious and bewildered. It was a leather-bound book with faded gold printing. He grabbed it and opened it to see what it was about. He was guessing maybe a book of the classics. A book about philosophy. Maybe even a book about gardening.

The next day she would come in, with her impeccable white uniform and her soft-soled white shoes and neatly pinned brown hair, and he was waiting for her. She stopped when she saw him, because he was gesturing to the book she’d left on his bedside.

You left your book, he tells her.

Her eyes flicker, but her face is calm and smooth. Oh, she says. I knew I’d forgotten something when I left.

And then she comes around, grabbing the book from the table, pressing it against the side of her thigh. Thanks. She doesn’t sound like she means it.

How can you still believe in religion, he asks her in a serious tone, after everything that’s happened?

She doesn’t flinch. She’s not shocked by his question, or even flustered or unnerved – almost as if she’d seen it coming.

I don’t, she answers, believe in religion.

“That book you’re holding there proves the contrary.”

“I don’t have to believe in religion to read this,” she says. He can't figure out how she sounds. A little tightly wound, but only subtly so, a forceful nonchalance. There's a look beneath the dullness of her eyes, a subdued thrill lurking under the sheen of the boredom of routine -- but he's not sure, maybe he just wants to see it -- that tells him, Go. Go on. Ask the question.

"It’s misleading, at best. Carrying around a Bible as white as your uniform. What exactly do you get from those pretty little passages in there? Hope? Faith? Security? Delusions?"

She shakes her head, but she’s smiling. She tells him he doesn’t understand. And then he says, Which part? She answers with: All of it.

He stares at her. There was nothing remarkable about her answer – it was your usual religious person response to a challenge from a nonbeliever. It was smug, conceited, and seemingly superior. He held such conviction that if there ever was a God, he was a sadistic master puppeteer – but otherwise he was just an illusion created by idealists looking for a savior and a meaning they couldn’t find in themselves. It was an excuse to create war, to crusade, to kill, to invade, to destroy people’s identities. God was just a holy vessel steered by men with hidden agendas. God was false advertisement for a faulty product. God was a fickle shadow, menacing but harmless and certainly not tangible. Most of all, God was an invention, a tool, a weapon.

He says all of this to her. It doesn’t occur to him that this is the most he’s ever spoken to her in two entire years. It doesn’t even occur to him that his weekly re-bandaging is getting delayed because of a point he was desperately trying to make. How can you believe, he asks, almost so earnestly that he’s choked up by it, when everything around you is proof of the contrary?

He remembers he lost his leg. He turned good, and then he lost his leg. And two figures stood above him, unmoving, as he screamed and squirmed, grasping at the limb that used to be. He remembers a voice, a voice he always hears in his sleep, weak and almost even emotionally strangulated: I think I’m going to be sick.

She stays silent for a minute. Predictable. These religious types, they need to formulate, they need to dig through their heads for pre-meditated answers fed through the writings of so-called prophets and descendants of God. He watches her in scrutiny. The room stays absolutely silent, as if watching and listening with its bleak colorless walls. And he just waits.

What, she finally says, her voice quiet and still and white, do you have against God?

Draco smiles without knowing it. “Everything.”

Suddenly, he has an uncanny urge to tell her about how he lost his leg. About how he had killed all of his friends. About how he had betrayed the side he had been born into. About how he couldn’t even begin to talk about the nausea he’d felt as he felt the power surging through him and the blinding green lights flashing in front of him, and even almost inside him, that pulsating and unadulterated energy that made the hair on the back of his neck stand rigid straight. The energy of death, he called it. It was that powerful. It made men go insane. It made men betray.

Then she says something funny: “Everything, is it? Maybe you should be a little more specific.” And then she has a little smile -- a quarter of a smile, a sliver of it, barely hanging off the side of her mouth. Maybe in a different angle he might have never noticed it, because if he tilted his face the slightest bit, it disappeared.

He didn't understand this about people. The way there were so many facets to them, like a diamond, but you could never see them all at once -- like a diamond. You turn your head one way, you see a sly carving on their face that only remotely resembles a smile, and you turn it the other way, or even just a little, you see something else. Or even, perhaps, nothing at all. Sometimes he found comfort in the fact that there was never a complete uncovering of somebody's soul -- this made him sleep easier at night -- but also brought him to question exactly the validity of someone if you could never hold them in your hand as a whole, or even think of them as a whole, with their guts hanging out and the bruises on their ego and the dullness of their spine and the unhealed holes in their heart with their chest ripped open. They were never fully exposed. Even if they were, even if it seemed like a lot, like a whale load, it was never the case.

Maybe, if it happened to him, he would have a little bit more trust in people. Maybe even in God. He could not hold God in the palm of his hand as a whole, he couldn't even think of God as a whole. It was perforated, like Swiss cheese, like an innocent used as target practice.

He wanted to tell her that he didn't know how to be specific, that he had lost the ability two years ago – that the word had lost its meaning because it had been completely swallowed up by an ambiguous, tumultuous time made of ancient grudges and barbed wire and black nights. But it didn’t stand alone. Many words had spiraled out of his vocabulary; they had lost all of their weight and had been crushed from inside out, and their empty weightless shells had just drifted out. Out there. Out there. Words. They were just words. Faith. Love. Peace. Bad. Good.

The hard part was trying to tell whether she would understand. In the end, he decided she wouldn’t be able to. It was just easier that way.

