The Twilight series is the property of Stephenie Meyer - No copyright infringement is intended.
This entire fic is dedicated to JAustenlover.
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~ * ~
Bella Swan
"Bella?"
He says my name and I'm frozen, unsure what to say. I'm ready to close my phone, even though I know I'll never be able to call him again because I will be too humiliated from the fuck-up that was dialing his number a minute ago, when he speaks again.
"If it's you, don't hang up, okay?" There's a pause, maybe while he waits to see what I'll do, and then he continues.
"I've been thinking about you." He's quiet, tentative, not sure and confident as I've been remembering him since he left our house. "Wondering how you're doing. Are you okay?"
I bite my tongue to keep from answering. I want to tell him that I've been thinking about him, too. The sound of him speaking, concentrated, directed just at me, floods me with memories. Blood rushes to my face as I remember the last time I saw him, the last time I was able to really look at him.
"That's probably a stupid question. I'm sorry." The line is quiet again. I start to wonder if this is going to turn into the two of us sitting here, saying nothing in uncomfortable silence, since I am apparently incapable of speech. I'm not sure what would be worse – the dead air or if he brings up what happened with us, which I figure he'll do any minute. My fingers itch to hit the power button on my phone but I can't bring myself to do it. Now that I've heard his voice again, I can't abandon it, and he doesn't seem to want me to.
"I... when I was thinking about you I realized I don't know very much about you past the basics, and you don't know very much about me. So, uh..." He pauses and takes an audible deep breath. "So, my dad's military. We moved around a lot when I was growing up but we've been in Texas for the last seven years or so, at Fort Hood. That's outside of Killeen, which isn't too far from Austin." He stops and clears his throat. My anxious pacing has brought me to the other side of the room and I flip off the overhead lights.
In the dark, I can focus solely on Jasper's voice, coming to me from a thousand miles away. I try not to think about him saying my name and how it had sounded when he'd breathed it against me as he'd held me against the wall. He continues talking as I settle on my bed.
"I have a younger sister, Lucy. She really hated when we moved and would always run away from home right before we were supposed to leave. Everyone panicked the first couple of times, but she'd always go to the same place – the nearest swing set, it didn't matter whose yard it was in – so she was easy to find. The last time she did it, we piled into the minivan without her and drove by the playground where she was hunkered down. We parked around the corner and waited, and she came running down the street, crying, about a minute later." He laughs quietly and I smile involuntarily as some of my tension dissipates. His voice might be soothing, but his laugh is thrilling. I'm happy that he's starting to sound more as I recalled than he did a few minutes ago.
"I decided on Washington for school because I figured it would be the easiest way to try a new place all on my own, and I heard it was beautiful up here. I don't love the constant rain, but it's not as bad as some people say...."
He's settled into a rhythm and I am nestling further against my pillows, surprised about how well this "conversation" seems to be going, when I hear a key in the door. I sit up, surprised, wondering why Kate is home, then realize it won't be any fun to explain to her why I'm on the phone in the dark; her disapproving look will certainly kill whatever small amount of peace I'm feeling from listening to Jasper.
I hate to do it but I can't just hang up while he's talking. Remaining silent is one thing, hanging up mid-word is another.
"Jasper." He falls silent immediately. "I have to go," I whisper. "I'm sorry."
I close my phone without waiting for a response and am standing next to the bed by the time Kate and Garrett come through the door.
"Oh, sorry, Bella! Did we wake you?" Kate asks as she takes in the dark room and my non-pajama attire.
"No, I just fell asleep reading." It's a pretty lame excuse but Kate smiles and nods before I step into the bathroom we share with our suite-mates.
When I emerge and get into bed for the night, I'm happy to find the sight of Kate and Garrett spooning on Kate's bed doesn't make me feel as lousy as it did earlier.
As I start to drift off, it occurs to me that Jasper hadn't mentioned anything about what happened in the office – not even a hint about it. I try not to over-analyze that as I almost-smile at the ceiling until I drift off.
For the first time in fourteen days, I sleep all the way through the night.
