Rose watched Bella pace. It was no secret where she and Edward had gone.
"Did you tell them everything?" Rose finally asked.
Bella stopped, looking at her.
"Did you?" Rose asked, an eyebrow cocked.
Bella's face crumpled in on itself briefly, then seemed to smooth out tautly, Bella nodding.
"Mmm," Rose said, "crappy."
Rose sat down on the workbench, leaving room for Bella to do so too. Humans, she noticed, like to do things in pairs, or groups. Sitting. Eating. Shopping. Shitting.
As on cue, Bella sat down too.
"I thought it was getting better, Rose," she whispered. "It feels worse today. Now."
"Yes," Rose said sympathetically, "talking about it makes it worse."
"Then why does everyone say talking about stuff like this will make it better?"
"Because it will, eventually," Rose said, "but before that, it just makes you realize how awful it was. Easy not to think about it, when you don't give it words."
And the words had crow-barred open that box of memory, letting all sorts of ugly things come slithering out.
The deputy's questions had been professional: thorough, systematic, and specific.
They'd made her blush with embarrassment, and then blanch with recollection.
He'd used words like force, penetration, and penile.
She blanched, remembering the conversation, and remembering what it had described.
He'd asked her if she'd experienced pain, and where. How much.
If there were bruises still.
If he'd used a condom.
If he'd penetrated her anally.
If he'd used anything beyond his body to do so.
She put her hands to her hair, standing again, pacing.
"I need to go have a shower," she said.
"Oh no," Rose said, blocking her path. "No way."
"Move Rose," Bella said, fighting the urge to start scratching at her own skin again.
"No," Rose said again. "It won't help," knowing it was just as likely to make it worse.
"Please," Bella said, feeling the tears coming.
Emmett was fast-talking Edward in the house. "Just give her a chance, Edward. She knows what she's doing. Please." He was pleading earnestly. "Please. Let her help her. She wants to—and she hasn't been able to yet. C'mon, you know Rose can do this."
Edward knew no such thing, but didn't want to interrupt if it might help.
"Five minutes," he growled, "or less, if she gets worse."
Emmett nodded. His trust in Rose was absolute.
He knew just how shitty it was to be in Edward's shoes.
"He did all the things he did, Bella," Rose said, very carefully putting her hands on her sister's arms. "But he's not doing them now."
Bella was nodding, trying not to cry.
"She's OK," Emmett said again to Edward, his restraining hands becoming embracing ones. "Sometimes it has to be someone else."
Edward's throat was tight and burning, the confused hunger and emotion a thumping mass.
You're doing everything you can, Emmett murmured silently. It's OK.
Edward nodded, his posture, and Bella's mirrored in his sibling's arms.
"He's not here, and he won't touch you again." Rosalie made her voice low and elastic, stretching over the space around them, imagining it winding Bella up in its compulsion. She kept reiterating these statements, until she could hear her heart-rate slowing.
"Good," she said, tucking her own feelings and memories back into those now foreign places. It wouldn't do to let such things free now.
"Thank you," Bella managed, letting the tears out, finally letting her body soften in Rose's careful embrace.
"No problem," she said, "us girls stick together."
She slowly released the hug, hearing Edward approaching.
"Until husbands interfere," she said softly, but not unkindly. Catching Bella's look, she said, "we can talk more, later, about what to do with husbands." Hers had arrived as well, and her face glowed, finding Emmett in its gaze.
In a voice almost hushed with a emotion, Edward said "thank you," to his sister, taking Bella's hand.
She was pale, all the colour of her emotion retracted, leaving her hands cold and shaky. She murmured, "I think I need to lay down for a bit."
He didn't even ask, just picked her up, the dizzying speed ending in their room, her too tired to say anything about it. She was asleep in minutes, and he frowned, seeing it. It'd been too much today, to do what she'd done.
It was too much for him to have her do it.
He sat, watching her breathing, taking in the slow tick of her heart, assuring himself of her wellbeing. The burn in his throat was a low hum, but one that was growing louder, thirstier, and he knew he would have to hunt—and soon, if he wanted her safe.
There were other thoughts vying for his attention, though. Anxious ones from Alice, who had been finding Bella's future suddenly inconstant, flickering in and out, like a light whose filament was in its death throes—sometimes there, and sometimes gone.
He listened to her theories, and knowing what Carlisle had asked of the wolves, felt the lumps of worry in his stomach knot together into something greater.
Jasper and Emmett were listening to Alice's now vocal words, moving outside, starting a patrol, scenting for wolves. For Jacob.
It was Carlisle who triggered another theory, arranging for medical supplies on the phone.
"The pregnancy," Edward said to himself. To all of them.
Everyone stopped.
He looked at Bella, sleeping peacefully now, and swallowed.
If Alice couldn't see Bella's future...then he stopped the thought.
The others finished it for him.
Of course, Alice hushed, with a blossoming horror, searching for a polite phrase...their progeny...but if she wants to terminate anyway...
