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BPOV
I slowly regained consciousness feeling dazed and disorientated, my head feeling extremely heavy a mixture of sleep and a pounding headache both contributing factors to my slight confusion. I slowly thought back to last night at first wondering why I was on the living room sofa and why my eye was blazing with pain every time I blinked or rotated it. Then slowly recognition seeped in I remembered perfectly why my eye hurt and what had happened last night, I then registered I had never even gotten the chance to change out of my dress; the nicest dress I owned was now creased due to having been slept in.
I averted my thoughts and as I looked around the room I noticed Jake must still be in bed; if he had not I would have been callously jerked awake with the bellowing question where the hell is my breakfast? I still didn't understand last night; ever since I had been with Jake I'd always known him to be a little temperamental and rather rude to me especially if I hadn't made his breakfast before work or had his dinner ready when he got home for the evening. He has always had a slightly violent temper which alcohol seemed to bring out in him and he often pushed and shoved me or called me names but he had never quite hit me like that before. The last time I got hurt was when he split my lip and even that was to some degree of an accident I tried to take the bottle of whiskey out of his firm hand by grabbing at it from behind his torso and as I did so his elbow jerked out and collided with my lip. He had made it perfectly clear it had been mostly my fault for coming up behind him.
BEEP….. BEEP….. BEEP……
I heard the radio alarm clock sounding from upstairs. Holy crow the alarm going off meant it was 7.15am meaning I needed to have his breakfast ready and quick; He'd be leaving for work at 8.00am and if he's late because I haven't made breakfast, I shuddered as flashbacks of last night filled my head.
The eggs sizzled in the pan as I spread butter onto the two pieces of toast. When the eggs were cooked I placed them on top of the toast onto his plate and poured orange juice into the glass, while grabbing a knife and fork. By the time Jake was padding down the stairs his breakfast was sat at the table waiting for him.
"Morning" Jake grumbled as he sat at the table.
"Good Morning" I replied meekly not wanting to aggravate him.
"Sorry about your eye, it looks sore and rather grotesque."
"It does?" I whispered slightly shocked I mean it hurt like hell I knew that much but I hadn't looked in the mirror yet so I didn't know the true severity of its appearance.
"You do realise it was you who provoked me though don't you?"
I stood there opened mouthed I could not believe he had just blamed me for this. "Provoked you….?"
"Yes of course it was your fault I snapped, if you hadn't of argued with me it wouldn't…o..of..happen..ed."
The last bit came out rather garbled due to his mouthful of egg and toast.
"I think your find Jake I did no such thing as provoke you. You completely humiliated me in front of my friends. People who I care very much about they are practically my family, and you sat there and insulted me and my books."
"STOP….JUST STOP TALKING." He shouted nearly spitting egg at me. "Why do you argue with me Isabella, do you like to upset me and make me angry? Do you enjoy irritating me?"
I felt afraid again like I had last night. I better stop talking now, I would rather not have two black eyes.
"Sorry Jake."
"Yes you should be, now sit down and let me eat my breakfast."
And so I did just that. Minuets passed and we hadn't said anything to each other. I could see he was nearly finished; he'd eaten and was drinking the last of his juice he would only need to brush his teeth and then he would go off to work at the construction site.
"OHHH I don't want you going out of the house until your eye is all healed up." He stated abruptly.
"Jake I promised Alice I would ring her and we'd go shopping If I don't go she will think something is wrong."
"Fine" he sighed. "But don't even think about telling her what happened, everyone knows what a clumsy idiot you are just tell her you tripped and banged your eye on a piece of furniture. I'm saying this for your benefit not my own, you don't want her knowing how worthless you are do you. She will only agree with me anyway everyone will, so don't think about telling anybody. Some women just need to be hit once in awhile and you needed it last night."
I was dumbfounded had I just heard right, maybe he was right maybe everyone would agree with him. It wouldn't matter anyway because I had no intentions of telling anybody the Cullen's included.
"Ok Jake I understand, I got it I tripped."
"Good Girl" he conceded walking for the stairs to brush his teeth. "OHHH and Bella don't worry about my dinner tonight me and the lads are going to the football game after work, and after that we will probably head to the bar so don't wait up."
Great I thought more drinking, that's all I need. As I waited for him to leave for work I folded up the blanket I had used last night and replaced it on the back of the sofa.
"Right" Jake announced. "I'm off."
He looked at me critically for a moment….. "Bella will you please change out of that god awful dress, I'd like to think you look remotely respectable when I'm not here."
He turned for the door but not without saying…. "Remember Bella not a word to anyone about last night do you understand."
I merely nodded.
"Say it Bella."
"Umm…yes I said nodding my head for effect." Why wouldn't he leave already?
He suddenly charged towards me herding my back into the wall, his hand grabbed my chin roughly. My heart was beating faster and faster. In the last couple of day's Jake had scared me more than anything in my entire life.
"Say I understand Jake; I won't say a word to anybody." He muttered through clenched teeth pretending to imitate me.
