August 13, 2010

Storyline: This entry continues the characters/plotline from the prompt “Slippery.”

“Do you want to come in?” he says.

“Into your parents’ house?” I say. “For real?”

“Yes, for real Valley Girl,” he answers smiling. “I have my own entrance.”

“Really? That’s cool,” I say. I know houses have back doors and such but his own entrance? “I still don’t think I should. What if someone sees my car? I’m pretty sure no one else at Cullen drives a Mini.”

“I’ve got a launch pad over there. You can park by my entrance as well,” he says. “It’s out of the way, plus people drive Minis who don’t work at Cullen you know.”

Damn boy has an answer for everything.

“What do I do about Jake?” I wonder aloud.

“Jacob can suck it,” he says. He smiles like he knows what a bad boy he is and I’m loving it.

“Okay,” I relent. “If you promise I won’t get caught by your parents.”

“You won’t. I have my own apartment. It just happens to be part of their house,” he explains.

Finally I get the picture. He lives in the Cullen Compound. Do they vacation in Martha’s Vineyard too?

Edward directs me back to where I need to park and waits for me to join him so that he can walk with me to the door. I step aside while he unlocks it and he turns on a table lamp that casts the room into a soft light.

It looks rich. It looks like it’s always looked rich and I note the little class distinctions: dark wood paneling, oriental throw rugs, culturally authentic bits of artesania. It’s really tasteful and really masculine. I look at Edward to see how he looks in his native surroundings.

He is moving fluidly through the space as he grabs two giant wineglasses and uncorks some red wine.

“Is Bordeaux okay?” he asks.

“No – Bordeaux is fucking fantastic,” I say.

He snorts and pours and then says, “Salud,” holding up his glass in a toast.

“Salud,” I answer.

“Want some music?” he asks.

“Sure,” I say.

He turns on his stereo and Thomas Dolby comes out really loud singing “She Blinded Me with Science.”

Edward squelches the stereo before it can go any further and I’m laughing.

“Are you a nerd Edward?” I tease, implying misleadingly that I’m not.

“I guess that depends on your definition,” he says. “Did I play football? No. Did I play any of the big sports? No. Was I in chess club? Again, no! But I did take fencing and I also played golf and tennis but not in school.”

“Mm, tennis can be sexy,” I say. I wish I could just shut up. My amazing lack of filter around this guy is making me a little scared of myself.

“Did you play sports Bella?” he asks.

“I’m dismally clumsy as you may have been able to tell with my spectacular wipe-out on the floor the other night,” I say. “So no, I didn’t play sports.”

“True enough,” he says. “Were you a nerd?” he asks. He walks over so that he’s in really close proximity and leans down so that we’re eye to eye. “A math geek perhaps?”

“Captain of the math geeks if you must know,” I say softly. He’s really close and I feel a little intimidated now that we’re somewhere containing a bed, Bordeaux and Dolby. He reaches and takes my wine glass, setting it on a table and then pulls me up close in his arms. To my amazement, he starts to sing.

It’s poetry in motion
She turned her tender eyes to me
As deep as any ocean
As sweet as any harmony
It’s a silly irreverent song in reality, but the way his honey voice sounds caressing the words makes my thighs go up in flames. His body is long and hard and his hands hold me like he knows me.

“It’s really really late,” I say absently. “And I have to work in the morning.”

“And I have school,” he says. “Hence why I’m mopping in the evening.”

“Mm,” I say. “Long day.”

“But tomorrow’s Friday,” he says. “You can rest after that.”

I feel a little thrill at the thought that I might not be resting tonight.

“But what about tonight?” I ask.

“Tonight you’ll be awake,” he says matter-of-factly.

“Why’s that?” I ask.

“Because you’ll be screaming my name,” he says.

“Won’t your parents hear?” I ask, smiling a little and touching his messy hair.

“They’re in another part of the house,” he says, his hands sneaking down for an ass grab.

“What if I scream really loudly?” I counter, moving my mouth closer to his.

“What if I make you scream really loudly?” he taunts, murmuring against my lips.

“Then it’s all your fault and I won’t get into trouble,” I say.

“Deal,” he says, and he takes away the remaining space between our mouths.

With no place to go and being absolved of guilt, I let my guard down to enjoy the ride.

It wasn’t until we arrived back home that Alice informed me that, while I had asked Bella to come and meet the rest of my family, I had failed to establish a time I would pick her up. Since it was past midnight when I left her it was easy to assume she would be asleep already. Besides, if there was any hope of not consuming her then it would be best to spend the night hunting.

“What do you see happening tomorrow?” I asked Alice as we ran to chase down a herd of elk.

“You haven’t decided that, so I see nothing,” she quipped before starting to think about what she planned to do with Jasper when she returned. It was a tactic she commonly employed to keep me out of her head. It also meant she had seen something, she just didn’t want me to know about it.