Think about it, she says, and she gets out the bandaging kit, falling into routine. It was strange, the way they had seemed to cross into something out of the ordinary from the past two years, a remarkable, different instance. Think about it some more, she says again, and just be specific. And then everything goes silent, and all of the whacked out pieces and fragments that had been blown up into the air the minute he spoke falls back into place. He says nothing back, and the silence stretches out between them so familiarly – except there is one exception, a dangling artery that connected her to him, and that smile on the edge of her lips that seemed to appear and disappear from angle to angle, if ever at will.

- - - - - - - - -

He must’ve let it sit there for days.

It took a nearly fatal almost-injury for him to take notice of it again.

What the fuck? she says, peering at the floor, moving her foot away. What the fuck?

He looks up from his Sudoku so nonchalantly, and she gives him an accusing glare, as if he had meant it to be there, as if it had been a conspiracy. She tells him there’s a pile of shattered glass on the floor, and had he known this? He tells her Yes. She swears at him – why didn’t he clean it up? And most curiously, how long had he let it sit there, waiting for a poor unfortunate soul to get the soles of their feet all cut up?

He has this calm look in his eyes. He tells her to look at it.

Well, she says, her hands on her hips, I’m looking at it, aren’t I? How else did you think I noticed? Nearly got my foot all cut up, you fucking bastard.

Don’t look at it – look at it. Closely. And still he says this so calmly. She thinks there’s something wrong with him, that maybe he’s been living by himself too long. But she does what he says, squinting, before sighing and throwing her hands up and calling him crazy. If you’re that fucking lazy, she grumbles, I’ll clean it up myself. And then she grabs a broom.

He stops her.

“Things break. That’s just how things are.”

She tells him she doesn’t care. Someone is going to get hurt, so she’s cleaning it up.

“That’s the problem,” he tells her, shaking his head. “Every time something’s broken, people want to fix it. If they can’t fix it, or if it isn’t worth the fix, they want to sweep it up and throw it away – out of sight, out of mind. See, I,” he says, licking his lips, gesturing to the pile of broken glass on the floor, “have made peace with broken things.”

And that’s exactly the way he put it. He’s made peace with broken things, and he takes the broom from her, and puts it back where it originally was. He just leaves it there, a pile of shattered glass, and she looks at it as if it was a predator, waiting to jump out. She asks him if he’s serious, and he just picks up where he left off on his Sudoku.

He’s made peace with broken things, he says again, not looking up, and so should she.

- - - - - - - -

They went out for beers. Often. They found comfort in the dimness of the place, where you walked into and would often forget whether it was daylight or night outside, and the tired but cheery faces of the bartenders with the steady hands for pouring alcohol, and the shining bottles of liquor perfectly lined up against the mirror. And in the mirror they would see themselves, their own faces, and sometimes they recognized themselves – and sometimes they didn’t. It all seemed to depend on what kind of day they’d had, on whether they’d woken up from nightmares and hadn’t been able to go back to sleep, and even the time of night.

This is nice, one of them would say. Then they’d remark on how they always managed to congregate, no matter what was happening. And then they’d pop nuts into their mouths as they drank beer, talking about something that happened at the office or at the market. They rarely talked about the news. On occasion they would remark about the Ministry, which always got Ron riled up, especially if he was drunk. Those bitches, he’d say. Those fucking bastards. Don’t you remember how they left us out there to die? They left us out there to die.

Each of them felt a certain disconnectedness from their surroundings. Their environment. Sometimes they felt as if they were going through their days in a plastic bubble, untouched and not being able to touch. People and noises and conversation and the music of daily life would go on above their heads, just this slight and low humming, and they would simply be unfazed and unaffected. She was able to drink her coffee black. She was able to talk dirty and speak in a way she had never imagined she would. Worst of all, she could block out the world so easily, sometimes even without her knowing.

Sometimes, Harry says, staring at their reflection in the mirror, with the bottles all lined up neatly. Sometimes I can’t figure out what’s so different. Us or them. It’s one of the other.

He meant to say that nothing felt the same. Not even the texture of his skin, or the softness that he used to be able to feel when he touched certain things. His skin was tougher. Less sensitive. His eyes were darker, absent of the naive sparkle it’d had in previous pictures; sometimes it even looked hollow. When he saw innocence he could not help but think of how, someday, it will all vanish. It will be stolen. It will disappear.

And nothing would be the same.

Ron is the one that replies. Can’t it be both?

Harry shakes his head. Not this time, he answers. It has to be one or the other.

Hermione nods and drinks her beer, a nice languid drink. It’s funny, she finds it funny, because that’s exactly how it is. One or the other. War, beauty, life. It was always one or the other. It couldn’t ever be both. It was either broken or whole, pure or filthy, good or bad. One or the other. She wondered if there could ever be a middle, a neutral. If you could possibly live on as secular to either and both.

Well, fuck me, Harry says, putting down his drink. His voice is smooth, but low. Isn’t it funny? It’s after the war, and we still don’t have any answers. Makes you wonder, doesn’t it? We go in with a cause in mind, with solution as our goal, and we come out with nothing but questions. You get out, and everything’s a glaring question mark – even the damn sunlight. Even the damn sunlight, you know? Fuck.

- - - - - - - -

The two figures, these two black and fuzzy shadows, always visited him in his dreams. It was always the same scene, and he was forced to relive it every night – his betrayal, his moment of weakness, his act of crossing the boundaries. The skies churned red and black, with the stink of rotting corpses everywhere, with flashing lights bathing the soil. It lit up the apocalyptic sky like fireworks, except there were no sounds of awe or exclamation. Instead there were screams in the distance.