~ * ~
Monday night, rest comes just as easily and I'm relieved and hopeful that maybe things are starting to get better. But on Tuesday, the heavy, bleak blanket is back and even a long phone call with Peter doesn't help. In fact, given the nightmare I have just before waking Wednesday morning – in which Billy makes another early-morning phone call, except it's to me about Peter – I think it makes things worse.
I am at the science library Thursday evening, trying desperately to pull together notes for a Genomics paper, when I have the overwhelming urge to call Jasper again. Now that he has my number, I have been half-expecting him to call, but his Texas area code hasn't popped up all week. I push back the thought because, really, no good can come from talking to him again. I still don't know what I would even say and I can't imagine he would be patient enough to deal with another one-sided conversation. Unfortunately, more than once since Sunday night, I've found myself spacing out and thinking about him and the sexy, even cadence of his voice.
"Bella?"
My knee slams against the underside of the table as I jerk back to reality. Mrs. Cope, the librarian, is standing in front of my table.
"Are you okay, dear? The library is closing in a few minutes and I don't want you to be trapped here all night." She smiles at me but looks a little worried, and I wonder how many times she said my name before I heard her.
"Yes, I'm okay." I start to gather my books and papers, stunned that it's already almost ten; the last time I looked at my phone, it was just after 8:30.
The temperature is unusually cool for a February night in L.A. My thin track pants and short-sleeved hoodie don't provide much warmth and I'm shivering by the time I get back to the room. Kate is nowhere to be seen and her laptop is missing from her desk, so I assume she's at Garrett's.
I climb into bed without changing and huddle under the covers. Lying in the dark in the silent room, all I can think about is Dad and how he would have shaken his head at me for wearing flip-flops in February. I had tried to explain to him a dozen times that I had to take advantage of the weather down here while I could. While growing up in dreary and drenched Forks, I'd so rarely been able to break out shorts and sandals and tank tops, but living in L.A., I can do those things pretty much anytime I want, and will, regardless of forecasts. I remember how Dad had actually put together a care package of cold medicine and Kleenex my freshman year when I'd gotten sick in the middle of the winter because I'd been waltzing around wearing inappropriate clothes for a month. He had included a silly card that I still had tucked into a drawer somewhere.
This time my decision to call Jasper is much less impulsive. I roll onto my back and wipe away my tears with one hand while pulling up his number with the other. I stare at his name for a few minutes, waiting for some sort of panic to overtake me. When it comes, it's not as strong as it was last time, and it is eclipsed by the desire to hear his voice, the need for the mental serenity I know he can bring.
It's like I am seeking him out as I found myself doing in Forks. He didn't seem to mind then, and I hope he doesn't now.
As the phone rings, a quick succession of worries runs through my head. Maybe he won't want to talk to me again. He might be busy or unable to answer. The worst is that he could be hanging out with my brother.
He picks up on the second ring, sounding a little breathless.
"Hey, Bella."
Again I can't find words that I want to say, and I close my eyes, waiting for him.
Jasper doesn't seem to miss a beat and quickly continues. "I'm glad you called back. I didn't know if you would. Pete mentioned that he talked to you a couple of days ago and you were pretty upset.... I was worried."
He sounds genuine and I again regret how I had shut him out at the house. Maybe if I'd just given him a chance to talk to me, the whole thing could have ended... or continued... with much less confusion and guilt.
"I'll admit I was kind of hoping for some input this time...." His tone is lighter as he teases. I'm starting to forget why I was silent in the first place, but just thinking about it brings forth thoughts of Dad, and the misery, which has been hovering just out of sight, rolls over me in a long, slow wave.
I curl my knees to my chest and shut my eyes, willing the feelings not to become overwhelming. The tears had paused for a moment but are back. I move the phone a bit away from my mouth so Jasper can't hear me crying. Between my nutcase behavior in Forks and my silent phone calls, I'm sure he thinks I'm completely weird. Regardless, I don't want him to think I'm calling for sympathy or pity, because I'm not. I'm not sure I can give a logical explanation for why I made this second call, but it's not because I want someone to feel bad for me.
"It's okay, I'll wait until you're ready, Bella."
I slowly inhale an unsteady breath. If I ever do say actual words to him, my thanks will be one of the first things I express.
