This is just some extremely fluffy fluff about how I think Jake and Renesmee's first kiss should be. I hope you like it – it was fun writing it. Enjoy, and please, review – a lot! :)
Disclaimer: I don't own the Twilight Saga or the characters, only the following plot.
Renesmee's POV:
"Mom, Jake's here! I'm going!" I called, smiling, as I saw a familiar, tall figure through the trees. Jake, my Jake; my best friend whom I had known since the very day I was born.
We had decided to go hunting that afternoon, and he had come to get me – he always came to get me, as though the thought of me running to La Push on my own scared him; as if there was anything around there, animal or human, that could hurt me.
I ran outside and flew right into his arms as he twirled me around like I weighed no more than a leaf; he had always done that, since when I was little, and even if I was now seventeen – actually six in human years, but Carlisle said I had reached the growth level of a seventeen-year-old – nothing had changed.
I laughed, holding onto him tight and relishing the warmth of his skin; living among a coven of vampires meant that nothing was ever really warm around me, but Jake was, and it felt wonderful to be in his arms. He was my sun, always ready to warm me up after the night and the rain.
"I've missed you!" I complained as he set me back on my feet; he had been busy with his pack duties down in La Push, and it had been a whole week since I had last seen him – a thing that happened more and more often lately, and that made me ache terribly. Since when staying away from him had become an actual, physical pain?
"I know, Nessie, I missed you too," he said, grinning; it took just that, just a smile, to make the pain go away, to make me forget that I had been sitting at my window for days hoping to see him. He took my hand, and I smiled as I took in the difference between us; our skin colors were opposites like night and day, mine snowy pale, his of a deep russet, contrasting sharply yet mingling perfectly together.
"So, you up for a good hunt?" he asked me, a glint in his black eyes. "Who knows, maybe this time you could even beat me in a run."
I rolled my eyes at him, releasing his hand to fold my arms over my chest.
"This time?" I asked skeptically, raising an eyebrow; if he was expecting to get me into a race that way, he was right. I was a Cullen after all; it wasn't in my nature refusing a challenge.
"Want a head start, Nessie?" he asked, his grin becoming larger and larger as he spoke.
"Oh, please," I said in mock disdain, tossing my hair back. "I don't need it to beat you."
And then I sprang forward, pulling my legs at their limits, shooting at bullet-speed through the trees; my feet barely touched the ground as I ran, and I laughed as I heard Jacob's heavy footsteps behind me; when he was in wolf form it was usually fair game, but on two legs it was awfully easy to outrun him. Between the two of us he was the most human, after all.
Eventually I stopped, my breath just a little quicker than normal, and I smirked, folding my arms again and waiting for him. He wasn't far behind me, but that handful of seconds was enough for me to tease him shamelessly; I had the right to, since he did the same whenever I lost – or let him win, depending on points of view.
"You are slow, Jake," I said, grinning, as he stopped by me, short of breath. "Maybe we should put an end to these races; it's becoming boring, there's no competition anymore. I can beat you too easily."
He growled playfully as a mischievous smile spread on his face.
"You want competition?" he asked, looking positively smug. "Let's see if you can beat me in a fight, Nessie."
He tackled me, and then we were wrestling on the ground, laughing and trying to push each other down; it was another of our things, something we had always done together. We played like that every time we went on a hunting trip – which often didn't end with hunting at all, since after running and wrestling we usually ended up in La Push hanging on the beach or curling up on the old sofa at Jake's house to watch a movie. It had been over a month since we last did something like that.
"It's not fair, Jake, look at how big you are!" I complained as he pinned me down easily, grinning. "I'm half of you both in height and weight, you have too much of an advantage!"
He shook his head as I tried to push him away, without much success.
"Says the one who has the strength and speed of a vampire," he mocked me, his eyes bright with amusement.
I laughed, and I felt my cheeks warming up as – I knew – I blushed.
During the last weeks I had felt a change in how I reacted when Jake was close. Yes, he was my big, funny wolf friend as he had always been, but lately being so close to him made something flip in my stomach, and my heart, which already beat faster than a human's, did an odd flutter; besides, the blushing didn't make things any easier since it often betrayed me tinting my cheeks with pink.
