I am so happy that the reviews are starting to pick up. I am probably the most self conscious person you might ever meet, so reviews make me less scared to write. Also, I write to better express myself and help myself with some stuff that happened as a child. So please, understand that I am not just writing for reviews or to become popular. I am writing to become a better person. I know, sounds stupid...Anyways....
On to Chapter Eight!
P.S Sorry if you hate this chapter, but I felt you needed to understand the characters better. Bella is first up and it starts to explain why on Earth she is putting Alice above herself.
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Waking up this morning was the hardest it had ever been. It wasn't due to my lack of sleep, although that wasn't helping, but because of the dreams I had to leave. I was pleasantly surprised by my lack of nightmares, however the fact that I was too afraid to leave my couch until four in the morning made we wonder if horror movies where a good distraction from Jasper drought. The reason though, that waking up this morning was so hard, was because of how amazing my dreaming had been.
Dream-world was much nicer than reality, considering unconsciousness meant being able to be with Jasper completely. In my dreams, Jasper was mine.
We didn't have anyone interfering; we were a pair and were able to be a pair. It was amazing, going on dates with him, kissing him in public. The fact that in my dreams I would wake up to a pair of toned arms wrapped around me made it all that worse when I woke up to a cold bed and the sound of a beeping alarm clock.
I wanted nothing more to return to bed and go back to the only place that Jasper and I could be, publically, a couple.
I began to worry slightly when I realized that in reality, I had no claim on him. We weren't even privately a couple.
I suddenly had the need for a cigarette, something that had not occurred in years.
----
Seated at my kitchen table, coffee in one hand and cigarette in the other, I thought about my options. I could do what I had originally planned, the thing I had done since I was a kid.
Put everyone else's happiness above my own.
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From a young age, I was my mother's pacifier so to speak. When she had issues, I was the one who filled her with false promises of 'it will be okay' and 'it's going to get better'. She should have been doing that for me instead, but it was her who seemed to be the child in our relationship. I spent my youth being my mother's mother. I knew that I was probably more messed up than her, yet I pushed my problems aside and helped her.
When I was fourteen, a boy at school had asked me to the fall dance. I said no, already knowing that I didn't want to go. The next day his ex-girlfriend had heard what happened and three of her friends joined her in abusing me. I wanted to bawl my eyes out and just have my mother comfort me for once.
Instead, she decided that was the day to tell me that she was still in love with my father who she divorced, so I had to spend hours telling her that she would have been miserable with Charlie because they simply didn't work. I cooked dinner, cleaned the house and baked her some cupcakes to cheer her up.
I never told my mother that I had been beaten up at school. I simply suffered in silence. She never even noticed my split lip or black eye. Her care for herself had given her rose coloured glasses when it came to me.
The same happened when I moved to Forks, Washington. I had left my home with Renee at sixteen, a few months after my mother had remarried. She wanted to travel will her new husband, but stayed home with me. It was the one time she did something un-selfish, but I was never grateful for it. She spent every day crying and complaining to the point where I finally left and moved.
Charlie, my father, was incredibly awkward and adorably fatherly. I think he understood me better than my mother could ever dream of. He knew when to ask questions and when to leave me alone. Her never hovered and yet showed me the exact right amount of attention.
I regretted not moving sooner.
It was his perfectly un-perfect attitude that made it impossible to ever act unhappy around him though. He was so sweet and caring that I refused to make him feel guilty or worry by being upset.
So, once again, I suffered in silence.
It became a habit. If I was upset, I tried to hide it from everyone as much as possible. I guess it made me bottle all my emotions, but during my childhood it seemed necessary and now it was just who I am.
I suddenly felt shame wash over me when I realized I had spent half of my time with Jasper crying or whinging.
Note to self; never weep or complain in Jasper's presence unless it is completely unavoidable.
