Chapter seven

"That's not a full house, there, friend," Jasper drawled, pointing to my cards.

"It is! It's... all the same color," I said, moving to take the pot on the table.

Emmett smacked my hands away and Jake squeezed my waist as I sat on his lap.

"I'll google it," Jess said, whipping out her phone.

"Tell 'em Jake," I said, leaning back into Jacob.

"B. It's just...I mean, it's pretty and all. But it's not a full house."

I looked down at the cards.

"My grandma told me a full house was all red cards," I said, and the entire table burst into laughter.

"Shut up!" I laughed, throwing a poker chip at Jasper, who flicked one back with a snap of his fingers. Emmett scooped up his beer out of the line of fire, just as another chip went whizzing by his head.

"Yo, watch it, ass wipe," Emmett grinned, picking up the chip and trying to snap it back, only it fell lamely to the floor.

"Nah, man. You can't treat her like a quarter. These are clays, Emmett," Jasper said like that was supposed to mean something. He proceeded to educate Emmett on properly adjusting your finger position to accommodate for the increased girth of the poker chip, and Newton sat there making obvious innuendo after every single thing they said. After a few snickers over "keep your hand firm" and "Emmett, I said to be gentle," the boys finally started snapping chips at Mike.

"Have you ever seen any more obvious homoerotic subtext in your life?" Rosalie murmured. Me and Jess nodded, our lips in firm lines, trying to hold back the laughter bubbling underneath. It all felt good.

After dodging a few errant chips, Jake took one final, deep inhale on his Camel and tossed it in the ashtray before tossing me on his shoulder, protecting me from the flying chips.

"Try it now, suckers!" I called from behind Jake.

Rose came from behind and since I was upside-down, my hair hanging in my face, I had no warning that I was about to get doused with her fruity cocktail. I could smell the coconutty-pineapple stickiness dripping down my skull and I shrieked in maddened delight. Then it was a free-for-all that ended with all of us in a drunk, laughing mess.

I leaned back and smiled around the table, taking a mental snap, keeping this moment safe, as I'd learned to do.

It was funny how somehow, we'd all gravitated back together like we always did. Like it was no big deal, like we hadn't been avoiding doing this for over a year now. Like everything was normal and we weren't all cracked, empty vessels scrambling like hell to replace the emptiness by plying ourselves with alcohol and by forging forced, new memories.

Because Edward was not there.

But Jacob was, and so was his laughter.

Emmett and Rosalie were courteous to each other in the beginning of the evening, but after a few drinks in, they were downright flirtatious. This, too, felt normal and forced into normal. Jasper drifted around but always came back, glancing down at his phone often, texting a girl named Alice with this stupid smile on his face.

Some things are just meant to be, so much so that no matter what, the earth pulls them together like magnets, like a dog that always finds its way home. Some things cannot be stopped from being together, and you just have to believe that. You have got to believe the right thing will happen, no matter how long it takes to heal and get right.

xxxxx

"The diner wants to do a fundraiser in his name," Esme said without inflection. We were sitting on her sofa, she staring straight ahead as I goggled at her. "I don't care. It's up to you."

"A fundraiser," I repeated slowly.

"For missing and exploited kids," she said quietly, finally breaking the stoic mien she had been affecting since I had knocked on her door.

"Oh," I said, blowing out a breath. "They're trying to be nice, I suppose."

"I know," Esme said, a light smile on her lips, her eyes far away.

She had been on a steady diet of tranquilizers for the past year. Esme used to be the woman organizing all of the fundraisers, always so crisp and efficient, even vivacious. Being chipper and enthusiastic was what she did best, so it only seemed natural that she would spearhead all sorts of philanthropic activities.

She hadn't been doing any of it for over a year now. It just goes to show you, even the best of us can be brought down low, torn apart. Maybe with no hope of mending.

"I can't get over it, Bella," she said, turning to me, a wild look in her tearing eyes. "I just can't. I can't pour myself into work or helping others. I joined this group of mothers with missing kids and they all pour themselves into helping others. They say they do it so their child's tragedy isn't in vain, but maybe I'm just too selfish. I can't do it. I just keep thinking that he's out there...and he needs me."

I expelled a shaky breath and sat next to her on the sofa. I awkwardly patted her hand because I never did figure out how to comfort others. I always figured that simply being there was enough, but in this case... so many of her memories of Edward were entangled with me. It suddenly occurred to me that it must kill Esme to see me, to talk to me. Or maybe she needed to see me so that she wouldn't forget? I wasn't sure and I was scared that I wasn't doing the right thing and I was desperate to run off but I was even more desperate to stay because... she was the only one who believed besides me, and I needed that. I always needed that. Maybe that's why Esme needed me, too.

"It evolved for those other people. For everyone else. The whole town just...got by. I can't, Bella. I carried him in me and I created him and I just cannot let him go. I wish I could."