Tonight, Jasper talks to me about what he does with his friends and his free time. I'm not too surprised to find out that some of his tastes are similar to mine. It is reassuring to hear that we actually have things in common aside from a history that is at least one person deep of hooking up with semi-random people. It makes the pull I felt – and still feel – to him a little less confusing.
I laugh to myself when he says that he never told his mom that he first looked at schools in the Pacific Northwest because of the great music that had originated from the region.
"It sounded like a dumb reason to pick a college, but it seems to have worked out okay," he adds.
When he talks about wanting to attend a massive, four-day music festival over toward the East Coast, my mind tumbles together images of spending two weeks in close proximity to Jasper Whitlock, seeing the country and listening to amazing music.
Jasper mentions that my brother got him started playing indoor soccer last winter, and this year, he's captain of their semi-informal team. Captain seems like a perfect role for him. From what I had observed of him at the house, he had a constant air of cool and calm about him. It wasn't as if he knew Dad, but there was no way he could have been unaffected by everything that had been going on around him in Forks. Yet, aside from just two times, he hadn't appeared anything but absolutely sure and collected. And those two times – at the funeral and then in the office with me, when he had been anything but cool or calm – fell under the header of "extenuating circumstances." I picture Jasper as the guy to whom everyone turns in an emergency; the guy who effortlessly takes everything in stride and gets shit done. Maybe that is part of why I had felt such a natural draw to him all that week.
And maybe that is why he doesn't sound the least bit exasperated to be spilling his life story to a girl he barely knows, who won't even talk to him.
Several times, I find myself on the brink of asking him questions, of asking for more information. I want to know if he was reading Vonnegut while he was in Forks because he wanted to or if it was for a class. He mentions he just saw Burn After Reading and I'm curious if he likes Fargo, or maybe No Country, better. If I call him again, or if he calls me, I will have to get over the chickenshit thing I am doing right now.
As I listen to him, I think about how much lower turnover would have been in Microbiology if he had been the one at the front at the front of the lecture hall. I'm convinced he could discuss the most mundane topic and still hold an entire audience's attention.
Somewhere around a funny recount of a hockey game he had gone to last year with one of his friends, it dawns on me that I am no longer associating every word he says, every noise he makes, with thoughts of him naked. I'm just listening to him, hearing him, not just the echoes of memories.
After about a half hour, he pauses for an extra-long moment. When he speaks, his words are surprisingly disappointing. "I hate to do this, but I have to go."
I sit up quickly, almost as if I'm physically reaching out to stop him. My heart pounds a little harder and I want to ask him to stay on the phone with me, but since I won't even speak to him at all, I certainly can't do that.
"I'll talk to you soon?"
I nod in the dark, already knowing I'll call him again, sometime.
"Okay, bye, Bella."
There's a pause and before it goes on for too long, I whisper, "Good night, Jasper."
I hear him breathe out and then, with a smile obvious in his voice, "Good night, Bella."
During our conversation, my tears had dried up. Instead of feeling cold and alone, I'm now cozy and comfortable in a cocoon of Jasper's words. It isn't until the next morning, when Kate says she's surprised I was asleep when they got back, that I realize I had never even brushed my teeth or taken off my bra before I fell asleep.
~ * ~
"You sure you don't want to grab dinner with us?" Kate is shouldering her bag while Garrett cleans up the rest of the mess on our lab table.
"No, thanks. I'm just going to head back, get a start on some reading I have to do."
"Want us to bring you anything?"
"No, I'm good." I finish zipping my books into my bag and stand with Kate to wait for Garrett.
Kate frowns and pokes my side.
"What the hell was that?" I rub my ribs where her nail dug into me.
"You haven't been eating. You're too skinny."
"Too skinny? I thought that was impossible for women?" Garrett asks as he joins us. Kate narrows her eyes at him and he gives her a kiss before we start up the steps to the outside world.
I shrug, not really wanting to get into it. My appetite hasn't been what I'd call hearty lately, but I don't think it's to the point where I've lost much weight.
