I own nothing.
Have you ever been in love? Horrible, isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and opens your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses. You build up this whole armor, for years, so no one can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life…you give them a piece of you. They don't ask for it. They do something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then you life isn't your anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so a simple phrase like 'maybe we should just be friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the mind. It's a soul hurt, a body hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love – Neil Gaiman
Song for this chapter - Tonight I wanna cry by Keith Urban
Chapter Seven – Revelations
Jasper's POV
"It's not you Bella. I know that Edward loves you. I could feel that. That was not the reason that he left. I was the reason that he left. He could not even trust his own family with you. All he wanted was to protect you and he felt the only way that he could do that was to leave. Blame me for everything," I explained to her and then told her something I should have a long time ago, "I never did get to tell you I was sorry about what happened at your birthday. I know that it is not enough but I have nothing else. I really am a monster, you know. I am not surprised they left me just that it took this long."
"Stop talking like that. I never blamed you because it was not your fault. It was all my fault. I mean really I could not even open a present without causing blood loss."
"I should have been able to control myself. No one else had a problem and we all have the same diet. I am just weak and that is why my family left me behind."
I could not help but go back to that day. All the hurt came flooding back to the surface pushing me down deeper into the pity pool that I had been swimming in for a long time. I did not think I was ever going to resurface.
"You are not weak. You just feel too much. You were overwhelmed by everyone else's bloodlust as well as your own. You were not the only one experiencing overpowering desire for my blood. There was not one of them who did not want to drink my blood no matter what they claim. I could see it in their eyes. You don't think that had some affect on you? You were not only feeling your own but all of theirs. There was no way that you could have controlled that immense amount of pull no matter what you believe," Bella explained to me defending me to myself.
I stared at her letting her insightful words slip into my mind. What a significant revelation. How could it be that I never considered that before? Of course I was affected by their bloodlust just as I was by every other emotion they experienced.
I quickly thought back to every other time that I had almost lost it overcome by the monster inside of me. There was not once that I had been alone. I had always been with another member of my family. And true to the theory the times when it was the worse I was always with more than one of them.
How come no one had thought to tell me this before? It had to occur to at least one of them. My only thought was that they we all too happy to let me keep feeling weak and needy. Always needing Edward to read my thoughts to see if I was planning some human's death. Or my dear wife looking into my future to see if I hunted down a human. Even Emmett for his strength to hold me back like he had at Bella's party.
I was never allowed to go out on my own. I was never allowed any privacy. I was consistently watch and monitored. I was forced to hunt when I didn't feel like I needed to. I was forever poor Jasper. The newest vegetarian struggling with the diet change. I was always the weak one dependent on the rest of them. And certain members of my family always made sure I remembered that.
"Thank-you Bella. Thank you for forgiving me and seeing some thing more in me than anyone else has, even myself. You don't know how hard it is to always be considered the weak link," I let her know feeling sorry for myself. I don't know what was worse having my whole family leave me or for them to use me as an escape goat. I think mainly I was pissed that I had not figured this out for myself. It took Bella all of five minutes to dissect my life.
Before now Bella and I had barely spoken except that time we were on the run from James. She had always been Edward's. He made it crystal clear that I was to go nowhere near her because I was an animal that could not be trusted. I did not blame him considering that in the beginning I had made it known that I had no problem killing her to save the rest of the family. But that was before I met her and before I knew how much she meant not only to Edward but everyone else, especially my wife. Alice really did love her like a sister which made me still wonder how she could have left her. It seemed that she had no problem leaving the ones she claims to love.
"I know everything about being the weak leak or in my case the weak breakable human that can not walk without hurting herself. No matter what you say I know that he just got so sick of saving me. Or maybe he just grew tired of me all together. I was nothing more than a toy to be played with until he grew bored and moved on."
"Bella…"
"No don't tell me I was wrong. I always knew that I was not good enough for him. I was just a silly little human disillusioned into thinking that I had a future with him. We never had one…I was just a distraction."
