Disclaimer: Characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. Story is produced without profit.
Characters: Leah/Jasper
Status: Completed one shot
Rating: K
Warnings: Angst
Inspirations: Let it Be by The Beatles but more specifically the Aretha Franklin version.
Summary: One shot about knowing what to change and what to let be.
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Let It Be
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It is a cold night. A bitter night and to normal ears, it might be silent. She hears everything, of course. Every chirp and every twitter. She can hear the rustle of heavy boots on dead leaves about a mile away, heading in her direction.
It is her gift to be so connected with the world around her. She can hear a roach scuttling across an empty room, she can hear rats nesting in the walls. She knows that, no matter where she stands, she is never truly alone. The only price she has to pay is a complete lack of peace and the tranquillity that comes with silence. The trade isn't exactly fair but she didn't really have a choice anyway.
"Cold night."
She turns to face the intruder she already knew was coming. "Freezing." she replies simply. They both know neither of them can really feel it. He scuffs his boot on the ground. It's the first time she's seen a leech look nervous and it sparks her own worry.
"I expected this to happen sooner. You always like to know what's going on."
He looks up at her, honey blond hair shimmering in the moonlight. It is only one shade darker than his marble white skin. She has never seen anything so beautiful. "It took me a little while to figure it all out. I didn't think it would be possible."
She snorts and tilts her head to the sky. The stars are out in full force tonight. Shining bright, her destiny weaving between them. Can anyone fight something so big?
"That makes two of us." It's her turn to look nervous now, although she has rehearsed her part a million times already, words forming in her head. The words she wants to say and not the words she needs to. "When did you figure it out?"
"When Alice and I returned with Nahuel. I saw the way you looked at me." His voice catches slightly on his wife's name.
"I was glad you were back."
He nods, and silence falls between them once again. They both watch a doormouse scurry across the ground, right into a bush where they know a hungry fox is waiting. She picks up a rock and throws it, startling both predator and it's prey and it's prey.
"Why didn't you leave it?" he asks. She whips her head towards him. Her eyes are glazed and she smiles dreamily. He knows that this is an affect of him simply being there. There is no hint of the confusion she is feeling in her expression.
"He would have eaten him if I didn't stop it."
He shrugs lazily. It is beyond his ability to feel such compassion for small animals so he focuses his ability and delights in hers. "It's nature. Maybe the mouse was meant to die tonight."
"Or maybe I was meant to stop it. Maybe that's why that rock was right there. Maybe that's why I hit the right bush. What if the things that we think are meant to be, really aren't?"
He doesn't answer because he knows this discussion has gone way beyond mice and foxes, and there are no real answers for what she is asking.
"When was it?" he asks after a long pause. "When did it happen?"
She drops onto a fallen log and he sits beside her. "When I first saw you. You were showing us how to fight the newborns."
"And none of the others knew?"
She shakes her head and black silk drapes over her shoulders. He has the swiftest urge to reach out and touch it. "It wasn't like they say it is. That's probably why I didn't realise it straight away. It was just a niggle, really. I saw you and I felt like I'd known you forever, like you were a part of me...but I hated you because you were a leech. So maybe that helped me to hide it." She looks thoughtful for a moment. "Edward knows. He has to know but he hasn't said anything to me." she adds.
He nods slowly and swallows the lump in his throat. Her admission has simply confirmed everything he already knew. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"You're married."
He breathes a sigh of relief at her words. "You could have pushed it. I might not have been able to refuse." His voice is questioning, prompting.
"You wouldn't have been able to refuse. Because it's meant to be, right? I don't know why it was you. Maybe because I'm a genetic dead end and that fate bitch doesn't want me taking away someone else's one true soulmate, or maybe vampire venom is the only thing on this planet that could possibly knock me up." She falls quiet but he knows she isn't done yet.
"I couldn't do it to her. To you." She whispers her last words. "I know that if you could choose, of your own free will, it wouldn't be me."
He wants to protest because her pain is overwhelming but he can't because it's true. It wouldn't be her. It still isn't her.
"Fifty years of memories. Fifty years of grafting a life together. I couldn't be the person to knock it all down. I couldn't live with myself."
He wants to hug her, kiss her, hold her, because he has met some of the imprint couples and he's not sure that he could have resisted the pull of her emotions, even if he could have denied his own. It's taken him a while to figure out what he wants and that is without her asserting her claim over him. He's eternally grateful that she put Alice first at a time when he couldn't.
"Y'know...even after all of this, even feeling it...I still don't believe it's real. It just seems to easy."
He knows exactly what she means because underneath the pull, there is still the glaring doubt that any of this is right, that any of it is natural.
"It's not just about you and her." There is still a bitterness when she talks of Alice. "This is for me, too. I don't want to be put in love. I want to fall. Otherwise, how can you trust it? How can it be a leap of faith if you're stuck on the ground? And isn't that what love is all about?"
"I think it is," he agrees. "Or at least, that's the best way to do it. And you really do deserve the best, Leah."
"I know," she replies and he laughs at her lack of humility. She's quiet and there is a haunted look in her eyes and a throbbing ache in his gut. "It's not easy. It hurts everyday, and sometimes I do think of trying to convince you, but I won't do it. I promise you that."
The tears start, sliding slowly down her cheeks before she is overcome with emotion. "I love you, and I love Alice because you love Alice. But when I step back from it all...when I think of love, real love, you already have that with her. So why isn't that enough? Why is this better?"
She is echoing questions he has asked himself a thousand times, over and over just for the slightest hint of an answer. They were her questions first, formed when she first realised that everything she had given was not enough and never had been.
"Perhaps it's not better. Maybe realising that is half the battle won."
She nods and swipes at her tears with the back of her hand. "I think it fades a little when I really believe it. If I thought it was right, if I thought it was real, then nothing would stop me, Jasper. If I had chosen you, then I would fight until I dropped dead, or until you dropped dead." she adds as an afterthought and he chuckles at her precision.
"I saved that doormouse because I felt like I had to. Because I was there and maybe it was rushing home to it's babies or something. But you and Alice, you're happy. You've got something good. There's no need for anyone to come between that."
She sighs and looks at the stars with a grimace, before her face shifts into an expression of grim determination. "Sometimes the best way to fight, is to just let it be."
And he puts his arm around her and pulls her into a hug, because he understands. Sometimes doing nothing can be the hardest thing of all.
…...