"We're bringing you something whether you like it or not. We'll be there in a bit." I don't bother to argue; once Kate's on a mission, she's impossible to stop. We wave as our paths diverge, and I continue walking toward our dorm.
My phone vibrates in my pocket a few minutes later. I am a little disappointed - and then I'm annoyed with myself - when I look at the display and it's Peter. We exchange "hellos" and "how-are-yous" and give updates on our weeks. I realize part of the way into our relaxed conversation that I used the wrong formula on something during the lab I'd just worked on with Kate and Garrett and am distracted until Peter says something that catches my attention.
"What was that, Peter?"
"I said that Lauren says hi."
"Lauren?" I smile my thanks to the guy who holds open the dorm door for me and start up the stairs as I wait for Peter's response. To my knowledge, before the funeral he hadn't spoken to her in quite awhile.
"Yeah.... We've been emailing and stuff. There's a party here on Saturday and she's going to come down to go to it and then stay with me for the weekend." He's using that tone of voice he always used whenever he was trying to get something past our parents. It's the "if I say it really casually, like it's no big deal, maybe no one will notice" tone. It always worked on Mom, but never on Dad, and never on me.
"A party?" I realize I sound like a parrot but I know how Peter works. The shorter my questions, the more likely he is to spill way more than he intended.
"Yeah, here in the dorm. Our RA is off visiting his girlfriend in China or something so we have the run of the floor. A bunch of the guys' birthdays are this month, so we're throwing a massive early St. Patrick's Day shindig."
"Sounds classy, Peter." He snorts in agreement. Since I'm sure the point of his call is to mention the Lauren thing, I get right to it. "Lauren, huh? What's going on there? I thought you two determined it would never work out?"
"I don't know. It wasn't so much about 'never' as it was about right then. She was so great the day of... the day of the funeral. We kind of reconnected and thought we'd see each other and maybe see where things go."
I try to smile to myself as I let myself into my room. I've never been Lauren's biggest fan, but she was always good to my brother. If things worked out between them, I'll be happy for him, even as the selfish thought starts to nag at me that in just a few months, Peter will be here, on this side of the country, with a girlfriend and all of his friends, while I am setting out on my own on the other side of the country. I know it's uncharitable and petty to think that, and I try to forget it had ever crossed my mind.
"That's great, Peter. I hope things go well." I flop down on my bed and start to think about how to fix the assignment I just messed up.
"Thanks, Bells. Hey, speaking of birthdays, Jasper asked the other day about how you're doing."
I tense slightly, wondering if Jasper told Peter what a creepy stalker his sister is - calling and not talking, not just once, but twice - but Peter sounds nonchalant for real this time. "That was nice of him. How is he? And what's that have to do with birthdays?"
"His birthday is today, actually. Last I saw him, he was headed to a bar with some of the guys."
Jasper hadn't said anything about his birthday when I'd called last week - now almost a week ago - but he doesn't seem like that kind of guy who would, so I'm not surprised. "Tell him happy birthday for me, will you?"
He agrees and I'm pleased I was able to pull off those couple of dozen words without blurting out anything about my goofy phone calls or Jasper in general.
We chat for a couple more minutes before Peter says he has go do a couple of things so that he can meet his friends at the bar. I close my phone and sit up slowly.
My heart is racing and has been since Peter said, "Jasper." I don't think it's fear that Peter would find out about my phone calls, because the pounding is only increasing, not abating. I take a couple of deep breaths and try to decide if this is a great opportunity to call Jasper under semi-normal circumstances, or a terrible idea.
His number is on the first page of my call log. Peter said he was out, so he probably won't even answer. I realize that calling him when he's busy is almost as cowardly as calling with no plan to talk, but I consider it a baby step. Maybe the next time I call, I'll do it with the intent of actually speaking with him.
I grumble at myself and my inanity as I push the "call" button. I quickly rehearse a "hi, happy birthday" message in my head while I wait for Jasper's recorded voice to tell me to leave a message.
To my surprise, the voice that answers is not recorded but live. Over the sound of a noisy background comes a surprised, "Bella?"
I'm as surprised as he is and react more out of instinct than anything else, my mouth opening before I have a chance to second-guess myself. "Jasper. Hi."
