A Heart's Desires
Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight.
[A/N: Wrote this in half an hour. What can I say? Inspiration struck.]
"Hey Rose."
"Emmett," Rosalie greeted, her lips tilting into a gentle, welcoming curve, though her eyes had a certain wistful quality to them, as they remained glazed, looking into the distance without truly seeing anything.
He moved towards her like a hapless moth gravitating to the irresistible allure of a burning flame, leaning down to press his lips to her smooth porcelain forehead in tender affection, a far cry from his usual brash manner of expressing his feelings. Emmett knew what was going through his beloved's mind right now, and he did not want to deprive her of the only reprieve she had from reality – Rosalie might not have been able to produce any offspring with her immortal body, but in her mind, she already had a hoard of little children belonging to her.
Shifting her to sit on his lap as he took her place on the armchair she had previously been lounging in, Emmett wound his arms around her petite waist and turned his head into the wealth of finely-spun gold that tumbled like a smooth waterfall over Rosalie's shoulders, inhaling the clean scent of roses that haunted him even in his dreams.
Almost absent-mindedly, Rosalie twined her slender fingers with those of Emmett's, which rested above her belly, reminding her of what could have been and what would never come to pass.
Breaking the peaceful silence that had settled upon them, Emmett murmured thoughtfully, "Isn't Reneesme beautiful? And so well loved by all."
Rosalie hummed in agreement, a sigh passing through her lips as she thought about what it would be like to hold her own child in her arms, regardless of the impossibility of such a situation.
"The little lady's growing up real fast too; I'm sure she'll prove to be a handful in no time, if she isn't already," Emmett chuckled lightly, eyes creased into that familiar joyous expression Rosalie had seen so often throughout their years together that she could discern it from his tone of voice without even needing to lay eyes on him.
She hummed in agreement once more, her own smile growing wider in response as she tilted her head to the side, a soft laugh making its way out of her throat as Emmett took the opportunity to bite down lightly onto the bared stretch of marble-like skin playfully.
"Stop it, you brute. Tonight is Reneesme's birthday celebration; we shouldn't be hiding in her and engaging in such inappropriate activities," Rosalie chided without any heat in her tone, sounding almost loving in her utterance of the insulting term she had used to describe her husband.
Rumbling laughter sounded from Emmett as he conceded defeat, "All right, you win."
Contented with his easy acquiescence, Rosalie curled deeper into his embrace, golden eyes sparkling with an inner light, losing their glassy dream-like quality as she returned from her fantasyland to savour her reality in the arms of her attentive and ever-loving husband.
"Say, Rose, do you think you would ever want a child of your own? Like, one born from your body." Emmett mentioned offhandedly, voice made deceptively casual as his sharp, dark gaze searched for any hint from Rose that she wanted the one thing that he could never give to her.
Frowning, Rosalie could not help but stiffen at the thought, tone unintentionally sharper and harsher than was necessary as she snapped curtly, "What's the point of asking me such a question, Em? You know as well as I do that no matter how much I desire a child from my own womb, it will never happen, because this vampire's body was not made to nurture, but to kill. And there's nothing I can do about it. I will never have any children of my own andthat's that."
He knew her heart.
Therefore, she simply could not understand why he would choose to torture her with this line of questioning, knowing full well what her answer would be.
But before she could demand to know why he was doing this, he said quietly, "You know, Rose, I think I might have found a way to help you achieve your heart's desire."
"What?" Rosalie turned to face Emmett; eyes blazing with anger as she took hold of his chiseled face between her manicured hands and glared straight into his solemn eyes. "Do not joke around with me, Emmett Dale McCarty Cullen, this is not at all funny."
Although her voice was firm and brooked no nonsense, Emmett could see the telltale sign of hope within the flash of uncertainty in her gaze that had been the immediate precedent of his declaration before it had been replaced by anger, which she had cloaked herself with for protection.
"I know, Rose."
Somehow, she got the feeling that he was not referring to her previous words.
"I know that you only saved me because I look like Henry."
She inhaled sharply.
How had he found out?
