Places| A Twilight Fan Fiction|

Chapter 9

Marley

"Alice, I beg of you, let me win just one round."

"No chance in hell, Mar," she sang, having successfully beaten me not once, not twice, but three times at rummy. I was seated on the expansive Cullen sofa, dressed in what might have been the most comfortable pajamas I'd ever worn, eating what could only be described as the best piece of strawberry shortcake in the existence of man, or vampire, kind. It was an out-of-body sort of experience. Sitting beside me with his knees drawn up to his chest, Edward watched me lose, again, all smiles.

"You're terrible at this, Mar." They'd started calling me that at some point during dinner, and I had decided that, as a nickname, I didn't really mind it.

"You're terrible at this, Mar," I mimicked in a poor interpretation of his voice, making even Carlisle laugh. He and Esme were pouring over some sort of blueprint on the floor, but I couldn't quite figure out what it was for. Alice, seated on Jasper's lap on the other side of the coffee table, shot me an impish grin.

"Best three out of four?"

"Absolutely not! You're entirely too good, and I'm not even sure if it's possible for you to cheat at this particular game with your gift, which makes it extra infuriating." Pouting, she shuffled the deck in a blur of fingers and cards that my brain couldn't quite comprehend.

"Fine, Jas and I will just go play upstairs." The Southern vampire rose as she did, then tipped his head at me in farewell. It felt like he was messing with me after the arousal debacle, but I knew better than to be embarrassed. I waved them off. Though Esme and Carlisle were only a dozen or so feet away, it suddenly felt like Edward and I were the only ones in the room.
"What's it like, reading minds?" I asked him, turning towards him and casually tossing my feet across his lap. My toes, painted a pretty crimson, wiggled. For a moment, he stared blankly at my legs, as if not sure what to do with such a platonic gesture of affection. But I truly felt like his friend and liked him as such, even if he was sullen and withdrawn.

"Very loud," he settled on. "It's like a million people are shouting my name at once. It's easier here, at home, where every voice is familiar and relatively calm. I've gotten better over the years at being able to tune it out, and to focus on one voice over another if I want to."

"That sounds hard," I told him, earnestly. His hands had settled on my shins without thinking about it, and I smiled internally, pleased that he was letting at least some of his rigid guard down.

"I wanted to kill you, you know," he said suddenly, in regards to my thoughts or his own I could not tell. I nodded my head. I had suspected that there was a reason why Rosalie and Emmett were not so fond of him when they brought me to the house for the first time.

"Why?" It was a useless question, but the curiosity plagued me.

"Because I was selfish," he admitted in a whisper. "Rosalie and Emmett have been parading their love around me for decades. I'm the only unmated vampire in this coven, and it was jarring to learn that they were Mated to you, making you their third, and yet I have found no one. Of course, there was the issue of anonymity, the worry that you might somehow expose us, but that came second." With a puzzled frown, I blinked a few times to center my thoughts.

"You know, you didn't have to spend a century alone. You could have dated. Or slept around. No one would have judged you for it." Edward's chuckle was just a hint bitter.

"It's not the same. You know the instant connection, the intense bond and love you feel for Rosalie and Emmett?" I nodded immediately. "How could I settle for less, knowing that that might exist out there for me, too?" His eyes were not just gloomy, I realized, but despairing; I tried to picture myself in his shoes and could see his point. Now that I knew just how good life, love, could be, I would never choose something else. It would pale in comparison. "Now you see," he mused quietly.