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This Is Not My Life by isakassees
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5540509/1/
This Is Not My Life
Chapter 1: Prologue
EPOV
"Lily, did you have fun with Nana Esme today?" I looked in the rearview mirror at
my little princess who was bouncing with an excitement she must have inherited
from her Aunt Ali.
"OOOH Yes Daddy, we had so much fun we played outside in the morning with
chalk and bubbles and then I decided to make yucky soup in the mud and then I
found a roly poly and I gave him a hug but I think I hugged him too tight because
then he didn't move anymore but then I found a ladybug and Nana Esme told me
that you can get ladybug farms and keep them for pets and so I want to ask
Santa for a ladybug farm for Christmas or is my birthday coming before
Christmas because then I will just ask you or Nana Esme or Papaw Carlisle or
Aunt Ali or Uncle Jazz or Aunt Rose or Uncle Em-"
She paused to take her first breath since she opened her mouth and I took the
opportunity to jump in before that continued. I swear one of these days she was
going to pass out trying to tell me about her day. But this was truthfully my
favorite part of the day, hearing about hers. I hated having to leave for such long
hours while I was at the hospital, but as soon as my residency was finished, I
planned on starting up a private practice where I could work more reasonable
hours. The hardest part of my day was driving away from her.
"Lily, your birthday will be coming up before Christmas, because it's July, and
your birthday is September 25th, so I will make sure to put a ladybug farm on
your wish list, okay, Princess? We need to stop at the store on the way home,
okay?" The silliest question to ask, really, the child loved the grocery store. I
swear she was going to be a chef when she grew up. I loved having her help put
meals together and cook dinner every night. It was our thing that we always did
on nights when I was off in time for dinner.
"What are we making tonight little chef?"
"P'sghettis please, Daddy. Ooh and I want to make a salad and garlic bread to go
with it okay, Daddy?" She told rather than asked me, knowing she was the menu
maker in the house. In so many ways she was growing up too fast, but I loved
that she still couldn't say spaghetti right. I'd probably cry the day she did.
"P'sghettis it is, Princess. Remember to stay close and keep your hand on the
cart, or you go in alright?" I reminded her.
"I know daddy," she sighed at me. I could almost hear the eye roll.
I pulled into the parking lot of the grocery store and grabbed the first spot I
could. I'd never understood the need to circle a parking lot for fifteen minutes
searching for a space that saved maybe 10 feet of walking distance. I unbuckled
her booster and hoisted her up onto my hip to walk into the store. She wriggled
out of my arms as soon as we were inside and helped me pull a cart into the
store. We walked straight to the back of the store and worked our way to the
front, going aisle through aisle collecting all the necessary ingredients for
tonight's dinner, chatting more about her day as we shopped.
We finally made our way to the front of the store in the produce section, and I
was selecting some tomatoes for our salad when she exclaimed, "Daddy! I almost
forgot. We're out of apples my new favorite fruit is apples! Can I go pick some
up, they're right there at the end of the lane?" She pulled out the puppy dog eyes
and batted her lashes, while sticking her bottom lip out just a tad. My god, she
had to stop hanging out with Alice so much.
"Yes sweetie, but you stay right there and don't even think about walking around
the corner where I can't see you, alright?" I gave her my best stern look,
complete with the arched eyebrow. I learned that one from my mom, and hey, if
she was going to pull out the big guns, so was I.
She nodded her head emphatically agreeing with me and skipped over to the
apple display, and I saw it happen in my mind a split second before it actually
did. A huge pyramid of apples balancing precariously on top of each other was
just asking for my daughter to pull from the bottom causing the ENTIRE display
to come crashing and rolling around her.
At that exact moment, a woman came walking around the corner, feet first into
the avalanche walking straight into Lily. Her feet went right out from underneath
her and Lily fell on top of her while apples continued to fall all around them.
I probably stood there gaping for a full second before I sprang into action,
jumping over to them in a leap but still unsure of exactly what to do or say to this
poor woman or my daughter who appeared to be sobbing into the woman's shirt
clinging on for dear life. The woman had her eyes shut tightly and seemed to be
shaking slightly as well, and I worried I might soon be dealing with a very upset
stranger… until all of sudden I heard a giggle burst out, followed by a snort and
another giggle. Was she laughing?
Before I could blink, they both burst out laughing. Lily was still lying on top of
this woman who was flat on her back in the produce section.
