The idea for this story came from a scene of the Lion King. I don't own anything of course. Set post-eclipse.
It's an extremely cold night when Jake finally stops running.
He has no idea where he is nor does he know how long he has been running; doesn't know whether days passed, maybe it has just been a couple of hours. All he knew when he started to run was that he had to get away, as far away from Forks as he could possibly get; so that he wouldn't see Bella with him, so that he wouldn't watch her disappear from his live forever. He couldn't bear the thought, couldn't accept the fact that she was willing to die, but she was and there was nothing he could do to change her mind.
All he could do was run, get away as far as he possibly could, and never look back.
He ran faster than he had ever run, the last conscious thought in his mind was Sam telling him to take his time; after that it was all a blur, just a whir wall of thoughts and emotions. He ran until his paws were bloody, until breathing actually became a problem; still he did not stop until his body actually gave in, until he fell down on the cold ground unable to move anymore. This is what he had wanted to exhaust his body so much he wouldn't even be able to think of Bella anymore; but it didn't work that way. In the end he just lay there on the cold forest ground, breathing heavily; hoping he would fall asleep, yet at the same time wishing he wouldn't. To afraid of the nightmares that would surely follow, to afraid of seeing his Bells as a leech.
Finally he lifted his head a little, staring at the star-filled sky above him.
He swears he can hear Bella's voice, like so many times before.
'Just look at the stars.'
When Jake is six his mom suddenly disappears.
It happens suddenly, without any explanations; one second everything is alright, the next his entire world changes. At that moment in his live he is far too small, too young to understand what actually happened. All he really knows is that one moment his mom was there by his side, reading him a story, and in the next she was gone. Then everyone is suddenly acting strange, different somehow.
His dad grows very quiet all of the sudden, there was no more laughter, no more stories that were told, no more games played. All his father does is sit there staring out the window and Jake wonders if he is waiting for his mom to return home. His sister's also stop playing games, they stop picking on him: they just stay in their room all day long. There were visitors from everywhere, strangers as well as friends, all coming by to say how sorry they were; but nobody would tell him why.
All he knows at that moment is that his mother is gone and he has to find her.
Somehow.
Time passed by him, he didn't really notice.
He wasn't aware of the hours that ticked away; he would never know how long he lay there on the cold ground. He's not even sure whether at some point he really did fall asleep or if he stayed awake in a sort of trance the entire time; it will never really matter, there is not a person on this earth that will ever ask him about this time. He knows that if he ever returns home, nobody will speak of this time; if they can they will never mention Bella's name again, hoping that will make him feel better. If he ever returns home, but at this moment he doesn't even know if he'll ever get up.
He doesn't want to return to the place he and Bells were together.
Doesn't want to remember the time they almost were, doesn't want to think of the fact that they almost made; that they could have if that damn leech had just kept his word and stayed away. But he returned and Bella took him back: no matter how many what if scenario's his mind comes up with the truth will never be changed. He had lost her the only girl he was sure he'd ever be able to love, and now he lies there miles away from Forks, he's not even sure whether he is still in America. Doesn't even matter anyway.
Hours tick away, time is something that could never be slowed down.
With each tick Bella's time ran out and yet he wouldn't have noticed how much time passed.
Except that night eventually turned into day.
At first he just waits for his mom to return, sitting a window next to his dad.
Because he knows that she has to come back; she has to because he misses her and he doesn't understand. Any moment now she'll just walk trough that door again, she'll pick him up and sing him a song, she'll even explain why she left him alone for so long. All he has to do is wait for her; just sit there like a good little boy and just wait for her; so that when she comes back she can be proud of him. All he has to do is wait for her, she'll come back someday.
His dad looks at him with worried eyes, keeps trying to make him go outside.
But Jake doesn't want to go outside, his dad simply doesn't understand that Jake really can't go outside; he can't because what if she comes back while he is gone? What if she returns but disappears again before he can see her? Before he can hug her, before he can tell her how much he missed her? What if he doesn't get to see her ever again? He can't even remember if he told her he loves her before she left. So he'll sit there, like a good little boy; staring out the window, waiting for her to return to him.
Because she will come back.
She has to.
Slowly he gets pack up on his legs, shaking a bit from pure exhaustion.
