The Conclusion

[themidnightson]

If we take care of the moments, the years will take care of themselves.
- Marian Edgeworth
~*~

He's not the one who skips school on a whim. That's Jasper and Emmett more than anyone else, each for their own individual reasons. But drastic times call for drastic measures, which is why Edward isn't at school today.

Instead he's in the Fork's Hospital parking lot sitting on the hood of a very shiny Mercedes.

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[ofthefamily]

"Um, Doctor Cullen?"

Carlisle hates 'Um'. He smiles anyway.

"I think your son is outside in the parking lot."

This is enough to raise an eyebrow and get Carlisle to wash his hands so he can step outside for a minute.

"Sitting on your car."

Carlisle washes his hands faster. Edward -- ?

[themidnightson]

He hears the thought but he doesn't answer.

In fact, all he does do is scoot up the hood a little more and look over the tips of the new shoes Alice made him wear today while they're resting on the front bumper.

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle walks out the front door of the hospital and over to the doctors' parking spaces at a brisk clip.

He starts thinking at Edward before speaking.

Why aren't you in school? And what do you think "you are doing on the hood of my car? Get off."

[themidnightson]

Edward's look is nonchalant, but his butterscotch eyes (he's still feeding twice more often than everyone else) are amused for a flicker. Then he glances up at the gray and impending sky, at least a little more mockingly petulant than actually petulant.

"Are you finished avoiding me then?"

[ofthefamily]

So this is what it's about.

"I won't even avoid throwing you into a tree for sitting on my car, if that's what you'd prefer."

[themidnightson]

Edward's lips tugged at one edge but the smile didn't form. He reached up and picked a minute piece of lint off of his opposing shirt sleeve. "Does that mean you're avoiding me and the question?"

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle's jaw sets.



The way he does when he lies.

"I wasn't avoiding you." Still irritated.

[themidnightson]

Edward's eyebrows they disagree.

They want to subscribe to your magazine.

Since they've already got a handful of your issues.

[ofthefamily]

So what if I was avoiding you I was trying to make things better since I apparently can't fix anything "Now will you get off my car?"

He might ding something.

[themidnightson]

Edward scoffed, but it's closer to a laugh this time. "I'd fix it if I did." Before he looked up, with something of a slightly more serious bent. "And no, I won't yet."

Beat.

"But I will ding her if it will get your attention." Edward was stroking the hood a few inches over with his first two fingers.

[ofthefamily]

Very nearly panicked: "What do you need my attention for?"

Carlisle's tired of not getting it.

[themidnightson]

"It wasn't your fault."

Direct he still gets points for. He'd had long enough to think about where to start with some parts of this while waiting the hour for someone to notice him in the parking lot and report back to his 'father.'

[ofthefamily]

This deflates Carlisle somewhat.

He stops thinking about his car, at least.



"And?"

[themidnightson]

"And," Edward says with a more specific gentleness a normal person wouldn't pick up. "If your aim is actually to make it a much bigger issue than it is you should go about doing what you're doing. If not-"

He lets it linger with a look.

[ofthefamily]

The thoughts move faster than Carlisle's speech. They don't match up with Carlisle's glare he's trying and failing to give Edward.

I didn't know what else to do. I'm not sorry I was able to see you, even if only for a day. I heard you with Alice and I couldn't help.

I'm not sorry.

"I'll stop avoiding you," Carlisle adds.

[themidnightson]

"I'm not asking you to be sorry," Edward said, still and simple.

He doesn't want Carlisle to be sorry. Sorry won't make it better or worse. It'll just be a hurdle stuck between them. Another set of words outgrown and left to linger in the middle.

"Good." Then a small curl of a lopsided smirk with a low half-glance. "You've given dying plague patients more attention, and last I checked nothing as exciting as one of those has managed to drop on the hospital of foggy little Forks."

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle manages a laugh. You missed me?

"I'll have you know that I just received my latest textbook order this morning and I'm going to just have to bring some home; I can't put it down."

He's only exaggerating the slightest bit.

[themidnightson]

Edward mimed, with obvious exaggeration, a yawn before his lips shifted into an amused curl. Quick and effortless as though the two expressions were one, not thinking about slowing down for a second.

"Who else am I supposed to rely on for sane, rational discussion?"

[ofthefamily]

The laugh turns to a snigger.

"Certainly not anyone in our house. I don't retire to my office; I hide there, and even that doesn't work half the time."

[themidnightson]

Edward afforded a mock serious expression. "The door are too breakable. You should have your wife fix that."

[ofthefamily]

"Another project for Esme to -- "

Wait.

Glare.

"You are still on my car, Edward. You are washing and waxing her when I get home from work."

[themidnightson]

"That's fine."

Yes, he did just settle onto the car more.

Stretch his arms back to lean leisurely and James Dean It over the Mercedes.

[ofthefamily]

Wearied, You enjoy picking on me, don't you.

[themidnightson]

"As long as you're here for it," Edward said, smile fainter for very true words. "Besides she can stand the abuse. Rosalie and I wouldn't let you out of the house in something that couldn't."

[ofthefamily]

"Alice runs my wardrobe, Esme designs the house, you and Rosalie control my vehicles -- "

[themidnightson]

"You know you're glad you don't have to think about such trivial things."

Then a small quirk toward but nor reaching a frown graced his expression and he glanced upward and back toward the building. "Your one o'clock is worried that you'll forget about her in the remaining twenty minutes before her appointment."

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle's head rolls back as he groans softly.

"One time she showed up forty minutes early. Who shows up forty minutes early for an appointment at a hospital?"

[themidnightson]

"People who worry about dying," Edward said with an smugly unrepentant smirk. "Far too much in her case."

[ofthefamily]

"Still."

She's a patient, and Carlisle is a doctor.

"I should get back to work." Thank you for coming. "Are you going back to class?"

[themidnightson]

"Most likely." Edward miss Biology Class? Perish the thought. He does have his priorities in this life, Carlisle. "Wouldn't want to tarnish my reputation of being the only Cullen child who doesn't abuse the system based on their test scores."

He slipped off the Mercedes finally, with graceful ease, but stopped with a pause still looking at Carlisle.

[ofthefamily]

I'll be fine. I'll see you at home. I promise not to work late.

[themidnightson]

That wasn't what the pause was for, but Edward just smiled, quiet and small. There weren't enough words to say what it was and the ache for not just being instantly understood was much fainter. All this still being right here, still the way it always was and had and would be, was far more important than what if's and could's.

He tipped his head in a nod and turned to walk toward where his Volvo was parked. Even though he was out of sight in under a minute, there was the ghost of a chuckle that suffused the parking lot when Carlisle had to pet his car before he could go back in.