Another Eclipse

Disclaimer: All the characters in the story are the property of Stephanie Meyer. I have borrowed them for my entertainment and (hopefully) your reading pleasure. I make no profit from their use.

Author's Note: This story is a continuation of my other story "New Moon Rewound," which envisions the Twilight Saga as if the original New Moon was only a nightmare.

Chapter 4: Worries

It's Monday morning, the first day of my final semester in high school, and I feel ready to face the world. We have just come to the end of a long four-day weekend. Even though it should have been a relaxing time, I spent a lot of my time worrying about Charlie, how his appointment went with the doctor, and then all of the tests he would have to have.

Charlie was much less stressed out about it than I was. I suppose that he had already come to grips with the fact that he hadn't been taking good care of himself over the years and he had to stop avoiding the obvious. On the other hand, I had really only entered his life ahead ago. And I had been been ignoring and denying a lot of the symptoms that I had seen.

However, with the support of my new family, I feel much better about facing things down the road. It was very hard for me to do, but I had to figure out for myself that I couldn't make changes in Charlie's life for him. He had to do it himself. And there was never going to be a good time for me to disappear from his life. I just had to decide for myself when the time was right.

After my Calculus and Spanish midterms on Tuesday, I went back to the Cullen house with Edward and Alice. Alice drove there in my car so that we could compare notes on the Spanish exam. It was difficult to absorb the fact that I really had done well in two subjects that I had never felt very confident in.

"I can't believe that I ever thought that Spanish was hard!" I said as we turned out of the school parking lot. "But I suppose that after all of my hours speaking Spanish with Carmen, it finally stuck in my head. And the reading comprehension and writing sections were easy too. I wonder if I'm going to get in trouble for using vocabulary that we weren't taught in school."

"Not going to happen," Alice assured me. "That happens to us all the time. Edward says that it doesn't bother Mrs. Goff at all. In fact, sometimes she has to look the words up for herself. It helps her to learn more Spanish. She's not a native speaker, you know."

"Well, that's good," I said. "Now all that I have to worry about tomorrow is physics and I'm home free."

"For the next four days until school starts up again," she replied. "And we're going to the mall one day. No complaints!"

"I won't complain as long as Esme comes too," I answered.

Alice pouted, but didn't say anything. Once Esme knew that I wanted her there, she would be happy to join us. But Alice had also begun to feel a little jealous because Esme and I were now so close. One thing that Alice hadn't counted on while we were in Alaska, was that I would spend more time with Esme than with her. And while our best friend/sister status was intact, I had become much closer to Esme.

It wasn't anything personal, it was just that Alice and Jasper liked to hang out with the other "young people," and as a human, I couldn't keep up. The few times that I went out with Edward, I was limited by the amount of time that my body could handle the cold. I couldn't do any of the fun things that they were doing that involved running and jumping.

There were times that I insisted that Edward go out and have fun with them. I knew that although he would never complain and he wanted to spend as much time with me as possible, there were times when he needed to go run around and have fun with the others. So it was Esme, who was my companion when she wasn't overseeing the work on the house.

Of course Carmen was my other buddy. Like me, she was quiet and sometimes felt as overwhelmed by her more boisterous sisters as I was by my future brother and sisters. Like me, she also loved them dearly, so I provided her with another companion, who preferred the indoors. She was also terribly proud of me. By the time we left, I was very nearly fluent in Spanish.

"Wait until you are a vampire," she said as I was leaving. "You must also learn French and Italian. We have so many books in the European languages to read and centuries to read them. And then we can discuss them in their languages."

Of all of those folks that I left behind in Alaska, it was Carmen that I kept in touch with everyday by phone or email. When we spoke on the phone, it was always in Spanish. That was so that I could practice, but it also meant that I didn't have to censor my conversations. One night Charlie overheard me talking to her.

"Who is Carmen?" he asked, when I got off the phone on Thursday night.

"She was my private nurse," I replied, lying easily. "She was very helpful to me while I was there and I still call her when I want some advice."

"Were you just speaking in Spanish?" he asked.

