The Burning Man
I sat at Bella's feet, focusing all my energy on keeping up the façade. I grinned weakly at her jokes, and responded if I was directly spoken to, but I used all the remaining space in my head – and there was a lot of it, but still not enough – to try and repress the fire destroying my soul.
For the millionth time today, I wished I could sleep, and escape the thoughts of the thing. It was killing her, I knew that. Breaking her apart form the inside out. Bella's once pale, flat, stomach had been stained black by bruises, and was so round it looked like she had shoved a yoga ball underneath her shirt. Her once shapely, gorgeous body had turned disproportionate and hollowed, all the excess fat, muscle, and tissue had been sucked to her belly to feed the constantly growing bulge. And her face. The most beautiful thing in my world – innocent, flawless, and kind – had turned pale and waxy; with pronounced purple shadows under her eyes, and hollow cheeks. Of course she was still dazzling – she always had been – but you could see her pain, as much as she tried to hide it, and this marred the once-perfect image.
The atmosphere weighed on the house. Even someone without my… abilities… could see that at a glance. Carlisle looked weary and tired, and it caused him terrible pain to work on Bella now; he felt no joy for the work he once loved. This new species that was so closely related to vampires would have once held great interest for him; it terrified him now. Esme no longer sketched, and the house felt oppressively quiet without her tuneless humming. She cleaned obsessively, compulsively straightening every pillow, picture, and vase.
Alice was nowhere to be seen. I felt her deep remorse – it was an undercurrent of every thought – for not being the best friend she should be to Bella during this time; but it gave her an enormous headache to even try to be near her. She couldn't see the fetus, and its future was so intertwined with Bella's that she was blurry; flickering. So she hung out in the attic, like a vampire bat in the belfry, as she put it. Jasper was there too. I missed his company more than I was willing to let anyone know; he knew something of what it was like to know the thoughts and feelings of everyone around – our talents were very similar. This situation was almost as hard for him as it was for me, even though he and Bella did not have a very strong bond. So he stayed with Alice, out of the thicket of emotions. Trying to comfort her, and yet letting her help him.
Rosalie. At times I wanted to rip her head off. I knew that Bella's life meant little to her, she saw her as selfish and short-sighted. But Bella's life was tied with the baby's, so Rose was doing everything she could for her. Bella, the baby, Rosalie. All hopelessly and inseparably intertwined now; due to Bella's first reckless, misguided impulse to call Rose; and Rosalie's twisted, selfish choice to protect that thing growing in Bella. What did Rose care if Bella died? It might even please her; she would be the obvious choice for the baby's new mother. Bella's choice redeemed her slightly in Rosalie's eyes though; fighting for the baby was what Rose would have done, had the circumstances been reversed. I could tell Emmett knew Rose's feelings; he knew her inside and out. It hurt him to see her view of the situation. Unlike Rosalie, it would hurt him tremendously if Bella died. As much as he teased her, their bond was deep, and she reminded him so much of the little sister he had lost when he had changed. He clung to the spark of optimism that he felt, deep in his unbeating heart. This little piece of hope was what Emmett had always relied on to pull him and those around him through tough times. He hadn't been able to call it back while burning his way to being a vampire, and it had terrified him. Emmett was a firm believer in the power of laughter. He knew jokes of any kind, or crazy antics, or seeing the good in a situation, was better than any medicine. But as he clung to the sunshine inside him, his grip wasn't quite tight enough to be happy, only to keep him from sliding into depression. So he stood, still, silent, and stone-faced, waiting it out.
Hearing their thoughts was truly more than I could bear.
And they all had nothing on me.
I could feel I was about to lose it. I frantically grabbed the stake of the fire that was already burning me – if I let go, if I had nothing to cling to, the fire would fully consume me, and it would show. Bella would see the fire, and know how much I was suffering. And that was the point of the burning. If not for the sake of keeping Bella happy, I would have gone to the Quileute werewolves long ago and begged them to kill me, to put out the-
Shock. Pain. Confusion. Relief. Emotions coursed through my dry veins, like a shot of adrenaline. Jacob was here. In an instant, I could hear all his thoughts and plans to kill my family. Jacob had assumed, after hearing that Bella was sick with a rare South American disease, that she was indeed a vampire. If only. Jacob planned to take as many of my siblings down as he could, although he clearly did not want to fight girls, even vampire girls. He assumed, knowing my "over-inflated ego", that I would want to fight him alone. He had no idea.
