I am finally back with a new chapter! I'm sorry it took me so long, but life has been incredibly busy lately... Thank you for the kind reviews - I really appreciate them! Hope everybody had a merry christmas and see you in 2018

Like a Sister

Saturday 11-16-11/7:16 p.m.

Emmett's Pov.

We had all been called to the living room, but none of us really knew, what was going us, so we were a little tense. I didn't like to be kept in the dark about things that were obviously important. "I heard you have news?" I asked and Carlisle sighed and nodded. He went on to explain that Bella was alright. There didn't seem to be anything wrong with her heart, which was definitely good news and I was relieved. He also told us that Bella was pretty severely underweight, but it wasn't like that was something any of us had had any doubts about. One only had to catch a glimpse of Bella's tiny figure to realize that putting on a few pounds would do her a lot of good.

Carlisle hesitated. He was clearly nervous, which in turn worried me. He told us the whole story of how he picked up her lab results and brought her to the cardiologist's office while looking over them. He struggled for words, which was very unusual for Carlisle. He was probably the calmest and most thoughtful person I had ever met and I was reasonably sure that I had never seen him lost for words. He was stuttering and it was bewildering to see him like that. After several failed attempts at explanations, he eventually gave up and went to his office to just show us the paper with the mysterious results.

When he came back, Edward demanded to have a look at it and Carlisle handed him the paper. My brother carefully looked at all the different blood values and for a few seconds, he didn't seem to see anything out of the ordinary. Then his eyes suddenly stopped moving and he furrowed his brow. "Oh" was all he managed to say. I was slowly getting irritated with them. Could it really be this hard to just let the rest of us know what was going on. I had never been the most patient person, and my impatience made it hard for me to stay calm.

I gave up and went over to my brother to see if I could by any chance figure out what was going on myself. He was still holding the paper in his hands, so I tried to look over his shoulders, but it just looked like a random compilation of numbers and letters. How could they read anything from this? I tried to look at it again, without success. "What?" I finally asked. Nobody even tried to explain. "What is this supposed to tell me?" I specified and Edward looked at me gravely. He took a deep breath. "She is pregnant."

It felt like my head had started spinning. Pregnant? Bella? Was this some kind of distasteful joke? I closed me eyes. It couldn't be - Carlisle wasn't one to make fun of situations like this one. I was starting to feel sick. "Damn" I muttered and saw how Esme gave me a brief condemning look. For a few moments, we were all taken aback by Edward's words. We had most definitely not expected this. I had assumed that it was going to be bad, but it would never have crossed my mind that Bella, of all people, could be pregnant.

I looked over to Rose to see what she was making of this and was staggered to find out that she was probably the least confused of all of us. In fact, she looked like she wasn't very surprised at all. I couldn't stop myself from quietly muttering profanities. How was I supposed to deal with this kind of information? And what did Rosalie understand that the rest of us didn't? How could she stay so ... composed? I took her hand and gently squeezed. She looked at me, but then turned to the others.

"She is pregnant?" Rose asked. There was almost no emotion in her voice. Did she really care this little about Bella? Did she not care how this girl's world had just been flipped upside down? I had noticed that Rosalie didn't seem to care much about Bella, but could she really be this cold? Or was I just missing something? Was she hoping that she had misunderstood Edward? More and more questions kept popping into my head.

Carlisle nodded and Esme asked how far along she was. The news seemed to have hit her hard and she looked upset. "Around four weeks, I believe" Carlisle answered. I could see how Esme thought about the new piece of information for just a fraction of a second, then she suddenly stopped and looked at her husband. "But that's almost exactly when she accepted our offer! She called on October 24th to tell me she had changed her mind. That's about three and a half weeks ago!," she said. This confused me even more. What did this have to do with the pregnancy? None of this made any sense to me.

To my surprise, Carlisle agreed and said something about how it would be too big of a coincidence - I didn't really see how it would be - and how he was worried about it. Alice finally muttered that she didn't understand either, which reassured me a little bit. At least, I didn't seem to be the only one who couldn't make any sense of all the things that had been said in the past few minutes. It was driving me crazy. Suddenly, Rose let go of my hand and sighed.

"Come on! Don't you see?" she said. "There must be a reason why Bella would all of a sudden want to come here. One does not spontaneously decide to move to the other side of the world without a reason. What could have made her leave her home? I'm sorry to have to say this, but coming from her school to ours is a pretty sharp decline. She left behind all friends and family head over heels. Bella does not seem like somebody who would make such a big decision without thinking about all the consequences. She might be spontaneous and adaptable, but she wouldn't make such rash decisions without having a real reason. This is where the pregnancy comes into play."

I gave her a bewildered look. What did she mean? Carlisle bit his lip, then he seemed to understand what she was trying to get at. The rest of us, on the other hand, had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. Rosalie took a deep breath - it sounded surprisingly shaky - and then grabbed my arm, as if she needed something to hold on to. I put my remaining arm around her and lightly kissed her hair. Why was she suddenly so upset? All of this kept getting more and more confusing.

