Story name: Beautiful ugly, heartbreakingly lovely
Author: Rosesfade
Pairing: Bella/Jasper
Disclaimer: The characters in this story belong to Stephanie Meyer
A/N: I know I said no more fanfiction but this just came to me and I had to write it. Hope you enjoy.
Summary: It started out as a fascination that escalated into a deadly obsession called love. Forbidden fruit tastes the sweetest. Jasper/Bella Oneshot.
It was sad, really, the way it all ended. We knew it wouldn't have a fairy tale happily ever after but we hoped for something more than what it turned out to be. No one thought it would've ended like that except for maybe her…
Silence. This pitch black room was silent to the human ear at least and although dark as the abyss my eyes could see everything. I didn't want to see anything though; I wished for everything to just fade away. I wanted to be senseless and numb; I wanted to escape reality and just be.
I was curled up on the cold wooden floor with my head leaning against one of the cracked walls. Every fiber of my being shrieked in agony and memories bounced through a mind that no longer wished to be perfect. Able to sift and analyze everything in seconds, I was forced to relive that moment of pure torture knowing that saying a few words could have changed everything. My perfect predator's brain made everything worse; vampires weren't perfect, our weaknesses once exposed and exploited would be the end of us. Some would hide away perhaps for forever and others would kill themselves. Alone in this room, I was consumed with memories of her.
From the moment I saw her, I was hooked. Her long mahogany hair cascading in tousled waves down her back is what caught my attention first. Alice had short hair; I was a sucker for long locks. Her long legs and creamy skin is what drew my eye. A perfect body; as far aw humans go. The emotions were what reeled me in; calm yet nervous, bored, curious amazement and enough self loathing to kill a person. Her stare was directed at me and it was then that I saw her eyes which captivated me. Framed by thick tangled lashes they looked as if they'd seen everything the world had to offer and found it lacking. They were a complex weaving of colors: a warm honey brown filled with copper, gold and chocolate brown flecks. They rested in a heartbreakingly beautiful pale heart shaped face under long dark winging eyebrows. She had lips that were full and disproportionate in a way that made her look unintentionally sexy. She would make an artist weep at her beauty. I thought she looked like an angel come to life; an angel that long ago I would've gladly liked to make fall. She noticed me staring and blood rushed to her cheeks staining them a delish pink. I graced her with a smile and she quickly looked away. I chuckled to myself as her emotions hit me: lust, amazement, wonder. She wasn't Alice but she was my new fascination. She also belonged to my brother.
The months passed and she became a part of our royally fucked family. She learned all of our secrets and loved us in her way. I almost killed her once when the temptation of her blood was too strong and Edward made us all leave. I wanted to end him myself at that moment; he hurt Alice by his decision and I wanted to see her more. We eventually did come back but she wasn't quite the same. Already damaged before, our abandoning her had killed something inside her that could never come back. I wasn't a good person though and I enjoyed toying with her when Edward let her out of his sights for more than a few minutes. I exploited her crush on me, using the southern charm I was gifted with to play with her feelings for my own amusement. She used to gaze at Edward with adoration but now, when she was with him she wasn't fully there. Her gaze flickered to me often. I watched her whenever I could. I learned to guard my mind well and Edward never learned of my thoughts that flipped and flopped between killing her and kissing her. Alice never saw anything because Bella's future shifted so much that eventually she just disappeared from my pixies radar. Maybe it had something to do with how her mind was, or maybe it was because of her friendship with the wolves, maybe it was something else entirely. Everyday I found myself growing increasingly interested in the Enigma that was Isabella Swan.
It started with a kiss…
I knew she belonged to someone else and yet I didn't care. I was cruel and found that toying with Bella was a way to pass the endless amount of time that I had. This particular day started out like any other. Edward had his arms wrapped around Bella. His emotions were bursting with love while hers were a dark cocoon of self loathing and despair. She glanced over at me and caught me staring; she quickly returned her attention to Edward. He kissed her softly on the lips before leaving with the others for a weekend hunting trip. I was left to babysit Bella.
I cleared my throat letting her know I was still here and she whirled around to face me, her multihued eyes resting on mine. Her emotions changed to lust and adoration and then worthlessness crept over here, diming the light in her eyes. I knew she had developed a crush on me and now was the time to take the next step in my plan.
"Oh, hi Jasper" her clumsy tongue tripped over the words in an endearing way.
"Bella" I nodded letting my southern accent to thicken. She liked my accent.
I turned to walk away and once again her self doubt had me by the throat. I spun around and stalked towards her. The closer I got the more I could feel the heat radiating off her and hear the blood pounding through her veins. Her sweet scent clouded around me, sucking me in. Locking my eyes with hers I leaned in slowly, her emotions wrapped around me making me want her all the more. I gently touched her face and was pleasantly surprised by how soft she was. She sighed in ecstasy and my skin burned where it touched hers. I was drowning and burning all at the same time.