Jake never said anything, but I was sure he noticed; he wasn't blind – my skin was so pale that even the faintest blush stood out like a red traffic light – and his hearing was as good as mine, if not better, which meant he had to hear the funny backflips of my heart.
I hoped it wasn't because of that that he felt distant lately – we used to spend every day together, and now I saw him every two, three days, or even a week or more sometimes; I knew he had to patrol with his pack brothers, but he always had, and he had never been so busy before.
He looked down at me, and his smile faltered for a split of second, something I didn't recognize shifting in his gaze – affection, as always, but something else I had never seen before, and he leaned an inch closer.
And for a moment all I could think was, Kiss me.
Jacob's POV:
It was always like that with us; the friendly competition, the satisfaction of proving each other who was better. I didn't have a chance in racing with her when I was in human form – she was far too fast for me – but when it came to wrestle, I always won. I knew there was no game, she was so small – smaller than Bella, even, almost like Alice – that she had no chance.
It took me less than a minute to pin her down, and she pouted, complaining about how I was advantage since I was twice her size. After all she was a half-vampire, she would have had the strength to beat me if only she wasn't so thin.
She laughed, the happy, careless sound warming my heart, and I looked down at her.
Her eyes, of the same soft chocolate brown Bella's had once been, were bright and open, and there was a small crinkle above her nose, the one that always appeared whenever she laughed; her cheeks were tinged of the faintest of pinks, and she was smiling so widely I could see her front teeth, only a bit larger than normal – I loved that tiny, tiny flaw, that only added to how beautiful she was.
Beautiful…The time when I used to tell her that she was pretty was gone for good; she had grown up incredibly fast, and the thin, round-faced kid had now morphed into a breathtakingly gorgeous girl.
I had been through every single phase of my Imprinting with her – I had been a protector, a playmate, a confidant and a friend – and I knew that I was sliding in the last stadium almost without realizing it – the unbreakable affection I always had for her was changing into a steel-strong, desperate love.
I knew the time was right – she had reached maturity a few weeks before, and she now looked more or less like a seventeen-year-old girl – but I had never told her about the Imprint, and I was afraid of doing so. When you love someone so much its attraction on you is stronger than gravity, what would you do if that someone didn't feel the same way? Or what if, even worse, that someone pitied you?
I would have been able to handle it, because I would have done anything for her, but the pain of rejection would have torn my heart in two, and I didn't know if I was ready to deal with such an intense suffering for the rest of my life – which, in my case, meant forever.
That was why I was trying to put distance between us, telling her I had to patrol with my brothers while I actually spent the whole time looking out of my window, wondering what she was doing, if she missed me like I was missing her. It hurt terribly, but it was nothing compared to how I would have felt otherwise.
Her already pink cheeks darkened, and the brightness in her eyes clouded a bit with – was it shyness? I wasn't sure; it looked a bit like that, though.
Then I heard it; the faintest change in the quick beat of her heart, a flutter that resembled the flapping of a scared young sparrow's wings.
Something tightened in the pit of my stomach, and my whole heart seemed to warm up; she was so close, it would have taken nothing to close the gap and kiss her. I almost did it. But I was too afraid of losing her.
So I rolled back, letting her free and trying to act as though nothing had happened; she sat up, a hint of something odd in her eyes – but she blinked, and a moment later it was gone.
Her hair was ruffled and full of leaves, and I shook my head, smiling and reaching out to pick them out of her bronze curls, along with fragments of twigs.
"Is it such a mess?" she asked, smiling and wrinkling her nose, running a hand through her hair to smooth it down a little.
How could I tell her that it could have never been a mess, for she was too beautiful to ever look anything less than gorgeous?
"Nah," I said simply, taking the last leaf out before standing, holding out my hand for her to take it. She grabbed it, and I pulled her up easily; she weighed nothing to me.
The sky above us, barely visible through the thick branches of the trees, was covered in dark, heavy clouds which threatened rain soon, which meant our hunting trip was cancelled – again. As she grew up, Nessie had started to become quite fond of human food, and our hunting trips had become simple excuses to hang out together, knowing way too well that we would have eventually ended up at my house and that she would have eaten something with my dad and I before going back home.