"No," he said, "we are not going to put her through that until we know its necessary. It's only a week. We can wait. Jacob would be stupid to try anything on his own. He'd know we were expecting him."
He hasn't exactly been smart, Edward, Jasper said. I wouldn't put anything past him.
"Then we patrol," Edward said. "And see what Charlie finds, if anything." He'd proved his resourcefulness before. Edward didn't doubt that Charlie would apply himself as tenaciously again.
Alice huffed out a quiet, anxious and almost exasperated breath. She hated being hamstrung this way, but was trying to mentally contain these feelings for Edward's sake.
Will you at least tell her? She asked him. She should know.
He hated that she was right. His frame fought the notion of sharing this distressing news, and he forced himself to be calm. "Yes," he sighed, "but later."
He slipped into the bed beside her, pulling her form to his, finding peace with this temporary respite sleep seemed to offer her. When he felt the familiar changing rhythms of her body surface, his own heart lightened, anticipating her waking, their togetherness.
He just didn't expect it to be with tears.
"I'm so sorry," she said, her back to him, "this is my fault. If I hadn't—"
"No, no," he murmured, turning her to face him, his forehead creasing with worry.
"It is," she said, "if I hadn't insisted that I go see him, this never would've happened—"
"Bella—"
Her breathing was hitching upwards, air becoming too precious for all her words. "I knew how he felt, Edward. I knew he wanted more than friendship. I never should've told him I'd be changed—"
"It's not—"
Her hands were shaking now. "I could've just left when he kissed me, Edward. I could've walked away—"
"No," he said, firmly, loudly. "He wouldn't have let you go, Bella."
"You can't know that," she said, shaking her head.
"I do know that, Bella, because I saw what Sam showed me."
She stared at him, all her panic sliding into an oozing dread at her feet. "What?"
"Sam came, and spoke to Carlisle and me. I saw what they'd seen."
Bella's hand went to her mouth, and she stumbled to her feet, moving away from him. "You saw?" Then her hands were in her hair, pulling at it in distress. "I knew you would hear," she whispered, "today, but…" she looked at him, head shaking, voice horrified, "you saw."
Then she sat down on the couch, curled over, hands locked together, capping her head, as she rocked back and forth.
"Why does it matter to you, Bella?" Edward asked.
"Why?" she asked, incredulous. "How can you even ask that?"
"I love you," he said, "that will never change."
"But you'll see—" she whispered, more tears coming, "you'll see that."
"I see you," he said, "right now," he shook his head. "I see the woman I love."
"You've seen what he's done, Edward," she said, "I know what that means. You can't forget it. It's like he'll touch me every time you will."
The words thudded into his midsection with a weight beyond themselves.
She hadn't even realized what they'd done to him, she was so wrapped in her own distress.
Did she not want him to touch her? At all? Ever?
Because he'd seen?
Crushing Jacob Black slowly would be too kind an end for the creature, Edward thought. He was wrestling with all his own emotions, and the monstrous thirst, that lived hushed and subdued in his throat, rattled its cage, and screamed for release.
He stood slowly, making himself catalogue every whisper of fibre the carpet made to the soles of his feet, then noting the particular diaspora of dust that clouded the space between them. When control was more than an airy concept, he allowed himself to move towards her, kneeling to face her.
"No," he said, taking her hand, not letting her pull it away. "I love you. He will not touch you again, and I am not him, no matter what I've seen in my thoughts."
"Don't," she said, yanking her hand back, and standing, turning, walking out of the room.
Rosalie was doing the mental equivalent of yelling at him. Don't chase her!
And Jasper, feeling and smelling the heady mixture of protection and predation, stood between him and the way Bella had gone.
"You need to hunt, Edward."
"I'm fine, move," was the terse reply.
Emmett had joined them now.
Jasper levelled his gaze, and said silently, Would you ever let me take such risks? Again? It was painful for him to realize, let alone think so purposefully, and he shared with Edward the anguish he'd carried.
Edward groaned, still straining against the necessity.
"I'll go with you," Jasper said, "she'll be safe."
But she wasn't well.
"Rose is with her," Emmett reminded him. "She knows how to help her."
His hands contorting in frustration, Edward nodded, turning and running, before he could change his mind.
Rose was with Bella, but keeping a wise and wary distance, waiting for Bella to settle.
It was the first time she'd really been left alone—or at least, with the pretense of solitariness. She saw no one on her way out of the house, finding and following the crushed gravel path down to the river.
At the edge, she perched on one of the well washed flat stones, trying to imagine her thoughts and feelings leaving with the water flowing in front of her, wanting to be as mindless and singular as its current.
Or in its current, cold and numb.
No one came.
She sat, the temperature even and cool, despite the grip of mid-July, for sometime.
It was almost an hour before Rose seemed to arrive. "That wasn't fair," she said, making Bella jump.
She didn't apologize for the fright she caused. She knew well enough that it didn't help. How being 'handled' sucked.