"Jasper, what are you…" She began but I silenced her by gently touching my lips to hers. I tangled my hands in her long hair. The heat floored through me and I could feel her pulse through the thin skin of her lips. I was at war with myself; keep kissing her, kill her or walk away. I growled softly struggling to keep my control when her tiny hands came up and curled into the hair at the nape of my neck. She exhaled softly and her sweet scent enveloped me in a cloud of strawberries, chocolate and vanilla. I broke away from her and put my lips against her ear. She shivered lightly.
"You're beautiful." I whispered before turning and running to my study.
Her longing swirled through the house crushing me and filling me with exhilaration at the same time. She wasn't Alice but, I wanted to keep her just the same.
Things escalated from there. Was it my fault? I knew it was.
When it came to Bella Swan I couldn't stay away. I wasn't sure when it stopped being just toying with her and changed to an unhealthy obsession. I longed for her and hated her for always being on my mind. I allowed things to go farther and farther after that first kiss. When Alice and Edward were around we were perfect actors, pretending to be nothing more than friends, hiding the emotions that burst to life when we were alone.
I'd sneak into her house at night and take her to my secret hideaway. We'd spend almost the entire evening there; kissing, touching, talking. Alice never saw and Edward was too blind by love to notice anything amiss. I took to calling Bella, Isa, because it was something that I came up with and only I called her. She'd tell me that she loved me but I'd never say it back. After all, she wasn't Alice and I didn't want another weakness.
It started to go downhill but I couldn't let her go. I was selfish and maybe that's what killed her in the end.
She loved my scars; would run her fingers along them whenever she could. She had a favorite one; it was particularly nasty and marred part of my neck. I wondered how she could be so accepting of them when even Alice didn't like to look at them. One night while lying in bed I asked her about it. I grabbed the hand that was lazily rubbing her favorite scar.
"Why do you like them so much? They don't disgust you?" I wondered aloud to her.
"They make you imperfect like me; I'm growing so tired of perfect. They could never disgust me because they're a part of you." She sighed out before gently resuming feather light touches to the raised marks.
Her answer made me happy and it felt nice to feel her skin on mine so I allowed myself to purr, showing her my appreciation without words. Her scent around me caused me to drown while her skin on mine caused me to burn. She was heaven and hell.
She wrapped her arms around me and her bare legs tangled with mine. She mumbled the words to a song with a haunting melody.
"Maybe I'm brainless, definitely not wise but I know you're not like other guys. You make me laugh, you make me cry. I'm growing tired of this chase. We're going in circles…" She trailed off falling asleep and the steady rhythm of her heart lulled me into a calm I'd never known. My mind screamed stay, while the monster inside roared kill, while my heart wept with guilt and held itself together with longing.
The sky began to lighten and I carried her home. I turned to leave when her hand grabbed my wrist with her feeble human strength. I looked into her eyes drowning in their depths. Her emotions sighed love and screamed pain while self hatred drifted through sporadically. She wanted me to save her, I wasn't that person.
"Jasper, I love you" she said softly beginning the scene that broke her heart a little more each time it was repeated.
"Isa you're lovely" I replied staring into her eyes and watching her break before jumping through the window.
Her emotions chased after me as I fled the scene tearing up my insides with hurt, guilt, heartbreak and longing. I wanted to say it back but I didn't want her to know what it was that she was doing to me. A part of me liked hurting her though. I wasn't human and my emotions weren't the same. When it came to Isa I walked a very thin line between love and hate; to me they were almost the same thing though. She wasn't Alice but they were blurring in my mind to mean the same.
The end was drawing near and I could feel it in the air. I chose to ignore it and continue with the hurtful charade.
A furious growl rumbled through my chest as I glared angrily at her. She wasn't the same anymore. I had slowly killed the innocence inside her. I was her poison and she was my drug. She started to like hurting me like I enjoyed hurting her. Her emotions were a constant whirlwind. A tug-of-war that she was slowly losing. She walked towards me with her eyes blazing like the setting sun. I forgot my anger as soon as her lips met with mine. She would be changed soon and I would no longer have to be careful with her. She never said she loved me anymore but you could feel the words unspoken. We were both walking a tightrope between love and hate. She wasn't Alice but I craved her company more.
The beginning of the end came with words that sounded like goodbye.
She was to be changed today and the cruel Bella I had created disappeared for awhile and the old one came back.
I took her away with me for an evening together. Her emotions were choking her and I knew it was my fault. No one questioned where we were going; maybe they figured it out after all. In a field by my cabin I spun her around in a dance that nature provided the melody for. Afterwards we laid in the grass letting the silence over take us. The silence was slowly killing me. Time was almost up and I offered her my hand. Her eyes a blend of hot and cold gazed into mine with an intensity I'd never seen.
"Jasper, you know I love you right?" she whispered her human tongue stumbling over words for its last time. She soon would be perfect and her human restrictions would be gone.