"Esme...I...this thing, with Jacob-"

"No. No," Esme said, her soft, understanding smile the first I had seen on her in more than a year. "I wouldn't, even Edward wouldn't...begrudge you that. Don't do that. Don't not live."

"I'd rather he come home," I whispered.

"Me, too."

xxxxx

Very, very early, just before dawn on Edward's eighteenth birthday, Emmett and I met in the meadow.

It's not that we didn't intend to tell anyone else. We simply didn't.

"Eighteen," Emmett breathed out. The streaks of blue and aqua limning the horizon were starting to give way to a soft pink and orange haze. We were both facing it, my eyes closing as I breathed in the crisp, dewy air around us. I could smell the wet grass, the rich and moist soil. There were few sounds but the air seemed poised for something, ready to make a jump on the day, maybe, expectant and full of the promise of new things, a new season.

"Happy birthday," I whispered.

"Doesn't seem right that like...we're going to graduate. We're going to grow up and go to college and get jobs and wives and shit and he's... He'll always be just...stuck."

"Forever sixteen," I said, then I was struck with the thought of me, at thirty, still in love with a sixteen-year-old boy.

"He woulda been a helluva ball player," Emmett said and with that, he drew his arm back and threw Edward's winning Regionals ball so high and so far out in to the forest, I wondered if it could've reached wherever it was Edward went.

xxxxx

I spent the rest of the day with Jake.

"Bella?"

"Yeah?" I asked, sitting up on his bed, adjusting my bra strap.

We were in Jake's bed.

We never, ever went to mine.

It was this thing. This ridiculous, last thing I held onto. Because someday, maybe not in this world, but some day...I wanted to be able to tell Edward that I had saved something. That there was a sacred thing.

I never let another boy in my purple bed or through that open window.

"You know it's okay to feel different about me, right?" Jake finally said, his cheeks turning pink.

"What?" I asked, suddenly self-conscious, that maybe I'd done something wrong.

"I know what today is, Bella," he offered, quiet and still, as Jake often is when discussing this particular subject. "You're sad, and it's okay. I don't expect you to like... miss him less because I'm here. I'm not him, and you weren't done with him by choice. I'm not trying to replace anyone, you know?"

"I know," I said softly, looking down at my hands, but it was a lie. I hadn't known that. And it felt so good to hear him say it.

"Thank you, Jacob," I told him simply, my head falling onto his shoulder.

"Nah," he said with a seemingly dismissive wave of his hand. "Just consider it an early graduation gift." He grinned his easy grin and thrust an envelope in front of my face.

"Jake, we don't graduate for months," I laughed. "What is it?"

"Open it and see," Jake said, rattling the envelope and rolling his eyes.

"What did you do?" I asked, eyes narrowed, snatching the envelope from him.

He smiled with anticipation as I opened the envelope and peered inside.

"A plane ticket." I said, my voice very even. "You trying to get rid of me?"

"Come to Phoenix with me. Over spring break."

"Jake."

"Don't say no yet."

"There are like a zillion reasons...and my parents are at least half of them," I said, biting my lip.

"It's cool...Billy talked to Charlie before I bought the ticket."

"What?" I gasped. "Are you serious?"

"Totally serious," Jake said, plucking the envelope from me and kissing my lips.

"I mean..."

"My sisters are there. I wanted to see them over the break. I want you to meet some of my old friends and just...let's hang out in Arizona?"

"Okay," I shrugged, laughter bubbling up.

"Yeah?" Jake asked, hopeful and lifting a corner of his mouth.

"Yeah."

He whooped and jumped off the bed, reaching down to put his arms around me and lift me inches in the air.

"You'll love it. I know it. We'll get you a tan and everything."

"I burn," I told him.

"Then I'll SPF the shit out of you."

xxxxx

"God, you're so lucky. I'm going to hang in Port Angeles over spring break," Jess said with obvious disgust and envy, plopping on my bed.

"I'll be here in Forks," Rosalie said. "Em and I talked about going to Seattle for a few days or whatever, but he's got baseball training camp or some shit, so we're tied here."

I didn't let the sting of that take the smile from my face, even though I felt it. In an alternate universe, I'd be tied here because of baseball camp, too.

"Are you staying with his sisters?" Jess asked.

"No, in a hotel," I said, and at this, all ears perked ;up.

I was our only remaining virgin.

It wasn't even by choice, really. It's just...plans and expectations having been derailed and all.

"Sharing a room?" Jess sang.

"Yeeeessss," I mocked back, shoving a pillow at her.

"Well. Are you gonna do him or what?" Rose asked.

"Yeah. You like, totally should. Homeboy's pretty hot, you know. Lots of girls are always eyeing him when we're all out, yours truly included," Jess said seriously.

"Jess!"

"Look, it's good for Michael to know he's not the only meat up for offering on the chopping block. Not that I'd ever poach or anything," she added quickly.

"I know," I said fondly, patting her hand.

