Thank you to everyone for continuing to follow Coming Home, reviewing and adding it to your favorites. I can't tell you what it means to me. I sincerely want to apologize the extraordinarily, long wait for this chapter. Real life has been terribly stressful and has been extremely difficult with being able to find any creativity and motivation to continue writing. The next few months are going to be difficult ones, but I PROMISE that I am not giving up on this story. Updates may be slow, but I will continue with it to its end.
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EPOV
In front of me was the last person I thought I'd see. He had made his feelings quite clear. So why was he here?
"I don't know what you are doing here, but you might as well leave. I don't have time to deal with your shit!" I said as I walked away from the door going to lay back down on my cot.
He walked into the room and stood there looking at me. I kept my eyes on the ceiling as I hoped he would catch my drift. He had a lot of nerve showing up of all the places...here. My conversation with Charlie helped me understand more about where he was coming from, but it was still extremely pissed off with him.
"Edward, I.." He started but then stopped.
I quickly sat up on the cot and interrupted him. :No, I don't want to hear it! I can't believe you had the nerve to show up here! What do you plan on doing? Sabotaging the search? Telling me again, what a fool I am? Well?" He stood in front of me with his head down.
"Say something, damn it!" I sneered.
"Edward, I don't know what to say. What I said and did….I can't...I'm so sorry. I can't tell you how badly I feel."
"Emmett, you have no clue as to how much you hurt me. I needed your support and understanding, now more then ever but you let me down. I know it was a lot of information to process, and a bit of a surprise, but I would have never in a million years expect you to act
and treat me like that."
"E, please, try to understand. You of all people should understand how hard it's been. I couldn't accept that there was any type of hope. It was too hard accepting she was gone. She was…is such a huge part of my life. I need to be here. I want to help. Please." He pleaded.
I stood there for several minutes looking at him, unsure of what to think. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked over at Charlie. I had totally forgotten he was in the room. He was trying to remind me of our earlier conversation.
'Edward, you know Bella wouldn't want you to be upset about this. If anything, we've had to
learn from this situation is that time is too short." I stared at Charlie for a moment and then looked back at Emmett.
His head was down and shoulders slumped forward. He lifted his head and I could see the dark circles under his eyes.
"Who is helping Rosalie with the kids?" I asked.
"Ummm, she moved into your house with the kids, Leah, Esme, Jasper and Alice. Esme thought it would be easier to have everyone under one roof to help each other out with all the kids. Jasper wanted desperately to be here, too, but thought it would be best to stay to have one of the guys at home to be sure everyone was okay. It was hard for him to even think of leaving Alice and the baby. He also felt that I should try to make things right after...everything."
"Well, I guess if Rosalie is alright with you being here and everyone at home is doing okay. You did come a long way to be here. I guess you can stay."
The next thing I know I am getting a gigantic bear hug from the brute. I tried to keep a straight face as though I was really indifferent to him, but looking at the wide ear to ear smile on Emmett's face made me smile a little as well.
"Emmett…need to breathe."
"OOOpps. Sorry, man." Emmett said as he let go of me and steps a few feet back.
"E, are we good?" He asked after a few moments of awkward silence.
"Em...I'm not going to lie to you. I might not be able to forget what's happened for a while, but I'll try."
"That's all I can ask for, E. I'll make it up to you and...B. Th..thanks, man." Emmett said.
Charlie showed Emmett where he could put his suitcase and which cot he could take.
"Okay, now. When do we get this show on the road? What's the game plan?" He asked and I brought him up to speed on all that had transpired since we arrived in Japan. We were waiting for Commander North to brief us on where things stood with the information that they had gathered and what the next steps were going to be. I went ahead and called Mike and updated him on what's been happening. He asked me to keep him informed and that he would do the same for me.
Shortly after Charlie and I caught up with Emmett, Dad returned. He was very excited about the tour of the hospital on the base. He went on and on about it. Thankfully, Emmett came to the rescue of changing the subject by stating that he was hungry. Surprise, surprise. We all agreed to walk down to the mess hall to grab something to eat.
The food wasn't quite as bad as I had imagined it would be, but it left a lot of room for improvement. Much of the food didn't have much taste to it. Thank goodness for salt and pepper.
As we were winding down our meal, we were approached by Commander North and two other soldiers I hadn't been fortunate enough to have met yet.
"Excuse me, gentlemen. I hope I'm not intruding." Commander North said.
"No, not at all." Dad replied.
"I hope that your accommodations are well and that the food is acceptable."
"Everything is fine, Commander. We are very appreciative of the hospitality you've bestowed on us. Thank you." I said.
"Good. I am glad to hear it. I thought you all might like to meet these two gentlemen." The Commander motioned to the soldiers standing next to him. "This is Lieutenant Quil Attera and Paul Wolff. These two soldiers were the ones to have gotten the communication from
Lieutenant Black. They wanted to speak with you all."
"Oh, really? Please gentlemen won't you come join us? Charlie said.
