Disclaimer: Don't own it.
Author's Note: I don't know where this story was born from. I just woke up in the morning and I had to write. I feel like a maniac but I can't stop myself. I hope you at least like it. But if you don't I'll continue anyway.
From error to error one discovers the entire truth.
- Sigmund Freud
Anybody can become angry, that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, and to the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way, that is not within everybody's power, that is not easy.
- Aristotle
EDWARD'S POV
It was dark now, the time well past nine. Charlie had come home hours ago. He had looked very much the same he had last time. Only his hair was a little longer and he looked more tired than I remembered. He was getting old, I realized, watching him get up from his car and walk, while rubbing his neck, to the door.
I was still waiting for Bella, but something felt wrong. I had heard Charlie go into the kitchen and open something that made plastic sounds and throw that something in the microwave and eat alone in the living room, watching tv. Every once in a while he went to the kitchen to dig a bottle of beer from the fridge - I heard the sound of him opening the bottles. Perhaps Bella was sleeping over at someone else's place? I wondered. Perhaps that's why her car was there?
I felt a stab of jealousy in my chest. What if she was staying over at a boyfriend's place? The whole idea seemed utterly impossible, even though I had naturally thought about it before. But now, face to face with her new life, I found myself terrified that she had gotten over me. In just a few months. Was it possible that it had been so easy to convince her I didn't love her because in reality her love had been fickle enough to die like a flame? And she had thought mine was of the same kind?
I guess I should've felt happy that my plan was going as I had intended. But I couldn't feel happiness, only sheer terror.
I was still selfish enough to want her back. That was the real reason I had returned - I had come back to make her mine again, to tear her well-organized life back to pieces, to selfishly covet her as I had done before, to make her love me again.
And the loss I anticipated now was instead tearing me back to pieces, showing my true ugliness, the selfishness of my actions. Everything I had done had been a lie, just like the words I had uttered to her in these same woods I was hiding in now.
I couldn't stay here. I ran away. Like the coward I was.
I wandered along the streets of Forks, not managing to shake off the self-pity and loath I felt for myself. I was alone, the streets already empty and the stores closed.
I had ruined everything, everything. I should've known myself well enough after all these long years to know that I never could've been strong enough to let her go. In the deepest, ugliest corner of my mind I had always known I would end up coming back. I just never had admitted it to myself.
I ran without joy until I came to the city, already dark and deserted. I sat down on a bench in front of a book store and buried my head in my hands. I needed to collect myself. I had to go back, but I needed to get my feelings back together before I did. Perhaps she would be home this time, I hoped. Perhaps she would cry in my arms, call me every name in the book and then let me kiss her and allow us to have a new start. I would be better, I promised myself. I would be perfect for her.
Even if she had a boyfriend, what would it matter? She was my other half, my life, my world. How could anyone compete with the devotion I felt for her?
How could anyone compete with me?
It was already nearly eleven, definetely past the conventional visiting hours. But I had to go back, even if it would lead to nothing but being yelled at by Charlie. I got up. I was about to start running when something caught my eye.
Her face.
It was printed on a yellow paper along with the face of some boy's and glued to a street lamp. And there was a text on top of the picture that would've made my heart leap if I still were a mortal.
HAVE YOU SEEN THIS PERSON?
CHARLIE'S POV
Another lonely night. It had been like this ever since Bella had left over a month ago. I was back in my old life - freezer meals, beer and football in the evenings, instant coffee in the mornings. And the fear, always nagging somewhere in the back of my mind. I hadn't heard from her since the post card she had sent me from Seattle two days after she had left.
Hi dad,
I'm fine. I can't really tell you much but I'm with Jake and we're both ok. There was just some stuff and we needed to get away before it got worse.
I'm happy. Happier. I'm - -
I can't tell you when we're coming back. I w - I am not sure if we will. Please don't look for us.
I'm sorry. I love you.
Bella.
