I. Giving
On February 16th the weather is getting to be a little warmer and the Newtons' store is noticeably busier today. During Bella's lunch break, Mrs. Newton and another employee named Holly are in the break room with her drinking coffee and flipping through magazines. By now most people who work there have gotten used to Bella never having much to say anymore; they just about ignore her presence as she sits spinning the cap from her soda bottle on the tabletop.
"Did you and Derek do anything special for Valentine's Day, Holly?" Mrs. Newton asks.
Holly is in the middle of yawning boredly. "Not really," she answers after a moment. "We were both kind of busy. He gave me some flowers, though."
"That's nice. Andy and I tried to do something nice . . ."
As Mrs. Newton now starts telling Holly about a bad experience she and her husband had driving out of town to eat at some fancy Japanese place, Bella remembers Jacob handing her the little pink box of conversation hearts. It made her a little uncomfortable at the time, but now she thinks of it and feels grateful for how easy instead of awkward Jacob somehow manages to make everything. "What exactly does that entail?" "The usual - slave for life, that kind of thing." It suddenly seems a lot more silly to her than it did at the time, and without her fully realizing it, the corners of her lips tug up into a tiny, uncontrollable smile for a moment as she remembers it.
Jacob takes everything so lightly that sometimes he reminds her of a little kid. It makes the world feel like a safe place again rather than a dark and serious one. Somehow, at some point, the sound of Edward's voice humming her lullaby in the dark at night has been replaced with the chipper sound of Jacob casually whistling in the daytime as she's gotten used to him habitually doing all the time when she's with him. It's a very different kind of pleasing and comforting sound, like the chirping of birds outside as the sun is rising.