"I always knew that I was not good enough for her. I guess she always knew that too. I'm finally seeing that I too was just a distraction," I let out pausing taking a deep breath that I did not need, "I know you have more questions but if it is okay with you I need to go refocus. I won't be long," I told her just needing to be alone.
"I will be fine and when you get back and are ready we will continue. I know you are hurting and I also know from experience that nothing I can say will change that but like you told me once… you are worth it."
Her words stayed with me as I disappeared into the woods. I climbed an old favorite tree and sat there staring out into the darkness of the night. Being out here was where I felt most at peace. No ones emotions but my own to feel. But tonight my own were more than I could handle.
I never felt weaker in my life than I did tonight. My feelings overwhelming my whole being until I just broke down. I had sat there and shook shedding invisible tears for what I had lost.
Before Alice my life had no meaning. I was just a lost soul wondering aimlessly through the world only surviving but not living. That all changed when Alice walked into my life. She was sure of everything. She had all the answers. Of course I was quick to realize that was from her gift to see into the future. At the time that had been perfect for me because for once I did not have to worry about what was to come.
Looking back now I know that had been a mistake. From the start I had given Alice all the power in our relationship. I followed behind her like a little lost puppy as she dragged us to our new family. From day one she fit right in with this strange coven of vampires and they all loved her. How could they not? She was an excited little pixie full of energy that could see the future. If they had to welcome me into the family to keep her they had been willing to make the sacrifice.
And I had been willing to make sacrifices of my own to be with her. After centuries of a diet of human blood I went cold turkey switching to animal blood spending every endless moment fighting the thirst. But for her love I would have given anything.
And though I could not see it then I had continued year after year to slowly give up more and more of myself to keep her. In the end no matter what I did she had left me anyways.
So here I was with what was left of me.
I didn't know who I was anymore. I did not know how to live without Alice. I didn't know if I wanted to. What did I have without her? Nothing. I was left with nothing. And I knew in my heart that if I did not somehow get her back that I never would again.
Even after she had ripped me apart from the inside out leaving me to suffer a long painful death I still loved her. I still wanted her. I did not know how to be without her. She had showed me another life away from killing and torment. No matter what she had done to hurt me it did not compare to what she did to heal me. How many times had she forgiven me for the things I did? Too many for even my brain to remember. So how could I not look pass a few indiscretions she had made? The answer was I couldn't. I would forgive her if I ever got the chance. And I knew that I had only one chance and that was through Bella.
Bella's POV
I don't know how long I sat there and waited for Jasper to come back. Time had already ceased to matter to me. What did matter to me now was Jasper.
I felt this strange connection to him which I could not explain. My only theory was that it had something to do with the fact that he had been the one to change me. Maybe part of it was that I had lost Edward like he had lost Alice.
God I could not imagine what he was going through though. I had only been with Edward such a short amount of time compared to Jasper with Alice and I wanted to die when I lost him. They had been together decades.
I did not for the life of me understand why Alice had left him. I never witnessed a second of strife between them. Unlike Rosalie and Emmett who were always fighting about something. Then again Jasper seemed much more of a private person than Emmett. Which meant that probably whatever had been going on between them had been kept behind closed doors.
As much as I wanted to ask him that would just be rude. I mean he would tell me if he wanted me to know. Maybe he would when he was ready. When he felt like he could trust me. Because for all intensive purposes we were nothing more than a step above strangers. I wanted to change that though. I wanted to get to know him now that my blood was not in the way. I had this feeling that Jasper had quite the story. I also had the feeling that he needed a friend maybe more than I did.
Maybe that was why it had been so easy for me to simply let go of the fact that he had changed me. My nurture and take care of trait kicked in on overdrive when I looked at him. He seemed so fragile. Like at any minute he would just break into a million pieces and no amount of glue would put him back together.
Nothing could change what had been done. We had both made decisions and choices that lead us to this point. Now came the part where we take what life had dealt us and move on. At least we did not have to do so alone. If neither of us had no one else we had each other. Maybe that would be enough to get us through.