Rosalie guarded that fact quite fiercely in her heart, even partially from herself, partly because she did not want nor need a reminder of her past human life and also because she feared that he would think her affection for him was misplaced, though she herself was not entirely sure that it was not.
"I'm sorry I'm not and could never be the child that you wanted. But I do have something for you. I heard from… well, I asked around, and… there just might be a way for you to change back. I don't know the details, hell, I've never been too brilliant to begin with, but all these religious hocus-pocus is simply beyond me. So, you know, you could try it out if you really want a child. Who knows, it could work and you could be happy again with the child you've always wanted and a nice, human husband to love you till the end of his limited days." Emmett ended his short speech rather abruptly, looking awkwardly at anywhere but Rosalie as he loosened his hold on her, just in case she decided to leap out of his arms immediately in search of the antidote to what she believed whole-heartedly was a curse.
It was sad how Rosalie could not even find a way to refute his words.
She was desperate for humanity, yes.
But faced with the choice of losing her husband or losing the chance to grasp at her lost humanity once more, what could she choose?
Rosalie could not and would certainly not leave the man she had so selfishly condemned to a painfully eternal existence for her own benefit, yet she also could not bring herself to reject what she had wanted for so long.
When faced with the prospect of not knowing what to say, Rosalie's mouth opened and spoke insolently, "Yes, that is true, but if I had continued to think of you as the child that I could not have, do you think us coming together with the heat of a thousand suns in our passionate unions would have been possible? Do not be silly, you big bear. I love you, Emmett Cullen. Not as a child, but as a man. My man. So don't you dare belittle what we have between us, or I swear, I will make you regret it."
The scalding heat of her anger rising so suddenly came as a great surprise to the both of them.
Her implicit threat was not left unnoticed.
Emmett nodded slowly, uncertain as to how exactly he should react to her sudden, unexpected outburst and deciding that it would be wise to stay silent for the moment lest she chose to make good on her threat. But his curiosity would not allow for that.
"Then…"
"Oh, just stop it, will you! I want to have a child. I want to be human so that I can experience what it would be like to live my life to the fullest. But you never asked me if it was worth it."
"Worth it?"
"You thick-headed oaf…!" Rosalie cut herself off as she thumped his muscled chest with tightly clenched fists in pure frustration, letting out a loud growl to show the extent of her unhappiness with him. "You never asked me if I thought it was worth it to give all that up to be here, right now, with you!"
Closing his eyes in resignation, a move hardly ever employed by the cocky Emmett Cullen who liked to fight just for the fun of it, he whispered, "What's the point of asking when I know that nothing I could ever give you, nothing about our current lives would be enough to satisfy the emptiness within you at having lost all those things? I love you, Rose. I don't want you to be even the slightest bit unhappy, but it's obvious that you're unhappy when you're with me, because you're pining for something I can never provide you with."
Choosing to ignore his blatant idiocy, Rosalie hit him a few more times in increasing intensity before hissing out, "Just ask me the damned question, you stupid, stupid idiot!"
"Is it worth it?" He gritted out.
"Yes."
Emmett's eyes flew opened at the barest wisp of a whisper to look right into Rosalie's glowing orbs.
"It's worth it, because I have you; because without this curse, I would never have found you. And that is unacceptable, because I love you."
Her voice had grown so soft that he had difficulty ingesting her words after they had left her mouth.
"Rose." His own voice was hoarse with emotion, and he could only mutter a muffled declaration of love alongside a loving endearment into her mouth once more as he devoured her mouth with desperate kisses that made her cling to him tightly – her anchor in an emotional storm of his making. He practically crushed her smaller body to his, rocking them as he squeezed her tight, showing her with his body what he could not eloquently put across in words.
She breathed in his masculine scent of sandalwood and moaned in pure contentment, having found true peace for the first time in a long while as the burden of her human desires lifted from her small shoulders.
And she had finally realized, after the longest time, that there was nothing in this world and out of it that could ever induce her to give up what she had with Emmett.
Nothing.
"I have felt it and lived it and now it leaves me here, love is the ultimate pain and joy, without it you die and with it you perish." - Christopher S.