For Life
Jacob/O.C. FanFiction
Chapter Three: Explanations
When I awoke, she was still wrapped in my arms, her head tucked under my chin as she nuzzled into me. I glanced at my clock, and seeing that it was already 8:30, I decided to skip school today. She was still sleeping soundly, curled in a ball under my arm with her face buried in my chest. And, despite the bath she took yesterday, she smelled just as strong as she had before. I pulled her into me, nuzzling into her soft hair as her scent filled me, when I heard her stir from her slumber. She moved her head a little, and I looked down on sleep-filled eyes, dark blue under her hooded lids. She was probably still tired.
"'Morning," I said, moving back so she could get out of the bed if she wanted, moving my arm from it's position across her side. She looked over at me, then past me to the small window where the morning light was shining through the cracks of my blinds.
"Is it?" she asked, sitting up a little. My over sized shirt was slipping from her slim shoulders again, as I lightly reached up to pull the cloth back over her pale skin.
"Yeah, it's 8:30, actually" I said, glancing back at my clock. "Well, 8:34…." She detangled herself from the small spot on my bed and stood, stretching her arms out before walking out of the room. I sat up, curious to where she went for a moment. When I heard the toilet flush and the sink running, I quirked my brow; she didn't know how to open a car door, but she knew how to use the bathroom?
She walked back in, rubbing her wet hands on her shirt-or rather, my shirt- and then leaned against my closed door, still a few feet from me.
"How did you know how to do that?" I asked, actually curious for once. She blinked, then looked past me out the window again.
"…I don't know, I just did," she said, before her stomach started growling. She cringed and wrapped her arms around her stomach. I laughed. I moved past her, holding her arm as I tugged her into the kitchen. I whirled her into one of the seats at the small table, which Billy had kindly added another chair to, and watched her confusion.
"I'll make breakfast," I said, opening the refrigerator and fishing out a pack of bacon, eggs, and bread. I placed them on the counter, and then fished out a frying pan.
She sat quietly, watching every move I made with curiosity. She was like a child, she didn't know anything. I quickly turned on the burner and placed the pan over the flames, cracking four eggs into the pan at once.
"Come here," I said. She obeyed quickly, standing next to me as I watched the eggs fry. I looked over at her and smiled as she eyed the eggs, her expression confused. I could have laughed. "Make the toast, I'll show you how." She nodded.
I grabbed two pieces of bread and handed them to her. She stared at them, then back at me. I pointed to the toaster.
"Put the slices of bread in the slots, and then push down on the lever in the front," I explained. She could handle making toast; a three year old could handle making toast. I watched out of the corner of my eye as she sniffed the bread, then dropped the slices into the toaster before pushing down on the lever. "Good, now wait for it to pop up." She nodded.
I cooked in silence for a moment, flipping the eggs then sliding them onto two separate plates. I tossed some bacon into the pan and waited. I spun around, leaning against the counter and watched her. She was concentrating on the toaster, waiting for it to pop. I'm sure she was watching out of curiosity. When the toast popped up, she let out a small yelp and jumped back. I laughed.
"Did it scare you?" I asked, before turning and pushing the finished pieces of bacon onto the plates. She glared, then grabbed the two pieces of toast and held them out to me. I put one on each plate and walked over to the table. "Sit," I said, nodding towards the empty seat across from mine.
She obeyed quickly, and, as I placed a fork in front of her, looked at me oddly. I sighed and took her fork, placing it back in the drawer before I sat across from her. I speared some eggs with my fork and plopped them into my mouth. She watched me eat for a while, and I arched my brow at her. She was hungry, I knew she was hungry.
"What's wrong? Eat," I said. She stared at me like I had just grown horns. "What?"
"Shouldn't I wait until you're finished?" she asked, her eyes glittering in confusion. I blinked back at her.
"Why?" I asked.
"Because, you're higher than I am," she said. I blinked again.
"What?" I said, putting my fork down.
"In the pack," she explained, "You're of higher rank, so you eat your fill, then I get what's left over…."
Oh, right…the wolf thing. I smiled calmly to her, did she really think she was that low on the chain? Did she really lead herself to believe that my pack was so decided among its peers? I mean, yes, there was Sam who we all recognized as the leader, who we all went to, but that was more a test of seniority than it was importance.
"I'm not of higher rank," I said, pushing her plate towards her. "We don't rank, we're all equal. You are on the same level as I am." She arched her brow at me, but didn't say anything before she quietly picked up a piece of bacon and tossed it into her mouth. I saw her make a face, one that was either disgust or confusion as she chewed and swallowed the piece before placing another in her mouth, still completely silent. The meal continued in this was before her light voice broke through.