It was a nice grocery store in a good part of town, but I'd never in my life seen a
woman fall to the ground who didn't immediately start shrieking. But there they
were, with tears of laughter streaming down their faces pointing at what used to
be an impressive pile of apples, laughing hysterically and gasping for air for
several minutes before I finally cleared my throat to remind them of my
presence.
The woman looked over at me then, flushed in the face from laughing so hard
and grinning from ear to ear. She tilted her head and said, "Excuse me, but did
you happen to lose a giggle monster? Because I seem to have found one that
landed on my lap and I'm sure her owner is very eager to find her. I hear giggle
monsters like apples, but I wouldn't recommend the granny smiths. They seem to
out of stock at the moment." At this, Lily broke out into hysterics all over again
as she scrambled off the woman and started trying to stand up amongst the
apples surrounding them.
I was so dumbfounded at this stranger, who had my daughter laughing harder
than I'd ever heard, when same said daughter had knocked the wind out of her
and made her fall onto a filthy floor, and was just joking about it, like there was
no other natural reaction.
I was in such a daze that I didn't even offer my hand to help her up, until I saw
her start to rise and stumble over some of the apples under her feet. I reached
over and grabbed onto her left elbow while my other hand instinctively went
around her waist to steady her, and I finally got a good look at her up close. And
my god was she pretty.
No fuck that… beautiful.
Like the natural kind of beauty, with big brown doe eyes and pale porcelain skin,
with a gorgeous blush in her cheeks from all her laughter, and big full lips that
smelled like cherries.
Wait how can I smell her lips?
Oh shit… I am standing way too close to this woman. And I've still got my arms
wrapped around her!
I jumped back quickly and looked down at my daughter who was gaping at me,
mouth open, probably wondering when her daddy's brain died and why he was
groping at strangers in the supermarket. I glanced back up at the woman- I
really need to find out her name- and she was looking at me with her eyebrows
raised …but at least she wasn't beating me with her handbag yet. She just stood
there staring at me, until she shook her head a bit, and blushed anew.
She knelt down next to Lily, and introduced herself. "Hi! I'm Bella. I think we
should probably start picking up some of these apples don't you?"
Lily giggled out a little, "Yeah," and they started picking up the apples and placing
them back onto the shelf.
I finally snapped out of the trance I was in, and stuttered out quickly, "Let me
just grab my cart and I'll come help pick them up. Miss, you really don't have to
help, you didn't cause this mess." I didn't want to call her by her first name, since
she hadn't introduced herself to me, but wow, I really wanted the chance to say
it.
Bella. Beautiful.
She didn't even look up, scoffing, "Please. The great apple avalanche of 2009 has
been the most exciting part of my day; I haven't laughed that hard since...ever."
At that, she glanced up at me, smiling slightly, and I looked away quickly,
because apparently looking into this woman's eyes took away my ability to have
coherent thought process.
I walked to my cart to push it back over them. As I reached it, I heard a sound
that would haunt my memory for the rest of my life. I heard my Lily scream and
then a gunshot rang out followed by complete silence. I whipped around to save
my little girl from I don't know fucking what, and what I saw made me freeze.
A man, with stringy blond hair, and cold gray eyes had a gun pointed at my baby
girl and Bella.
Chapter 2: His Story
EPOV
Five o'clock. Fucking finally.
I had been ready for this day to be over since it started this morning. Living in
Seattle, I was used to gray, cloudy, overcast days. But it was fucking pouring this
morning, and I just wanted to curl up under my covers with my very sweet and
sleepy daughter and not get up for a day. But I didn't have that option, because I
was pretty sure using the rain as an excuse to call in sick really wouldn't fly with
the Chief of Medicine. Even if the Chief does play golf with my dad on a weekly
basis.
So I got my ass out of bed and managed to stub my toe twice on my way to the
shower, cut myself shaving, and step on a Barbie shoe all before breakfast.
Awesome start.
My four year old daughter Lily, apparently had the same views on sleeping in this
morning that I originally did, because it took me fifteen minutes just to get her
out of bed, and she decided to play 'limp noodle' while I dressed her. She was
really trying to make things easier for me today.
I managed to get her to my parent's house without further incident, and not for
the first time, did I wish there was someone at my home to be with her. Not her
actual mother…god no, that was a mess I was glad to have cut from my life.
I still didn't know how I was going to tell Lily one day about her mom. She'd
asked about her before, and I had managed to put her off for the most part for
now, but I knew that wouldn't last forever.