My family's heads snapped up, nearly in unison. They could hear, smell, and see Jacob, once they paid attention. Only Bella remained oblivious. Carlisle stood to answer the door.
"This really isn't a good time Jacob, could we do this later?"
He was asking to postpone the death match?
I felt the stirrings of something I hadn't felt in weeks. Hope. Not hope for Bella, not hope for the fetus, not hope that Bella would not be killed. I knew she would.
"Hope" might not even be the right term for it. It was more the realization that, when the thing killed my wife, I would have an out. So Jacob wanted to kill me? I would beg him to do it.
I heard Jacob's gasp, and knew immediately what had caused it.
I caught her scent. Her warm, clean, human, scent.
She was still the Bella I loved, her skin a soft, pale, peach; her eyes still the same chocolate brown.
His relief would not last long…
Then I really saw her. There were deep, dark, circles under her eyes that jumped out of her haggard face. Her skin seemed tight – like her cheekbones might break right through it. A few strands of hair had escaped her messy knot, and clung to her pale forehead, which was covered in a slight sheen of sweat. She looked so fragile it was scary.
She was sick. Very sick.
Jacob realized that the story Charlie had received was indeed the truth. I fought the urge to cover my eyes with my hand, to jam my fingers in my ears, and to run as far away as I could as he processed the situation. He knew something was off.
This was wrong. Bella was afraid of Rosalie! And Blondie wasn't that fond of Bella either. So why would she be crouched so protectively in front of her? But now Bella was looking at her, like, apologetically or something. Then the blonde snatched up a basin just in time for Bella to throw up noisily into it.
I fell to my knees, tortured. This was so profoundly wrong! I couldn't watch this; Bella's pain was more than I could bear. I moaned quietly. I couldn't help myself, it escaped me. I let myself cheat – My head slumped against her leg. I wanted to die. She put her hand against my cheek – comforting me. That just made it worse.
I lost the dialogue that ensued then between Bella and Jacob – I was so consumed in self-loathing. This was my fault entirely. Why had I not thought of the possibilities? Women's bodies had to change to bear children, to even prepare to carry them. But men's body's needed no such thing. The reproductive organs did not change from puberty until death. There were no monthly cycles, no time when they expired. Why should that change when we transformed from human to immortal? Perhaps it would have been better if I had killed her that first night; then at least Jacob and his pack would have had a good excuse to kill me. It would be better for her, too. She was dying now, but this way was so much slower, so much more painful. So much harder on both of us. Because when it killed her, it would kill me too. We were too intertwined for just one of us to die; just halves of the whole.
I was still lost as to what was going on, until I felt Bella shift her weight on the couch in preparation to rise.
Oh no, oh no, tell me that's not what I think…
Yes, Jacob, it is exactly what you think it is.
"No," Jacob whispered. Trying to protect his own eyes from what he subconsciously knew was coming. "Don't get up…" She looked so weak, I didn't know if she could stand it.
"I'm answering your question," she snapped at him. Those words gave me a little bit of hope – Bella was in the habit of making weak jokes, downplaying everything, and generally trying to pretend that she was her old self, and everything was fine. If only she knew how much worse that made it… But these words sounded more natural, easy coming and not so faked. It was the way she usually talked to Jacob, back when it was all okay. Before it happened… and that was about where the hope I had been feeling disappeared.
The wave of emotion that washed through me was a weak echo of feeling I had when I heard, but it was still enough to bring me to my knees. First confusion. Then realization. Disbelief. Calculation. Fear. Disgust. All these were basically wordless emotion. But when the words did come, they just hurt that much worse.
I didn't want to see this, didn't want to think about this. I didn't want to imagine him inside her. I didn't want to know that something I hated so much had taken root in the body I loved.
I could only guess why she looked like this – so pregnant, so sick – because whatever was inside her was taking her life to feed its own… because it was a monster. Just like its father.