"Yes, she was helping me to keep up with my class," I answered. "In fact, I improved my spoken Spanish so much that she says that I am almost fluent."

"That's great, Bells," he said. "And you said that you think you did well on all your finals?"

"I feel really confident," I replied. "There wasn't a whole lot to do other than study and watch movies while I was in the hospital. I decided that I wanted to prove to my teachers that I was keeping up with my work."

"But you won't know how you did until Monday," he said.

"That's when we get them back," I said. "And my first semester scores go to all my colleges too."

"Oh, yeah," he said. "Colleges. But you won't hear from them for awhile."

"Not until spring," I answered.

I knew that he was nervous about that. I hadn't applied to any schools close to home. No matter what, I was determined to set things up so that I could say that I was going somewhere in the northeast. But he had other things on his mind the night we discussed that. The next day he was going to Dr. Gerandy for his full physical. Even though he wasn't expecting a completely clean bill of health, he was afraid of what he might find.

After my own anxious night on Monday because he told me that he was finally going, Carlisle sat down with me on Tuesday afternoon and explained that I was getting myself all worked up without cause.

"You've been hoping that Charlie would go to the doctor for a check up for a long time," he said. "Now he is. You should be glad about that. With any luck, no matter what the doctor finds, it can be managed with the right medications and lifestyle changes. And he is doing his best to improve his eating and drinking habits."

"I know that you can't diagnose him," I said. "But what would you look for?"

"Well, to start with, there's his weight," he answered. "That indicates the possibility of high blood pressure, which he can measure in the office. There are medications for that. Other things like high cholesterol and diabetes need blood work. Gerandy will probably want to give him a stress test. But anything else is pure speculation."

"And you aren't going to speculate," I said.

"No, and neither should you," he said. "We don't even know if he's had any worrying symptoms. He hadn't been complaining about anything, has he?"

"No, none other than the fact that his pants are too tight. But I don't think that he'd tell me anyway," I answered.

"He probably wouldn't," Carlisle agreed. "Because he doesn't want you to worry! Now why don't you find Edward and go have some fun. Or you could study for your physics midterm."

"I should probably study for my physics midterm," I said.

So I wandered off downstairs where Edward and Jasper were trying to play some kind of video game. It was funny to watch because the game couldn't go as fast as their minds and hands. Alice was watching and shaking her head.

"Why do they bother?" she asked me. "Sooner or later one of them is going to get angry and throw something."

"Well right now I could use some help studying for my physics midterm," I said.

"I'll help you," she offered.

But Edward was already at my side.

"No, I will," he said. "I'm done with that game for a while anyway."

"Thanks because you were losing," Jasper said. "You want to try, Alice?"

"No," she replied. "I can think of lots better things that I can do with you.

And with that they were upstairs.

"Oh well," Edward sighs. "Let's see what we can do about that physics."

And so of course, physics went perfectly well on Wednesday morning, and then we were free. I felt very light-hearted as I drove out to the Cullens' house. I was also quite proud of myself because I no longer needed to follow someone out there. I could find the turn by myself. That made Edward happy because he didn't have to drive at human speed anymore.

I did my best to follow Carlisle's advice and focus on the good things happening around me. On Thursday, Alice, Esme, and I went to the mall, where they helped me pick out some new outfits. Alice insisted that I try on outrageously expensive clothing, and then Esme supported me when I wanted to buy more midrange priced things. Aside from the fact that I thought it was a waste of money, I felt very self-conscious wearing designer clothes.

Friday was the big day. Charlie was going to the doctor for his physical around nine. After he had gone out for his physical, Edward came over to keep me company. He figured that if I waited alone, I might go out of my mind. After a half hour or so, he began to grumble.

"You really should have come to my house," he complained. "There's a lot more for us to do there.

This was true, but I wanted to be here when Charlie came home. He had taken the morning off and was coming home for lunch. Since I had come home, I really hadn't done much about cleaning the house and there was a pile of laundry to do. I needed the mindless physical activity to keep my hands and body moving while I tried not to think too hard about anything.