The worst was when there was absolute silence, because that meant that they hadn’t seen it coming.

He remembered how he’d clutched the ground, as if wanting to sink into it or be swallowed by it, his fingernails scraping against the dirt. He’d wanted something to hang onto besides himself, because he felt his soul – if he ever possessed such a thing – reeling inside him, as if wanting to rocket out of his body, squealing with pain and confusion.

He thought it was funny how he felt pain in a place that was no longer there. His leg.

He didn’t ask for help because he knew he wouldn’t get it. He didn’t ask for help because he knew what the two figures were thinking, why they simply just stood there, watching. He was suffering, and it pleased them. He was suffering, and for once, life was fair. It was the purest act of retribution long coming, and they were simply there, soaking it in, like licking your lips after a delicious meal – except not really. It wasn’t that they found pleasure in it. It was just that it was fair; it was justice. It had a magnetic pull on human kind, seeking out justice, seeking out to witness justice. Maybe to scavenge what little hope they had left. Or maybe just because there was nothing else to do.

- - - - - - - - - -

“Why did you do it?”

He remembers those five words flittering in his dreams, cutting through fabrics of silk and shining silver like thunder across a boiling, tumultuous sky.

It’s a woman, standing at the edge of his bed, gripping the steel bars with her small, dainty hands. Hands capable of evil. Hands capable of healing. Hands capable of things beyond her knowledge and imagination. His eyes are so heavy they can only be held up at half-mast, like torn sails on a boat, but he stares at the blurry image of her hands on the bars.

He doesn’t say anything and she continues on, her voice a harsh whisper. Accusing.

“What was it? Were you looking for redemption?” She spits the last word like poison. And he cringes, inwardly. It is poison.

“No,” he manages to choke out. His throat is dry and gravelly. He hasn’t had anything to drink for hours. He sits there in the heavy, tormenting darkness. “I just wanted to live.”

There it was. He was no broken savior, not even a hero. Just desperate scum.

She calls him a selfish bastard. Then she disappears.

It had nothing to do with wrong or right, bad or good, or even justice. He just decided that his cause wasn’t worth dying for, after all. Life was precious. He was only sorry he hadn’t realized this before. Maybe it could have saved him a leg.

- - - - - - - - -

They all heard the stories – it was bar talk, the kind you swig your liquor to and then nod your head to when you were half gone. Meaning it wasn’t the type of talk you would have in broad daylight of clear mind, if there ever was such a thing. Sometimes it came up and there would just be this real gritty silence, with their mouths puckered against the lip of their beers, and then real bitter laughter. The ironic kind. Boisterous. Loud. Not happy, but not sad, either – just in between there somewhere, in a crevice. Usually the laughter came from Ron. And Hermione, she just drank her beer – not as to say she didn’t have anything to say, it was just that everybody already knew. It was kind of twisted that way. Everybody somehow just already knew.

- - - - - - - - - - -

It was a Thursday night that they had all agreed to meet at the bar. Hermione ordered a beer and so did Harry. They chatted away about what was happening at their offices. Ron was a little late – but this wasn’t new, Ron was always late, so they didn’t think much of it.

Ten minutes later they look up to see him limping towards them. Harry makes a snarky remark about his lame, crooked stride. He sits down beside Hermione and quickly orders a beer. Around them, they hear the surrounding hum of mixed conversation, all blurred together in a language they could not make out and did not ever care to. To them, they're surrounded by people they saved, by people who no longer cared unless something forced them to remember the tragic fate they could have faced, and by people who mostly preferred to forget. It was human. To forget. But it was also human to latch on to something, forcefully, in an effort not to do just that--forget.

To Harry, forgetting was a sin. To others, it was a necessity for survival. And to others, it was simply a luxury.

“It’s my foot,” he tells them, without them having to ask. The bartender passes him a beer. He sighs, shaking his head, and swipes his thumb against the front, wiping the moisture away. “I stepped on some fucking glass this morning.”

A/N: Thoughts? Questions? Comments? PLS DO.

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Wed, 16 Jul 2008 06:57:22 GMT

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[011-016]: Jenny Lewis
[017-021]: Zooey Deschanel

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Gravity, Chapter Seven: Target

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 23:02:36 GMT

I BET YOU DIDN'T SEE THIS COMING. DID YOU?

This has been sitting in my files for quite a while, collecting desktop dust. This isn't quite as action-packed as the other chapters (we all need a little downtime, eh? Bella isn't Jack Bauer). I have some plans for this fanfic but the fandom crack that propelled me to start this fic and take it as far as I have has considerably waned, which would explain the long delay in the updates. I am simply not so inspired anymore, ppls. Pls to be forgiving? I'll try to squeeze out as many chapters as I can, but the battery's dying.

Gravity
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Edward and Bella fight their oh-so-passionate bodily urges while new happenings take place at Forks. A vampire hunter and a ghost from Edward's past? And Bella's clumsiness just makes everything worse. Of course. [BEDWARD]
SPOILERS: Takes place after Twilight, so this is pre-New Moon, and you can forget about Eclipse, that was whack. Sorry Jacob-lovers, as much as I'd love him and Edward in a cockfight!fic over Bella, this ain't it. I just didn't feel like writing him in.
Status: 7/?
CHAPTERS: 1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6 //

Chapter Seven: Target

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking.
Racing around to come up behind you again.
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older.
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death.
- Pink Floyd, Time.