"How about a movie?" I asked, brushing dirt and leaves off my clothes and grinning. "Last time you chose, so today it's my turn." Last time was about a month and a half ago, and it seemed like an eternity.
She shrugged, smiling.
"I'm fine with that. It's been a while since our last TV-afternoon."
"Perfect. How about another race?" I asked, mocking her, trying to look normal.
She smiled a little, stepping forward so that she was right in front of me.
"How about we just run and I slow down enough to keep your pace?"
I had to hide my surprise at her offer; she had never refused a challenge before, not with me, at least.
I just nodded, and we broke into a run, shooting side by side into the woods. As I peeked at her, though, I couldn't help but notice that she kept her eyes on the ground the whole time, a thoughtful look on her face.
Unfortunately, we weren't fast enough to escape the rain, which started to rumble down in heavy, thick sheets just moments later, drenching us from head to toe.
By the time we got in front of my house, it looked like we had just come out of the water after a swim, and the rain was pouring down so heavily it was hard to see or hear anything else beside the water.
We ran into the house, laughing like mad as I wiped water out of my eyes and Nessie stuck her head out on the porch to wring her water-darkened hair, leaving a small pool on the wooden planks.
"I look like a half-drowned cat," she complained, trying to shake some water out of her soaked t-shirt; her shoulders shook slightly as she shivered, and I immediately kicked in protection gear.
I didn't matter being soaked – I hardly felt cold even standing half-naked in the middle of a blizzard – but Ness wasn't as warm as me, and it wasn't exactly summer; I didn't know if she could catch colds and such, and I didn't want to discover it.
"C'mon, I'll give you some dry clothes," I told her, heading to my room; I knew she would have followed.
I took one of my t-shirts and an old pair of sweats, which I had outgrown years before with the sudden growth spurt preceding my first phase – those were the smaller I had – and handed them to Renesmee, along with a towel from the cupboard in the corridor. She smiled at me and slipped into the bathroom, closing the door quickly.
"You choose the movie while I dry up a bit!" she called from there. "Even if maybe I should step directly into the clothes dryer!"
I chuckled as I took another t-shirt and a pair of battered jeans from the closet, dumping the soaked clothes in a corner; the room was already such a mess they were almost invisible. Then I walked in the living room, scanning the titles of the old VHSs on the shelf, and grinned, taking one of the ones I liked the most – The Exorcist. It was just so silly, seeing how they attempted to make it scary at all costs, without even succeeding.
"I could use these clothes as blankets, Jake, they are huge!" Nessie said as she walked in, her bare feet barely making noise on the wooden floor.
I turned to look at her, and I had to use all my might to keep my jaw from dropping. Her hair was still damp, messy and wild, falling around her face and body to her waist in a fiery bronze mane; my clothes were huge on her, the edges of the sweats rolled up several times so that she wouldn't walk on them, the t-shirt so large it hung almost to her knees, its sleeves brushing her elbows, yet she had never looked more beautiful, if that was even possible.
I forced my eyes down, trying to restrain my heart from hammering in my chest at the sight of her, and busied myself with the movie, setting everything ready as Ness plopped down on the sofa behind me with the softest thump.
"What are we going to watch?" she asked me, crossing her legs as I sat down by her side; I smirked and stuck the case of the VHS in front of her face, already knowing what her answer would have been.
"Jake, The Exorcist?" she asked, wrinkling her nose; I knew she hated that kind of movies, and I usually avoided choosing something like that for our TV-afternoons, but that day I wanted to give it a try.
"Come on, Ness, it's fun!" I assured her, taking the remote and pressing the play button on it. "You have never even seen it before, watch at least a few minutes before deciding that you don't like it. Who knows, maybe you might discover you like it, deep down."
"Very deep down," she muttered, but she smiled, folding her legs under her and leaning in the cushions, fiddling with one of her curls. I had to physically restrain myself from reaching out and pull her closer to do the same myself, and I focused on the screen, my arms folded over my chest.
"Jake, turn that damn thing off!" she screeched less than fifteen minutes later, her voice muffled by my shoulder; she had been able to resist for almost a quarter of hour, looking more and more sick, until she had jumped in my arms, curling up in my side and hiding her face in my chest.