"If you're that bored," I said in reply. "Then why don't you go home and I'll come over after lunch."

"No," he said. "I want to be here for you. And I will drive everyone at home crazy if I go back without you. I'll go see what's on TV."

As soon as he turned away from me, I rolled my eyes. As usual he was trying to take care of me. In this case there was no danger, he just wanted to make sure that he was there as "back up" when Charlie returned. So I cleaned and he pretended to watch some random sports game. At about 11:30, I was in the kitchen making chef salads for lunch, when I heard Charlie come in.

"Hey, Edward!" he said. "Bella told me you were going to keep her company. Did you help her clean the house?"

"Actually," Edward admitted. "I sat here and watched sports."

"I guess you're practicing to be a husband," he said, with a laugh that didn't sound quite genuine. "I hate to tell you, but with all this women's lib stuff, the girls expect us to help out around the house. Don't be fooled by her now. After the wedding, it's all downhill from there."

"I heard that," I said, walking in from the kitchen. "Lunch is ready."

They followed me into the kitchen. Edward declined the salad saying that he would eat a sandwich when he got home.

"Let me give you a piece of advice, son," Charlie said in a confidential tone to Edward. "Her cooking is real good. When you have to split the chores with just make sure that she does the cooking."

"I believe that Carlisle already gave me that bit of advice," he answered.

"Well, considering what a good cook your Mom is, he didn't steer you wrong," Charlie replied grinning.

I had to bite my tongue before I made a snarky remark about Charlie hardly being the person to give marital advice. Edward was smirking, so I could tell that whatever was in Charlie's mind, it wasn't his health. But I preferred to feed him before he laid the bad news on me.

"Well, Bells," said Charlie when he was done eating. "It's a good thing that you know how to cook healthy meals. Because Dr. Gerandy wants me to lose about forty pounds."

"Forty pounds?" I asked in shock.

"That will make me just overweight rather than obese," Charlie admitted. "And he's given me a prescription for some kind of high blood pressure medicine. You might know about this, Edward. How bad is 270/200?"

"Pretty bad," Edward replied. "I'm surprised that you haven't had a heart attack."

"So is Gerandy," he grimaced. "I was hoping that he was exaggerating. And tomorrow morning, I have to go to some diagnostic place in Port Angeles for a bunch of blood tests and something called a stress test. Then on Monday, he wants me to go to Olympia for some kind of scans to check out my heart. He didn't like what he heard, was talking about some kind of stint or something."

"Stent," Edward said. "It's a pretty minimally invasive procedure. They basically put these tiny tubes into your arteries to unclog them so that the heart can pump more easily."

"Yeah," Charlie said. "I guess that sounds right. And he says the cholesterol is probably too high. And he took a blood sugar sample from, you know, my pee, and that was too high. So I'm not allowed to eat before I had the blood tests tomorrow. One of them is what they call a fasting glucose or something."

"That's for Type 2 diabetes," Edward said. "Did he explain that?"

"I'm afraid so," Charlie replied. "It means that I won't be able to eat any of the good stuff anymore. And I'm going to have to exercise. But if I expect to lose weight, then I'm going to have to exercise anyway. But, boy, old Gerandy sure doesn't take any prisoners. He really yelled at me for letting myself go like this."

"I'm glad he did," I replied, getting up to clear the table. "Or I would have. I'm going to drive you for those tests tomorrow if you can't eat before them. And I'm not taking no for an answer."

"Yes, ma'am," he answered sheepishly. "I'm sorry, Bells. I didn't realize how far out of shape I had gotten. But Gerandy says that if I turn myself around, I can really make some big improvements. He said that if I wanted to be around for those grandchildren I'm going to have someday, then I better get on it now."

I turned to the sink, because I couldn't look him in the eye for that one. I felt guilty because not only wouldn't there be any grandchildren, I'm was to be gone from his life in six months. But maybe if he felt better and he went out to do more things, he would have some kind of life outside of his job, his sports, and his fishing.

