It was late, maybe two in the morning. The night was moonless and Bella’s room was almost pitch dark, though Edward had no problem with the lack of light. He was stretched out beside her on the narrow bed, a thick comforter shielding her from his cold body. His shirt was off and she was nestled against him, his arm cushioning her head and holding her shoulder and arm, his other hand lightly holding hers.  
 

“Tell me?” 
 

“Anything.” 
 

“Tell me about all your girlfriends.” 
 

He smiled in the darkness. “A gentleman doesn’t speak about such things.” 
 

“Gentlemen don’t sneak into a girl’s room and spend every night with her with her father sleeping on the other side of the wall, either.” She nudged him. “Please?” 
 

“I haven’t had…” 
 

“Oh, come on. Don’t hand me that. In almost a hundred and ten years you must have at least gone for a walk or a movie with someone.” Silence. “Who was she?” Bella rolled over onto her stomach, up on her elbows and looked down at him. “I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.” 
 

“There isn’t much to tell, honestly.” 
 

“There must have been some girl in high school—I mean the first time you went—who you liked, wasn’t there?” She could have sworn that she could hear him smile. “There was, wasn’t there? Was she pretty?” 
 

“I thought so, yes.” He paused for a moment and she wondered if he was remembering this other and probably long dead girl, wondering if he’d liked her better than he liked her now. 
 

“…What was her name?” 
 

“Helen.” 
 

“And…?” She poked him again. “What did she look like, where did you meet her?” 
 

“Bella…” 
 

“Please. I mean, you don’t have to tell me if you really don’t want to but, I, I’d just…I like to hear if you don’t mind. Please?” She’d wondered about this for months now, wondered what kind of woman or girl had turned his head, what attracted him. And how one earth had he decided to settle with her? 
 

“I was sixteen, a senior in high school and she was in the class below me. Our families had known one another all my life, she was quite literally almost the girl next door and we grew up together.” 
 

“This was in Chicago?” She felt him nod. “Where did you live there? I mean, did you live in the actual city?” 
 

“Yes, we lived in an area called the Gold Coast, on Lake Shore Drive. My father was a lawyer and Helen’s father was a partner in his firm. They lived down the street.” 
 

“So you grew up in a rich family?” She sounded sad at that; just one more example of how he was out of her league. She’d suspected as much; even living with Carlisle all these years wouldn’t account for his ingrained manners and attitudes. He had to have learned all of that from his parents or a governess. Of course he’d end up with someone from the same country club. 
 

“I never really thought about it, Bella—honestly, I didn’t. Truly, I had nothing to compare it to, it was just the way we lived and—you must understand—this was a different time. Things weren’t the same as they are now and so to have servants was common.” He stopped, uncomfortable and knowing how this sounded. “I was different then as well. I never really thought about anything as I do now. I’d been so carefully sheltered by my parents and so firmly set upon the path they assumed for me that I just assumed along with them.” He touched her face carefully, emphasizing what he was saying. “It took me years, decades to really begin to think and that only happened because of Carlisle, you must understand that. When I look back at how I was then, I’m just…I’m embarrassed and ashamed of myself. You must understand this.” 
 

Bella nodded, she did understand, at least to a degree. “So what about Helen?” 
 

“Yes, Helen. “ He paused a moment. “We were childhood friends and then one day, we were walking along the lake and it suddenly struck me just how lovely she’d become.” 
 

“How old were you then?” 
 

“We were both sixteen, she’d just celebrated her birthday. She was small, slender and had thick, long blonde hair that she wore pulled back and which fell down to waist. Her eyes were a remarkable blue, just exactly the color of cornflowers—her eyes were beautiful.” His voice was soft.  “We’d often spent time together but this day, with no warning, it was suddenly different to be with her. It was spring, warm, the breeze was gentle and we started talking about things that mattered to us. She asked me if I’d planed to study law like my father, she told me she’d begun volunteering at Hull House and was becoming involved in social work, and how she wanted to continue with that, maybe open another house across the city when she was a bit older.” 
 

“She sounds like she was ahead of her time.” 
 

