Edward avoided Bella's glare guiltily.
"I know," he said. "I could have handled that-"
"You could have handled that a HUNDRED times better. Or let me do it," she snapped, her folded arms a sign of her disappointment while she was in mother-mode.
"I told him the plan, what more can I do?"
"Honey, you're not very skilled at delivering bad news," she reminded him, and he was transported back to that time in the woods, the breakup he still doubted she had forgiven him for.
Carlisle strolled in then, and seemed to recognize the tension in the room. His eyes shifted between the pair.
"You could have asked me to-"
"I know, Carlisle," he growled, and heard distantly the sound of the phone crumbling to pieces in his fist.
"But it was my idea," Rose called from upstairs, seemingly both triumphant and amused that no one else had thought of it. "I could have done it!"
"Hey!...Carlisle, I did it that way for a reason," he said, and his father let a short laugh escape him.
"I don't like the idea," he admitted. "I don't like the idea of her being close to...Alice. She's not stable."
"Edward," Carlisle breathed as he looked down sadly, "we have no other option. If we did, trust me, I would do anything. I would drag Aro here physically, if I knew where he had disappeared to."
"Besides, Jasper will never let a cell on her arm be touched by her," Bella assured, but Edward was still unsure.
"Alice is desperate. And unpredictable."
"And weak," Emmett's gruff voice added as he appeared in the doorway ahead.
"But I still can't get into her mind. With a vampire, weak or not, that's a risk."
Bella huffed in exasperation. "Ed, sweety, you have got to drop this hero thing you've got going."
"It's like-"
They all turned to Jacob's familiar voice as he too appeared in the doorway, next to Emmett. They were about the exact same build about now.
"Mom!" Renesme called, and skipped into the living area to hug Bella. She began laughing at her exuberance.
"I see you enjoyed your visit to Florida!" she laughed, and Renesme lightly touched her cheek.
Bella's golden eyes grew wide, and a smile lit up her eyes. "Same old mom," she mused with a chuckle.
Her daughter tore away from her and embraced her father, while Jacob was routed next to Emmett like a displaced object.
"Sup," Emmett greeted quietly from the side of his mouth, leaning nonchalantly against the door frame.
"Nothing much, anything going on here?"
"Eh, Jasper found a new chick who turned out to be his mate and Alice escaped but we got her back."
Jacob choked on his breath. "What?"
Emmett shook his head patronizingly. "Which part did you not get?"
"Jasper...found..."
"Oh yeah," he confirmed in boredom, and soon Jacob gave up on the subject.
"I wouldn't be surprised if we have another wedding soon," the man beside him murmured finally, earning another spluttering from the kid. Despite his tanned complexion, his cheeks were a deep red.
"Huh?!"
"Man where's your head at?"
Jake thought for a moment, and suddenly remembered the conversational topic before. "Oh," he sighed, and his racing heart kept on pounding in his crimson ears as his eyes followed his reluctant friend's niece.
...
"Not far now," Jasper said, holding her close to his chest so her face was buried in his neck to keep away from the breathtaking gusts. She had never imagined that anything could run this fast.
He kept true to his word, and soon he slowed to a walk, eventually stopping, but not dropping her yet.
"You have to promise to close your eyes," he whispered, her face still against his throat. She hadn't seen a thing, yet.
"Eyes closed," she announced, and he let his arms go so she was standing.
"I feel like Belle in the library," she said as he covered her eyes with his cold hands, nervous with anticipation to see what he wanted her to see.
"Appropriate analogy," he said from behind, humor in his voice. "Beauty and the beast."
"Shush with your misdirected loathing," she ordered with a slight giggle, and waited.
"Ok...ready."
His cool hands brushed away from her eyes, trailing down through her hair and onto her shoulders, while she stared, stunned at the scenery.
The clearing was huge, the open purplish sky sheltering above. The horizon, lined with tree's impossible to determine the height of lined the deep red horizon, blocking the world out like walls. The ground was covered with flowers of colours she never knew existed, shades of gold and red and purple she had never imagined.
"Wow," she breathed, the word barely making it passed her lips. She felt Jasper's fingers entwine with her own repeatedly.
"I've known of this place for years," he began, and she tore her eyes away to watch the man speak.
"Whenever I need some time on my own, I would always just come here."
"Why here?" She asked, capturing his memories from his hands. These were the first ones she had seen him...contented.
"It felt like home," he replied, eyeing their hands like he was fully aware of what he was allowing her to do.
"I thought it was strange that I had to travel this far to feel that, but I went with it anyway."
"Why did you?"
He gave her a look then, full of meaning and love, and, with a gentle push, her mind received an image.
A young, red-golden haired woman. Eyes of fire, age old wisdom shining through. That, with the jolt of belonging, she felt from Jasper, but it matched her own, from what she could remember of that moment she had first seen him.
With a feeling of opening her eyes, it was replaced by him again, that half smile playing innocently on his lips.
"When I first met you, I felt that sense of home, but on a more exciting, more...dizzying extent... the only time having ever experienced it being here. I think..." he began, "that the reason I love this place is because it reminds me of you, even before we met. Like its been hinting, all this time. Fore-shadowing."
Alenia couldn't keep the tears in her eyes, or the smile from her face, as he said those words. He described them, exactly like her own, only applying words to them in a way better than she could.
Silently, she walked and turned, so she was facing him directly, his body only a couple of inches away. His eyes followed her the entire time, shyness and nervousness and content swirling around all at once in the topaz orbs.
"I can't even word it...how I feel...as well as you," she admitted breathlessly, and he looked away sheepishly.
"I haven't even started," he said. "'I love you' seems...fickle. Tiny. But I do, words fail to describe how much-"
She pressed her lips to his in an instant, and his shocked ones seemed frozen for a moment.
She pulled away momentarily, giving him a look he had never seen before. Coyness.
"It'll do for now."