"Rose... Everything is alright. Calm down, there isn't anything you have to be afraid of" I whispered in her ear, trying to comfort her. She jerked her head in my direction. "No Emmett, nothing is alright! How can you not see it? Isn't it obvious?" she replied. I shook my head and gently rubbed her back. Carlisle was the next one to speak. "Emmett, I believe what Rosalie is trying to tell you and the rest of us is, that there seem to be parallels between her life and Bella's current situation. Maybe - and I pray to god that this isn't the case - Bella had to encounter a similar cruel fate as Rosalie did a long time ago."

His voice sounded professional. There wasn't much emotion, which usually was a pretty clear sign that something was bothering him so much that he had to try to distance himself from it.

But was that really possible? I could subconsciously feel how Rose's grasp of my arm grew even firmer, to a point where it was almost painful, but that didn't bother me at the moment. Bella? She was supposed to be the victim of such a vicious crime? Nobody deserved having to make such horrible experiences, but I couldn't wrap my head around it happening to Bella. She was still so young - just 16... She was a very petite young woman and probably wasn't remotely strong enough to defend herself against a man. It made me incredibly angry, but I knew that it would not at all be helpful if I snapped now, so I tried to stay calm and focus on getting Rose through this difficult moment. But still, why Bella? It just wasn't fair. "Life isn't fair, Emmett. It's always the innocent ones who get hurt, isn't it?" Edward said bitterly. "Just stay out of my head, Edward" I sighed.

We all knew what had already worried Carlisle and Rosalie so much and it was as if a big heavy cloak had been laid over us. Nobody dared to say anything anymore. We were speechless. Even Alice hadn't said a word in at least half an hour. Then, Esme sobbed and the sound broke the uncomfortable silence. It was heartbreaking. My siblings and I thought of Esme as a mother and seeing her cry was painful. She had saved us from doing stupid things so many times and we loved her with all our hearts. Usually, she was always there to give us advice and comfort us and to see her suffer was difficult.

"But why her?" Alice asked. "I don't know, Alice" Rosalie said. "There is never a reason, at least not in my eyes. It is something that can't be justified and I refuse to try to explain it. It just doesn't make any sense." Alice smiled feebly. "I can't imagine what it must feel like, but it has got to be horrible. Nobody deserves to experience this kind of pain." Esme was still crying, but she seemed calmer. "She is only 16. Her whole world must have collapsed. I can't even fathom how desperate she must have been to run away from home."

Esme herself had been abused by her husband for a long time until she finally got pregnant and escaped. I knew that it hadn't been easy for her, but now it suddenly appeared to me, that her situation might not be so different from Bella's. I knew that victims almost always knew their rapists. Had Bella's trust been broken by someone she loved. Was it just some stranger? I couldn't know and I wasn't even sure if I wanted to. Rosalie slowly loosened her grip on my arm. "Esme, how did you deal with your pregnancy when you were still human?" she asked.

Our mother seemed to chose her words very carefully. "It was most definitely not easy for me, but I had always wanted children and I was married to Charles after all, so he wasn't technically doing anything illegal. At the time, there was no such a thing as rape or even abuse within marriage. There were several times I was close to leaving Charles and when war broke out and he was drafted, my mother helped me prepare for an escape. But it somehow wasn't meant to be because just when I had packed my things, Charles returned and of course, he would have never let me leave. As his wife, I didn't have many rights, so I had no choice but to stay with him. I don't remember much of my time with Charles, anymore, but I still know how I felt when I realized that I was pregnant. It was clear to me, that there was no way I could raise a child in that household."

For a few moments, she thought about how to go on. "I wasn't thinking about myself, when I left town in the middle of the night. I was only thinking about my unborn child. My own mother had always been kind to me and I loved her very much and my father had often been hard on us, but I didn't seriously resent him either. Charles wasn't the type of person one would want anywhere near their children. He was a heavy drinker and didn't know when it was time to stop." Then, a smile appeared on her face.

"Of course, I had never forgotten about Carlisle even though I hadn't seen him in ten years. He still was the man of my dreams. I hadn't married Charles out of love. He was simply was my best option at the time and I didn't want to die alone. I also knew that my parents would approve of him - they had already started worrying that I would never find a husband - and he didn't seem like a bad guy when I first met him."

"Anyway... I travelled all the way from central Ohio to Ashland, Wisconsin. It was a very long journey and I had to stop in several towns to earn some money before being able to move on. I had a cousin up in Milwaukee and she had offered me to stay with her. I wanted to get as far away from Charles as I could, and especially back then, there was no way he could have found me in a small town in northern Wisconsin. Of course, life wasn't easy there either. I was pregnant without a husband. I took any work I could get. First, I was earning some money as a server, but then I figured out that it was easier to pass as a war widow. I wasn't as much of a disgrace and actually managed to be a school teacher. That made getting by a little easier, but people still thought it was pretty scandalous to be a pregnant single woman" Esme laughed bitterly. It was strange to look at Esme as someone scandalous.

