12.

I woke slowly, in disbelief because my dreams had been angry and this feeling was not. My aching hand was stretched out before me, the ice bag melted uselessly. I groaned and stretched out. Alice was conspicuously absent, but I understood that to be the sweat-soaked sheets more than me. I could be reasonable in this case.

I got up, showered, and dressed before consulting my cigarettes. As I smoked I studied my hand, looking for spots too sensitive or of a darker swelling than the others. For once the morning seemed peaceful and the air still; I found that my head was clear – even if I was alone and without external distractions. This must be what normal feels like.

Alice knocked on the door and waited patiently. I admitted her – there was nothing here she had not seen before – and returned to the window for my unfinished cigarette. Alice wrinkled her nose and took a seat across from me as I leaned into the gray morning.

"You don't need to go to school today," she said.

I looked over and brushed the hair from my face with my palm. "Why?"

She looked desperate and unsure. I knew immediately that the nightmare had been fragmented. She was as clueless of what might happen as I was. "There was screaming, Jasper," she said finally. "I don't know anything except that it was your voice. It was in pain."

I snorted out a laugh and shook my head. Alice's dreams could be highly questionable, even to one as faithful as me. Most likely, it was a dream of no consequence – or a late arrival about yesterday's incident. Her dreams had been known to come too late, too early, or in the wrong settings before.

"Don't worry about it," I said, holding back a cough. "I'll be fine."

"You promise?" I remembered then that Esme was taking her to Seattle on a campus tour today; she wanted reassurance of my safety since she couldn't have proof.

I smiled softly, surprised that it was genuine, and brushed a wisp of hair from her face. Her fierce need to protect me was astounding. "Promises, Alice."

She closed her eyes and sighed.

There was a rapid knock on the door. Alice and I spun around like two kittens caught spilling the jar of cream as my door opened again. I flicked my cigarette out the window behind my back and swiped at the smoky air. It was only Edward, but he saw Alice with me and paused.

"You coming to breakfast?" His eyes flickered between the two of us before lingering on Alice. They narrowed briefly and she jumped to her feet and skipped from the room. Edward paused until she was out of hearing range before speaking again.

"How are you feeling?"

"Fantastic," I replied with a wry grin.

Edward chuckled and shook his head. "How is your hand feeling?"

I looked down and sighed. I was not in the mood for a conversation right now; my mood was too good. "Like shit, and no, I'm not eating breakfast."

He shrugged and looked around my room as he did so. "Then I guess I'll get you before we leave for school."

I spread my hands and smiled widely. It was a sarcastic smile of sorts and Edward's face immediately lost its friendly glow. He turned on his heel and left. My smile faded back into contemplative thought. I did not think I could take any more bad days, and I was fearful of what kind of day today would be. My mood was holding solid, but I could not trust it to hold throughout the day; like an entirely separate entity from conscious thought, it had a notorious habit of changing without my consent and leaving me with the results.

The car horn honked and I looked down to see Edward waiting in the drive. I sighed and got to my feet. Today, I thought forcibly as I took a deep breath, will be a good day. I was not sure if I was convincing karma or myself, but if I kept repeating the litany eventually one of us would believe it.

Our drive to school was awkwardly silent. Edward had his mind on the road and drove slowly, even turning off the radio as a precaution. I personally had not thought the weather was that bad until I had walked out of the house and slipped down the front steps. I hated cold weather precisely for this reason – an abominable amount of snow, misery, and ice. Needless to say, I was excited when we pulled into the parking lot and I could escape the silver harbinger of certain, icy death.

Edward was already making his way toward the building ahead of me. I paused and for a moment, lit my cigarette and began walking as well. The going was tough for me, however, and I caught myself on the hood of his Volvo as I fell. I was already beginning to feel grumpier. Damn weather. A truck roared into the lot and I realized why karma was being such a bastard.

As she parked, I gingerly made my way over to the orange truck. She turned around as soon as she jumped from the driver's seat and checked the wheels – rigged with chains – and I cursed as I lost my footing again. Why? Why must I right karma just right now?

"Oi, Bella!" I called out to her and snickered, unable to keep a straight face as her surprise caused her to slip. So much for graceful.

She turned on me. I almost recoiled from the anger in her eyes. "What do you want?"

I was about to snap back and officially fuck over my karma when I heard an unearthly sound. We both froze, and then I saw the van careening toward her. The cigarette dropped from my grasp. My body was moving quickly before my brain could tell me to just let her get hit – just shout for her and stay out of the way – and, even when my efforts were so heroic, I lost footing on the ice again just as I grabbed her. We both fell; I heard her head crack against the pavement and cursed loudly as I scrambled to my knees, trying to pull her to safety.

It was useless. My vision was swallowed up by the overturned van as it spun around the corner of her truck. With one arm I managed to spin half of her body underneath the truck as I braced for impact. A wave of broken glass hit me before the van did; I flinched, dread overwhelming me at the manner of my death, and froze helplessly as the pain hit me.

The crash was… epic. I don't know why I bothered to brace for it; if my hand was not broken before it certainly was at that moment. I felt that pain, and then my face smacked against the ground as I lost coordination and fell into the van's path a second time. My vision crackled and turned to static. I held onto Bella tightly as we skidded across the glass and ice and came to a stop beneath her truck. There was an immense groan of metal against metal and then silence.

I opened my eyes and saw a dim haze of light before me. I breathed a curse through the pain and scrambled forward, pulling her with me. Once I had more room I peered down at her face; her eyes were closed, but I could see nothing else. I put a hand on her chest to feel for a heartbeat, but she fucking wore layers so I had to check her neck for a pulse. She was alive.

I sighed with relief. "You okay?" I whispered as I tapped her cheek. She groaned and tried to move, but our bodies were still entangled and I was heavier than her. Her eyes flashed open.

"You hit your head. Are you okay?" My voice was low and fervent. She nodded, but I heard the uneven breaths coming from her body and that was never good. Her eyelids flickered. "Stay still… don't move."

I blinked furiously. My eyes were burning; it occurred to me that I was crying, but that thought was soon corrected when my vision went red. I was blind and unable to see the people who were flooding the scene. My first instinct was to wipe my hand across my face – and then I remembered the glass coating my skin. Blindness it is, then.

"Ms. Swan, can you hear me?" A paramedic.

Bella did not respond. "I think she has a concussion," I supplied weakly, my consciousness fading in and out like a badly tuned television as I looked down blindly to where her face should have been. "She… hit… her head."

The voices turned on me. "Get him out of there."

I protested, but hands stronger than my will wrenched me free. There was a roaring scream as I came free, and, though the sound subsided as soon as I was on the stretcher, the pain would not go as easily. I was being jostled through the crowd, treated roughly like a package of meat as I hissed in shallow breaths. Maybe that's what I looked like. People murmured my name and I flinched with every bounce of the paramedics' steps, my pain threshold approaching.

"Fuck, it hurts," I complained and abruptly the jostling ceased. The doors were slammed shut and for a moment my ears rang. Silence and static quickly won over, however, and, though I was painfully awake, I lost sense of time or space.


The saga will continue. There may be another update before I leave for Boston next week; I have not decided that. Maybe some reviews to get me over 100 will help me continue this so we can see further repercussions of Jasper's bad karma. If not: I'll see you in two weeks!