A/N: Hello, lovelies! A few of you were understandably repulsed by Carlisle and Esme's willingness to let Jasper back into their home so quickly— with Bella there nonetheless. I absolutely understand your anger towards them. It wasn't an easy pill for me to swallow either. I'm not a parent, but I can only imagine how heart-wrenching it would feel to have your child commit such a terrible crime. I honestly feel like it would be hard to just shun that child out of your life completely. In this case, Carlisle and Esme have gone to the extreme and just created an unbelievably shitty situation. So, where do we go from here? I suppose the only way to go is forward.

Again, I apologize for the time it took for me to update. I don't have any good excuses for taking so long. One thing that has been keeping me distracted is the amount of amazing fics out there. There are so many talented writers, and I am still coming to grips with the fact that you amazing people are reading this story and actually like it! I love you guys. I love the reviews, even if you're reviewing because you're pissed off at the characters. Being able to stir emotion from you in my writing, good or bad, is good enough for me.

I really appreciate each and every one of you. You really keep me motivated to update this story in the first place. Thank you!

*~*~*~*

The moral of the date rape story: It does not pay when you're drunk and horny. That's the way it had to be. They locked him up and threw away the key. Well, I can't take pity on men of his kind (even though he now takes it in the behind). –Brad Nowell, Sublime – Date Rape

*~*~*~*

Edward

I sat across from my completely deranged family in the living room.

The tension in the air was so thick it could have been sliced with a knife.

Bella was in the guest room behind a locked door, per my request. I put some feel-good music on, Sublime, to lessen the stress of the conversation she was about to hear. However, the upbeat guitar licks and harmonious voice of Bradly Nowell faded suspiciously quickly as I walked away from her room. It was as if Bella wanted to hear the conversation between my family taking place, and I immediately felt guilty for being so controlling toward her. I certainly didn't want to be that kind of boyfriend.

I could still hear the faint sound of music as I began, making pointed glances at Carlisle and Esme as I spoke. "This is fucking bullshit."

"Edward Cullen, watch your mouth! Why must you curse so much to get your point across? All of us are very aware of your anger. No amount of 'F words' could make it more apparent. So just drop it, son." Carlisle spoke firmly.

I pointed at him angrily. "No!" I said, raising my voice. "I don't even want to be referred to as your son after the bullshit you've pulled!" I made sure to emphasize the cuss word so that Carlisle knew he had no impact on my mouth and never would.

"What exactly is your problem, Edward?" Esme asked in a menacingly calm voice. She nodded toward Jasper as she continued, "This is your brother. Despite certain situations he was involved in, he is still part of our family. You need to calm down and start showing everyone a little more respect."

I stood up and scoffed in Esme's face. "You are all fucking crazy! I don't know about before, but I sure as hell don't consider any of you my god damn family anymore!" I pointed at each of them as I yelled, feeling slightly guilty when I saw the look on Alice's face. She didn't deserve to be put down, but I would have done anything to get through to my clinically insane parents.

I continued, raising my already loud voice. "Don't you see what you're doing? What the fuck is wrong with you people?! Letting a rapist in your house, the same house with the girl he raped?! And no one seems to see anything wrong with this! Everyone is just going through the motions, pretending everything is hunky dory, eating fucking dinner together! It makes me fucking sick!"

Alice ran out of the living room and slammed the door behind her upstairs. I was certain that she would likely be locked inside her room the rest of the night. She always locked herself away when she was upset.

"That was really unfair of you," Esme whispered with glistening eyes. She hid her face as she spoke through her sobs, "I don't know what we could have done better . . . if . . . to make everything okay . . . I . . ." Carlisle soothingly rubbed Esme's back to calm her down. She was breathing anxiously, but I felt as though she deserved it. If Esme felt that upset, how the fuck did she think Bella was feeling? Or even her other family members? Everything wasn't all about her.

I sneered and said, "Well guess the fuck what? Life's not fucking fair. Just ask Bella! I just wish you would have used the incredible thing inside your skull called your brain before you got us all in this situation."

Esme sobbed into Carlisle's shoulder. I expected him to lash out at me, but his response surprised me. Carlisle sighed and began, "I know, son. I don't agree with the way you're reacting, but I know that we didn't make the best decision about this situation."