Without wasting a single second, Edward had crossed over, grabbing me by the arm. I stared at him with wide eyes, dumbfounded, with my ears pounding, as he then proceeded to drag me out of the house. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed a dark blur beside me, and turned my head to see Alice softly grasping my other arm. I blinked, taking in my full vampire escort.

Jasper was holding the door open, and I almost twisted myself around to try to get some more answers to understand exactly why the Volturi was coming and why exactly I had to get out so fast – but Alice seemed to see this coming and blocked my way. I only had a passing glimpse of Esme and Carlisle standing there with Rosalie, solemn and grave, before the door shut.

The thunderous sound of the angry rain echoed all around me, and as I breathed I watched as white puffs appeared and disappeared, flimsy and elusive. Edward swept me up into his arms, and before I knew it, I was inside the dry leather interior of his car, with barely a few raindrops on me. Then, in a second that came as quickly as it went, Alice leaned in, brushing her frosty lips against the plain of my cheek, and was gone. Her soft words had barely reached my ears before I heard the slam of the car door, and Edward was beside me, still drenched, revving up the engine.

I stared ahead, my breath hitching in the middle of my chest. Her words floated around, like tattered pieces of ribbon in the wind, stumbling inside my brain, struggling to make sense.

“Goodbye, Bella.”

It wasn’t long – not even a second – before the Cullen Manor was far behind us and we were speeding back into the town limits of Forks. I stared at the window in front of me, and it reminded me of being trapped inside a car as it sank to the bottom of the ocean. So much water. I was even beginning to feel it in my lungs. Heavy. Suffocating.

“Edward,” I said, turning to him with an earnest and confused expression, “what’s going on? Why are the Volturi coming for Elizabeth?”

His response was quick. “They found out about her power. My guess is that once they’d heard about the vampire hunter putting his hit on her, they sprang into action – decided her power was too valuable to waste.” His eyes were hard, unwavering, directed at the unseen road past the glass. The pounding water made everything hideous – it ran everything together, into one sloppy, ambiguous form. As I looked at it, it made me uneasy and even more frustrated than I had been before.

“What do they want with her?”

“They want to make her one of them.”

I nodded, swallowing hard. My hand, like a block of ice, unconsciously clenched into a useless fist on my lap. “And Lucas Tamer…”

He continued to avoid my searching eyes, but his voice was burdened with anger and concern. “Might not get his hit after all.”

I stayed silent for a second and thought about what that could mean. Nothing too clear came to mind – all of the pieces were still being so haphazardly shoved my way – but I knew as much to trust the feeling that immediately cropped up in my gut: fear, worry, and a subdued panic, bubbling underneath the surface.

When I spoke again, I didn’t recognize my voice – it sounded small. Too small.

“This is bad, isn’t it?”

He pressed his marble lips together, tight. “You’ll be safe, Bella. I’ll make sure of it.”

“I don’t care if I’m safe,” I abruptly choked out, my eyes beginning to burn, “what I’m worried about is you—”

Finally, his head snapped in my direction. His eyes flashed. “Bella, don’t be stupid,” he harshly said through his teeth. “You have to understand, you’re my first priority – above anything and everything else. You, Bella. Don’t you see? You’re in constant danger, and it doesn’t help at all that you’re with me…” He sighed sharply, his nostrils flaring, before he looked back at the road, his hands tightly gripping the wheel. I could spot the empty veins faintly bulging from the white skin of his forearms. His voice was tight – and was as rigid as the rest of him was. “I’m taking you home. You should be safe there.”

Home. I almost wanted to scoff.

There was a sickening growth in my throat. Thorns and barbs had sprung out from my pulsing pink flesh, and with every hard swallow I had to take it had become exponentially painful. I stared at him, unable to speak. Cold hands, again. This time, around my throat. Around my heart. I turned away, pressing my forehead against the cool glass, in a dim, painful haze. I could feel the rain pounding on the other side. I hugged Alice’s cozy designer sweater close to me. Somehow I had an uncanny and terrible feeling—a feeling that gutted me inside out—that I would not be seeing the Cullens for a very long time.

I fought against it, of course. They couldn’t be leaving Forks. Not like this. I was just being paranoid – silly, as always. Stupid. But I knew what sorts of things I was capable of fighting, and that this was not one of them.

As I crept into the dark hole inside my mind, the car ride crossed the border between time and space – fluctuating from eternity to its unforeseeable end. One moment seemed to drag on forever, barbed with the frosty claws of silence – and then before I knew it, the car had stopped.

The rain pounding against the windshield had slowed its furious tempo. He still had his hands on the wheel, and for a second I caught him from the corner of my eye; he looked like a perfect marble statuette. Stoic. Unmoving. Lightning whipped above us, and his shocking porcelain skin glowed for a moment, making him look ghostly. My heart ached.

I could see the blurred outline of the houses from my window, and I knew that it was late. Really late. Charlie would be surprised to see me, especially since Carlisle had called him just hours before to tell him that I would be staying over. I knew the sooner I got inside the better, but no part of me was willing to move from my seat. We both just sat there, saying nothing. I let out a shuddered breath that noisily clanged in my ears upon its release. It was every bit as painful as it sounded.