I always knew he would kill her.
My head snapped up as I heard the words inside his. In one second we were both on our knees, the pain of the situation dragging us both down. I pulled it together enough to stand, towering over him. Any other day I would have wanted to hurt him, no, to kill him for even thinking that. As if I didn't already know, I thought bitterly. Yes, any other day there would have been a fight. Not now. The only rage I felt was at myself for knowing all along that Jacob was right, and not doing anything to stop it. Sure, I had tried. I had tried to leave her, but I was too weak to stay away. I had tried to refuse promising to change her, but I was too selfish to leave her human. And I had tried to get the abomination out of her, but she loved the thing, and I couldn't bring myself to go against her will, even when what she wanted would kill us both. I had tried, but not hard enough.
"Outside, Jacob." My eyes were flat black, I could see it in his thoughts.
He stood too, taller than me. "Let's do this," he agreed. He thought I wanted to fight. If only I could – my love for Bella, and my hatred for her pain, prevented that.
"No!" Bella gasped. She stumbled forward – her center gravity was off. Her fingers, too cold for a human, clutched my arm with all the strength she had left in her drained body. Rosalie moved with her, like they were invisibly linked. I didn't need Jasper's thoughts to show me her wild and unconcealed panic.
I couldn't let her think that, for both of our sakes. "I just need to talk to him, Bella," I promised in a low voice. I stroked her face gently, with eyes only for her.
That made me see fire. After all he'd done to her, he was still allowed to touch her that way.
I forced myself to not let my anger/self-loathing show through my compassionate mask. "don't strain yourself," I pleaded. "Please rest. We'll both be back in a few minutes."
She examined my face, looking for a false note in my promises, and then was satisfied enough to allow Rosalie to lower her back down to the couch.
She turned her eyes on Jacob. Her gaze held his, and I could tell that was what she was going for. "Behave," she insisted, her lifeless voice straining with the effort of sounding fierce. "And then come back." Jacob didn't answer. I wasn't making any promises today.
Oh, yes he was. If he thought I would kill him or let him escape, he was sadly mistaken. He would come back, if only for Bella's sake.
I strode out the door and into the woods behind my house, never turning back to see if he was following. If he was planning to attack me, I would be forewarned without use of my eyes.
Without slowing, or turning to face him, I prepared to address him. This was going to be difficult. "I'm not ready for you to kill me yet, Jacob Black." I whispered. Not yet. Despair nearly overwhelmed me as I realized the truth of those two small words. Not yet, but it was only a matter of time. "You'll have to have a little patience." I knew this was the way to provide myself with an out when my world ceased to turn.
He growled. Like I cared about his schedule. "Patience isn't my specialty," he snarled.
I continued pacing, monitoring Jacob's self-control level. It wasn't high. He stalked after me, angry but cautious. I finally pulled it together and wheeled to face him.
For a second I was just a kid – a kid who had lived all of his life in the same tiny town. Just a child. Because I knew I would have to live a lot more, suffer a lot more, to ever understand the searing agony in Edward's eyes.
And then it invaded my head. Cutting off every other thought, every other instinct. It was one thing to know that Bella would die. It was quite another to see it for myself. Alice's vision plunged me into total blackness, just me and the constant, horrifying pain. Bella, her horribly distorted body lying crumpled on the floor, still, white, and broken. I couldn't think, couldn't breathe. And then hatred for the creature was there, so strong it momentarily distracted me from the pain. It was what I grasped to begin pulling myself out of the hole. I raised a hand to my forehead, and raked my fingers across my granite forehead as if I was trying to rip the skin off. My mouth was opened in a silent scream, but I couldn't find words, vowels, or pitches to explain the agony tearing through me. I couldn't force the air out, so I stayed silent.
This was the face a man would have if he were burning at the stake.
These words, repeated so often in my family's thoughts, were enough to give me the strength I needed to drag myself those last few crucial feet. I obviously was not keeping up my act, everyone but Bella had assuredly seen through me. And probably her too, although I couldn't know it.
I felt his realization, the final piece of knowledge that gave it a place in reality.