"Oh, look at the time!" Charlie said. "I need to get to work. I'll be working late tonight to make up for missing the morning. See you later!"

"See you later, Dad," I said quietly.

"Hey, kid! Don't worry!" Charlie said. "I'm going to take care of myself. I promise. Edward, you make sure that she doesn't worry."

"I'll do my best," Edward replied. "See you later."

After Charlie was gone, Edward came over to me, slipped his arms around my waist, and kissed the top of my head.

"Really, Bella," he said. "I know that sounded like a lot, but most of it is interrelated. And a lot of it can be improved if he changes his diet, exercises, and loses weight. The rest of it will be helped by medication."

"That's not what I'm upset about," I replied.

"What is it then?" he asked.

"It was when he was talking about sticking around for his grandchildren," I answered.

"Are you beginning to regret the fact that you won't be able to have kids?" He asked in surprise.

"No, not at all," I said. "It's more than that. It's not just that Charlie won't have grandkids. It's that in six months he won't even have me."

"Bella, if you are having any worries that you may be doing this too quickly, then you don't have to," he answered. "If you want, you can wait until we finish college. I have never wanted to force you into a decision based on an arbitrary timeline. I am going to have you forever. I can certainly wait four extra years, if you want to have them with Charlie."

"But you were so disappointed when I didn't want you to change me last fall," I said as I considered his words.

"Bella, how many time do I have to tell you?" he said patiently. "This is about you, not me. You are literally giving up your life to be with me. There is no greater gift that anyone can give to anyone else. The only regret that I will have is if you do this too quickly and without thinking through all of the ramifications that you will be unhappy later. Once you are changed, you don't get a do over. It's all or nothing."

"I know that," I answered, feeling subdued. "It's just that all of this seemed so much simpler when we were up in Alaska. I was going to come back here, finish high school, and get married. But it's not that easy, is it?"

"It's never been that easy," he agreed. "And that's why it's good that you did come back. And it's good that you made that decision for yourself. This is another choice that is all yours to make. The only one who's going to be really disappointed if we don't get married in June is Alice."

"Won't you be disappointed?" I asked.

"I'll get over it," he answered. "Like I said before, I have a much different perception of time than you do. But there is something else that you need to consider. You may stick around for Charlie for a few years longer, but he's never going to have any grandchildren."

"I know," I said.

"Bella," he said in reply. "Children are not something that you have because you want to give your parents grandchildren. You have them because you want them. Now please be honest with me. Is this about you or Charlie?"

"It's about Charlie," I admitted with a sigh, as he looked relieved. "If he hadn't said anything about it, I wouldn't have even considered it. And even as I think about it now, if I'm going to be eighteen forever, I don't see why I would ever want kids. I mean, I'm going to spend the rest of my existence with you, sometimes moving around with Carlisle and Esme going to high school and college."

"And sometimes traveling around the world," he added. "It's not that I'm trying to sell you on the life or anything, but there's a whole big world out there for us to explore. And even if I've been there before, it's going to be a whole new experience seeing it with you."

"It's just going to be so hard to say goodbye to him," I replied wistfully.

"No matter when you say goodbye, it will be hard," he answered. "The best that you can do is spend these five months with him doing the best you can to enjoy them and make them a happy time for both of you. But even if you waited to change, you would still be going away to college on the opposite coast and wouldn't see him very much."

"So then he is the one who really needs to be making a new life for himself," I said slowly. "I can't do it for him."

"It's his life and his choices," he replied. "Do you want to stay here or go back to my house?"

"Let's go to your house," I said. "I want to go visit the Crumbling Cottage."

"And why is that?" he asked with a smile.

"I just want to remind myself that it's about my life," I answered. "And whenever we're there, my future with you feels so much more real."

"Sounds good to me!" he answered cheerfully.

After I finished, we went out to drive to his place in the Volvo. When we got there, the only one home was Esme.

"How did things go with Charlie?" she asked, looking up from some blue prints.

