Forks -- March 27, 2010

[themidnightson]

Everyone knows he's coming before he hits the door.
He isn't making an effort to be quiet as he walks to the house.



And it isn't as though he misses the looks they exchange with each other. Relieved and conflicted, so many different emotions. Hands that end up in other hands. Still, when he does open the door and then close it, quietly, it's like everything pauses. Not exactly. Electronics are still on, screens making noise, but there's a static stillness.

They know where each other are.
All home. All accounted for.


It can only be him.


He walked toward the staircase, making it one step up before he has to look over.

Jasper's gaze was even elusive, already too in tune with everything he was feeling, and Alice smiled, wobbly but bright. Rose looked away, only to elbow Emmett for good measure as if she could read his mind for what he was planning to say, which earned the first sound of theirs to break the silence at a What?.

Edward meant to say something. That was what you did when everyone was waiting on something. His hand lay on the railing and he looked over them. The so many different facets, different reactions and emotions and opinions. How much damage. And the strange, uncomfortable, yet obvious, relief his presence brought them in different way without relaxing them.

There really weren't words.

He met their eyes and then headed up the stairs.
No one was all that surprised or disappointed by it.

As Edward neared the second floor, conversation started back up in the living room with Jasper commenting on vacuousness of the woman rambling about What Not To Wear still. It wasn't an easy starting line, but it worked. Especially when Alice frowned and Rose threw a pillow at his head, which he ducked and Alice had to deflect straight back to them.

The anxious tension was still there, but so was the riotous assortment of voices suddenly. Which left two. Esme was another floor above, paused in the act of sorting something, listening, and Carlisle was ---




"Seriously?" is quiet, right outside the study door.

Comments

[themidnightson]

It's simple.

This part always has been.





"You asked."

[ofthefamily]

That's never really worked before.

Ah.

[themidnightson]

The longer it goes on, somehow the less it annoys him. Even as it makes him aware of the distance. The separation. It's the most telling and important, single proof that he was right about his point if not his means of talking about it.





"Why would you want to be here, with me or to have me at home, if you don't believe anything about me is the same anymore?"

[ofthefamily]

unfair
missed you
love you
need you
don't know what i'm doing



Because it is the closest I have to pain, when those I love go away from me.

[themidnightson]

There's no victory in that. Not here. Not anymore.
No one wins. Nothing to win. It simply is. They are.


That's the way with the truth isn't it.


Edward's voice dropped, as he looked at the area. "Do you want me to leave...so you can...or to wait somewhere else for you--"

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle should probably get down out of the bloody tree now.

Probably.

A lighter-than-expected thump, and it leaves Carlisle just standing there, about 20 feet off from Edward.

"We can go back."

[themidnightson]

He didn't turn yet. "Can we?"
So many bridges burned. Things changed.
The many things inside of him.
The endless mistakes.

It's so small and undirected it'd be easier to question if Edward ever meant or even knows that he said the two words out loud rather than if he was looking for an answer to it.





He looked toward the direction, but still without turning, without seeing him yet. There's no recrimination or order or snap. It's a simple statement. About the whole instigating point to the last bit of conversation. Carlisle wanting and having been sitting there waiting the whole time.

"You haven't eaten."

[ofthefamily]

"I know."

As if almost confused as to why that matters to either of them.

[themidnightson]

Edward looked over, a little pointedly questioning but empty of sharp edges in the weariness. There was a half-formed gesture to around them with his hand. "We're already here."

[ofthefamily]

They're already here.
In the mess they both have made.
"I can keep."

Don't s-- I already know I am keeping you.

[themidnightson]

He doesn't disagree with that.
There isn't a part of him that can.



"I thought that was what you wanted."



For him to not be there.
To be keeping him. Here.

Home. With them. Him.

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle doesn't know where to go with this, and it shows on his face, even from his distance.

He wants for Edward to be happy again, even if he is not in Isabella's immediate presence.

What he wants doesn't matter.

He wants to be thoroughly crushed at chess again.

He wants Edward to not look at speaking with any of them as a chore or burden.

[themidnightson]

"I'm not going anywhere." Calm.

He's said those words before. Almost.

He means here. Now. The forest. Him.

He would mean more.
If he could.

Will. In time.



"Take care of yourself."
He doesn't say the please either.

[ofthefamily]

A first hint of lightness:

Since when have I been any good at that?

[themidnightson]

Edward snorted, and it tugged one side of his mouth a little upward as the words were rolling out of his mouth, straight from his thoughts, before he could even stop himself.

"Maybe that's the real reason we acquired them?"

Someone had to be better at it than either of them.




There's an awkward second at the end. Realizing what he's doing.

[ofthefamily]

"...What is it?"

Placid curiosity, noting the awkwardness.

[themidnightson]

Edward shook his head, barely.

Quiet, more than hollow. "You and me. This."

[ofthefamily]

Oh.






"I'm out of the tree."

[themidnightson]

There's almost -- his cheek shifted -- but he only nodded.


"And avoiding the reason you should have been still."

Don't make him actually have to say please. "Carlisle."

[ofthefamily]

Trying to figure out how to answer the question.

That never really gets asked, really. It's an old pattern.

"I am fine?"

[themidnightson]

He doesn't believe it. This either.







"We're done then?"

It's a complicated tone, and even faint expression. One part of him quickens for the joy of being another step closer to returning. The other almost imploring for being handed another reason to go on standing there.

Because Carlisle has decided he really doesn't need the one Edward had.

[ofthefamily]

Not even close.

Even now, I am just wanting to help you with what you want.

[themidnightson]

His hand shifted his shirt, fingers catching against the faceplate of the bracer on his forearm. Even without thinking of it they secured and stayed, five white bars around it, enclosing it, as his brow furrowed, very little, studying Carlisle.


"Why?"

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle tightens his mouth somewhat, as if he is sucking something out from between his molars.





"I may have what I believe are termed 'issues'."

[themidnightson]

Edward's mouth tugged very slightly crooked. A deviation on the straight line of his mouth. Wasn't that an understatement. For them. For himself. All of them now.