"It's killing her, right? She's dying." And I knew when I said it that my face was a watered-down echo of his. Weaker, different, because I was still in shock. I hadn't wrapped my head around it yet – it was happening too fast. He'd had time to get to this point. And it was different because I'd already lost her so many times, so many ways, in my head. And different because she was never really mine to lose.
And different because it wasn't my fault.
This fact hit home with crushing force, force so undeniable that I crumpled to my knees in the dirt. I couldn't fight it, I couldn't win. He was right. "My fault…my fault." Saying it did little to relive the pressure of the knowledge, but I kept repeating it anyway, confessing to the dirt.
"Yes." I groaned, my voice so much calmer than the turmoil I felt inside. "Yes, it's killing her." I couldn't explain the agony, so I stopped fighting it and gave in to the pain.
His broken helplessness irritated me. I wanted a fight, not an execution. Where was his smug superiority now? Didn't he understand that we couldn't fight for Bella's sake? Didn't he know that it would kill her?
"So why hasn't Carlisle done anything?" he growled. "He's a doctor, right? Get it out of her."
I hated having to explain this again, it was exasperating as well as excruciatingly painful. It was so Bella, protecting the ones she loved at any expense of her own. "She won't let us." Of course.
Jeez, she was running true to form. Of course, die for the monster spawn. It was so Bella.
Of course he understood so much quicker than I did. He knew that she loved the thing inside her, so much that she was willing to die for it. I had assumed she was afraid that she wouldn't make it through the removal process, or that it would be anguish for her. But no, it was all for the baby, she had no fear for herself.
"You know her well," I whispered, more to myself than him. "How quickly you see… I didn't see. Not in time. She wouldn't talk to me on the way home, not really. I thought she was frightened – that would be natural. I thought she was angry at me for putting her through this, for endangering her life. Again. I never imagined what she was really thinking, what she was resolving. Not until my family met us at the airport and she ran right into Rosalie's arms. Rosalie's! And then I heard what Rosalie was thinking. I didn't understand until I heard that. Yet you understand after one second…" I sighed. I groaned. I fought back tears that would never come.
"Just back up a second. She won't let you?" of course I knew what he was about to suggest, but that wasn't an option. "Did you ever notice that she's exactly as strong as a normal hundred-and-ten-pond human girl? How stupid are you vamps? Hold her down and knock her out with drugs." Obviously.
"I wanted to," I murmured, confessing a horrible thing. "Carlisle would have…"
What, too noble were they?
"No," I answered his rhetorical question. "Not noble. Her bodyguard complicated things."
Understanding flowed through Jacob. So that's what Blondie was up to. What was in it for her, though? Did the beauty queen want Bella to die so bad?
"Maybe. Rosalie doesn't look at it quite that way." It's not that she wanted Bella to die, it's that she wanted the baby to live. And since their lives were inseparably tied right now, it was essential that Bella survived to bring the baby into the world. After giving birth, Bella could live or die, Rosalie didn't care much either way.
"So take the blonde out first. Your kind can be put back together, right? Turn her into a jigsaw and take care of Bella." Obviously.
Jacob's "duh!" attitude was starting to irk me. Did he really think that we hadn't considered all of his alternatives, along with millions more? "Esme and Emmett are backing her up. Emmett would never let us… and Carlisle won't help me with Esme against it…" My voice disappeared, contemplating the stupidity of people when their mate was involved. I was willing to against Bella's greatest desire for the greater good, for what would help her in the future. For the rest of my family, however, things were different. Once their spouse even hinted that they didn't approve, that vampire was out, and fiercely opposing a choice that had nothing to do with them. Idiots.
"You should have left Bella with me." Hadn't I tried? I had even encouraged it, knowing that it was better for her all along. But it was her choice, and she had made the wrong one.
I kept it simple. "Yes."
It was a bit late for that, though. Maybe he should have thought about all this before he knocked her up with the life-sucking monster.