"What was?" Bella asked, trying to sift through her thoughts, too upset to recall everything they'd said.
"It's like he'll touch me every time you will," Rose parotted to her.
Bella was shocked. "No," she said, "are you—?"
Rose looked at her witheringly. "Sure?" she snorted, cocking an eyebrow at her, "Yes."
With her head on her knees, Bella whispered "I'm so sorry, Edward," wrapping her hands tightly over her ankles.
"Just give us a minute," Rose muttered, below Bella's hearing, knowing Edward was back, just itching to interrupt. Again.
"You can feel crappy all you want, Bella," Rose said, leaning back on her hands, beside Bella, "but you can't say stuff like that to your mate. Ever." She looked at her, making sure the words had registered. "Because he can't forget it."
Bella had entered that comfortably numb state that seemed to steal over her when the emotions became too much. It was easy to be there, the grey state of things so preferable to the oscillation of fear and rage she otherwise felt she dwelt in.
It was the perfect state to ask the questions she needed to.
"How did you manage?" Bella whispered. "After. To be with Emmett?"
"Sex?" Rose asked, bluntly. Too loudly for Bella's liking.
She cringed a little. It reminded her of the morning. "Yes," she swallowed.
"Slowly," Rose said, flicking a small stone into the water. More quietly, she said, "obviously, I didn't have to worry about being physically hurt again, but I was still nervous. Afraid. Even with Emmett." She watched Bella listening, nodding, "there's no rush, Bella. And it might be better, to wait...until after, anyway."
It was Bella's turn to throw a rock into the water, angrily hurling it so that it landed with a satisfying 'plop.'
"But I understand why you don't want to," she said, sighing.
"No," Bella almost whispered, "I never wanted to wait for that." Then, with a volume and conviction that surprised a admiring smirk from Rose, she threw another, larger rock, shoving out a, "Fuck you, Jacob!"
"Dog," Rose added, for good measure.
Then Bella felt like she wanted to burst into tears again, the taut skin at her face uncomfortably tight. She wanted to see him beaten, and broken, and she simultaneously wanted to cry for the friendship they'd lost. What the hell?
"Sucks, I know," Rose said, "having your feelings all over the place like that."
Bella was throwing more rocks, still seated. When she ran out of the ones close by, Rose handed her more, but her arm tired quickly, and her breathing wasn't so easy. She made herself rest, after a bit.
"What helps?" Bella asked.
Killing your rapists, Rosalie thought. Slowly. Bloodlessly. "Letting the feelings out," she said instead. "All of them. Reminding yourself that it isn't happening now. That it won't happen again."
Easy enough for Rose to think, Bella grumbled mentally.
"It won't, Bella," Rosalie said, catching a glimpse of her face, "you think we'll let him near you?"
"No guarantees," Bella said. "He's smart. We don't know where he is—"
"We'll smell him, Bella. Edward will hear him. No chance. None."
The phrase pride comes before a fall rattled through her mind.
Bella mumbled, "if you say so."
"I say so," Edward said softly, some ten feet behind her. He was holding out her sweater, the one Charlie had brought. She was cold, and he was done waiting on Rosalie's notions. They might be doing some good, but his own anxiety for Bella's well being, fuelled by the words she'd thrown, overrode all patience with his sister's intentions.
"Thank you," she said, taking it gingerly. He stepped closer with it, helping her slip it on, coming to sit behind her, wrapping her in his arms. She could feel his breath ruffling her hair, its sweetness drifting downwards.
She felt safe there, utterly untouched by Jacob.
Rose was gone. As if she'd vanished on the spot.
"I'm sorry," she said again. "I never should have said that. It isn't true—"
"I know," he said, tightening his arms, "you've been so calm, Bella, through all of this. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop."
Calm? She felt like she'd fallen apart and been reassembled in the wrong order.
"I'm sorry you've been left with this mess."
He snorted. "We get to be together. You have no idea how happy this makes me. Being with you is like...breathing. When you're not there, it hurts. When you are, all is well."
She leaned her cheek against his arm, knowing her own heart to be the same.
He sighed. "I need to tell you something, Bella."
He hated the stiffening the crept into her fingers. "What?" she asked, the pretense of calm slippery over its more substantial worry.
"Alice can't see your future right now."
He had tilted slightly to the side, watching her carefully.
"OK." Her voice quavered. "Does she know why?" Were the wolves...or was Jacob?—No, she told herself. He wouldn't let that happen.
If he could.
"We think it's because of the pregnancy," Edward said quietly.
Standing with Emmett, Rose's face twisted. They'd retreated to the woods, but the conversation by the river was still audible. She wouldn't wish that on anyone.
Your rapist's leavings.
Dog spawn at that.
Bella swallowed, feeling her gorge rise. She began panting, willing herself not to vomit.
I am not going to throw up. I am not going to throw up. I am not—
When her stomach's volley ended, she wished her body could so easily reject what else it had so unwillingly received.