Obviously the run he had yesterday, or maybe it was the day before, hadn't been long enough; he needed to run faster, needed to run further away. He could still feel her lips against his, could still see the way her eyes light up when she smiled at him; he still wanted to return back home to tell her she had made the wrong decision. Except that he knows he can't, partly because despite the fact that he knows her dying is not right, it's her decision and he can't change that. Partly because he knows it's already too late, she's probably already gotten married; already one of them.
His Bells had probably already disappeared, seized to exist forever.
His mind wonders back to her as it always does, but he doesn't want to think of her; he wants to run until she disappears from his mind forever, until she's is nothing but a distant memory. Not that he thinks that that will ever actually happen, not that he thinks he can ever forget her; but at the very least he can wish for it, he can dream. He pictures her walking away for the last time, whispering her last words 'Until my heart stops beating.' His eyes well up with tears, his entire body begins to shake; he can not fall apart now, he can not allow his grieve to take over.
Despite the fact that his legs hurt he begins to run again.
Simply focussing on the world in front of him, towards the place he was running.
The world flies past him, but he doesn't really notice.
She doesn't return to him, no matter how long he sits there.
Everyone that comes trough those doors is saying that she died, but he doesn't really understand what that means; it can't last forever, he thinks, at some point she'll stop being dead and she'll return to read him a story or sing him his favourite song, she simply has to. He ends up asking his best friends in the whole world, but Quill and Embry don't understand either. There was a moment, not to long ago; that they had wondered why Embry only had a mommy, but he and Quill had both a mommy and a daddy. It had been his mom that had explained things back then, but she wasn't here to explain hem now.
Embry thinks they should just go out and search for her.
Maybe she's waiting for Jake to find her. He begins his search by asking questions, but everybody he asks just looks at him with sad eyes; nobody answers his questions, nobody explains a thing to him. 'Daddy where did Mommy go?' His dad had actually cried when he asked, which honestly had just scared Jake; after all daddy's are supposed to be strong, they're not supposed to get scared, they're not supposed to cry. But he is now, which means that something really bad must have happened; maybe daddy doesn't know where mommy is either, maybe he's expecting Jake to find her.
Becca cries as well when he asks, before running out of the room.
Rachel offers to play with him, she even lets him come into her room.
Things must be really bad if she is willing to do that, because Rachel never plays with him.
He still doesn't understand what's going on.
He just keeps running, every time he feels like giving up he just runs faster.
At some point he knows he'll have to stop running, at some point his body will simply give up on him; he'll have to stop running, and when he does his memories will catch up with him. But he doesn't give up just yet, with every step he takes the distance between him and Forks only grows, for which he is incredibly grateful. He hopes that the further he runs, the further away his memories will be; that he won't be able to feel when Bells doesn't exist anymore, that he'll stop worrying about his brothers, about his dad.
He ignores the sounds of the world around him, focuses instead on his own breathing.
Focuses on the sound of his paws against the ground, hears the frantic beating of his heart; maybe it will stop beating along with Bella, maybe he'll die as well. Maybe when he does he'll find her, his Bells, waiting for him to come to her; because when she becomes one of them her soul will float away, towards whatever comes next. But his time is not now, not as long as there is strength in his body; as long as he can place one paw in front of the other, as long as he can keep running.
He runs so fast that he can't actually pay attention to anything.
Not even to his thoughts.
'But when is she coming back?'
At some point he had gone outside with his questions, looking around for someone to ask next; because somebody out there knew what was happening and that someone would have to tell him. He finds the kid playing on the beach, he's a couple of years older then him; which makes Jake think that he might know what is going on. Sam didn't hear Jake approach him didn't see him until he was standing there by his side. 'Do you know where my mommy went?' At the sound of the innocent question his heart actually broke. He knew what had happened of course, but he had no idea of how to explain it to Jake; of how to tell him that when people die they never come back, how to tell him that no one knew where they went next.
'You'll understand when you're older.'
Jake heard the soft answer, he wasn't even sure if he was supposed to hear it; didn't this kid, didn't everyone understand that he didn't want to understand when he was older? He needed to understand now. Jake asks his second question, but when is she coming back, and Sam finds this one worse than the first could ever be. How do you tell a small child their mother will never return? How to tell him that he would live the rest of his live without her comforting smile? Could he even understand any of it? Instead Sam offered to play with him, even letting the small child play with his new toys.
Maybe he could only distract him for a short time, but any time Jake didn't think about it had to be a good thing, right?