"Do you really believe that?" she asked, her eyes looking through her dark hair. They were shimmering, and bright, almost like she was trying to see through me as she stared through her black locks.
"Believe what?" I asked, my eyes narrowing towards her.
"That you're pack…that everyone is equal in it…" she explained. I blinked. Of course I believed it, it was true, everyone in the pack was the same, other than Sam. Weren't they? I glared a little, how dare she assume that my pack was divided within itself. We were better than that, we weren't animals.
"Of course they are," I said haughtily. She looked over at me, then quietly laughed. Seeing her smile and laugh was a sight to behold; her laugh was silvery, like a clear bell, and when she laughed, it echoed through her entire being, shining through her eyes.
If it wasn't that she was laughing at me, I might have instantly been quelled.
"Why are you laughing at that?" I snarled.
"Because," she said, her eyes reflecting the defiance that she had held yesterday, "it's funny how blinded you all can become from living among humans."
I growled, my hand slamming onto the table as I stood. She jumped, but her expression remained the same defiant scowl she had had for the past few moments.
"We don't live among humans, we are human!" I screamed, feeling my blood boiling under my anger. She stood, her voice changing into a growl. It wasn't intimidating, but it was something. It made my tempers flare, how dare she growl at me!? Me, when I was being patient with her, giving her my home and allowing her to live! She had no right to live if she wouldn't listen to me on something like this.
"If you're so human," she snarled, and I could watch the blood rise through her body, changing her pale skin to a light pink, "then why are you acting like an animal." I growled again, she smirked. "A human wouldn't be contemplating killing me for being insubordinate, which I know you are."
My hands fell to my side as my mouth hung open. How did she know that?
"No," she said, answering the question I hadn't asked, "I can't read your mind, not in this form, but that doesn't mean I don't know what you're thinking." I felt my eyes change, as I moved away from the table, leaning against the counter. "Males animals all function the same way," she said, her voice coming down from the enraged growl it had been earlier, "Just because I'm female, you think that you have some right to control me, and you hate that I have choices, don't you? You hate that I disobey you, and you would rather see me dead than deal with the fact that I won't agree with everything you say and do. That proves that you're an animal," She turned and walked from the room, leaning against the door to outside as she whispered so low that I doubted she wanted me to hear it. "Humans know how to hide it better."
I stalked from the kitchen to the bathroom, slamming the door behind me and leaning against it. Having her around was starting to scare me, and I didn't know if it was because she accused me of being a monster, or because she was right.
---
I sighed as I leaned against the wall of my shower, the warm water sliding down my body. It was refreshing to finally be in a part of the house where my brain could be clear, where I wasn't preoccupied with her scent or her temper. I groaned.
This was becoming more of a hassle than she was worth, and it had only been a day. I grabbed my shampoo and worked it through my hair, wondering if I could explain this to Sam and Billy without making it sound like a stupid child. 'I don't like her, she called me a bully' somehow didn't seem like it would fly with those two. And, getting her out of the house was something that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, and set of a deep, angry reaction through me.
And what made it worse, was that everything she said about me was true. I was angry because she didn't obey me, I was angry that she could be so ungrateful that I was allowing her to live. But, I shouldn't be thinking that way. It wasn't my right to decide if she could live or die, it wasn't even near my right.
But it wasn't because she was a female-woman, she wasn't an animal. She may want to believe that we were, but I knew she wasn't. She was a woman, not a female wolf; she had a conscience, she had fears, she had joys, she had emotions deeper than just instinct. We all did. That's what separates us from real animals, like bloodsuckers. I rinsed my hair and body, then turned off the now lukewarm water. We weren't animals, but we weren't human either.
---
I walked through the house, my hair still wet from my shower. My pajama pants were baggy, and since I seemed to be doomed to a life of shirtless-ness, I might as well get used to it. As I looked through the rooms, I couldn't find Luna. I glanced out the screen door, and there she was, sitting just outside, her legs brought up to her chest as she stared off at the horizon; time for a peace offering.
I walked outside and sat next to her, handing her a can of coke and sitting next to her. She took the cold can, and observed it before setting it on the ground next to her silently. I rolled my eyes and popped open my can, which caused her to jump.
"It's pop," I explained, taking a sip from it. She nodded before glancing back at the horizon. Her eyes seemed so distant, so…melancholy that it almost hurt to focus on her face. "Look…" I said, trying my best to word this without sounding like a complete idiot, "…I-"
"I apologize," she said before I could finish. I blinked over at her, and her blue eyes stared at me from the corners. "I'm not used to this…interaction thing; you could say that I have really, really bad 'people skills.'" I suppressed a laugh.