"I'm so glad that times have changed and young women today don't have it as hard as I did, but I'm sure that carrying and raising a child alone still isn't without struggles. But well, a few days before I went into labor, I had to stop working and in the middle of September, I gave birth to little Joseph. I loved him with all of my heart and he finally gave my life a purpose again. It was as if being his mother had been my calling.

He was already a rather small and sickly baby when he was born, but when he got a lung infection before he was even a week old, things started looking very bad for him. The poor child hardly ever cried and he slept all the time. The doctors at the hospital made it very clear from the beginning that there was only a slim chance of him surviving. It is hard to imagine now, but this of course was before penicillin was discovered, so there wasn't much they could do for the little boy. And I hate to say it, but back then, one simply couldn't expect all children to survive. I mean, more than 10 percent of all babies didn't live to their first birthday. It was sad to lose a child back then, but it was just a part of life." Esme stopped talking for a moment to think about how to go on.

"Well, Joseph kept getting more ill every hour and it was no surprise when he died, but it absolutely broke my heart when his little lungs stopped breathing. It made me lose all hope. He had been my reason to live and I felt that motherhood was my calling. When poor Joseph passed away, the purpose of my life was taken away from me. I was certain, that I would never be able to have children again. After all, I was 26 years old already, still officially married to Charles and I had had a child. There was no way that I was going to find another man and I wasn't even sure if I wanted to. I was desperate and just couldn't find a way to go on. I believe you all know what happened next" she finished.

While I had already heard Esme's story several times and I had believed that I knew it pretty well, she had never told it in such great detail, there had never been as many emotions. I hadn't been aware, how heartbreaking the death of her son had been for her. I was positive that Esme was alright now, that she had accepted the loss, but it nonetheless made me sad to know that somebody as cheerful and caring and optimistic as our mother had at some point been unable to see a way out and had been convinced that death was her best option. I knew how much she loved seeing us as her children, and I felt that I now could better understand her profound love for us.

Carlisle sighed. "It just worries me... I think Bella might be trying to escape from the perpetrator and from the memory. She sacrificed a lot just to be as far away from everything as possible, but it looks like she failed. She cannot escape from this pregnancy. I am aware that she could get an abortion and end the pregnancy, but she will never be able to forget completely. Her attempt at absconding has failed. This won't be easy. Imagine giving up so much and leaving everybody you love behind to get away from something and then realizing that all your efforts were unsuccessful..." That really must feel awful. I couldn't even imagine.

I wanted to turn to Jasper to ask him what he thought about Bella's mental wellbeing, but he was gone. This surprised me - I hadn't noticed him leaving. "Where is Jasper?" I asked, more than just slightly confused. Everybody looked around the room and nobody seemed to know. When had he left the room? Jasper had always been a very sneaky person and he had always been good at disappearing inexplicably, but this was unusual for him. I did however understand that there must have been a lot of different emotions from all sides, when Carlisle revealed his news. He had probably needed to get away to cool off a bit for a few minutes and I couldn't hold it against him.

Suddenly, Esme gasped. I turned around to see what was going on. "I cannot let Bella move in an apartment with Mike Newton!" she said and there her voice was almost panicky - not at all normal for her. "The dickhead who is in my Spanish class?" I asked incredulous. "Watch your tongue, Emmett Cullen" Esme snapped, but Edward nodded. "That's the one" he confirmed. I furrowed my brow. Mike Newton wasn't known for being a particularly sensitive person and he liked to play with girls a little too much for my taste. He was definitely not an ideal roommate for Bella, especially not if our suspicions were true and she had really been raped.

"I have to find someone else... She probably wouldn't even complain, but there is no way this would end well. She doesn't seem particularly respectful or intelligent to me and I don't think he understands that Bella is no Tanya Denali" Esme sighed. "It's a shame all the rooms are occupied. This is going to be an administrative nightmare, but there has got to be an alternative" she said gloomily. There had to be some solution! I had to protect her. Bella had entered our lives a mere two days ago, but she had already become important to me. It was hard not to think of her as a little sister. That's what she was to me - a sister. I felt the need to protect her from all evil and I knew that I would never be able to forgive anyone who hurt her.

Suddenly, Carlisle moaned. "There might be another problem. How do I tell her? I know I have to let her know as soon as possible, but how do you tell a 16-year-old girl who just moved around the world that she is pregnant? And how will she react? We already know that her reactions can be quite unexpected and with news like that, I am just not sure... It will have to wait until tomorrow, but she needs enough time to consider all her options. Another thing I am a bit worried about is her having to tell parents. She is a minor and hiding such a big thing isn't an option for her. Now, I of course don't know her parents personally, so it is hard to guess how supportive they will be, but I do know that her father is a doctor. I am just not sure if that's a good thing" Carlisle said.

He paused for a few seconds."I am sure he has a very good understanding how critical her medical situation is, which technically is a good thing, but knowing too much can be a curse. I don't really know anything about her mother." Esme furrowed her brow. "I have talked to her mother before and she sounded like a very nice lady and her parents seem to trust her judgment, since she was allowed to come here, but this is a very extraordinary situation and I am not sure how they will handle it."