That was all my daughter had sent me after vanishing into thin air. A little card that was just as cryptical as her good-bye note had been. No answers, only more mysteries.
She had dissappeared right when I had started to hope that perhaps she would be fine after all. I had thought that Jacob Black would be a good, healthy thing for her. Someone trustworthy. Someone who would perhaps be good enough to deserve her. But I had been wrong.
Billy and I, we weren't what we used to be either. We had both lost our children and in a strange way it had united us, but at the same time we secretly blamed each other's kid for the disappearance. Billy had received no message, absolutely nothing from Jacob and I felt his pain every time he asked me if I had heard something new. My only consolation was Jacob's size and his maturity - perhaps he would be able to keep my Bella safe. But who would keep Jacob safe? The world was big and dark for two teenage-runaways. It wouldn't treat them kindly.
Of course we had looked for them the best we could. We knew that they had left with the Rabbit and it should've been easy enough to find. Seattle was the first place we looked and the police over there indeed found some witnesses who had recognized them from the description. A small, brunette girl who was travelling with a big dangerous-looking native, both avoiding attention - of course people remembered. But we heard little that was useful. We learned that they had driven to the South and that once they had bought food from a gas station along the road 90. None of the near-by motels we asked remembered having seen them, although once someone recognized that there had been a "big Indian guy that looked kinda like trouble who rented a room for himself only."
And another time a guest at a motel had recognized Bella's picture, saying that she had rented the room next to his for one night. The guest had asked her if she was travelling all alone and upon hearing that she was, had invited her to come over and have a drink with him. She had declined the offer and later that night the guy had heard a male voice on the other side of the wall, and had felt irritated that she had invited some other guy to her room.
The motels had been in different directions and no one had seen the Rabbit, so it was hard to say if we had even stumbled upon the right track. There was also one other quite reliable sighting that I hoped against all odds had not been Bella - someone told the police that a girl who looked like her had asked in his motel if they had any rooms available and had seemed to worry about the room rates - the guy had offered her a business card of a nearby Hooters, telling her they were hiring extra girls for a couple of nights. She had accepted the card but not stayed the night in the motel.
I guess in his own way the guy had tried to be helpful, but I wanted to smash the son-of-a-bitch's face in when I heard this.
I guess it was my fault, for having taught Bella too well about my profession. If she wanted to not be found she knew how to move without making herself easily found. She knew the car was the first (and the easiest) thing we'd be looking for and she also knew that if they checked in to the motels individually it would be harder for the staff to remember them. They always paid in cash and laid low.
But I knew the size of Bella's college fund and I knew that quite soon they would be in trouble. And when she needed the money, some Hooters bar might be hiring new staff.
I was drowning my eighth beer when the door bell rang suddenly. It was late, half past eleven already. My heart started racing. I got up and went to the door, my hand lingering on the door knob. I was always hoping, against all odds. And I was always disappointed.
Please, let it be Bella.
I opened the door.
"You!" I yelled, my rage bursting to flames like a match.
The source of all this, the one person that would never have any business coming back to this city let alone my door - standing there, in the misty night air looking as if these long, difficult months had never even happened, his face as youthful and well-maintained as ever, in his clean outfit and freshly shaven face. His appearance seemed to be mocking Bella's, the last time I had seen her anyway. She had looked so dead, and this guy was so... alive.
"You!" I repeated and before I realized what was happening I charged at him, my hands automatically clenched into fists, ready to smash his too-symmetrical, too-unattached face to a bloody mess. This boy had started all the misery in our family - he had ruined Bella, left her to mend her life back together and eventually caused her to disappear forever. I knew it in every single cell of my body - this boy was the reason why she wasn't here right now. The reason why she might be in some sleazy pub serving drinks to dirty old men who paid her to remove her clothes.
But this boy was also very fast. Or perhaps I was just very slow because of the alcohol. He moved aside quickly, taking a couple of steps to the right and I stumbled on my face on the porch. I got up quickly, ready to charge at him again.