Thinking back over the evening it was impossible not to have seen how smoothly it went. That surprised me more than anything. Surely this girl, who smelled so divine and was so silent, would prove on further study to be just as inane as all the others her age? Instead she was witty, intelligent, and enjoyed the genres of an older age, seeing the humor despite the difference in culture. Someone like that would be able to move through the ages as a vampire and not stand out as being so very different.

My ruminations were interrupted by the sound of warm heartbeats, heavy with blood, sounding to the northeast of where we ran. Suddenly all thoughts but those of the hunt disappeared, the burn in my throat controlling my actions, the monster in my heart finally released from his imprisonment and able to tear and rend. He wasn’t quite as satisfied as if I had allowed him access to Bella, but I knew that if he ever escaped around her then another part of my heart would suffer.

We were running home through a drizzling rain when Alice checked ahead for the coming week’s weather. Ice on Tuesday, she cringed, for even if we didn’t feel the cold we would have to dress as if we did, and Alice detested flannel. It was impossible to not laugh at her thoughts on that particular subject. She retaliated by visualizing her future nocturnal activities with Jasper.

Hours before she would awake I was back in front of Bella’s house, simply listening to her breathe. Whatever it was that blocked her thoughts from me also kept out her dreams, but she seemed to be muttering something incomprehensible. It would be good if that became clearer.

Her father woke before she did, his mind full of vague images as well. The overwhelming feeling he seemed to have this morning was that of being torn. He had plans to go fishing with his deputy, but was concerned about leaving his only daughter alone. A sense of jealousy combined with strong protectiveness filled him, and I chuckled quietly when he mentioned my name in association with that. He was a typical father after all. Only, I doubted he knew just how much he needed to fear.

Finally she stirred awake, the sounds of the bed creaking and her yawn made me imagine her to be stretching. It was followed shortly by a huff as I heard what could only be her collapsing back onto the bed. My ears followed her to the bathroom, at which I tried to listen to a bird singing in the woods to give her some semblance of privacy, then down the stairs. There was movement in the kitchen, followed by the sound of the toaster being depressed and a chair scraping.

Even though it was still early I simply couldn’t wait to see her any longer. Swinging my car around to the front of her house, and after checking for neighbors paying attention, I moved at my speed to her front door, knocking lightly.

Her gasp, followed by an overturned chair and racing feet on the floor told me she had heard, but then she ran right past the front door and up the stairs. “Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap!” she said as she dressed hurriedly. “I had no idea he would be here this early.”

Three minutes later she was back down the stairs and swinging open the door, catching the big toe on her right foot as it flew back. “Ow, ow, ow,” she cried, hopping back on the other foot, seeming about to fall over, so I rushed forward and gathered her into my arms to carry her to the couch. “I think it’s broken,” she said, obviously agitated.

My fingers flew over the injured appendage, but I detected no break. “Just bruised,” I opined, giving her a smile and being surprised as she took on a glazed look. “Are you all right?” I asked, reaching up one hand to test her temperature, for even though her skin blazed I knew it could be much warmer.

“Um, yeah,” she muttered, shaking her head slightly as if dislodging a thought. “I didn’t know you were coming over so early.” Her tone was part pleasure and part remonstrance.

“I apologize for not setting a time earlier, but wanted to be in your company again.” It was a good thing I had fed the night before, for her blush was incredibly enticing, especially since we were all alone. “Besides, I’m having trouble deciding what to write my Shakespeare essay on.”

“He’s a misogynist, that’s what I’m writing about,” she informed me, lifting her foot up to her lap to rub her toe.

“I’m not so sure about that,” I argued, taking her foot in my hand, knowing the cold would feel good.

She rolled her eyes. “Of course you don’t think so, you’re a guy.”

With a laugh I shook my head. “No, I’m thinking about how well he understood women, almost as if he could read their minds. It’s all through his poetry.”

“Oh, like any man can read a woman’s mind,” she argued, but then looked at me speculatively again.

“Think about what Titania tells Oberon as to why she wouldn’t give up the Halfling child,” I argued back.

“Set your heart at rest:
The fairy land buys not the child of me.
His mother was a votaress of my order:
And, in the spiced Indian air, by night,
Full often hath she gossip’d by my side,
And sat with me on Neptune’s yellow sands,
Marking the embarked traders on the flood,
When we have laugh’d to see the sails conceive
And grow big-bellied with the wanton wind;
Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait
Following,–her womb then rich with my young squire,–
Would imitate, and sail upon the land,
To fetch me trifles, and return again,
As from a voyage, rich with merchandise.
But she, being mortal, of that boy did die;
And for her sake do I rear up her boy,
And for her sake I will not part with him.

“See, a man who understood how a woman thought. She loved her friend who had gossiped with her, eaten with her and served her and so went to great lengths to protect her child. Even to pissing off her husband.” Bella’s look of astonishment was almost humorous if it wasn’t so insulting. “What? Am I not supposed to know Shakespeare?”

“You are an odd guy, Edward Cullen,” she stated, fixing me with a pondering look.

“You have no idea, Isabella Swan.”