Eclipse ends with Jacob Black running off into the wilderness to numb the feelings of heartbreak he endures when Bella decided to marry Edward. A few weeks in, he stops at a cabin owned by the family of his friend, Quil. Takes place in the very beginning of Breaking Dawn.
Quil's cabin was tiny.
It had a tiny living room, a tiny kitchen, a tiny bathroom with no shower, and a tiny bedroom with a tiny bed.
In an attempt to create space, the one-car garage had been converted into a makeshift second bedroom. It was illuminated with a single light bulb and furnished with a single mattress. But since it didn't have a frame, I could at least fit if I hung my feet off the edge.
I had phased back to human for the night, mostly to escape the voices in my head. The clan was tired of my agony. And I was tired of them being tired of my agony.
The moon shone through the garage's only window, leaving four squares of pale yellow on the grey mattress. I plopped down upon it naked, opened the pack of Marlboros and lit one up.
Yeah, that's right, you heard me.
I am smoking a cigarette.
Not that it's a habit or anything.
I only started about two hours ago. When I wandered into the area, I thought I might as well stop by Quil's place. When I got in, using the key under the welcome mat, the first thing I did was look for something to do. I'd been running around as a wolf for weeks, hunting deer and stuff. I'd take a distraction, any distraction.
So there was an ancient TV and a pile of videotapes from the early nineties, but nothing even remotely appealing. There were a few cans of green beans in the pantry. The most remarkable thing I found was half a carton of cigarettes and a lighter. So I thought, why not?
At first it made me cough, then it made me nauseous and dizzy, but at least it calmed my nerves down enough so I could sit still a few hours on the porch. Then I was more or less used to it, and kept on truckin'.
Bella.
Oh god, let me not think of Bella.
Is.
Inhale, Jakey, my friend.
Getting.
If I can't stop thinking of her I'm gonna get up and leave again.
Married.
Okay, so I thought the whole sentence again. I'm only human, okay? Maybe I'll phase back to wolf. I couldn't stand listening to myself whine. What could be worse than hearing your own whining go on for three weeks? Oh yeah, hearing your own whining for three weeks AND everyone else's, too.
I'll stay human. Just for the night. I'll leave when I finish all the Marlboros or something.
At that moment, I finished the one I was on, and threw the half-smoked butt into the corner.
I lay down.
Focused on my physical fatigue.
Focused on sleep.
Before long it seemed, I heard an engine rev outside.
Had I drifted off?
But this place was a good several miles off the nearest main road. Who would be here?
I got up immediately, my senses on high alert. Peeking out the window, I saw there WAS a car pulling up.
Quil? Sam? Billy? But a few hours ago they were all still back in La Push, they couldn't have gotten here so fast, even if they WERE dumb enough to try and drag me home. Besides it had taken me weeks of running to get this far from town.
Scrambling to grab some shorts, or boxers at least, I found a sheet. Better than nothing. Wrapped it around my waist.
I grabbed the handle of the garage door and heaved upwards. I wasn't too concerned with intruders of the human kind. Not much wolf-Jacob couldn't handle.
A familiar red pick-up truck was parked down the narrow gravel drive.
It was the truck that had once belonged to Billy. That now belonged to –
She cut the engine and stepped out.
It was her.
In the light of the moon, I could make out the familiar outline of her face, the silhouette of her figure.
Suddenly, it felt like my heart was constricting, like an invisible hand was squeezing it like putty.
"Jake!" she called, running towards me.
"Bella!"
I ran towards her. Eager. Couldn't help it. I'm a dog for her.
She leapt into my arms, just like old times.
"Jacob Black, why are you dressed in nothing but a sheet?"
"I haven't had clothes in weeks, I only just got here." I said, staring at her in amazement.
She came, she came, she came to find me.
"And what's that smell on you, you smell like stale smoke or something…" I chose to ignore this question.
"How did you know I was here? How did you find me? Aren't you supposed to be getting – isn't it just a week away – how did they – did he – let you go?"