"You are half-vampire; how can vampires be scared of horror movies?" I asked her, half-joking, half-trying to cheer her up a bit; I didn't expect her to react like that, and I felt miserable for scaring her. She was shaking slightly, and I pulled her closer, wrapping my arms around her back and caressing her soft, damp ringlets.
"I'm sorry, Ness," I murmured, holding her tight and trying to ignore the reaction of my heart to the warmth of her body in my arms – since I joined the pack nothing felt warm to me anymore, but Ness was, and it was the most wonderful sensation, having her so close. I rubbed her arms soothingly, and I smiled seeing how different our skin colors were – mine brick red, hers pale as the moon; yet they looked nice together. She was my moon, so beautiful and delicate she blocked out the stars; everything else paled compared to her.
"If tonight I'll have nightmares I'll consider you personally responsible, Jacob Black!" she accused me, sounding a little angry, but her arms tightened around my middle as she spoke, and I knew she wasn't really angry with me.
My smile grew wider; that was my girl! After all she was Bella's daughter; if her mother punched me because I tried to kiss her, Ness was surely capable of doing the same for scaring her.
"How about we watch something else? Something less scary?"
She nodded and carefully released me, but didn't move from her spot, staying in my arms; I didn't dare to move, afraid that she would have went back to her side of the couch if I did so, and I just flipped through the channels until I found an old movie I knew she liked – a comedy which title I didn't remember, but which we had already watched together months before.
She settled down, her legs pulled up against her chest and her head laying on my shoulder, and I put an arm around her, keeping her close; we always sat like that, and it felt right, like nothing had ever changed between us.
The movie ended, and as the titles ran on the screen Renesmee reached out with her hand, touching my face briefly as she sent me a thought; images, colors, sensations filled my mind, and it took me nothing to understand: she didn't want to go, not yet.
I pulled her closer, kissing the top of her head and hearing another flutter of her heart as I did so.
"You can stay as long as you like, Ness, you know that. I'm never tired of being with you. I'll never be."
She turned her head and smiled shyly, her dark eyes full of affection. God knew how much I wished it was more than just that.
"You used to say that a lot when I was little," she said softly as her cheeks turned pink again. "You always said that you would have always been here with me, no matter what. That you would have always been my Jake."
How long has it been since I had been her Jake, since I had heard her say those words? A couple of years probably; I was almost sure she looked about eight at the time. It felt like an eternity.
"And I'll always say that," I whispered, tugging at one of her long curls. "I have always been yours, Ness, you know that."
She blushed even more, her cheeks reddening almost like Bella's used to; she was trying to say something, I knew that, but I couldn't really understand what it was.
"I know," she said, looking down at her hands. "But – it's good to hear you say that. It's been a long time, and – and I thought – you had been busy here in la Push lately, so –"
I never thought I would have ever seen the day Ness was at loss of words; apparently, I was wrong.
Then something clicked into place, and her words made sense to me: she was afraid that I didn't want to be with her anymore, that someone else was taking her place in my life. As if it was even possible…! How could someone ever replace her, my Ness, my heart and soul, the very reason I was born? My world, my everything? They should have killed me first, ripped my heart out of my chest and replaced it with a stone before I could stop wanting her, loving her the way I did, and it probably wouldn't have been enough.
"Don't ever think that, Ness," I said softly, gently lifting her chin so that she was looking at me. Her eyes, those astonishingly beautiful eyes, were shiny with unshed tears, and I felt my heart rip into pieces seeing her so sad. And knowing that I had been the one who made her sad, not understanding earlier that she needed me, only made me feel worse.
"Don't ever think, not even for a second, that I don't want to spend every second with you."
Her teeth sank in her lip, and she reached out again, placing her hand on my cheek lightly.
She showed me things – sitting at the window wondering if I really had to be on patrol with the pack for a week in a row, scanning the woods with her eyes hoping to see me there; dreaming of me running away from her, saying that we had to grow up and create our own lives; wondering if she had said or done something wrong.
I felt the pain, the hollow ache in her bones and the throbbing in her chest, so intense it kept her awake at night.
And in the background, almost hidden behind everything else, I felt love. A love that was different from the one she used to show me when she was little – that was the love she felt for her best friend, the innocent affection towards a member of her family. But this – this was so strong and pure it made my head spin; I could feel it burning behind her thoughts like a storm of blazing fire, so intense it was actually painful.