“I need you to tell me, Edward,” I whispered, my cold hands clenched on my lap. “What’s going to happen now?”

Silence greeted me. Pointed and sharp.

“I don’t know.” His face was stern, but his voice gave away something else: uncertainty, worry. The jagged edge of his words softened. “I don’t know, Bella.”

“You… you’re not going to leave, are you?” I asked. I couldn’t tell whether it sounded as if I was begging – and at that point, I didn’t really care what I sounded like. All I knew was, everything had happened too fast, before I’d even had time to catch my breath, and I needed answers.

Answers that Edward, apparently, did not have.

He looked at me, and even through the darkness of his eyes I saw something that comforted me: reassurance. He seemed to be confused by my question. “I can’t leave you, Bella. You could very well be a target now. It’d be the stupidest notion to even think of leaving you here all alone.”

A big breath tumbled out of my lips. “Right,” I whispered, feeling a little lightheaded. Despite myself, a dry and hoarse laugh was emitted from my throat. It was completely beyond me why I seemed to be laughing at such a crucial and grave moment – even as I heard it, reflecting off of the glass windows that surrounded us, I heard the absence of humor. But I felt it, that relief in my chest that instantly released the airtight binds on my heart. “Right.”

His brow furrowed, and a flicker of emotion broke through his stony mask. When he spoke, his voice was quiet and full of awe. “You really thought I was going to leave you.”

I cleared my throat, glancing over at the runny front door of my house. I traced its outline on the window with my fingertips. I felt silly now for asking. “Now let’s not get too carried away.”

He sounded like he was laughing – but it was weak, and strained. Just then I felt his hand cupping my cheek, and I turned to him. “You silly, ridiculous girl,” he murmured quietly, barely the volume of a whisper. “You’re awfully stubborn in thinking that, aren’t you?” He leaned closer to me, and even though his body still held a trace of its rigidness, there was still that unmistakable gentleness in the way that he touched me.

“Why do you insist on thinking that way?” he whispered, his sweet breath fluttering against my face. His fingers lightly rested on my cheek, and if I hadn’t felt its chill, I wouldn’t have even known they were there at all. “Bella, your insecurities are utterly baffling.”

I slowly closed my eyes, swallowing hard. My throat was dry. “If you ever get the chance to be me for a day,” I said, hoarsely, “take it. Then you’d know.”

His lips brushed against mine, softly at first, then a little more forcefully. I wrapped my hand around the nape of his neck in my constant and unrelenting effort of bringing him closer than he allowed himself, but he pulled away. I watched him as he took back his position, resting his hands on the wheel.

“Charlie’s coming,” he informed me. His voice was calm. “You’d better go.”

I grumbled. “Good ol’ cop dad,” I said, unclasping the seatbelt. “Impeccable timing. Must be something they teach at Camp Fatherhood or something. Heightened sense of when their teenage daughters are getting the slightest bit of action.”

Edward’s car had disappeared by the time Charlie had appeared at the door, looking surprised, first, and then concerned. I walked up to him, trying to rid myself of the niggling shivers I got from thinking about what had happened in the past couple of hours. I could feel that my cheeks were flushed.

“Bella,” he said, as I walked up the path. He looked genuinely baffled. “Carlisle said—”

“My fever cooled,” I told him, trying to fetch out the appropriate tone of voice. “It was like a miracle. I guess the Cullens don’t just go for your regular Tylenol.” I smiled at Charlie, but it didn’t break the mask he had on his face. From completely bewildered to highly suspicious. I couldn’t blame him. “Is everything okay, Dad?” Aren’t you glad your daughter is still somehow miraculously alive after nearly getting mauled by her boyfriend’s rabid vampire ex-girlfriend?

He blinked before nodding his head. He tiredly rubbed his eyes. “Come on inside, Bella. It’s been raining hard all day.”

“Have you eaten yet?” I asked as I walked in, taking comfort in our newly installed heating system. Our house was cozy and warm despite the manic weather outside. I looked at him, taking off my coat, catching the announcements from the TV in the other room. I heard the familiar voice of the commentator from Charlie’s favorite sports channel. “I can make you soup.”

I looked at him expectedly. I was a little guilt-ridden because I’d made Charlie worry about me. Looking at him, he obviously still wasn’t used to having an accident-prone teenaged daughter running around in the free world living under his roof.

“Sure,” he answered, though there was still something about his expression that hinted to me that he was still wary about exactly what had happened with my fever vanishing so quickly. “That would be great, Bella. Thanks.”

I headed into the kitchen and grabbed a few cans from the pantry, starting up the stove. As I worked I could hear the sounds of the game, but that didn’t help the thoughts that kept creeping into my mind. Was life always going to be this eventful for as long as I stayed in Forks? If I’d stayed in Phoenix… how different would things be? Would my ongoing injury count still have stayed in the average range? And how different, exactly?

“Different,” I muttered to myself, stirring the chowder. “Really different.”

“What’s different?”

My head jerked up and I whirled around, only to spot Charlie coming through the kitchen door. He looked curious. And hungry.

“Life,” I reluctantly answered, going back to stirring the pot. “The soup’s almost ready, don’t worry. I can already see that glazed over look in your eyes from hunger.”

“I’m starved.” I heard the chair scraping against the tiles as he pulled it out and sat down. “The precinct ran out of donuts early.”