He held his hands up, signaling surrender. My hands were still clenched in fists when I asked him in a hoarse voice:
"How dare you show your face here again? How dare you come back after what you did to my daughter!"
There was a flicker of something in his black eyes, but I wasn't sure what it was. Then his face was smooth and expressionless again. I realized, for the first time, that there was something scary about him. I couldn't put my finger on what it was, but for a moment I felt very insecure standing there with nothing more than my fists, and thought briefly of my gun that was on the table mere two steps away. His expression changed, his eyes looking at me intently, but more softly.
"Mr. Swan, sir, please. I have come back because I simply need to see Bella again. I made a terrible, terrible mistake - - "
I cut him short.
"If you're here to see Bella, too bad for you. She's not here and I don't know where she is. Now get the hell away from my yard and never come back."
I stepped back in and tried to close the door on his face but he put his foot in between. The nerve he had!
"Please, Mr. Swan. Listen to me. I know she's not here - I saw a notice in the city. I just need to know what you know about where she might be because I simply need to find her!"
I stared at him with my mouth hanging open.
"You really have some nerve, Cullen! After all these months you show up on my doorstep in the middle of the night, demanding me to tell you what I know about my daughter's whereabouts! What the hell makes you think I would tell you? What the hell makes you think you have the right to hear anything about her ever again?" I barked at him.
"Because I love her." He said solemly. I tried to close the door to his face but he just wouldn't move. I jerked the door harder, with all of my strength, but it didn't move an inch.
"I think I could help. Finding her."
I stopped. And looked at him suspiciously.
"Do you know something?" I asked, my rage boiling inside of me still. If this git had anything to do with her disappearance...
He shook his head. "No, but I have some...acquintances that might be of help finding her."
I stared at him for a very long time. He still held his foot in between of the door and the frame and I was still holding the door as if trying to close it, but neither one of us was actually doing anything active. I searched for his face but it was in the shadows and looked completely expressionless. His eyes were black as the night around him, giving away nothing. I noticed that he didn't look as healthy from close up as he had seemed at first - there were dark shadows underneath his eyes. Like a stroke of ink on parchment.
There was only one thing I could do.
I turned and went inside, leaving the door open. He stood there for a moment and then followed quietly, taking in his surroundings - the kitchen on the right, the shoes cluttered around the floor, the coats hanging on the wall - and all of a sudden his face was full of emotion. He was reminiscing. I didn't know what had brought him to my door but if he could help me find Bella.. if anyone could...
"What kind of acquintances are we talking about?" I demanded to know, sitting heavily down on the couch. He avoided my eyes and stepped into the living room, sat on the armchair. He had sat there sometime before, I remembered suddenly. Before all this, when I still thought highly of him and his family.
"Just a few friends I have made that are very good at finding people. I guess you could call them some sort of... private detectives."
I wasn't buying it but decided I didn't want to know more.
"How did.. how did she disappear?" He asked me and his tone of voice was thick with suppressed emotion. Fear.
"I came home one day, found a note on the kitchen table and she never came back." I said, the painful memory making me uncomfortable - I didn't want to show weakness in front of this boy. "She packed very little things with her. There was no warning... one day she simply disappeared. In the morning she had seemed a little agitated but I didn't think much of it."
I was speaking like a witness would speak at the scene of an accident. A good witness. No emotion. Just facts. All the important ones.
"Could I see the note she left you?" He asked quietly. I got up and went to the old cupboard next to the door and pulled the note out from among other evidence that I kept at home. There were also a few motel guest book pages, signed in her handwriting but different names. Jenny Bell. Jessica Wilson. Laura Barker. Jane Jones. Jane Smith. Names danced on the page. Names that were easy to forget.
I closed the cupboard.
"I don't understand half of it... maybe you'll have better luck." I handed the note to him. I kept it in a thin plastic bag.
Dad,
I am so very sorry. I have to go away, right now.