"Thank you." Both lieutenants replied as they pulled out two chairs at the table to join us.
"I am afraid that I cannot stay, though. We have a lot to do in a short amount of time. If you'll excuse me, I will meet with you all later. Gentlemen." He said as he excused himself.
Once the Commander had made his departure, the lieutenants sat down and told us all that had happened when they had gotten the transmission from Jake. As they explained it all, I suddenly
worried about Bella and Jacob. What was she doing? Was she hurt? How much longer could they survive? When would I hold her in my arms again? Would Jacob be able to see his child being born?
"Edward?" I suddenly heard my dad call out. Coming back to, I looked over at all of them staring at me.
"Sorry, I was just thinking."
"Lieutenant Attera would like to know if he could get Leah's phone number? He thinks that she might be able to fill them in on Jacob's knowledge of the woods. Maybe then they could look for more signs." My dad quickly explained.
"We are going to also speak the Lieutenant Black's Commanding Officer and see if he can give us more insight on any specialized training he may have had." Lieutenant Wolff added.
"Sure, if it would help." I said as I pulled out my phone and looked for Leah's number. "Here you go." I said writing it down quickly on a napkin.
"Mr. Cullen?" Asked Lieutenant Attera.
"Yes." My father and I answered. We looked at each other and shook our heads. Lieutenant Attera looks at me as though he was directly talking to me.
"Please, call me Edward."
"Thank you, Edward. What I was about to ask you is if there were any information that you may have on your wife that might help us out. Does she have any survival skills? Does she know how to build any signal fires or anything with the resources available to her bring attention their location in case a search was being conducted?" Lieutenant Attera asked.
"Why would she need to know that if Jake was with her? He is the one with the skills and training?" Emmett asked.
"Well, we need to be prepared to any type of situation while looking for Mrs. Cullen and Lieutenant Black. If he's hurt, they may be relying on any skills Mrs. Cullen may have." He said.
Again, I grimaced. The thought of her and/or Jake being hurt barely being able to take care of themselves and living off the land made my heart hurt.
"Well, I took the kids fishing and camping regularly. I've taken the boys hunting a
few times, but Bella was never very interested." Charlie said.
"She...B..Bella was too scared we would hurt Bambi and his family." Emmett added.
We looked at each other and chuckled. That was my wife. Always the animal lover.
"Do you remember any jewelry that she wore regularly...a necklace? A bracelet? Earrings? Anything that may have come off or get snagged that we might be able to trace back to her if we come across while searching?" Lieutenant Wolff asked.
I sat back in my chair trying to recall what she took with her or wore when she left. "Well...of course, there is her wedding ring. She hardly ever took it off." I said.
After a moment longer of thinking, Emmett and I looked at each other and said simultaneously, "The locket."
Both lieutenants and our fathers looked at us. "She hardly ever took it off. Jasper, Edward and I
went out shopping looking for a birthday present for B's 14th birthday. We were in downtown Port Angeles when we came across and antique shop. We hadn't had any luck anywhere else so we agreed we'd give it a shot. The three of us split up in the shop hoping we'd find something. We all but gave up hope until I came across a jewelry counter and found an antique locket. None of us could afford it by ourselves so we all three pitched in and bought it for her." Emmett explained.
"We had our moms look through all the pictures that had been taken of us over the years and we found a picture of us three of boys and then one of the girls together. They put it in the locket for her and we gave it to her at her birthday party." I added.
"I remember that. She cried for an hour. You boys thought she hated it but she could never find the words to tell you how happy she was." Charlie said.
We sat quietly for a few moments. Reliving the memories of that day.
"Thanks, Edward. Please be sure that we will try everything we can to help find your wife and the lieutenant." Both gentlemen said their goodnights and left the room.
After one more cup of coffee, the four of us returned to our room and started to wind down for the evening by changing our clothes for bed when there was a knock on the door. Dad went to answer it and welcomed Commander North into the room.
"I'm sorry to interrupt this late in the evening, but I wanted to let you know that we will be meeting at 0800 hours in the conference room to get an update where things stand in preparing to start up the search and when it will actually commence. I thought you would like to be
there."
"Thank you, Commander. We will be sure to be there." Dad stated.
"Alright, then. I'll see you all there, then. Good night, gentlemen." Commander North said as he exited the room.
We all stood looking at each other for a moment. This was it. What we've all been hoping and waiting for. Anxiety slowly worked its way across the room.
"0800 hours? Is that pm?" Emmett asked.
"Emmett." Charlie said.
"I know, Dad. Just wanted to liven things up just for a few moments." Emmett chuckled.
"Well, I guess then, we should be heading to bed." Dad said.
Emmett, Charlie and myself nodded our heads in agreement and went to lay on our beds. I don't know how it was expected of me or any of us to try and sleep knowing what potentially was coming…the search was days...maybe hours away from starting. One more step closer to finding my love. I could only hope that she could hold on just a while longer for us to be able to
find her...and Jake, of course.
"Hold on, love. I'm coming." I whispered as the lights on the room were turned off.