“Ah,” I said. “The legendary diet of policemen. Donuts. Glazed or powdered? Or did you splurge and get the assorted kind?” It was a wonder why only very few of them actually caught criminals that bolted on those badly taped cop shows. “Maybe I should start packing lunches for you, Charlie. Maybe a daily pack of carrot sticks or something.”

He laughed. “It’s not so bad, Bella. We manage to get in a few good stuff every now and then.”

I hadn’t noticed that he’d gone quiet as I lowered the heat until he started talking again, this time with a strange and stiff tone in his voice. “Listen, I’ve been doing some thinking…”

I listened closely even though my back was turned to him. The atmosphere had changed in record time from lighthearted and amusing to serious and… awkward. I grabbed a bowl from the cabinet, along from a spoon, pouring in some soup.

“Exactly how serious are you with Edward Cullen?” he asked, and I froze, staring at the creamy broth inside the pot. He cleared his throat, and I had the uncanny feeling that he was feeling very, very uncomfortable with asking me this. “I’ve been talking to Renee, and she told me that you know all about—”

“Oh God,” I said, turning around as fast as I could, nearly dropping the bowl. “Charlie,” I said hoarsely, feeling my face reddening at an exponential rate, “you really don’t have to—”

“—what happens between two individuals who happen to…” he faltered, his face beginning to flush, as well. “And, of course,” he said, grunting, “the consequences. You’re a very smart young lady, and I’m sure you know all of this.”

I stared at him. What a sight we were. Two red-faced people in a kitchen with a – and I was fairly sure of this – rather exciting game going on in the next room. I could vaguely tell from the way the commentator was raving and yelling.

He looked like he was having a very difficult time with this – confronting me. I couldn’t blame him; it wasn’t exactly a big shiny moment of fatherhood for most.

“It’s just that I’ve noticed you’ve been spending a fair amount of time over at the Cullens’, and while I’m sure Carlisle and Esme have certainly brought their children up in such a way that… that most parents can only dream of, there are still some… worries, that I, as a father,” he said, gulping, looking at me, “have.”

I was mortified, and I was sure he could tell. We both were.

“I know this may be awkward,” he continued on, hesitantly, “but I’ve talked it over with Renee, and she insisted that I be the one to talk to you about it…” He sighed. “Bella, I just want you to be careful,” he said seriously, tired with trying to carefully pick out his words. This was the more Charlie way. “He’s probably the most well-behaved boy I’ve met in my entire life, especially for a boy his age… but he is still a boy.”

“I know what he is, Dad,” I said quietly. Replace the word ‘boy’ with ‘ancient vampire,’ and we’re actually a lot closer to the truth, I thought.

“And, you know, high school is the time of your life to mingle. To date around.”

“You want me to date around?”

“Yes,” he answered quickly, before he realized exactly what he’d said, and he shook his head. “No,” he said, correcting himself. “No, I don’t want you to date around, but I don’t think it’s such a wise idea to get so serious with a boy at your age, either.”

“Then what is a wise idea?” I asked, just a little tersely.

He began to stammer, his face reddening even more. “Schoolwork. Maybe try to get some extracurricular activities in? I heard from Gary that his daughter’s in the new school play.”

“I don’t get it,” I said, putting down the bowl. “You want me to date around but you want me to focus on my schoolwork or be in a play.”

He sighed loudly. “I’m just worried about you, Bella. I don’t want to be tough on you, but love… it’s not a science, kid.” He was looking at me earnestly, father to daughter. “I don’t want you to get hurt. And the more serious things get between you two, the more you might.”

He looked concerned, and being miffed at Charlie for warning me not to get too close to Edward seemed out of the question. He was only trying to do what he thought he was supposed to do, as a parent. And since Renee wasn’t here… the obligatory duties shifted, obviously. Although, it probably would have been less awkward if Renee had just sent me a little email instead of egging Charlie to do it instead. Typical.

“Like I don’t already know it,” I muttered. “Listen, Dad, don’t worry about me, okay? I’m fine. And I get what you’re trying to say. Fatherly precautionary advice.” I tried to crack a reassuring smile. “Everything’s fine. I promise.”

He looked relieved, glad that it was over with. “Good.” He looked at something behind me, eager to change the subject. “Would you mind giving me my soup before it gets cold again?” he asked nicely. I handed it to him, and he started to eat. “Not that I wouldn’t still eat it if it was cold. This is great,” he managed to get out between bites. “Chunky.”

“The chunkiest,” I said, reciting what I’d read from the can.

“So why is life so different now?” he asked.

I blinked. “What?”

“What you were mumbling to yourself when I came in. You said life was different.”

“Oh,” I said. I stared at the wooden grains on the surface of the table. “I was just thinking to myself about how different things would be if I’d stayed in Phoenix.”

He looked at me, intrigued. “Oh?”

“Just your regular old ‘What If’ questions, that’s all,” I said, a little softly.

“Well, it’s something to think about. Sometimes I wonder myself how I’d be if you hadn’t come along, too.” He took another bite of his chunky chowder. “I’d be horribly malnourished, for one thing,” he chuckled. Then he sobered up a little. “I worry a lot more now,” he said, more seriously. “Mostly about you. But I like it. It makes me feel… normal.”

“Normal?”

He nodded. “The guys at the station are always talking about their kids and their latest shenanigans. Always either fraught with worry or proud, and even if they’re proud, they’re always still worrying in the back of their minds.”

“So you’re part of the club now, then?” I said. “Do I sense an incoming Members Only jacket in the mail? Maybe a laminated ID card?”