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Suffering in silence and putting Alice's happiness above my own seemed like the most likely to happen. It meant I could keep my best friend un-harmed and innocent. She wouldn't have to deal with heartbreak yet, nor would she have to deal with being unwanted. Jasper could have the chance to be happy too, and he would not be alone.
But I would.
I sighed before taking a large gulp of the steaming hot beverage in my hand. Maybe if I drunk enough caffeine I would think clearer, or at least be peppy enough that Alice would not become suspicious.
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"Bella, what do you think?" I looked up to see Alice, hands on hips and eyes squinted.
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Jesus Christ," she muttered under her breathe before speaking louder. "Have you heard anything I have said today?"
"No, Alice, I have not. I have been too busy thinking of ways to make you happy and make myself fall out of love. But you know, feel free to bitch at me anyways. You don't know any better."
"If I say no, am I fired?" I jokingly said. She still seemed annoyed, and I realized teasing was not a smart move. "Sorry. I have a lot on my mind today. What am I supposed to have an opinion on?"
"I was talking about the contract, Bella. Do you think I need to add or change anything?" She put about twenty pages, neatly stapled in order, on my desk. I began to skim it, nodding as I read in hopes that Alice wouldn't notice that quite honestly...
I. Did. Not. Give. A. Shit.
"So, what do you think?" she asked excitedly, like this was something special, her prior bad mood now un-noticeable against her pride and glee. To me it was just a contract with extra zeros after the dollar sign. I turned to her with a fake smile plastered on my face while I wondered if she noticed my desperation to go back to my own work, or at least back to my thoughts and daydreaming.
"It's perfect, Alice. Great job," I complimented her as I turned back to my desk, hoping she would get the hint.
"Are you sure?" she asked, pulling my shoulder so I had to turn back to her. "I mean, I really need him to sign this so it has to be perfect. And I mean it Bella; it can't just be almost perfect it has to be more than one hundred percent perfect. I need to have Edward Cullen under my agency. It will mean wonders for the business!"
"Alice, I understand. It's absolutely perfect." Now, please leave me alone. For the love of God, leave me alone. "I don't mean to be rude, but I really need to get back to work."
Hazel eyes bore into brown as she stared at me. I felt self conscious, like she was trying to decipher sometime in my face. I closed my eyes and turned, once again, back to my desk.
"Thank you, Bella. You have been really patient with me and I'm sorry if I sometimes get under your skin. I'm just so desperate to make it, you know?" Stunned, I looked at her as she twirled a piece of hair around her finger and tucked it behind her ear. "I just...You know I love you, right?" I nodded, not fully knowing if I did or not. "If you ever need a break, just let me know. I mean, I would prefer it to be before or after Paris...but other than that, you can have as long as you want off okay?"
"Alice? Where is this coming from? I mean, I am really grateful, but this seems kind of..." I struggled to find the right words. "Weird."
"I noticed you looked tired and," she stared at me for a moment, her large eyes flickering all over my face. "You look quite sad, Bella." She pulled me in for one of her too tight, yet comforting, hugs. It was so familiar, yet unfamiliar. Comfortable, yet awkwardly handled due to my seated position. "I feel like we are beginning to drift apart," she murmured into my hair, her small hands clutching me tighter.
It was the first time since I had met Jasper over a week ago that I felt something other than guilt, annoyance, resentment, hate or despair when I thought of Alice.
With her here, trying to make me feel better and not even questioning me, I realized I had no reason to hate her. She was just a friend who unknowingly loves the guy I want. She never planned this, and for all she knew she actually had a chance with Jasper.
It was unreasonable to hate her for loving him but I couldn't help but hold a small distaste for her because of it.
Something my father once told me suddenly played in my head.
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"Love is completely unfair, unreliable and unreasonable," he said in response to my questions about my mother. We both knew that it would have been there eighteenth anniversary of being together, had they stayed together. I think it was our silent way of acknowledging it without saying it outright. It was one of the few times we talked deeply, and I remembered adoring someone treating me like an adult verbally but still taking care of me.