I gripped the stake again, trying not to let it show how hot the fire was burning now. "We didn't know." I was barely able to force out enough air to form the words. "There's never been anything like Bella and I before. How could we know that a human was able to conceive a child with one of us –"
"When the human should get ripped to shreds in the process?" The repetitive, depressing thought entered my head again. It would have been better if I had killed her then. She should have been ripped to shreds. This death was so much worse, excruciatingly long and painful for everyone. It would have been so much easier if I had been able to go to the Volturi immediately. Now I had to suffer with a brave face, next to Bella. But it was comforting to know that when she died, I would have the quickest out possible; I had no doubt that Jacob would stick around, waiting for his chance to kill me.
"Yes." I whispered. I might as well give the boy some background on the subject. "They're out there, the sadistic ones, the incubus, the succubus. But the seduction is merely a prelude to the feast. No one survives." I shook my head, revolted. This was one reason that I had had problems even thinking about being with Tanya. For her, love and lust did not necessarily mean the same thing. And I knew that she was attracted to my personality, but my body more than my mind. She needed someone that she wouldn't break. Disgusting.
Like he was any different. "I didn't realize that they had a special name for what you are." He spat.
That wasn't me, I loved Bella. Loved her for just being her. And yet, I was so much worse. "Even you, Jacob Black, cannot hate me as much as I hate myself."
Wrong. Wrong, was I? I knew exactly how much he hated me, and it had nothing on what I felt towards myself. "Killing me doesn't save her," I stated quietly. I wanted to beg him to do it, to release me from this agony, but I knew that it would destroy her.
"So what does?" I could feel his panicky desperation, the drive to find a cure.
I knew this might not work, but I would try. "Jacob, you have to do something for me."
"The hell I do, parasite!"
He thought I was asking for myself. Ha. The only thing I wanted for myself was death. He didn't understand I was asking for Bella. "For her?"
Jacob was feeling a weird mixture of despair and anger, teeth clenched, blood pounding. "I did everything I could to deep her away from you. Every single thing. It's too late." His mental agony merely echoed mine; it wasn't enough to make a conceivable difference to the pain I was already immersed in.
"You know her, Jacob. You connect to her on a level that I don't even understand." The human level, I thought bitterly. I continued. "You are a part of her, and she is a part of you. She won't listen to me, because she thinks I'm underestimating her. She thinks she's strong enough for this…" I choked on that odd feeling, the feeling of dry, prickling, eyes and a closed off throat. I didn't need to feel those things to know that I should be crying. "She might listen to you." I concluded.
"Why should she?"
Because she had to! She had to… I could feel that I was losing my grip on the stake, that the fire was becoming visible all too quickly. I lurched to my feet.
I wondered if he was really going crazy. Could vampires lose their minds? "Maybe," I answered, not even sure if he had spoken out loud or not. "I don't know. It feels like it." I shook my head. "I have to try and hide this in front of her, because stress makes her more ill. She can't keep anything down as it is. I have to be composed; I can't make it harder. But that doesn't matter now. She has to listen to you!"
I felt his shock at me showing emotion to him. "I can't tell her anything you haven't. What do you want me to do? Tell her she's stupid? She probably already knows that. Tell her she's going to die? I bet she knows that too."
Tell her she's going to die… she's going to die… and even though I already knew it, hearing it killed me every time. You have to say it, you have to say it, I told myself. "You can give her what she wants."
He wasn't making any sense. Part of the crazy?
"I don't care about anything but keeping her alive." I focused. That was true. I could do this for her, and I could do it calmly and civilly. "If it's a child she wants, she can have it. She can have half a dozen babies. Anything she wants." I paused to let the truth of my words sink in. "She can have puppies, if that's what it takes." I knew my control was slipping, and that Jacob could see through the cultivated mask to the frenzied pain below. His glare melted into shock, and his mouth popped open in a larger, round "o".
She could have them. She could have her babies. I could do that for her. "But not this way!" the words were out loud, I hadn't meant for that to happen. "Not this thing that's sucking the life from her while I stand there helpless! Watching her sicken and waste away. Seeing it hurting her."
Hurting Her. More pain stabbed me in the gut, causing a physical reaction. I sucked in more air. "You have to make her see season, Jacob. She won't listen to me anymore. Rosalie's always there, feeding her insanity – encouraging her. Protecting her. Not, protecting it. Bella's life means nothing to her."