"Oh Jake," she said, shaking her head at my pathetic state. "I didn't plan it. You know how Alice can't see me do things if I do them on impulse. Edward and Charlie knew I was visiting Billy at La Push, and by chance Quil and Embry were there and I overheard them mention the cabin. So I bullied the location out of him and left immediately."
"You must have been traveling for days," I said, holding her closer. I couldn't help it. I knew it was going to hurt more later, when I had to let her go again, but for the time being, I was so damn HAPPY she here. In my arms.
"No, only about eight hours, give or take some stops for gas. We're not that far, we're not even out of state…you must have run so far away and come back in a circle."
She held my gaze tenderly for a moment. She was so pretty it hurt.
I forced myself to let go of her and turn away, walking back towards the cabin. "Well if you came to bring me back, I'm not coming. But since you're here anyway you might as well stay the night. I warn you though, there's not much food. I've been living off the hunt for the last little while."
I stopped in the hall closet to dig for a pair of spare sweatpants or something, make myself decent for the proper lady. She waited for me to change in the bathroom, then followed me back to my dismal garage bedroom.
I turned on the single light bulb and picked up the Marlboro cigarettes, lit one. More to gauge her reaction than because I really wanted one.
"Oh Jake," Bella cried. I knew she would fly into a fit of worry. "Stop that! How could you do that to yourself?" she reached out to pull it from my grasp, but I jerked my hand away.
"My well-being is no longer your concern," I said, perhaps a bit petulantly.
"It breaks my heart to see you like this," she said.
I shot her a glare, and she immediately looked like she regretted her choice of words. That's right. Don't you forget who's breaking whose heart here.
"Jake," she whispered, cupping my face in her hands, forcing me to look at her. What a feeling it was, the intimacy of the touch. Looking into the depths of her eyes, I was home. I felt like myself again, like the happy-go-lucky person I was when it was just her and me.
"Listen to me," she continued, pulling me close. Her face was inches from mine. "I didn't come here to drag you home to all those people who are worried about you. I came here to tell you something. I came here to tell you that I love you, Jacob Black."
And before I could reply with something sarcastic, she kissed me.
And then I was caught in the crossfire of pleasure battling pain. Pleasure because her lips soothed my body like water soothed a man dying of thirst. Pain because my heart was ripping itself in two. She couldn't mean it. This kiss was a lie. She only meant that she loved me as a friend, or a brother, or whatever. She was going to marry someone else.
"Bella," I said, tearing away. "I don't need your sympathy."
"You think this is sympathy, Jake?" she said, and pulled me into another kiss.
The lit Marlboro dropped from my fingers as my arms wrapped tightly around her waist. I was overcome with the desire to meld my body into hers, to keep her this close. But at the same time, I couldn't fully believe what was happening.
"Bella," I choked. "Bella, you're marrying Edward in a week, stop playing with me like this, it's not helping…"
"Shh!" she shushed, and put a finger to my lips. "Promise me something. No – two things, Jake."
"What?"
"First, of all, you will tell no one about this. Understand?"
I nodded dumbly. My brain wasn't working properly.
"And second, there will be no mention of what you just tried to mention. Okay?"
"Okay." Was my automatic response.
"Pinkie swear?" she asked, holding out a tiny pinkie. I hooked mine into hers, playful as old times.
"Okay," I whispered.
And she came towards me again, slower this time, so that we were millimeters apart nose-to nose. Her gentle breath grazed my lips. She waited for me to initiate the kiss, and our tongues met in the middle like molten lava.
I pressed her close by the small of her back. Her petite breasts pressed into my chest through the layers of her sweater. I could feel the beginnings of an erection coming on. I was a slave to my body, to my emotions, to this incredible, overpowering force of sexuality.
She was so tiny, so much shorter than me. It was easier for her to kiss my neck than my face.
And through the contact of her lips on my collarbone, I could feel her trembling. She was nervous. And this made me feel better, because if she knew she was doing something wrong by being here and not with her vampire fiancée, that meant she was acting of desire, not pity.
