Chapter 21- Renesmee

The first thing I was aware of was that I was alive. But I was in too much pain to be as grateful as I should've been. My head was pounding, and the bite on my neck felt like someone had squeezed lemon juice into it. But that wasn't really anything compared to the knife twisting in my abdomen, which seemed to come in the same intense waves as the dull ache in my back. And the cold metal underneath my skin didn't seem to be helping any.

I could hear soft, familiar voices nearby, but my head was too fuzzy to separate the individual words, or to even begin to decipher them. I didn't feel any movement, but I realized that the cold metal was gone, and something soft and warm had taken its place. I drifted in and out of consciousness, never coherent enough to speak, or even open my eyes.

I noticed there was silence for what felt like a long time, and I became slightly more aware. I felt Jacob's hot hands holding one of mine in between them. I heard him speaking softly to someone—Mom? She shushed him, and then I heard my name.

She kept saying it over and over, stroking my hair gently. I felt like something was stuck to the side of my face, so I tried to touch my cheek to feel. But before I could feel around too much, a cool hand stopped my fingers in their tracks and lowered my hand back down to my side.

Pain shot through my torso again, worse than before, and I couldn't help but whine in agony.

Then there were more voices around me, and hearing Jacob's pulled me a little further into consciousness. He sounded upset, and he was getting louder.

Someone said something about painkillers, and I let out a whimper as a way of saying dear god, yes, please. There was more mumbling, and I felt Jacob's thumbs tracing gentle circles on my palm. I wanted to squeeze his fingers back, to let him know that I knew he was here, but I couldn't summon the strength. I heard the deep rumble of his voice speaking lowly to me. "It's okay, baby. You're okay." He said, and I tried to believe him.

It was only moments before I felt something cool begin to seep into my blood, and then my body was flooded with a feeling of warmth and heaviness that was undoubtedly the result of a very heavy pain reliever. Lovely.

I felt myself start to fade, so rapidly that it should have been distressing, but I couldn't have cared any less.

Jacob

Some part of me knew. I was sure of that.

But there's a big difference between knowing something and admitting it to yourself. Even if I didn't know exactly what had happened, I also hadn't allowed myself to venture any guesses.

There were only a handful of possibilities that came to the back of my mind when she started bleeding like that. I wasn't a complete idiot, but I also knew better than to make assumptions when it came to Renesmee. But if I didn't know before, I should have known the second Edward stepped out of the study. I could hear Renesmee's heart beating strongly, but Edward's eyes were so burning, so agonized, you would have thought someone had died.

But like everyone else, my understanding didn't come until he said the word. The three-syllable, eleven-letter word that had just been like any other word until this moment. Now it wasn't a word, but a threat. A consequence. A nightmare.

Miscarriage.

Miscarriage.

At first, nobody moved. Nobody spoke.

"What?" Bella asked after a beat, her features genuinely confused.

So then he said it again, as if once wasn't enough.

The anger that coursed through me was unlike anything I'd ever felt. It was paralyzing, worse than fear. I somehow got outside, though I was shaking so bad I couldn't imagine working a door handle.

I didn't want to phase. The pack was nearby, and I didn't want them all in my head right now.

What I really wanted to do was run. At every other point in my life that I felt anything even close to this, I would phase, and I would run the other way and not look back for a long, long time.

But now, I didn't even consider this to be a possibility. I couldn't be away from her, especially not now. All I could see was red, and I barely registered the pain in my foot as I kicked a young oak tree, snapping it in half.

I looked up at the sky and breathed in the early morning air. The sun wouldn't be up for another couple hours, but I had a hard time believing it was going to come up at all today. It didn't seem right for anything to just continue on as normal. I wanted something to stall, to give us back the time we had lost and then some, to figure out where to go from here.

Because where were we supposed to go? She had a miscarriage. Not only did this confirm my greatest fear, but it added a whole other factor that I didn't think I would ever be ready to face.

It meant that just yesterday she had been pregnant. Had she known?

I couldn't think about that.

Even worse than that, I was glad she had miscarried. This was so selfish it made me sick, but I couldn't help it. It was just too overwhelming to consider what the alternative would have been.

Just thinking about what he had done to her… I didn't have the words to describe it. But it was nothing short of murder. The murder of her soul. Of her innocence. That still seemed too mild a description.