"Hey, hang on a second?" The volume of the background diminishes and is then gone. "Okay, just had to get somewhere quieter."
"I'm sorry to pull you away from your friends," I murmur.
"It's no problem. You're not. They'll wait. How are you?"
I can feel myself smile as it registers that the seemingly unflappable Jasper Whitlock is almost rambling. Hearing that he's nervous helps loosen some of my own tension and my heart rate finally starts to decrease. Before too much time can go by and he starts to worry that this will be another one-sided chat, I remember my reason for calling.
"I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday. Peter said it's today?"
"Yeah, the big two-two. Thanks."
"Are you having fun?"
"Well, there's beer and wings, and hockey on in the bar, so it's not bad...." In a quieter voice he adds, "It's really good to hear from you. That's probably weird."
"No. It's... I'm glad I called."
"Me, too."
Unexpectedly, I find myself wanting to tell him all sorts of things and ask him questions, but I know his friends are waiting. "I should let you go so you can get back to everyone."
"No, Bella-"
"I don't want to keep you. I just wanted to say happy birthday."
"Hey. So, it's my birthday, right?"
"That's the rumor...." I lie back against my comforter.
"Do I get a wish?"
"I don't know, did you blow out all of your candles?" I chuckle at the thought of Jasper in a goofy party hat.
"I did, in fact. My wish?"
"Sure. I'm not sure what I can give you from down here, but I'll see if I can dig out my magic wand."
"Tell me something about you."
His request is so simple it catches me off guard. "Um...."
"Come on, Bella. You listened to me ramble for two nights. Give me something."
Moments ago, I had a whole list of things I wanted to say to him, but now I can't think of a single one. I've never loved talking about myself and even though Jasper did spend two entire conversations doing just that, I'm still uncomfortable. I take a deep breath and try to man-up.
"Okay, well, what would you like to know? It's your birthday, you pick."
He's quiet for a moment. "Well, how about what you're doing after graduation? I don't have any idea."
"Oh," I say, hesitating just a little bit. That one percent of my brain - or maybe my heart - that I do my best to ignore, that wants me to think about Jasper as potentially more than just a friend, twinges. It really doesn't want me to tell him. The other ninety-nine percent wins out. "I'm going to be doing a one-year fellowship at the National Institutes of Health, and I'm starting grad school after that."
"That's out east somewhere, right?"
"Yeah, NIH is in Maryland. Grad school is Georgetown."
He pauses for a second too long and I try to discount what I think I hear in his voice, because it's impossible and fucking ridiculous. "Really? Georgetown, huh? That's awesome."
"I've wanted to go there ever since I was little. I initially thought it might be for law, though, but I changed my mind back in high school when the sciences were more interesting."
"They have a lot of great sports programs out that way." When he doesn't elaborate, I'm desperate to know what he's thinking, what's going on in his head.
"There's all sorts of sports stuff in DC. Basketball, hockey, football, baseball, soccer. I think it's one of the few cities that has all of the major professional sports." I smile a little at how Dad and Peter would be proud of me for recalling that.
"Yeah, it is. D.C. is great. There would be a lot of opportunity in a city like that for someone with a Sports Management degree. You're going to love it."
"I hope so. It's a three-year commitment, at least, so I'm in pretty big trouble if I don't." I try to keep my tone light, but I don't know if it works. I flash back to Peter's potentially renewed relationship with Lauren and feel a little bit of heaviness tug at my heart. "Anyway, now you really need to go before they hunt you down and make you do shots in the parking lot."
"You have no idea how high the chances are of that actually happening," he says, chuckling. "Thanks for calling, Bella. It was the highlight of my day."
"Well, here's hoping your birthday gets better than that."
"Seems unlikely," he says. My body's physical reaction to his words is instantaneous: my heart thuds irregularly because I can't tell if he was joking or not, and my skin prickles with a now somewhat-familiar shiver that I am coming to associate with Jasper.
"Have a good night, Jasper."
"You, too, Bella. Thanks again."
"You're welcome."
