A/N Okay, so I felt a bit bad not resolving the cliffie for you...so here's the next chapter.
A blinding sparkling throaty necklace of light on breeze swept water. Three green parrots chortle noisily above between the green palm and cloud hovering blue. Dragonflies make circles in the air. Snippets of words, laughter, hang on the breeze as Bella lies out on the beach.
It's her first morning in Jacksonville, and she has awoken feeling incredibly peaceful. Strangely, the feel of the imprint has returned, and it gives her a huge sense of relief, as if she has a broken limb working again. How ironic, she muses, glancing at the pillows Renee has stacked on the side of her beach towel to prop up her strapped arm.
The air is static with insect hum, interrupted by barking, the conversation of dogs across the sand. Palm tree leaves sway back and forth like lazy pendulums with reedy music. High teenage voices, shrill barking.
Bella once more presses redial: she's been calling the Black's house since her arrival yesterday with no luck. Where the heck is everyone? She wonders if Jake is coping with them being apart, if he felt the lapse of the imprint too. Maybe it's like broadband internet – the signal just took a while to find me.
The sun hovers behind a cloud, diffusing the necklace of light, scattering silvery beads across the bay. At the horizon, the air is almost chemical yellow, rising to green blue, streaked with pale unmoving clouds. A fish twists out of the near water with a gulp of air, vanishing once more below.
Rubbing her chest, Bella winces. Is it all the throwing up that has made her feel so tender? It's like an actual pressure on her breasts. An odd quirk of stress? The imprint? A leftover from Victoria's attack? She doesn't know. It's so good being in the sunshine.
An old sea-plane bobs below the tree line. Waves folds the ocean water. Ka says a bird.
White dogs black dogs chasing on the sand.
"Bella!"
Renee strolls along the beach, hand in hand with Phil. They are carrying a cool box and beach mats. Bella eases herself to a sitting position.
"Wait till you see what we've got – your favourite - Phil made cheeseburgers and they are still warm!"
"Mmm…sounds good, Mom."
As Phil hands out burgers wrapped in paper napkins, bags of chips and cans of soda, Bella suddenly feels a wave of nausea roll over her. She can't bear to think of food. No. Absolutely not. Suddenly she realises she's going to be sick.
"Oh no." She puts her hand on her mouth, realises she's started to sweat.
"Honey? Are you ill…" Renee helps her up and together they stagger up the beach to some bush scrub, where Bella empties the contents of her breakfast onto the ground, then sits back with a low moan on the sand.
"Damn, I thought I was getting over this bug."
Renee looks at her carefully, as if seeing her with new eyes.
"Have you been needing to pee a lot?"
"Yeah."
"Sore boobs?"
"Yeah. Why, have you had this too?"
"Oh yeah…once upon a time." Renee's mouth shifts from worried to determined.
"Mom?"
Renee shakes her head grimly and steers her back to where Phil is sitting, a concerned looked stretched across his amiable face.
"Phil, would you come back to the house with me?" Renee asks distractedly.
"Sure!" Phil looks surprised. "What do you need?"
Renee dusts some sand between her hands. Her eyes scan up the beach to where there is a sign advertising the annual sand castle building competition that day.
"Oh, I thought we should get some buckets and spades. We haven't made sandcastles in years….we'll be back soon baby."
Bella watches worriedly as her Mom and Phil walk off. Well, actually, Renee kind of jogs and Phil walks with big strides to keep up. Soon, Bella can see her Mom gesticulating wildly, and Phil has his arms around her. This is seven shades of weirdness.
Bella picks up a copy of a magazine Renee has left lying on the sand. It's all fashion and celebrities, not Bella's cup of tea, and she quickly thumbs through it and discards it, counting the minutes until Phil and Renee could feasibly return.
Just like Mom to want to do something quirky like building sandcastles.
Time passes though, and her family do not return. Phil's burger has a single bite out of it, and he's not a man to half eat his lunch and then just forget about it. She feels like the last one standing on the Mary Celeste and nobody told her she needed to abandon ship.
Down the sand to her left is a little girl who has set up her little space for the sandcastle competition. Bella drinks a soda and watches as she takes her pink bucket down to where the wet sand is near the water's edge and fills it up, then drags it back up the beach. The girl must be only about four or five, but she's seriously determined. She upends the wet sand and forms it into a mound.
"Hey Ma'am," She squints against the sun and pushes sandy blonde hair behind her ears. "Doncha let ANYONE take my spot, okay?"
Before Bella can answer, the little blonde thing has stomped away in her jelly shoes back towards the sea.
The kid makes about twenty journeys, God honest, before she settles down with her mound of sand and a big stick. By then, other folk have gathered to start shaping their castles, and Bella can see the beginnings of shapes taking form – people working steadily to raise animals, buildings and strange objects from grains of sand. It's actually sort of fascinating.
But Bella's rooting for the little kid now, of course.
Though she doesn't seem to be building UP the way enough. She's piled up her sand, then flattened it out, and then ever so carefully has poked about on it with a stick.
The sun is lowering, and Bella knows she should try and get up and find Renee and Phil, but part of her really wants to see the sandcastle competition finished.
Easing herself to her feet, she has a better view of the near completed entries now. Some sea turtle shapes rising cleverly up as if burrowing out of the sand. A pyramid. A gator. A crab. A tower that is most likely going to win since it seriously looks like something out of Lord of the Rings.
Bella finally walks over to see what the kid has done.
She's got her tongue sticking out the corner of her mouth, and her yellow swimsuit is riding up her butt-crack in the way that only kids can get away with.
Bella moves closer, tilts her head, trying to bring into focus the flat picture the girl has made: it's a dog, with a bushy tail and pert ears. She's even drawn shaggy fur and a lolling tongue, a bit like the way the kid herself has her tongue hanging out.
"I like your dog," Bella says shyly.
The girl tuts, puts her hand on her hip. "That's not a dog, lady. Don't you know a wolf when you see one?"
"Guess not," a warm voice from behind her says, and Bella whips around with a startled gasp.
There he is. Impossibly tall and molten skinned. Wearing a pair of black jeans underneath brown abs that ripple like tide washed sand.
Grinning like a Sun God.