Jacob choked on the idea as if it was lodged in his throat. What was he saying? That Bella should what? Have a baby? With me? What? How? Was he giving her up? Or did he think she wouldn't mind being shared?
"Whichever," I replied truthfully. "Whatever keeps her alive." And that I was truly all I wanted – besides death.
"That's the craziest thing you've said yet," He said, still trying to come to grips with the idea that I was serious.
"She loves you." Agony. She loved him, truly she did.
"Not enough."
"She's ready to die to have a child. Maybe she'd accept something less extreme." I knew she wouldn't, but how I wished. I had to try…
"Don't you know her at all?" I had thought so.
"I know, I know. It's going to take a lot of convincing." As much as I had in me and more. "That's why I need you. You know how she thinks. Make her see sense."
I couldn't think about what he was suggesting. It was too much. Impossible. Wrong. Sick. Borrowing Bella for the weekends and then returning her Monday morning like a rental movie? So messed up.
So tempting.
I tried not to focus on the visuals of Jacob's head. I had to let him do this without ripping his head off.
This new image was worse. I knew I wouldn't have suffered over it for years if he hadn't shoved it into my head now. But it stuck there, like a poisonous, unkillable weed, winding it's threads and roots through my mind. It was Bella, healthy and glowing, so different than now, but something the same: Her body, not distorted, changed in a more natural way. Round with my child.
He tried ignoring the weed because he knew he wouldn't be able to rip it out. "Make Bella see sense? What universe do you live in?"
"At least try." Please, please, try.
He shook his head immediately, but I ignored it because I could hear the conflict in his thoughts.
"Where is this psycho crap coming from? Are you making this up as you go?" like I had done anything but plot this scenario, or ones similar to it.
"I've been thinking of nothing but ways to save her since I realized what she was planning to do. What she would die to do. But I didn't know how to contact you. I knew you wouldn't listen if I called. I would have come to find you soon, if you hadn't come today. But it's hard to leave her, even for a few minutes. Her condition…it changes so fast. The thing is…" I faltered. "growing. Swiftly. I can't be away from her now."
I felt his confusion. "What is it?"
"None of us have any idea. But it's stronger than she is. Already." He saw it then, the monster inside her. He saw it break her from the inside out. "Help me stop it," I whispered. "Help me stop this from happening."
"How?" By offering my stud services?" I didn't flinch when he said that, I had heard worse wording. I didn't flinch, but he did. "You're really sick. She'll never listen to this."
"Try. There's nothing to lose now. How will it hurt?"
It would hurt me. Hadn't I taken enough rejection from Bella without this?
"A little pain to save her? Is it such a high cost?"
"But it won't work." He was scrambling for a way out, but his resolve was slipping – I knew he was going to talk to her.
"Maybe not. Maybe it will confuse her, though. Maybe she'll falter in her resolve. One moment of doubt is all I need."
"And then you pull the rug out from under the offer? 'Just kidding, Bella'?"
"If she wants a child, that's what she gets. I won't rescind."
I couldn't believe I was even thinking about this. Bella would punch me – not that I cared about that, but it would probably break her hand again. I shouldn't let him talk to me, mess with my head. I should just kill him now.
I couldn't let him do that yet. "Not now," I whispered, mumbling to the dirt again. "Not yet. Right or wrong, it would destroy her, and you know it. No need to be hasty. If she won't listen to you, you'll get your chance. The moment Bella's heart stops beating, I will be begging you to kill me."
I felt his vehemence in the promise "You won't have to beg long."
The corner of my mouth felt like it almost twitched. I was just so Jacob. "I'm very much counting on that."
"Then we have a deal."
I was so relieved that he would do this for me. No, for her. I nodded and held out my hand.
I felt his pushed-back disgust as he gripped my outstretched hand and shook it once before releasing.
The sudden barrage of my family member's reactions as they heard Jacob's acceptance resulted in an ever-increasing din inside my head. Shock, relief, disgust, smugness – that was Rosalie, she knew Bella would never agree – and utter confusion. But I didn't care. I nodded in agreement.
"We have a deal."