“I’ve always been part of the club,” he explained. “But more so now. You wouldn’t be a father if you didn’t worry about your kid.” Then he smiled, continuing to eat, and I watched him, deep in thought. I wondered if Charlie had been ready to be a father when I had come around. It was obvious to me that Renee had been more than a little unprepared, but I always wondered about Charlie, and worried a little about him, too. Growing up with my mom, I’d always thought about how it would be like to be on the other side.

It was nice to see that Charlie had fully embraced his fatherly duties, though there hadn’t been much of an indication that he hadn’t already in the first place.

“Charlie,” I said, quietly. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure. Go right ahead.”

“Do you still love her?”

His spoon froze halfway to his mouth, and he looked at me. I didn’t need to clarify who her was; there was no one else. There had never been. Charlie had gone on a few dates but none of the women he’d met seemed to be able to hang onto him long enough for more than a few dates. And it wasn’t like he was an undesirable: he was a police chief with a good reputation, gentlemanly manners, and a good head of hair. He wasn’t old, either. He still had more than a few good years left in him, and while I knew it would be more than awkward to see women hanging around the house, maybe I wouldn’t feel so worried about him all the time. It would just be nice to know that he was happy – really happy.

He hesitated before he answered, and after he did, he continued to eat, albeit a little more slowly. “Of course.”

I toyed with the torn seam on the pocket of my jeans. “Did you ever go after… us?”

“Yes,” he answered, a little heavily. But he didn’t stop. He kept going. “But your mother… once she’s got something on her mind, she isn’t able to let it go. Even if she had agreed to come back, she would’ve just been unhappy.” He sighed. I could see it: his acceptance. “Renee can’t help it.”

I nodded. I opened my mouth to ask something else, but I could see the toll this was taking on Charlie: the way his face had tightened, and his eyes had a sad, sort of dark look to them. He looked exhausted and a little pained, but he was willing. I looked at his bowl, and it was empty. “Look, I’ve still got a little more studying to do, so I’ll just get you some more soup before I head upstairs.”

“No,” he said, not letting me take his bowl. “I’ll get it. You’ve done enough. Just rest up. You had a fever this afternoon, and I don’t want it coming back any time soon.”

“Okay,” I said. I swallowed hard. “Thanks, Charlie.”

Even after years and years of getting used to the fact that Renee had left him (and had taken me along with her), it was strange that we’d never really talked about it, or even acknowledged it. I didn’t know whether I was saying thanks to him for being honest with me, or for the fact that he was still Charlie to me, even though I had no doubt in my mind that every time he saw me, he was reminded of Renee. So maybe it was all of the above.

“No problem, kiddo,” he smiled faintly. The laugh lines around his eyes came out of hiding. “Thanks for the soup. It was delicious.”

“It’s no big deal. It came from a can.” Then I kissed him on the cheek and headed up.

- - - - - - - - - - -

I wasn’t surprised to see Edward sitting on the armchair in my room when I came in, nor was I surprised to see the faint trace of a smirk hanging on the corners of his lips. He seemed perfectly smug with his perfect form situated in such a way, taunting me of what he’d clearly overheard. Purposely.

“Shut up,” I muttered as I closed the door and collapsed on the bed, my hands over my eyes. “Yeah, the nearly-fatal sex talk? The least you could have done was warn me. Which – thanks for doing, by the way.”

I heard his musical voice from above me. “The moment was too priceless to ruin, Bella. After a century of living, you’ll find that we tend to savor those.”

“God, you sound like a Hallmark card.”

He sat down next to me, gently plucking my hands off of my face. I found myself staring into his honey-colored eyes, though they were still dark. It was evident he still had the night’s events on his mind in the way his jaw was slightly clenched and in the tautness of his expression, but at least he was making some effort. In the time it had taken me to get ready in the bathroom and take one last peek at Charlie, he’d gone back to the Cullen Manor to check up on things and then had run over to sneak through my bedroom window.

I wondered if there was an award for Most Dedicated Boyfriend in the Non-Human category.

“Any news?” I asked, staring up at him. His smirk fell away and the faint crinkle in between his eyes returned – it appeared every time he was worried or concerned.

“None,” he replied, and I couldn’t tell whether he was keeping something from me. The crinkle smoothed out and his expression became entirely too even. “Alice said she’d call if she saw anything.” He was playing with my fingers, brushing his own lengthy ones against them. Trying to distract himself, I figured.

“You don’t have to stay,” I said quietly. “It’d just be an inconvenience for you to stay here if you’d rather be with your family. I may be a girl with really screwed up priorities, but I think I’m right on this one.”

He laughed. At me, not with me. “Bella, my family is not in danger. And if they were, they can handle themselves perfectly fine. What I’m worried about – what I’m always worried about – is you. So stop trying to thwart my company.” His jaw clenched, and I suddenly felt more pressure on my hand. “I can’t let anything happen to you.”

“Who’s to say something will? The worst thing that could possibly happen to me tonight is if a dust bunny crawls out from under my bed and attacks me in my sleep. I think the more exciting events of this day have definitely passed.”

He shook his head. “I’m staying,” he said firmly. “You should sleep. You’re starting to babble incoherently – and that’s a clear sign that you need rest.” I sat up, facing him with a stern look, silently giving him indication that I did not intend to sleep for as long as I could possibly help it. He sighed, his expression turning solemn. “He’s right, you know.”

“Who’s right?”