"I think 'bad' is an understatement, you have horrible people skills, but I was going to say I was sorry, because I don't, so I shouldn't be acting so…"
"Animalistic?" she offered. I glared a little, but tried my hardest to not let her get to me. I wasn't an animal.
"…Yeah," I said, before quietly taking another sip of my coke. She didn't say anything for a while as we both stared off at the horizon. Though, I was certain that we were looking at different things.
The way we were facing, if I focused hard enough, I could see the end of La Push and the beginning of Forks. And I could picture her, sitting with her little lover-leech. It was aggravating, but leashing that anger was nothing compared with leashing the anger that Luna erupted in me. It was like a completely new degree of pissed.
And besides, at this point, thinking of her hurt more than it angered me. I glanced over at Luna, suddenly highly curious to her thoughts.
"What do you think about; when you stare off at the horizon like that?" I asked. She sighed, then looked over at me, her blue orbs echoing the sadness that she no doubt felt. She looked away, and rested her head on her knees.
"My pack…former pack…" she said, closing her eyes. "Wondering about them, if they're feeding well, if they've found a place to den the new cubs for the cold seasons, things like that. Basically, I think about whether they're going to survive." She opened her eyes, which were now filled with tears, "It hurts to imagine that they might not, despite what they did." I nodded, and resisted the urge to pet her hair. I decided to concentrate on my coke while I talked to her.
"You seem to care about them a lot," I said. She laughed.
"It's a one-sided human defect, I assure you," she said, a bit of remorse in her voice. She was trying to lighten the pain, but it just sounded pathetic coming from her soft voice.
"Why can't you return to them?" I asked, hoping it didn't sound like I wanted her gone. I didn't, I was mildly glad to have her here, where I could keep tabs on her, but all the same, it was obvious that she wanted to be with her pack, her family. Her eyes lowered, and a few wayward tears fell from behind her thick lashes.
"They…got rid of me," she said in a soft whisper. I couldn't look away anymore, as I stared at her. "When the hunter showed up, she killed a few of my pack," she explained, "she made it very clear that I was the reason she was there, and that she would kill any who defended me. The leader, my…mother, so to speak, decided that I was officially putting the pack in too much danger. When the hunter attacked me, they sat idly by, knowing that if they didn't act, she would leave them in peace. They…walked away from me," she said, her body shaking as tears fell from her eyes. She covered her face in her arms, her small body erupting in tremors.
I stopped resisting. I pulled her into my arms, wrapping myself around her. I don't really know why I did it, but it was an overwhelming need to protect her, to keep her from crying. Hearing her voice tremor with tears, and seeing tears roll out of those sapphire eyes was like something was stabbing me repeatedly, it was too much to take. She stiffened as I took her in my arms, pulling her onto my lap, but after a moment, she relaxed into my chest, her small, warm body pressed against mine. We sat like that in silence for a moment before I decided to speak.
"I'm…sorry," I said, resting my face against the back of her neck.
"What for?" she asked, her hands lightly touching my arms which were wrapped around her shoulders. I could feel the tension rising in her body, then I realized that she had probably never been held like this before. I couldn't say I didn't feel the same, I'd never held anyone other than…her this close before.
"I'm sorry that your family…abandoned you," I said. She stiffened a little, before pulling away from me. I could have easily made her stay, but if she was getting uncomfortable, I'd let her go. She sat next to me, pulling her knees to her chest again. We stayed silent for a moment, before she picked up my coke can and sniffed it. I almost laughed when she drank some, and instantly shook her head, rubbing her nose. She coughed a little, then wiggled her nose a little before looking up at me, tears in her eyes from the burn of the coke.
"What is that!?" she asked. I laughed.
"Pop," I said, taking the can back from her and taking the final swig. "It pops."
"It burns," she said. I stood and dusted off my pants, turning to go back inside. I stopped, then turned back to her, holding my hand out. I half expected her to refuse it, to stand on her own and look at me like I was crazy, but, when she placed her small, warm hand in mine, I smiled lightly as I helped her off the ground. I grumbled, she was still wearing my t-shirt from yesterday.
"I really need to get you some clothes," I said as we walked inside. She looked down at the shirt, pulling it away from her a little, then letting it fall back against her. I knew she wanted to ask why, but she didn't, as I walked into the kitchen, still needing to clear the table and do the dishes from breakfast. She walked back towards my room, and stopped at the doorway.
"Jake?" she called.
"Yeah?" I answered, peeking my head out from the kitchen. She looked over at me, then back at the ground.
"Thank you…" she said, before walking into my room. I could hear her fall onto the bed. I smiled to myself.
"You're welcome."
All Characters (save Luna) © Stephenie Meyer, this was made for recreational purposes, and the writer is not gaining any monetary benefit from this.