I nodded slowly not sure where this was headed. Her hand gently stroked her favorite scar and I was intoxicated with her presence. I kissed her fast and hard, trying to show her without words.
"I hope you remember that forever" she told me.
"Of course I will. You're stunning." I told her.
Her emotions were wild. The despair, pain and incessant longing almost the only things left. The self hatred always present. She was losing this battle and she wanted me to save her from herself. She was asking without words and I wanted to but couldn't; fixing her meant losing her. I was cruel and selfish and I would never be who she wanted me to be.
"Why don't you love me?" She suddenly asked surprising me with her boldness.
The words 'I do' jumped to my lips but I pushed them down. Saying them aloud meant admitting defeat. I replied instead with something entirely untrue.
"You're not Alice." I hated the words I had to force out.
She nodded excepting this and the defeat crushed her down. She was letting the emotions win.
"Why does this feel like goodbye?" I asked her.
"Everyday is another goodbye. I'm tired of imperfect and yet I'm scared of becoming perfect. I'm just weary Jasper. Growing desolate in the whole world's charade."
"I…" I wanted to say 'I love you' but finished with "I'm sorry."
She just shook her head and her eyes were ancient with sadness. She kept them closed as I carried her home. She sang to herself and I listened to the words.
"Running in circles as fast as we can. Finished the race and we're starting again; I can't start again. So I'll run far as fast as I can. You're chasing me, I'm done chasing you. This will be the end."
She wasn't Alice but I loved her all the same.
The end came with a cacophony of noise, flashes of color and the sun dying in her eyes.
Everyone got their chance to say goodbye to human Isabella.
"I love you is what she said to me" a star fire of hope burning in her emotions.
"You're beautiful" is what I replied, effectively crushing it all.
She wanted me to save her, I was not that person. She needed to save herself but she'd been losing that battle the whole time.
Carlisle bit her, the venom coursing through her veins; we waited. 30 hours passed smoothly before it went downhill in a spiraling crash. I knew what was happening, had seen it a few times before, and I waited for the end.
Her heart rate slowed down and her ragged shrieks of agony stopped. She laid still, her heartbeats few and far between. She was dying and nothing could change it. She wanted to die; she was weak and instead of fighting back, decided to run away. I suppose in a way it was my fault for never saying the words back, for never saving her.
The minutes trickled by turning slowly into hours until it was time. This house was home for the dead. Blood trickled slowly from her nose and her pulse sped faster and faster until soon it would cause her heart to explode. Her back arched off the bed, a hollow scream bursting past bloodless lips. Her eyes flew open flashing ruby red and copper as tears of blood streamed from them cascading scarlet down her face. Her gaze trapped mine as their light slowly died.
"You're beautiful ugly yet heartbreakingly lovely" She whispered soft as the wind.
"I loved you" I choked out, far too late as the sun imploded in her eyes swallowing up the dusky skies. Her heart stopped with a whoosh and she collapsed on the bed where she chose to die.
I was pinned to the wall with hands locked around my throat, voices snapping out words I could no longer hear. My gaze was locked on a figure I no longer knew. Fragile and broken, it wasn't the same. The life drained out leaving behind an empty shell. Slowly the rest of the world returned back into focus.
"This is all your fault! You killed her! I knew something was wrong!" Edward was growling carving, me with yet another scar.
Alice was lying on the floor, her gaze blankly staring as I broke free and ran from the room, from this house, from everything. The agony swallowed me whole and I collapsed in place where no one would find me.
Now we've come full circle, back to me alone in this room.
I lit the match and threw it on the logs. A fire blazed into life as it greedily licked at the gasoline.
It was ironic really; a human girl, a ghost, some heartsick memories were to be the end of me. After killing hundreds, possibly thousands it was loving one human girl that was the key to my death.
"Isa" I whispered before roaring "I love you!" hoping that heaven could hear me.
A feather light touch to her favorite scar and the wind outside seemed to howl a reply.
"Oh, Beautiful ugly, I'd hoped you'd loved me."
I sang the words to a song that only she knew:
"Running in circles, you're chasing me; while I chase you. I'll never let you run away so I'll follow after you as fast as you ran. I won't let this be the end."
I smiled as I stepped into the inferno. Drowning in my emotions and burning in this fire. It reminded me of her; heaven and hell. It was warm, smelling like Isa and filling me up with sunshine while I exploded into white ash as the room filled up with purple smoke.
She wasn't my Alice. She was Isabella, and I loved her for her. I'd follow her anywhere.
The story ended in a tragedy. As it all faded away like the sun that shone in her eyes and the night skies that were always present in mine. It was never a love story because neither of us were one to believe in happy endings. Love and hate blend together into the same thing when it came to us.
Just take away the words I say
'Cause I know that you don't feel the same.
Just go and say what's in your head
And I won't try to stop you.
It's the chemistry of a car crash.
-Chemistry of a car crash;; shiny toy guns