"About as we expected," I said. "He has to go for more tests tomorrow and Monday. Dr. Gerandy already told him that he has to lose weight, eat better, and exercise more. Hopefully the tests won't turn up anything too bad."

"Whatever it is, we'll help you both through," she replied. "Now if you will excuse me, I have some work to do with these."

Edward and I walked out to the yard by the river. Then I jumped on his back and he took a flying leap. When we were over, he took my hand and we walked through the woods until we found it. It hadn't changed at all in the months that we were gone. I sat on the stonewall and looked at what most people probably thought looked like a pile of rubble. But to me, it looked magical.

"It's a pity that we can't just move all these rocks up to Alaska for our cottage up there," Edward commented.

"But aren't we going to return here someday?" I asked.

"Not for at least a couple of centuries," Edward replied. "When I was out listening to Jared and Sam the other night, it seems that Jared has imprinted on a girl also. So now two of them have mates. That means at least one more generation of potential wolf puppies.

"Of course, the gene skipped two generations until we came back. It may be that unless the tribe leaves the area for a more modern lifestyle, we can never come back here without triggering the wolves. However, as long as they live with these old traditions and legends they will know that we exist. And that's a dangerous thing for them."

"That would be too bad," I said. "But you didn't tell me much about what they were thinking that night."

"Well, let's see," he answered with a smirk. "They were commentating on my meal and how disgusting it was to them. I have a feeling that neither of them has ever tried eating his wolf form. Talk about gross!"

"Now I know that they must have said more," I pressed him.

"Well," he said. "They were talking about Billy and Jacob. Billy is apparently pushing for Jacob to take a larger role in the pack. And since Jacob and Embry took out Victoria, Billy had kind of been feeding Jacob's ego. But it's mostly an irritation for them now."

"Is Billy going to try and interfere with us and the wedding?" I asked.

"Do you really want to know the answer to that?" he asked.

"Yes," I replied.

"Billy still wants to try to break us up," he said. "He doesn't want to see you marry me because he knows that it means that I will turn you into a vampire. Technically that breaks the treaty, no biting humans. However, Sam doesn't care if we get married as long as I turn you far away from here.

"He doesn't feel responsible for your choices. He also doesn't want to have to go hunting for us. It would kind of defeat the purpose of existing to guard the tribe. He also doesn't think that he could find us."

"But Billy doesn't want to give up," I said.

"It doesn't matter," he replied. "You gave Charlie a big scare when you moved out of the house and then when your anxiety sent you over the top and we had to get you away from Forks. He has completed accepted the fact that you are going to marry me. In fact, when he came in from the doctor's appointment and saw me watching TV he had a vision of him and me watching together. He's gone from looking for ways of breaking us up, to looking for ways that he and I can get along."

"But then we will leave," I said.

"Bella, you have to get over that," he said. "I don't want you to be unhappy. There are a lot of things that I can and will do for you. But I don't see any way that you can remain in Charlie's life without completely confusing him. It would be dangerous for us to even visit Forks.

"And after listening to Sam and Jared, there is absolutely no way that I can change you and we can live anywhere within a thousand miles of here. If I change you here and we stay around, we have broken the treaty. Things would not go well for either side."

"I know," I said. "And I'm sorry that I can't let go of this."

"Bella," he said gently. "You can change your mind up to the very last second. Even if we are married, I will not force you to change. It will just be a little, um, frustrating for both of us."

"Because we'll be married and you still won't make love to me because I'm human," I said. "I still think that you are being overprotective."

"Let's not get into this discussion again," he groaned. "I thought that we had decided that we would wait until after the change."

"Yes, we did," I replied, snuggling up to him.

With all things that I had to think about, I guessed that sex was at the bottom of the list of priorities for now. And I didn't want to bring it up, but I had a feeling that the issue of children was certainly going to come up with Dr. Weber. That was going to be a very interesting conversation. I had a feeling that all of those conversations would be.

I didn't return home too late on Friday night because I had to be up early to drive Charlie. After they drew the blood, he claimed that that just have at least taken a quart. Then they put him on a treadmill for the stress test. By the time we got home, he was feeling light-headed, so I made him a healthy breakfast and sent him to bed to rest. Then I drove over to visit Edward.