We leave it at that. I curl up on top of the covers to think. I want to read more into what he said about D.C. but I refuse to let myself go there. He doesn't even know me. I push away that shred of disappointment I know I heard and focus on congratulating myself for being enough of an adult to conduct a semi-intelligent conversation with the guy who is, I realize, slowly taking over all of my thoughts.
~ * ~
A week and a half later, we're up to conversation number five. With my speaking block gone, calling him the fourth time was easy. And this time, it's almost as if I've been doing it forever.
We're twenty minutes in and I'm tucked into bed when I slip and mention something about which I've been thinking. A lot.
"What does your tattoo say?" The one I saw when you were naked, my lips almost let slip.
"My tattoo?"
"Only if you want to tell me, though."
"No, of course, I just... never mind." I wonder if he has just remembered why I know about the words on his back. "'I know I was born, I know that I'll die, the in between is mine.'"
"Pearl Jam," I say, recognizing the "I Am Mine" lyrics. He had mentioned his love for Pearl Jam in passing, but this explains why he had come into my room when I'd been playing Vitalogy in Forks. I hadn't known if he'd used it as an excuse just to talk to me and even with all of the talking we've done since then, I'm a little disappointed that it maybe was just the music that brought him to my room. But the way he had looked at me and how he had leaned closer.... I brush it off, as I've already brushed off what happened between us. I know he had wanted me, but he's a guy- The train of thought isn't doing me any good so I stop it down, refusing to ruin this conversation by thinking about things that can't be changed.
"Yeah. And right above that-"
"Wait, there's more?"
"On my neck. I guess my hair was covering it. I probably need to get it cut...."
"Don't do that, I love your hair," I say absently as I think about Jasper walking away from me in the office and how the tattoo had flexed with the movement of his arms. I wish we'd had time for me to get a good look at words, to see the mark on his neck.
"What was that? You love my hair?" He sounds amused and I flush at my inadvertent admission before trying to backpedal without being obvious.
"Yes, it's very pretty."
"Hey! My hair is not 'pretty.'"
"It is so." I chuckle at his indignation, which is very cute. Cute... I shake my head and try to get the conversation back on track before we take it somewhere dangerous. "Anyway, tell me about the one on your neck."
"It's an Ouroboros. A dragon that's-"
"Eating its own tail."
"Yeah, that's right."
"When did you get them?"
"The Pearl Jam I got after sophomore year after... after some stuff happened. And the Ouroboros I got last year. We talked about them a little in a religion class I took and I really liked the symbolism."
"The continual recreation of life from itself and what came before?"
"Right. I was pretty... I don't know, depressed, maybe, for awhile after it became clear that playing baseball was not in my future. I'd been playing since I was little. It was sort of my anchor – wherever I went, when we moved, there was always Little League. When I had to give it up, I wasn't really sure what to do with myself."
"But you've figured it out?"
"I think so. And I liked the symbol because, well, out of every death... or ending, something new comes, you know? Even if it's not quite what you're expecting." He says the last bit quietly; I don't think he's still talking about the tattoo.
We're both silent for a few moments. I think about what he said and am curious about the "stuff that happened," but don't press. "That's really cool, all of it. I always like when tattoos have some sort of meaning. A girl on my hall freshman year got a huge abstract giraffe on her leg, after she saw a drawing on a menu at her favorite restaurant. It looked like a tree. You know she's going to regret that one of these days."
"Well, I was thinking about a butterfly or hummingbird for my next one. Something extra masculine."
"I am sure it will suit you well," I say, laughing. "Actually, I've kind of been thinking about getting one, maybe on my wrist." I'd had the idea a week or so ago, of getting something small for Dad, but haven't yet decided what I want, if anything.
"Really? If you come visit Pete, I can take you to the guy I used."
The line is silent. For the first time, one of us has crossed the invisible barrier between our phone calls and "real life" and suggested there could be more behind our late night conversations.
My excitement at the idea is tempered by the awkward silence.
"You know, that is if you'd want company." Jasper sounds like he's actively trying not to sound desperate as he tries to force us back to our usual air of casualness.
"That would be great. I'm sure I would be really nervous. I'm not so good with blood and stuff like that."
"So, you're not studying Bio for pre-med, huh?