How did you tell your child that her own mother didn't want her? I could only
hope she never found out how I had to beg and plead with Tanya to not have an
abortion, promising her anything under the sun, as long as she just gave me that
baby.
I never loved Tanya, and she sure as shit never loved me, but the day she told
me she was pregnant, I felt like the world just made sense. It was unplanned and
fucking horrible timing, seeing as I was only halfway through medical school, but
the absolute joy and automatic pride I felt at being somebody's father just blew
my mind. And I learned my protective side developed rather fucking quickly as
the next words out of her mouth were demanding that I pay for the abortion.
I quite fucking literally saw red. I flat out refused, and we hammered out a
financial and legal agreement which had me paying for her living and medical
expenses for the next year, with the understanding that she would walk away
after the birth obligation free. That was definitely not the way I envisioned
waiting for my firstborn child, what with angry phone calls at all hours of the day
demanding the most ridiculous food cravings. (At one point I actually ordered
chocolate directly from Switzerland, and this weird sponge cake that is made in
Germany but only sold in Japan for some unknown reason).
I paid for thousands of dollars in designer maternity clothes all designed to make
her look as least pregnant as possible, because as far as Tanya was concerned, it
was the most disgusting thing on the planet. She was actually a very pretty
woman, or at least she would have been if her soul wasn't a black vacuum of all
things good that destroyed all outer beauty. When we were dating she was high
maintenance to be sure, but she wasn't this vindictive manipulator I came to
know as the real Tanya. She could hide her true nature fairly well when it worked
to her advantage, but once she had me by the balls, the tiger showed its true
stripes…
And brought out the fucking claws. Jesus.
She completely refused to let me take any pictures of her stomach, or touch it in
any way. She demanded a 'post-partum' shower, where I paid for her and her
collection of equally vapid and shallow pit of vipers to gather around her and
lament her condition, while giving her gifts she could use once she was, and I
quote, "rid of this fucking thing."
They gave her gift certificates for personal trainers, treatments to the med-spa,
bottles upon bottles of liquor, and quite the assortment of diet pills. My family
ended up throwing me a baby shower once we found it was going to be a girl,
and I got to celebrate and start putting together my little princess's nursery. It
was slightly emasculating to sit in a room full of finger foods and diaper cakes (if
you ever met my sister Alice you'd understand) in a fucking sea of pink and lace,
but I was just so fucking excited that I was going to be a dad.
The day she was born was the best day of my life.
Tanya had a scheduled C-section, because she had apparently been able to fuck a
plastic surgeon into agreeing to give her a tummy tuck after she delivered the
baby.
I didn't fucking care. The second my baby was out and wrapped up, the nurses
handed her to me and I was complete. She opened up her little gray eyes and
looked right into mine, and I was hooked. I already knew the answer, but just to
be nice, I asked Tanya if she wanted to hold her, and she didn't even look up at
me to tell me to "Get fucking real Edward. That's your baby, not mine."
So I walked away and never looked back at her. After the forty-eight hour grace
period was up, I sent in my family's lawyer, who was a fucking shark by the way,
and she signed away all rights to my daughter, Lily Autumn Cullen. Tanya's loss,
not ours.
My daughter was beyond loved by myself and every single member of my family.
She was lacking for nothing in the affection and devotion department. And I could
lie and say I was an absolutely perfect father, who never yelled or put on a movie
so I could get some quiet, but I did.
And I could lie and say I never got frustrated when it took us almost two months
of crying and gas and colic to find a formula that didn't hurt her stomach but
there were days when I would cry into my pillow when she woke up for the third
time in the night wailing.
I could lie and say I was perfectly content doing this on my own, not that I really
was on my own. My mother was like a mother to Lily, but she was not actually a
mother to her. And I was not content like this. My daughter was my favorite
person on the planet, but I got lonely.
I hated sounding like a chick, but it wasn't even about sex. Granted, I would
fucking love to have access to sex on a regular basis, but what I really ached for
is a companion. Somebody to do this with, raise my little girl with me as her
own… I wanted a partner.
I learned my lesson with Tanya, and decided way back when that I would not
have sex with any woman I couldn't see myself having a child with. Because my
daughter was living proof that condoms were most definitely not 100% effective.
And while I wouldn't trade my daughter for the world, I would never want to have
to go through another situation like this one. Ever.
So it was safe to say I was in a bit of a dry spell. My sweet sister, god bless her,
had tried to set me up on a couple of dates in the last few years, but those were
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