Just like my love for her was.
In that moment I realized how stupid I had been, thinking that I was the only one to feel that way: my Imprint molded me to her needs, turning me in anything she wanted me to be – and that overwhelming love I felt for her was just a reaction to how she felt. I would have never been able to look at her in that way if it wasn't what she wanted.
She dropped her hand from my face and the flow of thoughts and sensations broke suddenly as she lowered her eyes again, her hair falling around her face like a thick curtain, hiding her from me.
As gently as I could, I took her face in my hands and lifted her head a little so that I could look at her. Large tears were rolling down her cheeks, dripping in her hair, and she kept her eyes low, refusing to meet my gaze.
"Renesmee," I said softly, my voice barely above a whisper as I said her name, that name that I never used when I talked to her, preferring the nick I gave her the very day she was born; she looked up, surprised as she heard it, and I wiped her tears from her face with my thumbs, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
There were so many things I could have said in that moment, so many words I could have found, but everything seemed too complicated, too difficult to express just how I felt.
"I'm sorry," I said softly, lowering my face close to hers and kissing away another tear. "I'm sorry I hurt you, I – I never meant to. I would never, ever do anything to make you suffer; it would be worse than stabbing myself."
She looked up at me, her eyes so sad my heart broke again and again, a thousand times a second, shattering into a million pieces.
"I will always be yours, Renesmee, mind, heart and soul. I would be nothing without you. And I had been so stupid, fearing to tell you that. It hurt me, and it hurt you more."
Our faces were merely inches apart, the tips of our noses brushing as I cradled her face in my hands; emotions slowly shifted in her eyes – first sadness, then relief, comprehension, and eventually the same thing I had seen in the woods just hours before. I could tell what it was now – shyness, yes, but also longing, expectation, and love.
She had wanted me to kiss her, and I had chickened out and acted like nothing had happened, hurting her. But I wouldn't have made the same mistake twice.
"I love you, Ness," I breathed, my lips almost brushing hers as I spoke. "Always have, always will."
Her heart was beating fast, faster than I had ever heard, hammering in her chest and pounding against her ribs with such force I could almost feel its pulse reverberating in her body.
Her eyelids fluttered close as she tilted her face in my palm, leaning into my touch; so beautiful and trusting my heart melted.
"Please, Jake," she whispered, her voice so low I almost thought I had imagined it. But a faint, rosy pink blush was spreading across her cheekbones, and I knew I had heard her words for real. I couldn't hold back anymore; I had to kiss her, or I would have died. So I obeyed what my instinct was pushing me to do.
I leaned forward and closed the gap between us, brushing my lips against hers once, twice, three times, kissing her gently, almost reverently, as though I was afraid to hurt her, while a slow fire burned me from the inside, gathering in the very center of my chest.
I had seen it in Sam's, Paul's and Jared's heads before, and I already knew that sensation, even if I would have never imagined that it would have been so overwhelming and intense.
That was what the first kiss of an Imprint felt like.
Renesmee leaned into me, her hands resting lightly on my chest, as she kissed me back tentatively, her small body shaking from head to toe.
I placed another lingering kiss on her lips, and then a thousand more, unable to let her go even for the smallest part of a second.
When we eventually parted, she opened her eyes slowly, looking at me with the most tender expression of the world.
"I love you," I repeated, kissing her cheek, her forehead, her damp eyelids, the tip of her nose. "I love you, I love you, I love you." I couldn't stop myself from saying those three words once I let them out for the first time. I pressed my lips to hers again, and she sighed, her hands going to the back of my head to hold me closer.
"I love you too, Jake," she whispered, caressing my cheek and sending me a thought of pure, overwhelming love. "Always have, always will."
She brushed my lips with hers, apparently unable, like me, to let go for more than a few moments.
"And I'm yours, too. Mind, heart and soul."
I held her close, burying my face into her hair and relishing in how her body seemed to be made to fit in my arms, to curl flawlessly into my embrace.
I was hers, and she was mine, and that was enough for me.
Forever.
So, what do you think about it? Loved it? Hated it? Let me know!