I gratefully latch onto Jasper's offered change of topic. "No, definitely not. Although...."
We spend the rest of the conversation talking about our usual things and nothing of consequence.
This sates my common sense but leaves my heart disappointed.
~ * ~
My cell phone was in my hand when I fell asleep, so when the nightmare wakes me - half-screaming and all-crying - alone in my room just after two in the morning, I don't have to search for it.
"Call whenever you want," he said last week. I am sure he hadn't meant at this hour, but I need... something. Something I know he can provide. I feel momentarily guilty that I am calling Jasper when I would normally call my brother, but Peter was in Forks all weekend taking care of business with the house and Dad's will, and is probably exhausted. Also, he could use a break from consoling me.
Jasper picks up on the third ring and his voice is gruff. "Hey."
"Hey, Jasper. I'm sorry for calling...." I try to keep the shakiness out of my voice but fail spectacularly.
"Bella, what's wrong?" Concern replaces the gruffness and I choke on the sob that rises in my throat. "Bella?" I hear worry in those two syllables, which only makes me cry harder. "Hey, it's okay...."
He says soothing things that would sound like platitudes coming from anyone else; from him, they sound like wishes and promises. My mini-breakdown and his soft words make it hard to hear everything he says, but I don't think I imagine it when he whispers, "I wish I could be there to hold you, baby."
The tears fall harder for a moment because all I really want, aside from my dad to be alive, is for Jasper to be with me so he can do just that. The few seconds he had held me before Dad's wake, his arms around me in simple comfort, are still clear.
Several minutes later, the tears have dried to a trickle and I'm able to speak and breathe reasonably well.
"I'm so sorry I woke you," I mumble. I pull a Kleenex from the box next to my bed for the fiftieth time tonight.
"Ms. Swan, if you apologize one more time...."
"What? What will happen, Mr. Whitlock?" I feel a smile tugging at mouth as I wipe my nose.
"Let's just say I will refuse to be held responsible for my actions."
A small giggle escapes before I can corral it.
"Feeling better?" he asks.
"Yes, but...." I hesitate, afraid he'll think I'm silly, although I should be well past that worry after crying in his ear.
"But what?"
"What if it comes back? The nightmare?" I whisper. "I think things are better and then I have another dream or something reminds me...."
There is nothing but silence on the other end of the line. He rescues me just as I'm about to apologize and make a hasty retreat from the awkwardness I created.
"What if I stay on the phone with you until you fall asleep? And then stay around a little longer to make sure it doesn't come back? If you wake up, I'll be here."
Amid the torrent of malignant emotions, my skin goose-bumps at the possibility of staying up all night with Jasper, even if it's only on the phone. But I remember that he has an early class and he's already lost enough sleep because of me. "Jasper, you don't have to-"
"I know I don't, Bella. But there's so fucking little I can do for you from up here...." He's quietly insistent. "I want to make sure you get to sleep. If nothing else, it'll make me feel better about you being alone."
"So it's for your peace of mind?" I try to tease.
"If that means you'll say yes, then yes."
I want to be nobler and insist he go back to sleep, but my selfish side wins out. "Okay."
I situate myself under the covers, trying to find a comfortable way to hold my phone to my ear without worry of waking up with the button layout pressed into my skin. Gregor has taken up permanent residence in my bed, and I hold him with my other arm.
"All settled in?"
"Yes. You?"
"Yeah."
We talk for a few more minutes. Jasper tells me about a test he has on Wednesday in his Race Relations class; I describe an interesting article I'm reading for Bacterial Survival. He fake snores as I talk about a new lab procedure and we end up laughing quietly in the dark. I want to stay awake and keep talking, but the edges are getting blurry and my eyes won't stay open.
The last thing I hear before an unexpectedly peaceful sleep takes me is Jasper's voice whispering a soft, "Sleep well."
Legna betaed it all. The next chapter will be up on Saturday (1/23).
In other news, Elle was just made a VIP author over on A Different Forest - she joins LVP and a bunch of amazing Twific authors. Elle will be hanging out in LVP's cabin (link in profile) until she has her own. Come visit us both!