I am leaving with Jacob. There's been some stuff going on and I don't think he can handle it so we have to leave for the time being.
There's something really important I want you to do. If you ever feel like somebody is in the house or has been, or that something is missing or something is weird - leave the house immediately. I can't explain why but you just have to trust me, it's very important! Go to La Push and tell Billy about it, no matter how silly it might seem. Please, do it for me.
Love you,
B.
I saw his lips move when he read the last paragraph.
Love you, B., his lips said soundlessly. He stared at the note intently, re-reading it, as if he was trying to memorize it. Then he handed it back over in a sudden movement that made me involuntarily flinch. I took it and put it back among other things in the cupboard.
"Are they searching for her - for them - in other states?" He asked me, his voice quiet. I didn't turn towards him, instead I started rearranging the mess in the cupboard. He was completely silent and waited for my answer. Finally I said:
"They are looking for him, yes."
He stood up abruptly - why was every movement he did so abrupt, ready to scare me? He came almost to my side. I still didn't turn, but I noticed all of a sudden that he was taller than I was. I felt him behind me, too close for my liking, and I turned suddenly around, without intending to do so. Like some crazy survival-instinct would've taken me over for a moment.
His face was whiter than I ever had seen it before. His eyes were dark coal in the snow white of his face. I held the cupboard behind me for support. Why was I so ridiculously intimidated by this teenage boy?
"What do you mean - they are looking for him?" He asked in a low voice.
I averted my eyes.
"Bella is an adult. If she wants to leave, she's legally old enough to do so." I hesitated for a moment before continuing. "The only reason why I managed to put a notice of her even in here was because of personal..well, connections. And because before she left she had made an official statement about this boy Jacob Black. Or rather, of someone else who was threatening him."
"Tell me," Cullen said. It wasn't a command - it sounded more like he was begging me. I moved back to the couch and sat down heavily, rubbing my eyes.
"When you left... it was horrible," I begun. I couldn't bear looking at him, instead staring at the wrinkled-up carpet corner, but there was an accusation in the tone of my voice. "She changed. She wouldn't eat, she wouldn't laugh, she wouldn't meet her friends... She withdrew from everything. For a week she did nothing but sit in her room, staring out of the window or at the blank wall. The doctor said it could've been just a shock - we found her from the woods.. after you were gone. She had gotten lost and we found her after searching for her half the night, lying on the ground. She didn't speak or tell us what was wrong. I was so worried..." I had to stop, my voice definetely too emotional for my liking. Cullen was silent as the grave but I didn't look at him. I continued.
"After months like this, out of the blue, she got a little better. She started hanging out with this Jake and it did a world of good for her. I started seeing her laugh again when she was with him. When she was alone she was still...different. But when I saw her with him she seemed almost back to normal. Now I'll be frank with you, Cullen. I've always liked Jake and the Blacks have been like family to us. I was thrilled about this unexpected turn of events. Jake's a good kid. Or was, anyway..."
I had looked up at his stone face when I had addressed him and noticed he had silently moved to sit in the arm chair again. His face was pained and he wasn't looking at me in the eyes. I hoped I had hurt him.
"What do you mean,'was'?" he asked me after a while. I breathed out heavily.
"Well, then things started to go wrong again. Which brings us to the statement Bella gave me," I begun again. "About two months ago something happened. I don't know what, exactly. First there was the stomach flu going around... Jacob got sick while they were out on a date and had promised to call her when he got home but never did. Then Bella got sick, too. She was sick for about a day or so and when she got better she tried calling the Blacks and turned out Jake was still sick. Only then it got weird... They weren't answering the phone and when Billy did he just told no one was allowed to go to LaPush to see Jake. She was going back to her zombie mode... and I think that after a while she went to see him anyway. She came back... in a horrible state. I didn't know what to think. I thought... I thought maybe they had broken up or something. She was so miserable. I called Billy but we only ended up arguing. I didn't know what to do...