Oh desire. Desire was the demon that brought me here. Desire was the demon that made me moan uncontrollably like I did now, as she traced the muscles of my stomach with her fingers, and sighed into my chest.
I leaned down to meet her, nibbled over her ears, her cheek, her neck. Oh pretty white neck, that would soon belong to him. He would take her from me. Oh Bella. Can't you see that it's me you belong to?
My hands stroked her torso from the ribs down to the hips and back up again.
"Bella," I moaned, as her tongue found my nipple. But the protest was lost in the din of my raging hormones. It was so much easier to give in. So I pulled her by the arm towards the mattress, which was starting to look a whole lot less dingy and a whole lot more like heaven.
We lay down next to each other and resumed our intense kissing. My hard-on was now most of the way there. I kissed her fingertips, one my one, until my lips touched the ring on her left hand.
Then we both opened our eyes wide for a moment. Guilt was threatening to destroy everything, and I wished I had ignored the ring.
"No," she said. "you promised not to mention it."
And with that, she pulled off the ring.
Took it off.
Put it on the cold cement floor.
Then she took off her sweater.
In that moment, as she lay there next to me in her tiny white cotton bra and flushed lips, all hope for chivalry was out the window.
You couldn't do this to an eighteen year-old boy and expect self-control.
I lunged for her.
I pressed my hips, complete with full unadulterated erection, onto hers. With my hands I yanked down her bra straps – forget undoing it, I might screw it up – and revealed her pale, round breasts. Her nipples were small and dark. I circled each roughly with my thumbs, then kissed them. Grazed them each with my teeth and tongue, taking in the texture.
"Jacob," she moaned, and arched her back. I licked a trail with my tongue from between her breasts up to her jaw, finishing with a full kiss on her mouth.
Her hands, meanwhile, were moving down south, pulling at the elastic waistband of whoever's sweats these were. I instinctively thrust my hips forward, my cock pleading for her touch.
And as her tiny hands wrapped around it, we both let out a simultaneous cry of pleasure.
We were past the point of no return.
With both hands, she stroked the length of me. I was propped on my elbows over her, my hair falling into my eyes. Bella looked as astonished as I felt to find my penis in her hands, but she seemed appreciative, delighted, as with each stroke she caused my whole body to tremor.
Soon I was slippery with pre-cum. God, it's like I was leaking everywhere. Between urgent kisses I had the vague worry that I might ejaculate too early. Then again, too early for what? For sex? Where was this leading, anyway? This was Edward Cullen's fiancée I had writhing underneath me.
The sweatpants were now constraining the movement of my ankles, so I kicked them off quickly onto the garage floor. I was now totally naked, with the love of my life beneath me, and she was still wearing jeans.
She must have realized this at the same time because with an exhilarated giggle she reached for the buttons of her fly. I hurried to help her yank them down.
At the flash of the bare skin of her thigh I knew I wanted this to carry through, morality be damned. I had to have her. I wanted her because I loved her, what was so wrong with that? And so bravely I reached for her panties.
Damp. The smell was intoxicating, clouding my head with single-minded lust. With one hesitant finger I dared venture into the silky, wet folds of her slit.
And she yelped out in pain.
"Bella!" I cried, pulling out quickly. "Sorry, I don't – are you – have you ever –"
"No. I'm a virgin," she said quickly.
"That makes this worse!" I cried. To the great protest of my loins, I summoned a modicum of willpower to pull away from her. My penis was throbbing. Soon it would be aching. What I wouldn't give to not give a damn and just go back to kissing her.
"You're Edward's fiancée. You're going to MARRY EDWARD."
"Jake!" she cried, jumping forward to put a hand over my mouth. "You promised not to mention that. I'll take care of Edward later. Tonight just think about us okay? Jacob, I love you."
"I love you, too" I mumbled. And she eased me back into a kiss. Pretty soon I was back to stroking her inner thighs.
"Try it again," She whispered, and guided my hand back to where we had left off.