My mind went back to the way she looked when I found her. The blind terror in her eyes; the way she flinched away from my touch. And all of the hand-shaped bruises that decorated her soft skin…

Before I could stop myself, a redwood in my path was toppling over, and I felt the ache of a few broken knuckles.

And I was about to do it again, but Edward's voice rang in my ear. "Is that actually going to help anything?"

I turned to see him standing rigidly by the front door.

"I'm not in the mood for a lecture."

"Good, neither am I."

I took a step towards him. "Did you know?"

His expression turned to exasperation. "Did I know what?"

"What he did to her." I couldn't bring myself to be any more specific than that.

Edward hesitated. "No, not exactly. Her thoughts have been unbelievably well-guarded, even for her."

I swallowed my frustration. "You must have suspected."

He grimaced. "As did you. I didn't want to believe it any more than you did."

I sat on the porch, thinking about this. It was obvious, in hindsight. Why he took her, why he's so desperate to get her back, why he wanted her in the first place… The answers are all the same.

Edward nodded thoughtfully. There was a moment of silence, and then he said, "I don't know what I'm going to tell her when she wakes up. She'll be devastated to know that we know what happened."

That was for sure the worst part of all of this; the fact that she felt like she had to keep it a secret. That was so much for her to carry all by herself, and for what?

"For you," Edward answered. "For Bella and I. For all of us, I would imagine."

"I wonder where she could've gotten that from." I grumbled, kicking at a rock. "Why are you so calm, anyways?"

"I'm not," he said through clenched teeth. "But anger can always wait, Jacob. What's more important? Getting revenge, or making sure she's okay?"

I didn't answer. He knew what I was thinking.

From inside, I hear Emmett's booming voice, clearly angry.

Aggravated, Edward turned to go back inside and I heard him hiss, "Lower your voice."

I followed, and entered in time to see the standoff between Alice and Emmett.

"He's on his way here," Emmett was saying, clearly upset. "Let's let him come right to us. You can't tell me you don't want to see him suffer, Ali."

"That's irrelevant." Alice looked beyond irritated, holding her head in between her hands. She was standing on the ottoman so she could be eye-to-eye with Emmett. "He's coming after Nessie because he thinks she's pregnant. That's what all of this is about. If we could just... communicate to him that she isn't, we could end this."

"What, so he can turn around and run the other way?" Emmett argued. "He's crazy. We can't just let him go!"

"The Volturi will deal with him." Alice retorted flatly.

"You don't know that," Emmett said darkly. "They're just as psycho as he is. The only way to end this is to do it ourselves."

Emmett looked at me for help, thinking that I, if anyone, would agree with him. But I wasn't so sure that I did.

So instead I asked Alice, "Can you see when he'll be here?"

Her eyes glazed over, and she was silent, concentrating. "Tomorrow," she finally said. "Just before dawn. The guard will be close behind."

"We can't let him come all the way here. Or the Volturi. I won't let any of them get this close to her." Bella's voice came quietly from her seat at the table, her hand grasping Esme's.

As if on cue, I heard Nessie shift upstairs, and she let out a soft whimper. In a flash, I was following Edward and Bella up the stairs, to Edward's old bedroom.

We rushed in to see Ness still fast asleep on the small white bed. Carlisle hovered around her, adjusting bandages and tubes.

The blood had been cleaned from her skin, and someone had dressed her in clean clothes. There was still an IV in her arm, and another thin tube snaked out of her nose and was secured to the side of her cheek with medical tape. Both ran with donated blood, one into her bloodstream and the other into her stomach.

Though I wasn't particularly a fan of her being fed blood somewhat against her will, Carlisle said that it was necessary to stabilize her. She was, apparently, very malnourished. There was no doubt she looked better, much more alive. Her cheeks had some color, and her wounds and bruises had visibly faded.

I pulled a chair up to her bedside and I held her free hand, careful of the yellowing bruises on her wrists. Bella sat at the foot of the bed, smoothing the sheets nervously.

There was a new, clean bandage over the side of Nessie's neck, and Edward peeled it back, slowly and gently. I looked away, until I saw the surprise that crossed Bella's face as she peered closer.

The surrounding flesh of her neck was no longer red and angry, and the teeth marks were starting to form scabs, some parts even puckering into pink scar tissue.