I basically spent the next two days with the Cullens. After Charlie "recovered" from his "dreadful" experience, he went over to La Push to compare notes with Harry. Then he went fishing with Mark on Sunday, while I went to church and hung out with the Cullens again. Dr. Weber was pleased to see us and reminded us that we needed to set up out counseling sessions. I promised to stop off at the rectory after school today.

Today is probably the first time that I've ever looked forward to going back to school to get exams back. At the end of the day, they would also be posting the honor roll and class ranks. I had not idea of where I might rank, other than below Edward and Alice, but I knew that I should make the first honor roll again.

English and History's grades are completely expected. Edward grins at me when I show him my papers. Angela looks absolutely relieved. As usual, she worried for nothing. Everyone else looks happy or relieved except for Lauren. She got her usual poor grades that she lets everyone know it by slamming her books around.

The most nerve-wracking test to get back is calculus. But Mr. Varner smiles when he gives me back my paper. I flip through the pages looking for the check marks for incorrect answers, but there are none. When I get to the back page, I see the grade, an A+, with a very large 100% written beside it with an exclamation point. My mouth drops open in shock. Oh. My. God! I have done well in math before, but never this well.

When the bell finally rings, I go running out the door to find Edward.

"Do you know?" I demand.

"Yes, I saw it in Varner's mind when he gave you back your exam," he answers. "But it was much more fun watching your expression through his eyes. By the way, he's very proud of you."

"Well, I'm very proud of me," I reply.

At lunch everyone is talking about the exams and grades and where all of this puts us in the class rank. My afternoon class exams are scored the same as the morning classes. In fact, Mrs. Goff asks me if I had any kind of special tutoring. So I just real her that my private nurse was Spanish and she helped me a lot. The last class of the day is Phys Ed, but even that can't spoil my good mood. There is a surprise waiting for me on the lists posted outside of the auditorium with the honor rolls and ranks

Alice comes to meet us as walk down the hallway. I can immediately see that she is thinking something to Edward. He looks very unhappy.

"Did you see the lists?" I ask. "What do they say?"

She looks at Edward, who nods to her.

"We all made first honor roll," she says quietly.

"And?" I ask.

"We aren't included in the class ranking because we were away for most of the first semester," she says. "Eric is the number one student in the class. Angela is number two."

"I'm very happy for her," I say immediately trying to hide my disappointment. "Does she know?"

Edward gets a very funny look on his face.

"Yes, she does," he says. "But I think that it would be better if we left quickly and quietly now. You can congratulate her tomorrow."

"Okay," I say puzzled by the fact that he and Alice are trying to get me out if there as quickly as possible.

"Come on, Bella," Alice says. "Don't you want to ask Charlie how his tests went?"

"Charlie!" I exclaim running up behind them. "Did you see anything had happening."

"Not at all," she says soothingly. "But why don't we all go over to see him? I think he's a little cranky."

"He's a little cranky," Edward agrees, obviously seeing what she is seeing.

On the way out to the parking lot, we pass Mr. Varner, who stops me for a second.

"Miss Swan," he says. "Congratulations on a job well done. You should be very proud of your accomplishments despite being away."

"Thanks," I say. "But I need to go home and see my Dad."

"Okay," he says. "We'll talk more tomorrow."

"What was that about?" I ask Edward.

But he just shrugs.

"He has a lot on his mind too," he answers. "Why don't I drive over with you?"

"Sure," I say.

But I still think that he and Alice are acting weird. Oh well, as long as Charlie is okay, that's really all that matters. Exams, honor rolls, and class rankings are really a lot less important than my Dad's health. I am disappointed that I wasn't included in the class rank, but my anxiety about Charlie helps me keep it all in perspective.

Author's Note: Thanks once again for all of your great reviews. They really hell me keep going. I am still not sure about whether I will be able to do another version of Breaking Dawn. A lot will depend on how this works out. However, i do plan to do a wedding and honeymoon.