"Then why does everyone crave it so much?"
"Because, kiddo." He stood and ruffled my hair, his hands immediately picking up his empty beer bottle and my empty water bottle the second they were free. As he walked to the kitchen to get another drink for both of us, he stared at a picture of my mother and me.
The expression he had while staring at the picture was brief, but I could tell in that moment that regardless of the pain my mother caused him, for some bizarre reason he still loved her.
He gave me that reason in his next sentence. He spoke while staring at the picture, but his words were loud enough that they were clearly for me.
"Love is what it is. It hurts, and excuse me swearing this once, but if fucking sucks sometimes. But those few moments in a lifetime, when someone looks at you and you can tell that no matter what has happened before, or will happen in the future, that person would rather be nowhere else.
They look at you with...love. There is this way some people look at others and you would swear that they are a blind man seeing the sun for the first time. Hell, even sometimes the way someone holds your hand or smiles at you, you can feel that you mean the world to them at that exact second."
He walked to the kitchen while I sat there, thinking about what he had said. It was then that I realized that it was the longest I had ever heard my father speak in my life.
I wondered how often my mother had made him feel like that, and if I would ever experience that; the feeling, the touch or the look he had described.
He returned a few minutes later, and I swore he had been crying due to the slight glisten of his eyes that made them appear wet. He gave me my water, as he opened his beer. He took a long drink before turning to me and squeezing my shoulder. "It's those rare moments; the ones where you feel at home no matter where you are that make love worth it, Bells."
Later that night, when I was about to go to bed, my father had called me in to his room. I stood at the door, pretending not to notice the photo albums from my newborn years in which my mother was frequently photographed. I pretended not to notice the tears in his eyes or the way his voice shook when he spoke, or the pain he so clearly felt.
Because like me, Charlie was the 'suffer in silence type.' I knew that we both knew how he felt, but also knew that he would rather me leave him to mourn, so to speak.
"Come here, Bells." He patted the spot beside him on the bed, which I took. Leaning on him, trying to give him affection without being too obvious, I wrapped an arm around him.
"I want you to promise me something, okay?" He must have felt my head nodding against his shoulder, as he continued. "If you find that love that I talked about today, never let it go. Even if it tries to leave, don't let it. Reach out with both hands and hold it as tight as you can," he murmured.
What happened to if you love it, let it go, if it come back that's how you know? I thought.
I assumed I had only thought them, but a few minutes later after we had said our goodnights, I realized I must have spoken them.
As my hand reached for his bedroom light on my way out, I heard him murmur.
"Those who say let love go never had love never come back."
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Pulled out of my thoughts by a semi-loud noise, I realized Alice had left the room and closed the door.
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For the next few hours I had that conversation with my father playing in my head. His words had never held much meaning before, I guess because even the idea me being in love seemed impossible.
I considered all my options and realized something.
There was no fucking way I was suffering in silence this time.
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Author's Note;
Ahem...
I don't really have interesting to say, other than this is my longest chapter yet I think. My brain went into overload and I realized what I had originally planned just would not do.
I feel bad for Charlie. I nearly cried writing the part with him. I am such a sap lately. Did anyone else feel bad for ol' Charlie Swan?
I thank some of my girls who are reviewers, because honestly if not for them I would probably have spent today in bed really sad. I have a lot of life stuff going on, and I have to suffer in silence.
Sorry if anyone got pissed by how much back-story happened here, but it was necessary. I think you guys can understand why it was, and if not just think. Do you think a completely happy with her life person would be willing to suffer in silence? Not likely, sweets.
ANYWAYS; Reviews are amazing. Heck, this would have been 1,000 words of...filler again. Instead you get a turn in plot! Bella has a plan now. -is laughing out loud right now cause you are all in the dark so to speak-
Thanks again, reviews are a golden way to thank me back.
I love you all,
Jade.