"She's healing," Edward stated, clearly relieved.

"Why is she healing so much faster than before?" Bella asked, staring at Carlisle intently.

"The pregnancy," he began, eyeing me warily when I flinched at the word, "even in its early stages, placed enough stress on her body that her healing abilities were compromised."

"She'll be okay?" Bella's fingertips brushed the side of Ness's face, tucking her curls behind her ear.

"In time," Carlisle promised. He looked at Edward and nodded knowingly, and they both excused themselves from the room. Bella was immediately peeved that she wasn't included in whatever private conversation they were going to have, but I couldn't have cared less.

I took Nessie's hand in both of mine and pressed her fingers to my lips. Her skin felt good against mine, warm and solid.

"Are you going to be okay?" Bella questioned, and I could feel her eyes studying me.

"Yeah," I sighed, keeping my eyes on Nessie. "As long as she is."

Bella pursed her lips, thinking. She opened her mouth as if to say something, and then closed it again.

"What?" I asked, looking at her.

"Nothing," She smiled, amused. "You're just different."

"What do you mean?"

"I expected you to be angrier."

"I am angry."

"Yeah, but you aren't letting it overtake you like you used to."

I shrugged, unsure of how to respond. "I guess there've just been more important things."

She nodded, toying with one of Nessie's curls. "It's been interesting," she murmured, looking down at her daughter and then back at me, "watching you change for her."

I wasn't sure what to say to that. "I love her." I eventually replied. I watched her chest rise and fall gently, and I thought about what a miracle that was, that she was here and I was here and we loved each other so much. "Loving her has made me better," I continued. "I guess… she makes me feel alive. And that's all I ever wanted."

Bella smiled to herself and said softly, "I know." She laughed suddenly, the sound comforting. "You're also much more sappy, apparently."

"Screw you," I laughed with her until her face turned serious and she shushed me, gesturing to Nessie, who was staring to wake. Her hand immediately came up to her face, and her fingers traced the tube going into her nose.

"Renesmee?" Bella murmured, gently removing Nessie's fingers from her cheek.

Ness whimpered in response, and I could tell it was in pain. Her eyelashes fluttered, but ended up staying closed. I gave her hand a small squeeze to let her know I was there.

Suddenly, a sharp pain in my gut knocked all of the air out of me, and it kept coming, almost in waves. I quickly realized that it was Nessie's pain, that she was projecting it to me through her grip on my hand. It was only getting worse.

"She needs painkillers," I said loudly, sure that either Edward or Carlisle would hear me. Nessie groaned, as if to agree with me.

Edward sped back into the room, a syringe in hand. I cursed as another wave of pain radiated through my lower back. I resisted the urge to let go of her hand; if she had to feel it, I wanted to feel it.

Edward frowned at me. "She wouldn't want you to be doing that," he said, nodding at our connected hands.

I ignored him, watching him slide the needle into her IV. I rubbed circles on the back of her hand, watching her face scrunch up in pain. "I know, I know," I said to her lowly, kissing the side of her face. "It's okay, baby. You're okay." I wondered if she could hear me.

"She can," Edward said, handing Carlisle a bag of blood.

Within a minute, the pain began to subside, and I breathed a sigh of relief. "Better?" Bella asked me anxiously, and I nodded. Nessie's grip on my hand loosened completely, and I knew she was unconscious.

Edward looked at her for a long moment, and then sighed, running his hands through his hair. His worry and exhaustion made him look much older. He looked like a dad. He rolled his eyes at my thought, and then pulled the loveseat from across the room closer to Nessie's bed. He sat down and opened his arm for Bella, who didn't hesitate to curl up into his side. I knew they weren't going anywhere for a while.

I felt a stone hand on my shoulder, and Carlisle said, "She's going to be out for a few hours, Jacob. Why don't you go get some rest, maybe something to eat?"

"Thanks, Doc," I shook my head, shrugging off his hand. "But I really don't think I can leave her. Not now."

He nodded like he understood. "I'll be back to check on her in a few minutes."

The first bit of sun was starting to come up over the treetops, and I thought again about how wrong that felt, how time kept moving no matter how far behind I was falling. Time was merciless. You'd think I'd know that by now.

a/n:

chapter 21! I hope you enjoyed;)

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Vanessa