I slid in, gently and slowly as possible, watching her expression. She grimaced at first, then relaxed. When it was fully inside, she started to buck her hips gently, inviting me to press against her inner walls.
We sighed into each others necks, as her pleasure was my pleasure. She grabbed onto my cock again, squeezing, pulling, ever so very nicely.
In that way we stayed for a few minutes, or was it a few hours, reveling in each wave of pleasure.
"Jake, I want to try something," she whispered. Her face moved into the light briefly where it cast a half-shadow over her nose. She slid down the mattress, flipped me onto my back, and took my cock into her mouth.
With a moan my whole body submitted to complete bliss. In that moment I couldn't remember my name, let alone any of those things I was worrying about before. I was pretty sure, there was no better feeling in the world until the most beautiful girl in the world sucks your cock. Time fucking stands still.
I came to climax with her mouth wrapped tightly around me, her hands lightly gripping my thighs. When I realized she was swallowing, I felt mildly embarrassed there was so much of it.
Bella crawled back up the mattress to kiss me. Her face was damp, her long dark hair in a disarray. There were tiny beads of sweat between her breasts.
I reached over to pop each one with my fingertips.
"I'm sweaty and gross, aren't I?" she said, jokingly with a giggle.
"Your armpits stink, too," I grinned.
"No they don't," she protested, but crossed her arms over her chest to cover her armpits anyway. This movement made her breasts press together sexily, and was so cute I had to kiss her.
"Besides," she said, "You're the one who smells like dog."
"Maybe," I shrugged. She was probably right, actually. "Do you want to go for a swim in the lake? There's not really a shower here that fits both of us."
She looked at me quite seriously, and nodded.
I got up, and put my sweatpants back on. Even though she always saw me in nothing but shorts and even though she'd just seen me naked, I was still weirdly self-conscious. Wasn't quite ready to walk around that way yet.
Went to look for a towel. Found one in the smaller bedroom.
When I got back, she was standing wrapped in the sheet I had been when I greeted her.
She smiled, a little shyly, making me feel like a confused, inexperienced teenager again.
I took her hand and kissed her on the mouth. Please, I wished, never let this night end.
We opened the garage door and walked hand-in-hand to the dock by the lake. It wasn't far. I decided this cabin wasn't too bad after all.
The sky was midnight blue. The moon cast a gentle glow over Bella's skin.
She stood facing the water. The sheet was a wedding gown, falling to her feet and trailing the ground beneath her.
"What are you staring at?" she said, turning to grin at me impishly.
"Nothing," I said. "I was just…thinking that you looked like a bride on her wedding night."
"I am a bride," she replied. "Yours." And she reached up for my shoulders, letting the sheet drop to her feet.
I hugged her nude form, caressing the curve of her bottom. My erection was back, full-throttle.
Two quiet splashes in the silence as we slipped into the water. I wasn't cold, as my body temperature was always so high, but I was a little concerned about Bella. She didn't seem to notice, though, as she dipped her head into the water and emerged with her hair sopping.
I dove under as well, playfully grabbing her legs underwater and nipping her breasts with my mouth.
She shrieked as this, and in return yanked my penis.
This of course drove me crazy so I had to growl and pretend to bite her.
We floated dizzily in our own intoxication for a while.
Keeping my feet on the pebbly lake bottom, I swam till I was up to my shoulders in water. This was too deep for Bella to stand so she straddled me around my midriff and held onto my shoulders to stay at face level.
The water lapped gently at her bare shoulders.
"I love you," I blurted out.
"I love you, too." She answered.
And so we kissed and kissed, exploring each other's mouths with our tongues. I used one hand to support her and with the other I brushed over all the most intimate ridges and folds of her body.
When we finally got out of the water I toweled off her body as thoroughly as though she was my only possession in the world. She intertwined her fingers in my hair while I kneeled before her, patting down her thighs and making sure there was no more gravel in between her toes. Then I lifted her up and carried her back.
Back in the cabin I made another run around the house to collect old blankets and sheets to pad down the garage bed. We managed a fairly comfortable setup.
Bella sat down and waited for me to join her as I went to turn off the light.