“Charlie.” He looked away. One of his hands brushed against my bedpost. “The more serious we get… the more I could hurt you.”

I thought for a second, peering closely at his face. “Do you think,” I started slowly, “that I could hurt you?”

His eyes turned soft. “More than you could possibly imagine.”

“Good,” I said, and shock flashed through his face. His eyebrows inched up his forehead, curious. I smirked. “We’re even, then.”

He let out a low chuckle, planting a kiss on my forehead.

“Just curious,” I said. “Did Carlisle ever give you a talk about me?”

“Yes,” he answered. “Although it wasn’t much of a talk. Carlisle and Esme were more understanding than the others – it wasn’t nearly as difficult as it should have been.” He caught a lock of my hair between two fingers. “They saw the change, and they liked it.”

I smiled. I liked the change, too. “Edward Cullen, the lone ranger no more.”

He laughed softly, his eyes sparkling. “You’re exactly right.”

“But what happened when you delivered the punch line? You know, when you told them I was a human girl that lured you to my blood than any one else?”

“Undoubtedly, they were concerned,” he admitted. “But they believed in me.” His fingers gently grazed my face. “Love is an extraordinary thing, Bella. It hasn’t proven to move mountains or shift the clouds yet, but it’s extraordinary in more subtle ways. If anything, Carlisle and Esme understood that, and they had faith in me.”

I looked at his face, closely. It was hard not to be perpetually stunned by him; the soft auburn sweep of his hair, the light fan of his lashes, the curvature of his lips – lips that I was sure were a lot softer than a vampire’s cold lips should ever be. How could anyone look at Edward and not have faith in him? He looked like an angel. It was a crime something so damned could be so beautiful.

“I have faith in you,” I softly told him, and he let out a low chuckle, moving his face closer towards mine. “A lot, in fact,” I continued playfully, my throat tensing as one of his hands swept against a sensitive part of my neck, “so much that it could be called –”

“Insanity?” he finished for me, planting a kiss on the apple of my cheek. “Extremely suicidal? Utterly idiotic?”

“I’m trying to be nice, and you’re mocking me.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, kissing me again. My head began to spin from his dizzyingly sweet breath. “Forgive me.”

It was hard not to with the way his hands were suddenly in my hair, his lips teasing mine. I felt that urge again – that monstrous impulse that began to pound through my veins and caused my toes to curl – and before I knew it, I’d launched myself onto him. His body tensed with surprise as suddenly he was on the bed and I had pinned him down, and he could have just as easily stopped me – it looked as if he was about to from the way he opened his mouth to object, but I caught his mouth with mine, halting his protest for the time being. I dared to dream, but I knew that I couldn’t hold him like this for long, so I was milking it for all it was worth.

We were both panting heavily when I finally released his mouth, and by then his body had lost some of its tentative rigidness. He’d lost the alarmed expression on his face and instead looked amused, and tempted.

“Bella,” he said. “Charlie’s in the house.”

He slid his hands off of me as I grumbled. My skin still tingled. “Of course he is,” I muttered. “He lives here, remember?”

Edward, chuckling lightly, brushed his frosty lips against my forehead. “It’s time for bed. Let’s get you tucked in.”

I slid into the covers and laid down, but not without a look of exasperation and a roll of my eyes. “If Alice calls,” I firmly told him, “I want to know about it.”

He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “I’ll decide that.”

“Edward, I’m in this whether you like it or not, remember?” I sighed, looking up at my bare white ceiling. He was right; the exhaustion from the day was quickly catching up and I felt the heaviness of my eyelids. “You can’t put me in some protective bubble and expect me to live that way,” I said quietly. “That’s just not the way things work.”

He was silent, and after a while, I had to glimpse down at him to check if he was still there – he’d gotten so quiet and still. He was looking at me intently, a somber but thoughtful look on his face.

“I can’t help it, Bella,” he said. His voice was so quiet and soft that I almost had to strain my ears just to make out what he was saying. “I can’t help but feel as if you’re so… fragile. If I let go, you’ll break. If I hold on too tight, you’ll break as well. I almost feel as if I can’t win. If something happened to you—”

“I’m resilient,” I pointed out. “I’m clumsy, but I heal well.”

He ran a hand through his auburn hair. His voice was begrudging. “Sometimes a little too well for your own good, I fear.”

“I think you give yourself a little too much credit here,” I found myself saying, the edge of my voice sharper than I had intended. My exhaustion was giving way to crankiness. “You’re not solely responsible for all of the things that happen to me.”

A slight frown appeared on his face. “No, but I can name a few, and they happen to be major ones that have risked your life.”

“So what? Big deal. I thought the whole point of life was living it to the fullest while you still had it.”

“Precisely, and not always trying to lose it.”

“Edward—”

He hushed me. “Bella, Charlie’s coming.” I opened my eyes for a quick second, and blinking through the darkness, I realized he was gone. Or at least – it seemed that way. For now.

I heard the creaking of the stairs and Charlie’s muted footsteps before he came in. My door opened by a slight crack, a little bit of light shining through, and I played unconscious as best I could. I leveled my breathing and kept naturally still. He was checking on me, maybe checking if the fever had come back. But after another minute or so, he had quietly closed the door and I heard as he made his way to his own room.

I called Edward’s name, knowing our conversation hadn’t been done, but there was no answer. It was obvious he was eager to avoid the subject, and it was easy, because in my anxious waiting, I soon fell asleep.

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