CHAPTER TWO:

I Swear I've Lived And Learned

She stood in the airport, looked around. It was official, she'd done it. She'd gotten on the flight, now she was in Port Angeles. She'd come this far, the brunette knew there wasn't any real sense in backing out this time.

She pushed through the crowd, grabbing her luggage from the carousel when it came around, and then made her way to the rental car station. With keys in hand came the realization that she had to do this, she had to take that next step, she had to make that leap. Because he'd done it already, and she'd turned him away.

It was up to her now. If, of course, it wasn't too late.

The drive from Port Angeles was a long one, the destination she headed towards held a lot of memories for her, it held a lot of things she'd done wrong, things she hadn't done but she wished that she had, regrets.

Maybe that's why she'd been in such a hurry to leave town after graduation. She just had to get away, she had to get some distance between herself and the craziness she'd been through, the shocking realization that normal wasn't actually normal. That there was more gray in the world than black and white. Things couldn't always just be written off or laughed at, explained away.

The bright lights and crowded streets of Port Angeles gave way to quieter roads, the monotony of trees on either side for vast stretches being broken up by the occasional house or grouping of houses. Flipping through the radio to distract her racing mind, calm her shot nerves proved futile, apparently all she was going to hear tonight were songs about love lost.

Was it some kind of omen, she mused to herself as she turned off of one road and onto the road that lead directly into Forks, the main street that ran through town. "There's no turning back now, Yvette. You got yourself this far, you have to go the rest of the way or you'll never know what you could have had." she murmured to herself as she stopped at the filling station that sat across from Newton's Sporting Goods and refuelled the car.

She groaned inwardly when she turned an aisle after grabbing a bag of trail mix, a Monster energy drink and some sour cream and cheddar chips and ran into Mike Newton and Jessica Stanley.

"Oh my gosh, Yvette!" Jessica rambled, Yvette stiffening in posture, looking at her with a raised brow. She was seriously going to talk to her after she'd stabbed her in the back repeatedly?

She blinked and forced herself to join Jessica's one sided conversation, her observations on the reasons why Bella would possibly want to marry at such a young age and said calmly, "Not that it's any of your business, but did you ever think maybe she's not pregnant or hiding something? Maybe she actually for reasons unknown to any normal person loves the dickhead?" before giving a smirk, shoving past the two of them.

She wasn't in the mood for a trip down memory lane tonight, she'd done far more than enough of that to herself on the flight to Port Angeles. She got back into her car after pumping her gas and then turned out into the street again, sighed to herself as she muttered, "You have to do this. Fear cannot rule your entire life. It's pointless to just keep denying yourself what you really want because you're afraid that when you get it, you won't want it anymore, or something bad will happen."

She fumbled with the radio tuner again, and turned onto the street her parents lived on, the pounding of her heart almost competing with the drums in the Motley Crue song she was currently listening to, and pulling into the driveway behind Bella's Mercedes, she sat there a few moments, collecting herself.

The howl from the direction of the woods had her looking around, alarmed. Surely he couldn't sense her back yet.

She wanted the element of surprise on her side. If she were going to take a risk this huge, she was going to go all out.

Charlie raised a brow as he saw a car pull into the driveway, stop and just sit there. "Bells? Do you know anyone who drives a black car?" he asked as Bella thought it over and shrugged.

Inside the car, fear was battling with desire and Yvette felt torn between just leaving, and writing this off as too little too late, or actually doing this, daring to hope it wasn't too late.

The knock on the window had her shrieking, grabbing at her heart and she rolled down the window on the drivers side. Charlie grinned as he saw his youngest daughter sitting there. "Why didn't you call? Your mom and I would have driven to pick you up, Yvette."

"I needed to think, Charlie." Yvette said as she got out, hugged her father and said "I decided to come home early." smiling at him. He smiled and then asked, "Did you guys get anything accomplished there?"

"We rebuilt a little of the 9th ward, there's still a lot that needs to be done. I just missed you guys, I got homesick.. Guess I'm just not cut out for this travelling bullshit, sir." Yvette said quietly as she saw her older half sister walking out the door.

"Yvette?" Bella asked as she looked at her younger sister. They had a love and hate relationship yes, but in the end, they were family, they cared about one another. So it didn't take a rocket scientist to see that Yvette apparently had been through hell the past few months. Bella had the passing thought that maybe the time away was good for her, someone admitting they love you and that they'd loved you since before they imprinted on you, marked you as their soulmate was probably a lot to handle.

Especially given what she'd figured out fairly early on in getting to know her younger half sister, her inability to actually express and handle emotional things. She almost seemed scared of it.

"I was worried you wouldn't come back for my wedding.. I mean we did have the worst fight we've ever had the night before you left." Bella said quietly as Yvette admitted, "About that, Bells.. I never should have scoffed at your warnings. I should have listened a lot better about Sawyer. And about Jacob."

Bella nodded, studied her sister and said quietly, "Does that mean you're going to fix things or are you just back?"

"I'm going to try, Bells. I just hope it's not too.." she started only to have Bella say quietly, "So you're sure you can accept what he said.. You don't have to push the boundaries, really prove that it's not just the imprint that makes him love you?"

"I have to, Bells. I love him. It's not going away. Knowing I love him is going to have to be enough for me." Yvette admitted as Bella nodded and then said "You might wanna hurry. Your mom made apple pie again, there are exactly two slices left." as Yvette smirked and said "Race you inside,then I suppose?" before taking off to the dinner table at a run.

Her mom hugged her and then said quietly, "Can I talk to you a minute?"

She nodded, followed her mom into the den the white pocket door sliding shut behind them. For a moment neither of them really spoke, but then her mom said quietly, "You didn't just leave to go help that team rebuild, did you?"

"No. I swear to God if Bells told.."

"She didn't have to, Yvette. Your friend Jacob's been calling almost every single day wondering if I heard from you. What happened?"

"Nothing ma, it's stupid.." Yvette said as she squirmed uncomfortably. She had this feeling that one way or another, she wasn't getting out of the den or out of the conversation until her mother got out everything.

"Try me. You know as well as I do, Yvette, I've done worse." her mom admitted quietly as she studied her daughter, concerned.

"He told me he loved me and I freaked out, okay? I freaked out because I realized I loved him back, and I got scared that somehow everything was going to fuck up totally. I was afraid to just trust in the whole concept of love and trust."

Her mom nodded and said quietly, "That's what I thought." as she hugged her and then added, "So, did the time away help or..."

"Yeah.. I realized that I have to try. I have to let someone in sooner or later. I mean you did eventually, you're okay.."

"Pessimist." her mom joked a little as she added, "Not everything ends badly. I found your dad again, didn't I?"

Yvette nodded and said quietly, "Let's just hope I'm not too late to fix this."

"If he really loves you, Yvette.. It'll never be too late." her mother said before grumbling as she caught sight of a tattoo and the small stud in her daughter's nose. "Your father is going to kick your ass." she said calmly as Yvette groaned and said "It's just ink and a piercing, ma."

"That we specifically told you you were NOT getting. Ever." her mother countered as she pointed Yvette into the kitchen.

While everyone talked around her, Yvette mostly sat quietly, eating her pie, trying to plan out her next move. This had to be perfect, everything she wanted in life was at stake.