His body finally completely shuts down on him.
Even if his life had depended on it at that moment, he wouldn't be able to run anymore; he wouldn't even be able to lift his head. His legs collapse under him, he passes out even before he hits the ground; at least he won't have to think about anything, and maybe with a little luck he wouldn't have to dream either. Except that he hasn't had much luck, not since those damn leeches moved back to Forks. His heart rate slows down eventually as does his frantic breathing; eventually anyone, or anything, that will see him will think he's simply asleep.
He sees her stand in front of him, his Bells, except that she isn't, not really.
Her eyes are red now, her skin pale and cold as ice; she is not his Bells anymore, Edward had killed her. What is left is nothing but a shadow, a girl that looks like her but isn't really; nor could she ever be again. Jake watches in silence as she runs trough the woods without a sound, without falling down so not like his Bells, until she attacks a human. And then he kills her. His eyes fly open, the tears are flowing freely now; he should have known he could not outrun the pain nor the knowledge. Should have known that eventually it would return to him.
He lifts his head towards the moon and howls a long and painful howl.
Until he can't even do that anymore.
Bella had arrived weeks later, though he can't really remember much about it.
He remembers asking her just like he asked everyone else, but she didn't answer him so he let it go. He had grown quiet and scared over the weeks, afraid his mom was really never coming back; he cried and begged her to return, hoping she could hear him, but she never did. Bella dragged him into the cold night, that he does remember; or maybe he just knows because his dad told him, he'll never really know. He remembers her telling him to lie down on the grass and look up at the sky.
She had told him a story there, though he never knew where she got it from.
The specifics of the story have gotten lost in time, he doesn't remember; he doesn't know if she does, he never thought of asking. Still they lied there side by side, Jake six years old, Bella eight. She told him a story of people who died and left this earth; and when they did they soared up into the sky and where welcomed into God's awaiting arms. She told him people that had to leave suddenly were then turned into stars; so that no matter where there loved ones were they could always look down upon them and watch out for them.
'Just look at the stars and there you'll find those persons that you have lost.'
He had looked and for a second he swore he saw his mom.
And he smiled.
Eventually Jake gets back up and turns around.
Slowly he makes his way back to where he came from; he can't outrun his pain, can't outrun his past. If it were at all possible Leah would have done it a long time ago. Step by step he returns back home, back to his brothers, back to his father; back to his destiny, though he hopes it doesn't involve killing Bella. Maybe the leeches have already left, maybe they'll never return; he hopes they never will, he never wants to see his Bells like that.
He's not sure how much time has passed, doesn't even know it matters.
Sometimes he found himself staring up at the sky, counting the stars; as if somehow he could see if there was one more star, how stupid that may sound. His Bells would go up into heaven and wait for him there; Edward would get another person all together. He wonders what would have happened if Bella had seen him first, if Edward had come second; would it have mattered. Would she have still left him for the leech? It's not like it will change anything, what has happened has happened; he'll never be able to change it.
By the time he gets home they'll be bound together.
She'll be dead, gone forever.
Someday he finally begins to understand.
His mother is dead, she'll never return; nobody knows what happened to her, maybe someday he'll see her again. That is the truth, he knows it is; everything else is just a fairytale. A story told to him to calm him down, to make him feel a little better. Still through the years the story Bella told him remained, though the details faded over time; sometimes he sat in his garden looking up at the sky. Wondering if maybe she was somewhere up there watching him, truth or not the stars always calmed him down.
When he was six his mom disappeared.
Suddenly without any explanation. When he's sixteen his Bells will disappear forever as well, but he'll know it has happened. In one decade he'll lose two important people to him; one he'll never truly understand why it happened, the other he'll never understand the choice from. Maybe in ten years he'll look up at the stars, maybe someday he'll find out if there was any truth to Bella's story, Bella's make- believe. He'll never know where she got the story from, he never thought to ask.
Now it is too late to ask her anything, now he has lost forever.
The stars however will always shine in the night sky.
Finally he makes it back home.
He phases before he arrives in town; doesn't want to hear the assuring voices of his brothers in his head. Slowly he makes his way to his house, barely noticing the pain in his legs; the blood on his hands, his blood. The dark sky above him is slowly becoming lighter, it's morning; the stars will eventually disappear. But like so many things in live Jake knows that they'll eventually return; that when he looks out of his window tonight they'll be there again.
Like they always will be.