"I understand Jake; I won't say a word to anybody." I repeated rather awkwardly as his hand was gripping my chin.
"Good Girl, enjoy your day." As he let me go I lost my balance slightly causing me to have to sink to the floor to avoid falling over. He had however finally left for work, at least I felt slightly more comfortable now with him gone.
After changing my clothes and surveying my eye in the mirror which had now taken on a rather black colour and had slightly swelled, I made my way over to the phone bracing myself to call Alice. I never had been a good liar but I'd really have to try hard now so she wouldn't suspect anything was wrong. My hand was lingering above the phone ready to pick it up when…..
RING…RING…RING…
I guess Alice had decided she couldn't wait.
"Hello Alice?"
"Hi Bella it's me Edward."
"OHHH Hi I'm sorry I…ummm…I..w..I was expecting it to be Alice I was just about to call her." Why was I stuttering like an idiot, I'm so glad he can't see me I could have sworn I was blushing several shades of pink.
"Yes I'm sorry but you told me to get your number off Alice and that's just what I did, I wanted to talk to you Bella. There are some things I need to tell you I don't however want to do it on the phone. Do you think you could meet me, not today because my shift starts in a few hours and I need to catch some sleep before hand, but maybe sometime this week. I was thinking this Friday I have Thursday night off so I will be wide awake Friday daytime."
Crap, Crap, Crap!!!! What do I say to that? I can't refuse to meet up with him, the past is past he's probably changed so much now; it's not his fault that he just didn't fancy or love me. Let's face it I'm nothing special never have been never will be, but to be his friend again sounds nice. I know I should hate him for what he did to me but I can't, I could never hate him.
"Bella are you there?"
He sounded worried. "Yes sorry I'm here, I was just thinking, Friday sounds fine. Where were you thinking of going?"
"I just thought we'd have a drive round and stop somewhere for lunch, if that's ok."
"Yep, fine you'll have to pick me up though because Jake takes the truck to work."
He chuckled "I'd already planned on picking you up Bella."
"Ohhhh OK."
"I'll come around midday for you…." He paused. "That sound OK?"
"Yeah fine midday, see you then Edward."
"Bye Bella."
I hope he didn't notice that I hung up the phone quicker than putting down a hot potato. Why did I agree to meet him? I mean yes I wanted to see him to talk things out but……what if my eye hasn't healed by then? What am I going to say? Edward could always tell when I was lying. Not to mention the fact that I would have to lie to Jake about where I'm going, he'd never let me see Edward if he knew. I have agreed to go so I have to go that much is final, and Jake would be at work all day so there is not really any need to tell him I'm going out. That's final then I won't tell Jake anything about leaving the house and if my eye is still bruised then I will just tell Edward what I'm going to tell Alice that I tripped and banged it on some furniture. That's settled then I said to myself as I picked up the phone to call Alice.
45 minutes later I had just got off the phone from Alice, God that girl can talk. After much deliberation she decided she was coming for me in an hour to go shopping with Rose and herself, they had both taken the day off work for it but hey when you're the bosses of your own fashion magazine you're allowed to do as you please.
BEEP..BEEP
An hour later Alice was honking her horn from outside. I gave my eye once last look in the mirror before opening the door. I couldn't have concealed my eye with any makeup as I didn't own any; makeup was not something I used.
As I walked down the porch steps I kept repeating the story I was going to tell them in my head over and over again. I tripped and caught it on the edge of the table, I tripped and caught it on the edge of the table, I tripped and caught it on the edge of the table. I had now arrived at Alice's Cadillac, both her and Rose turned to me and gasped.
"Bella, what happened?" Alice gasped.
"What do you mean?" I tried to brush it off, without success.
"You know what she means she means your eye, what happened are you OK?" Rose chimed in.
"OHH that it's nothing I ummm.. Well I tripped on the edge of the table and caught my eye on my feet. I stated in a rush and then I realised I had completely jumbled my words up. STUPID, STUPID.
"You want to try that sentence again." Rose asked.
"Yep I tripped over my own feet like I always do and caught my eye on the edge of the table."
"Huh." They both chimed together.
"Look Bella, you can talk to us, we are practically your sisters."
"Yeah" Rose agreed.
"Guys that's what really happened, I swear."
I could tell they both didn't believe me, they both sat there eyebrows raised, lips puckered into a hard line.
Alice looked me in the eye saying "Bella we are going to drop this for now because it is obviously what you want and today is about having fun and going shopping. But this is far from the last time we will mention it and you will eventually tell one or both of us what is happening. Because you're our sister and we love you and we want to help you." Rose nodded her head in agreement. "But today we have fun. OK."
I simply nodded, what could I say? They were quite rightly looking out for me. It was sort of nice to feel cared for, and they weren't going to question me about it right now, like they said to day was about having fun. I smiled jumping in the back as Alice sped off towards the Mall.
I hope you didn't think this chapter was a little slow, and that the romance between Edward & Bella isn't building fast enough but I feel I need to build on the abuse Jacob is putting Bella through before Edward and the rest of the Cullen family can come to the rescue.
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