Written for ILOVEJACOBANDSETH, who didn't guess right for "Unexpected" but she tried! She gave me the prompt, "a Bella/Jacob story. Edward came back after New Moon and finds out Bella is pregnant with Jacobs kid. Bella chose Jacob over Edward" and I was half-way through another drabble for her, when I wrote this, I will post the alternate one soon, but I liked this one out of the two.
The italicized parts are flashbacks!
I do not own Twilight.
They both stood on the cliffs of La Push, where not too long ago she had once contemplated her own death. Jacob stood beside her, holding her cold hand between his own, feeling the sickness coursing through her very body as she spoke.
"We both knew it would happen," she said, her voice on the verge of cracking, "I knew, you knew," she gave a short harsh laugh, "hell even Paul told me to go to the doctor." Her lips twisted in a smile, contorted with pain and anger, "I have to tell Renee. I have to think of a way to tell her I won't go to Georgia." She paused, sweeping her hands across the stars, as she spoke, "Dying in Georgia, sounds like a movie doesn't it?"
He gave her a wry smile, "Yeah," again, he looked out to the restless ocean, unable to meet her gaze, "What is it?"
Her eyes searched his face, and she said, slowly, "Too many things, it's a wonder they didn't catch it sooner, heart issues, low blood pressure, I have cancer Jake." Again, another short, harsh, bark of a laugh, he was growing to hate them, "it's eating away at my lungs and blood."
His eyes filled with tears, but he did not allow them to shed, "How long?" his voice was choked, not too far from like when he was but a child hearing his mother was gone. She gently touched his cheek, something she would do only a handful of times at first, catching the tears as they leaked from his eyes.
"A five years at best," they both knew the best never happened.
"Then why not stay here," he said, "Marry me, Bella." He was desperate, wishing she would say yes, "we can live with Billy, or live at your house, please Bella, just give me this."
What else could she say? Here was the boy who had tried to win her heart, staying with her through the long months when her father died, asking for the shattered remains of it? Telling her that he could care for her, when she finally gasped her last breath?
"Of course."
.o.
It was a small ceremony, held before the elders of the tribe and the extended Pack, held only a month after he proposed. There were tears of happiness, and those of pain leaking as well, for who could be happy for a woman married, a woman about to die?
They had sold Charlie's house, buying a medium sized house next to Sam's, and making it the official house of the Pack. Isabella lived happily with Jake, acting as if she didn't visit the hospital every month, as if her joints did not begin to fail, as if they did not both cry in their bed, holding each other, when reality caught up with them. She began to have feelings, and then dreams, that gave her a nudge in the future. She had a terrible feeling, and they ignored it, hoping it was wrong.
They pretended, and then...
She was pregnant.
.O.
Almost seven months pregnant with her son, Isabella was greeted every morning at six, when Jacob and Embry first arrived from their watch. Jacob would peck her on the cheek, ask her how she felt, asking the questions the doctors told him to, and gently rub her tummy. So far, her dreams were vague, as it the future was undecided, but she knew as soon as they solidified, she would know.
As she was cooking breakfast, the rest of the Pack would emerge from their corners of La Push, or their room in the house, and sit at the massive table, with Sam bringing Emily. They would eat for an hour or so, the two women cooking rapidly, and then the boys would go off to school and work, the two women cleaning up after them.
Emily was five months pregnant, her own belly growing, and the two women toddled around the house, cleaning and laughing. Jacob had started a business in La Push, fixing up old cars and repairing new ones, as the best mechanic in a hundred miles, he fetched a lot of work from all of Washington. Thus Isabella and he had a nice house, comfortable, and they were able to live a pretty life and pay her hospitable bills.
Then, one day, Isabella did not greet Jacob and Embry.
They did not smell breakfast wafting through the windows, nor did they see a light.
Jacob dashed up the stairs, and the smell of blood and tears overwhelmed him.
Embry followed a few minutes later, checking the area for vampires, to see Jacob and Isabell clutching each other in the bath tub, blood pooling around them, a small bundle of flesh between them.
.O.
Again, almost a year and a half later, the house was both filled with joy and tears. Emily and Sam had a son, and she just had a pair of twin girls. Isabella was god mother to their son, named Julian, but how could she be happy?
She had miscarried two sons, and a daughter, and was pregnant again, this time she was almost a week away, by why would she hope for something to unattainable? So tenuous?
But why was she suddenly having dreams of bright beautiful colors?
.O.
"What will I name him?" Isabella giggled at her friend's question, "You have to have at least an idea?" Emily shot back, thinking of her own ideas, as she was going to have her first baby soon, with Isabella.
"I-" she paused, "I haven't given it much thought," she absently rubbed her belly, hoping her son would be healthy, "Julian, it's a good strong name." She smiled, happy that she would soon be blessed with a child.
.O.
She had a beautiful daughter, she was named Mary. She was perfectly healthy, and looked like her father, save her brown eyes and curled hair.
An enormous party was thrown, and all of La Push, and much of Forks, came to see the happy little family. Isabella looked elated, but exhausted, for the baby had been a tax on her poor health. They had been told she could not have another baby, and Isabella's dreams supported that.
One night, she dreamt, and knew what she had to do the next day.
.O.
The Cullens had been gone for three and a half years, they had separated to different parts of the globe, but when they found out that Edward had finally caved, they all rushed back to Forks. They had run ahead, before their furniture could move.
They saw her.
Sitting on the porch swing of their house, no car in sight, holding a small baby in her arms, a large bag beside her.
They were slightly alarmed at her appearance, she looked almost haggard, her skin pale white, her eyes weary, her hair waxen and limp, but her expression was one of happiness, not very, as if they had only been parted a few hours.
"Hello," she said, once they had grouped in front of her, with a smile.
She was answered with a babble of happy voices, and she gave them a sad, amused, smile, and gently shushed them when her baby moved in her arms.
"May I?" Rose was the first to speak, her eyes filled with tears.
"Of course, Rose," Isabella said gently, and she handed her tiny babe off.
"Her name?"
"Mary," her voice cracked, "Why have you come? After so long?"
"We needed to make amends." Carlisle began.
"I forgive you."
"I needed you to know, I am sorry," Jasper said, quietly.
"I forgive you."
"Why can't I see your future?" Alice questioned.
"I run with wolves."
"Wolves?" Edward said, horrified.
Isabella's heart froze, and she felt a dull ache as she had not in so long, as she looked in his eyes. "My husband," she said quietly, "few else would take me."
"Husband?" Esme this time.
"I needed support, I need him."
"Why?"
"I am lonely, I need one to take care of me."
"Why? Are you not well?" Carlisle already knew.
"I am not."
"How badly?" Emmett.
"I'm dying, a year or so is all I have left."
"What it is?"
"Cancer, heart issues," she trailed off, "I want you to go." They stared at her blankly, "I cannot make you watch me die."
Rose silently handed off the child, and then, the Cullens left, never to return to Forks.
Isabella died a year later, and Jacob never found an imprint. Mary grew up, and became the new Pack mother, when Sam and Emily's son imprinted on her.
.O.
I write this to you, Edward, in hopes that you will not act rashly.
I have seen it, you will go to France soon, and meet a girl.
She will have been ruined, her maidenhood taken by force when you find her, and her blood will call you in.
You will overcome it, and she will marry you.
I write this, on my deathbed.
Know that I loved Jacob, enough that it is he, and not you, that holds me when I take my last breath.