"Quit changing the subject, Jessica," Rosalie said primly. "Our girl here needs to think about her options and first discuss them with us. So? Bella? Are we taking the F train and getting off at D street, or what?"

"I don't know," I shrugged. "I guess I should. I don't know. I don't want to like...make some big, elaborate plan."

"Why not?" Jess asked.

"Because. Because shouldn't it just...happen?"

My mind flashed to the past, to unexpected touching and promises, eager hands and hesitant words. Fluttering in my stomach like lightness, like air, like remembering something that you never, ever want to share with another person and then plummeting when you realize the one person you could share it with just... wasn't.

"I don't know," Jess shrugged. "Me and Mike did it after an argument involving a Taco Bell value meal, Facebook and that girl who's the denim expert at the Gap," Jess said, like we could have ever forgotten that.

"Me and Emmett did it after homecoming like the most cliched teenagers ever."

"It's just weird," I said with a shrug. They looked at me and waited. We hadn't discussed Edward in a long time at that point.

"Why?" Rose asked quietly.

"Because...I mean. I just always assumed it'd be with Edward. It's like...just a matter of rearranging it in my mind, I guess."

Rosalie laid back on the bed against Jess's legs and hummed.

"For what it's worth, Bella you're really doing well. I think we all are."

"I just wish I knew that he was dead," I blurted out, freezing the room. "Then maybe I could go to sleep and not be worried about him. That's the worst," I said, now on a roll, but I wasn't crying. "It's like, if he's out there and in trouble or in pain or having the time of his life- I can't not worry about him. It's like, this constant thing on my mind no matter what. If he was dead, I could just cry and get the hell over it, but I can't because there's not even a body, you know?"

It was the most removed from Edward Cullen I'd felt since the first day I laid eyes on him. There's not even a body.

Later that afternoon we went to the cemetery. There was no headstone for Edward. Esme and Carlisle opted instead to put his name on a plaque on a bench; I assumed it was a compromise between hanging on and letting go.

The girls roamed around while I sat on that bench and took a few heavy breaths, re-reading his name over and over.

Esme insisted there be no dates on the plaque- not a birth, not a death- just a memory. She was never willing to stunt his life in that way.

"You," I breathed out. "Really fucked me up."

"If you were here, I wouldn't think twice about taking trips or just kissing in a backseat, but nothing comes easy anymore. Edward, it's like I'm taking you into account in every simple move I make but at the same time, I'm starting to feel like a fool for it. You're turning into a childhood memory and I hate that.

"Don't get me wrong, I know I was lucky. I know how lucky I was to have been loved by you. To be next to you and touch you and listen to you sing to the radio and be in your life. I know that. But wow. As great as it was to have you, the harder it has been being without you. There's this part of me that wishes that you never even looked in my direction. Because then I wouldn't know what...being without you is like.

"That sounds selfish, but I wouldn't be this fucked up without you if I never had you. I'm sorry. I shouldn't say that. Because the truth is, I hope wherever you are that maybe, you feel the same way about me still.

"Forks is gonna play this season without you, and I told Em I'd go watch but I don't know. You know I hated baseball anyway and...and...no one else looks good in tights."

I wiped my cheeks and took a deep breath, grabbing deep down for grace, to say everything I needed to say.

"You just left so quickly, and I'm confused how you could've been my whole world before we barely even started," I whispered, shrugging my shoulders. "How you still dictate my life without even being here is just kind of insane...and Edward. You changed me and I don't know why. You were here, you were amazing and then just...nothing. So what was the point? Just to set me on this course and then fuck me up? And you were supposed to be so fucking much. You were gonna set the whole world on fire and then bam. Nothing. It's a fucking waste."

I rested my finger over his shiny name, tracing it with feather-like brushes from my fingertips.

"And now I'm swearing at you," I laughed, shaking my head.

"So. Look. There are promises that I feel are void because you ditched. I can't be only yours anymore," I said, then I choked on the next words. They wouldn't come.

I tried again.

"There are certain things I'll see through, though. I'll think of you every night, I promise. And I'll love you, forever sixteen. I will. I think I could love someone else differently? Like, when I get older and have a job and get mar- when I'm older, it'll be different. But you'll always be the time of my life. The love I learned. And no one will have a better smile or look better in tights. I will love you. I promise. And…you're the best," I finished, letting him win his dumb game at long last. "You'll always be best."

I stood up, brushing the debris from my pants and the tears from my face and turned to go, then paused.

"His name is Jacob Black. You'd hate him," I said, then patted the bench.

Thank you, once again, for your kind reviews! Even the not kind ones, really. I still can't believe the response to this story!

ETA: I didn't realize my page breaks weren't translating over when I uploaded. So sorry! That's super jarring and would take me out of the story and I'm surprised more of you haven't yelled at me for it. I will try to pay better attention next time. So... edited to insert page breaks. Would XXXXXs be better?