And that's how we get to the statement. She called me at work one day, sounding upset, and started spilling her guts. There's this guy at the rez who's been, like, following some of the younger members around, spooking the hell out of them. She said that Jacob's friends had all been afraid of him and then - all of a sudden - the same people skip school for a week and when they come back they're following this guy around as if he were their cult leader. She told me Jake had done the same - he had told her he's afraid of him and that "he's looking at me as if I were next, as if he's expect me to join his stupid cult one day." And then he had. Just like that. Done the same - disappeared for a couple of weeks and come back following this Sam-character around.
Now obviously the first thing I did was call Billy. He's usually quite well-informed about what's going on at the rez, and he got really upset with Bella about pulling Sam's name into this. Then he gave me a bunch of proof that Sam's gang has been doing valuable work at the rez, stopping drug trafficking and stuff like that. So that seemed like the end of that - no matter how much Bella insisted that Jacob had changed, there was nothing I could do about it, really.
And here's the strangest part: Bella and Jacob are fighting with each other, yeah? And then, one morning, they're back together as if nothing had ever happened. And then they do this... this eloping thing together. So obviously, what with her writing about the "stuff that Jacob can't handle" and "stuff they needed to get away from" - what am I supposed to think? Obviously she meant this Sam-thing."
I was quiet now, lost in my thoughts - I had started talking about the situation to Cullen as if he were my friend or as if I was talking to myself. Trying to find a solution. And yet, he was still the reason why she was gone. It was hard to grasp this fact. I looked up at him. He was staring at the floor, deep in his thoughts as well. There was a disapproving frown on his face and he also looked a bit panicky, now that I came to think of it - his hands were clasping at his chair's arm rests.
"And what about Mr. Black?" he finally asked me, turning his black eyes towards me.
"What about Billy?" I asked, surprised and caught off guard.
"In the note she told you to go to him if you notice something strange. Why? And what do you think she meant?"
I stared at him. To be frank I hadn't given much thought to the whole thing.
"I don't know. Maybe... maybe because Billy is Jacob's father. Maybe she thought that Sam would be dangerous or something." I said, uncertain. I had no idea why she thought Billy, an old man in a wheelchair, would be of any help. All of a sudden it felt as if I was missing something...
I didn't like the feeling. No self-respecting policeman would like this particular feeling.
"Hmm..." he said, pensively. He was staring somewhere over my shoulder but seemed to be deep in his thoughts.
I cleared my throat.
"So how exactly are you going to help with this?" I asked him, summoning authority to my voice. He looked at me as if he would've forgotten I even was in the room. It irritated the hell out of me.
"Don't worry about it, sir. I will take care of that." He got up, abruptly again. "My apologies for disturbing you at such a late hour. Please call me if you hear something more. I will do the same." And he was offering something to me - a card. I took it. It was of expensive quality but perfectly simple. All it said was his name and underneath his phone number. He was already at the door before I got over my shock at a 18-year old boy giving me his card.
He turned around before stepping out of the door.
"Oh, and has she been in any contact with you ever since she left?" He asked me.
"Um, yeah. Wait a moment..." I said, going through my pockets for my wallet. I had started to keep the card in there. I very often found myself taking it out and staring at it, trying the crack the mystery behind her words. He took it, scanned it over with a frown on his face and handed it back.
"Thank you," he said. He turned to leave, but hesitated. He turned his eyes towards me - had they always been this black? - and looked at me with a strangely vulnerable look on his face.
"I would also like to apologise, if I may, for causing so much pain to Bella. I can see now it was cruel and unnecessary - but I can assure you I thought I was making the respectable choice. For her, I mean. I thought... well, it hardly matters. Just please accept my apologies and know that if I'll ever see her again I will try my very best to pay her back for my poor choices."
And then he was gone, before I even managed to open my mouth to tell him to go to hell.
Author's note: As I said I have no idea where this story is coming from. I'm just rolling with it. Please roll with me. And review!