Jasper was sitting eerily quiet as all the drama unfolded.

I ran my fingers through my hair and let out a groan of frustration. My voice was calmer, but still had an edge to it. "That doesn't help things now, though. Just admitting you were wrong isn't going to fix everything. In fact, it won't fix anything." I lowered my voice to a faint whisper, even though Bella already knew about what I was about to refer to. "You were supposed to help Bella, Carlisle. Do you really think she will ever be able to trust you again after you let a major source of her distress just waltz around in the same house as her? I really thought you were smarter than that."

Carlisle sighed again. "I'm afraid nobody's perfect, Edward."

I laughed humorlessly. "Yeah, I think I've figured that out. Thanks. Still doesn't help anything, though."

Everyone sat silently. Esme was still crying, but the tears were now falling silently down her cheeks.

I interrupted the silence, as usual. "So where do we go from here? I don't feel like we can progress in any way with Jasper living here, or even being here." I turned to Jasper and said sarcastically, "No offense, bro."

I wasn't quite certain why, but I could not get a rise out of Jasper. He remained silent after my comment, and seemed almost . . . high? There was only one thing that could make someone so calm and euphoric without a care to anything around them, and I knew it very well. He was stealing my fucking pills. Of course, I couldn't address him about it in front of our parents, but I would definitely add it to my list of priorities (which was getting pretty large very quickly).

No one had time to say anything, because Jasper immediately mirrored my standing position and said groggily, "Well, why don't I just end all this drama right now by crashing with one of my bros? I'm sure someone will let me sleep on their couch or some shit." His groggy voice verified my suspicion that he'd been popping my pills, and I was definitely not going to let him get away with it.

Jasper stretched and headed out the door before a very horrified Esme could even make a peep. I followed the bastard, ignoring my parents' muffled warnings. When the front door was shut and we were out of earshot, I hissed in Jasper's ear, "So how were my pills, motherfuckwad?"

Jasper quirked an eyebrow at me before asking lazily, "What?"

"Oh, fuck you! You took my lortabs, you fucker."

Jasper shrugged. "Maybe you shoulda hid 'em better."

I ground my teeth together. I wanted to fucking rip Jasper's throat out. He had the nerve to enter my house where my girlfriend that he raped resided. Furthermore, he had the nerve to take my pills. I was motherfucking furious.

"I didn't really think I'd need to, because I was pretty certain I made it clear that you weren't welcome here." I said menacingly.

Jasper had the balls to literally laugh in my face. His eyes were in tiny slits, his head was tilted back, and his open smile revealed unnaturally white teeth. Laughing at me wasn't exactly a good idea on his part. Seeing Jasper's perfect teeth made me want to knock them out of his skull. I grabbed him by his grey jacket and threw him against my car.

Jasper's eyes grew wide as I tightened my grip on his scrawny body. "Woah, calm down. I'm sorry, man," Jasper said carefully.

I scoffed. "You are not telling me to calm down." I tightened my grip on his scrawny arms, making him wince. "If I ever see you here again, you won't be lucky enough to walk away like this." I shoved him away from the car.

Jasper looked like he was about to respond, but thought better of it. I thought I heard him mumble something as he walked swiftly down the driveway and out of my sight.

A/N: What the fuck is Bella thinking through all of this? We will see in 22, which I'm working on immediately.

Okay, I just want to talk about the pill thing for a moment. Pain medication is something I would not recommend to my worst enemy. I always liked the feeling I got on pain pills, but I ended up actually getting addicted to them. Although addiction is not part of this story, I obviously include pills every once in a while. I guess I do that with other things in my life, too, like the paranormal activity with Bella. I'm not looking for sympathy or anything of the sort. I just don't want anybody to feel like I'm being insensitive to people who actually use pain medication medically or even recreationally. All I can say for certain is that the withdrawal from pain medication (I took roxys) is the worst hell in the whole fucking world. I'm glad to say I am not taking pills anymore and I have not taken them for quite a while. I don't know if this is too much information or if anyone is even reading this, I just feel like I have a pretty consistent group of readers and I'm comfortable about sharing the reasoning behind certain parts of this story. As always, thanks for reading, and reviews are appreciated! Love you ladies!