“In some ways, yes, I suppose she was. She told me that she wanted to marry and have a family and all but she didn’t want to just be a society woman, she wanted to do something.” He laughed just slightly. “It was only years later that I realized that she was asking if I would be willing to allow my wife to do such things, but then she always was brighter than I was.” He stroked Bella’s cheek again. “I was quite amazed by her. We continued walking and I confided to her my desire to join the army when I was old enough and fight in Europe. I’m embarrassed to say I thought it would all be heroics and banners waving, not even beginning to comprehend the horror I’d endure but…” He paused. “…I was naïve.”  
 

“You might have been killed.” 
 

“Yes, but I was too dense then to believe that; I know my mother was terrified. Anyway, we stayed out longer than we usually did and by the time we got back to her house it was dark. We went up to the house by the back path up from the water and were holding hands by then—I felt quite brave to actually touch her like that. When we were almost up to the house I stopped her, gathered all my courage and kissed her and then, to my astonishment, she kissed me back.” He smiled, the memory obviously one of his best. “We stayed out in the garden for another hour, unknowingly watched by her father from the conservatory windows. From then on we were unofficially promised, both families were pleased and my father started really pushing the idea of Harvard law and a ‘real’ career to support Helen in the way everyone would expect.” 
 

Bella just stared at him; he’d been engaged? “Would you have really gone through with it?” 
 

“Of course.” 
 

“You’d have married her?” 
 

“Bella, yes, of course I would have. Helen was a lovely, intelligent young woman; she was one of my closest friends and I’ve no doubt we’d have had a good life together.” 
 

“But…you were sixteen.” 
 

“These things were common then. And I would have died at seventeen if Carlisle hadn’t been my doctor.” 
 

Bella settled back, thinking about the charming story Edward just told her and feeling jealous of Helen—she’d been his first love and no one else could ever have that special position in his heart; and it was so him, so Edwardian and made him more human, more real somehow. They were both quiet for a few minutes, each with their own thoughts. “Did she get the flu, too?” 
 

“No, she was fine.” 
 

“Do you know what happened to her?” 
 

He hesitated but then, “I was in no condition to find her when I was a newborn and then I was going through my rebellion. By the time I’d calmed down it was 1927 and it was 1930 before I went looking for her.” He inhaled and she sensed he didn’t like this part of the story. “I went back to Chicago and found her; she’d married well, of course and lived in the same area we’d grown up. She had three children and did open her charity house—it’s still in operation, in fact.” 
 

Bella had a sudden realization that the Cullen Trust would make sure it stayed solvent. 
 

“I even went back and, stupidly, stood outside looking at her home.  I don’t know what I thought to accomplish but then her car pulled into the driveway and her driver let her out. She gathered her children and started to walk to the door but she turned and looked straight at me. I was half behind a tree but she saw me and walked over to me. I didn’t know what she’d do but I couldn’t leave. I just looked back—she was still young looking, still lovely and then there she was, standing in front of me with her daughter of maybe five or six, holding her hand.” He swallowed, having some difficulty. “She just asked ‘It is you, isn’t it?’”  
 

“What did you do?” 
 

“I…nothing. I think I nodded and she smiled—she looked beautiful and she said ‘You’re just as I remember you, still as handsome’. Then she asked me if I was happy with my choice. I didn’t understand that, I’d had no choice and she surely couldn’t know my reality. I assume she just thought I’d abandoned her in a fit of grief over my parent’s deaths or some such and I couldn’t tell her the truth. I remember I said something inane, wished that she be happy and she wished me the same then turned back to her house. The girl asked her who I was and she told the child that I was just an old friend then they went inside and that was the end of it.” 
 

Bella looked at him, saw what he was feeling. “I’m sorry.” 
 

“Why?” 
 

“Because it could have been what you wanted; it would have made you happy.” 
 

“It doesn’t matter, it was another life.” His voice was a little harsh, a little bitter. 
 

“You’d have been happy.” 
 

“I am happy, Bella. Things don’t always work out the way they’re planned. I am happy, with you; this is the happiest I’ve been since 1918.”  
 

It sounded forced to her but she let it go, picturing the beautiful Helen walking openly on a sunny day with sixteen year old green eyed Edward and the two of them sharing their first kiss.  
 

1/29/09