I was completely hard again.
She wrapped her arms around me and pressed our bodies tight as she pulled me down to lie over her. I caressed both her breasts gently then followed the natural path down her sides until her knees, which I then hooked up to straddle my hips. She squeezed tightly and deepened our kiss. She was giving me permission. Invitation.
My heart pounding hard, I guided myself gently into her. Halfway in Bella tensed; the membrane was breaking. With very slow care I entered her fully, and there held the position for a few moments while we both calmed our raspy breathing.
She kept her fingers twisted in my damp hair as she kissed my lips, cheeks, ears and neck. We slowly fell into a rhythm again as before. And like that, we coupled gently late into the night to the sound of our quiet panting.
Then we talked. Recalled inside jokes. Laughed. All the while interspersed with kisses and caresses. Her hand always in my hair, my fingertips always over her nipple.
At one point I even got her to try a cigarette.
Bella held it clumsily between her lips and struggled to ignite the rusty old lighter.
"Here," I grinned, doing it for her.
Bella immediately tried to inhale deeply, and was greeted by a coughing fit.
"Ugh! Eww, this is so disgusting, Jacob, how can you like it?"
"I don't, really, it was more for the novelty." I said.
"Well please don't make a habit of it, okay?" she said, serious now. "Promise? Promise me you'll never smoke again after you leave this cabin."
"Okay," I promised. "I won't."
And she kissed me, the tobacco smoke lingering very lightly on her lips.
Sometime later, we both fell into a contented sleep.
When I awoke, the sky was pink outside.
Bella stirred a little. I leaned over to kiss her, and she opened her eyes, too.
"Darling," she said, and started to sit up. "I should go."
Where she had lain there was a tiny stain of blood on the sheet, now stiff.
I watched as she replaced her bra, touched her breasts to adjust. For as long as I lived, I felt, there would never be anyone so beautiful.
She pulled on her jeans, sweater, leather jacket. She picked up her motorcycle helmet, and at the very end, replaced her engagement ring.
My insides twisted. By the middle of the night, she had managed to make me forget about that. But the night was over, so my promise no longer applied, right? I was all of a sudden very anxious. What were we going to do? She had said nothing about leaving Edward…and ever he came near enough to hear my thoughts he would know everything.
"Bella," I called, as she was opening the garage door. "What's going to happen now?"
She smiled, not a hint of worry on her face. How could she appear so unfazed at the earth-shattering events of the last few hours?
"Bella, you're – you're not going to be a virgin anymore if you marry Edward. Don't you think maybe he'll figure that out, what are you planning? You can't just…"
"Come home soon, won't you?" Bella pleaded.
"Why can't you take me home with you?"
But my words were dinned by her revving the engine of the motorcycle, the one I had helped her repair months ago.
Wait.
Motorcycle?
But she had driven her red truck here.
"Bella." I repeated, grabbing her arm. "Where's the truck. You drove here. What's going on?"
Bella reached up to stroke my cheek with a leather-gloved hand. "Be safe on your way back, Jacob. We all miss you."
"Bella!" I practically yelled. "Where's the truck? You drove here! Where did the bike come from?"
Something wasn't right and I was struggling to keep myself together...
"What are you not telling me, Bella?"
But in the back of my mind, realization was starting to settle in.
I didn't want to believe it.
I refused to believe it.
She couldn't just leave now.
With every fiber of my being I needed her to stay.
But I was waking up.
And she was slipping away from my grasp…
Bella turned to face me, giving me one final heartbreaking glimpse of the smile that I loved.
"Oh Jake," she said, shaking her head at me as if it were obvious. "Haven't you figured it out by now? I'm not real. This was all in your head. This was all nothing but a dream."
And with that she swung a leg over the bike and rode off into the pink sunrise.
Thanks to Keane's Somewhere Only We Know for inspiration. I was also inspired to Steph Meyer's playlists, have been listening to those endlessly for weeks. Dedicated to anyone and everyone out there trying to quit smoking.
~ Nikki