a/n: my friend was taken into hospital and i cancelled my weekend away cos i needed to see her. She is ok, not great, but ok. So now I'm home so decided to get the next chappy done. Hope you like. Please let me know what you think - the reviews are getting less and less.

A shout out too hooker81 for all the great reviews you left me. You pushed me over the 700 mark so thank you!!

Also I was looking at the stas for my E&B vid to this and someone has it on there facebook - thats just sooo cool! thank you - please give me a little shout so i know who you are!

Chapter 35

BPOV

Four week had moved on but it seemed like Alice still couldn't.

I sat in the kitchen eating breakfast while she moped around in the corner preparing her own. There was some progress, she could now at least be in the same room as me, that happened two weeks ago but she was still yet to form any real conversation. She would string words together when it was anything to do with Edward but that was about the limit.

I felt his hands rest on my shoulders as he leaned down and kissed the top of my head. Edward. I pulled back to look up at him, and he reached in kissing me on the lips before wiping away small crumbs at the side of my mouth from my toast.

"Attractive." I mumbled in embarrassment at myself as I looked back down at my plate.

"On you, always." He laughed as he moved over to the unit picking up his car keys.

Alice still stood silent.

"So I'll see you in a couple of days." I told him.

He sat down beside me, his small smile disappearing. "Do you really have to go?" he huffed as he pulled me into him and let his forehead rest on my shoulder.

"Edward…" I warned him, we had been over this a hundred times.

It was time for me to go back to Forks, to see Charlie. I had left it for weeks since it all came pouring out around us, the truth. It was time to go back and explain myself to my dad. It was what he deserved. He didn't expect it, he knew what had happened but I felt it was only right to see him and try for him to understand. Charlie had never used it against me; he hadn't tried to embarrass me at my weakness. He had actually been relatively silent on the whole subject.

"I know." He sighed again into my neck as he placed a chased kiss there. "It will be our first night apart." He reminded me as he rested his chin on the edge of my shoulder.

"It's only a couple of days. Get some study done. And don't forget to call me and let me know how your session went." He was on his way to his fourth therapy session that Carlisle had set up for him. I hadn't been asked along by his therapist yet and Edward was getting annoyed with the matter. He wanted me there, the doctor didn't. I went with the doctors orders.

The sessions had been doing him some good, though Edward didn't see it. He was still just as frustrated but his anxiety and controlling it was getting somewhere and also his speech and directing his words, we all could see it. Edward was just always so blind to his own achievements.

"Like I would forget to call you." his small smile appearing again. "You should come with me." he tried, like he tried every week.

"I'm going to Forks." I reminded him. "Besides, you know the rule." The rule was I would only ever go at the request of the therapist. He had lied to me on the second week and got me at there office only to be told I hadn't actually been asked. He learned the hard way not to try that one again and he wouldn't. It was the first real lie he had told me and it took me three days to forgive him. It was what our relationship was dependant on, truth. We needed it desperately in order to help him, no while lies were allowed.

"So…Will you see anyone when your there." He treaded carefully, his tone soft. He was asking if I was going to see Jake and truth was I didn't know.

"I don't know." I shrugged. "I don't have any plan to; he won't want to see me."

"What if he does?" he asked.

"It's not something you need to worry about." I assured him as much as possible as I let my hand reach up to his cheek, to direct his eyes to mine.

"I know." He was sure when he spoke and a felt some light relief that he wasn't letting his thoughts consume him just now.

"Not getting caught with your knickers at your ankles this week?" Alice mumbled spitefully. Generally she was quiet and never spoke to me but on the odd occasion I would hear some quip come from her. She still found it hard to accept our relationship.

I heard Edward growl at her words. He hated when she would have her bit at me like she did. She was beginning to destroy there relationship. "Ignore her." He told me with a firm chaste kiss.

"You ignore her too." I smiled softly at him not showing how much her words were affecting me. They didn't really affect me too much; my real concern was how they were affecting Edward.

"You need to go." I reminded him as I looked up at the clock.

"Yeh I know. But call me when you get up there safe." He kissed my temple as he stood up and I felt his warmth leave me for the weekend.

"I will." I promised. "I love you." I told him before he bent back down to kiss me on the lips.

Breaking away "I love you too." He told me. A small but sad smile on his face and he was gone and out the door. Our weekend apart had just begun.

Standing up I stood in front of Alice. "You know you're going to make him worse. He is trying so hard and you just keep throwing it away with your digs. I understand I'm not your favourite person, fine, just don't let it affect Edward." Alice stood still on her feet, a little in shock as I began my rant at her.

"You are only making things worse for yourself, can't you see what your doing? He needs you so much but he wont go to you when you keep being like this." The harsh tone in my voice scared even me. "You need to let this go. Ok, don't be my friend anymore. I don't care, not if this is how you are going to act, that wasn't the Alice that I became friends with, that was someone else who looked out for her brother and her friends constantly."

"You took advantage of my brother." She argued back. "You…you lived this secret world with him and told no one. He leaned on you and you got him into bed."

I was surprised she still thought like this. "You think that's how it was, that I kept him away from you. Alice, all I wanted was for him to go to you. He wouldn't let me tell you. Could you imagine me going to you, you would have rushed straight to him and confronted him and he would be right back at the beginning and having no one and never trusting anyone again. Think about it, Alice." I begged for her to see it.

"I wouldn't have confronted him." She told me firmly but I knew she would have.

"Yes you would. You wouldn't have meant harm but you would have."

She stood there silent, thinking my words.

"You still slept with him when you had a boyfriend, you strung him along."

I had to defend myself. I had never meant to do anything like that to Edward. "Maybe I did." I admitted. "Maybe I messed with his head more than I should have let happen but it was messing with my head too. I was with Jake and then Edward came and just turned my life upside down." I sighed thinking about it.

"He came to me and I fell in love with him. I never wanted anyone hurt. I hurt Jake and I hurt you and I can't take it back and I'm sorry that it did but I won't apologise for what happened between me and Edward."

I could feel my eyes glass over and Alice wore the same look. "He's happy, why can't you be?" My voice cracked.

"I am." She told me. "I...I just wish I could have been part of it, that he would have spoke to me too." Her voice was shaky and I could see a flicker of the Alice I loved.

"He did, all his life it's been you that's stood by him, he knows this, he can see that without you he would be even more alone. He knows what you have done for him; he just felt he could talk to me too, about the things he couldn't talk to you about. It's not a competition Alice, you're his sister and he loves you but he loves me too. But if you keep going the way you are he will pull away completely."

"But he's already done that, he goes to you." her voice was a whisper and it was then she broke, the tears began down her face and it killed me to see the pain she had.

"But he still needs you too, he needs us all and he needs you. You can't take that away from him because he has me too. We all need to be there for him and get along. We got caught up in our own thing. You have Jasper, why can't Edward have someone too?"

She moved to the table and sat down thinking. Why couldn't she see that we had what they had? She would speak to Jasper about things that she wouldn't talk about with the others, I had over heard them.

"I know there are things you tell Jasper that you don't tell everyone else, it's how it works."

She nodded agreeing. "But he didn't talk to anyone before you." She tried to argue back.

"But he did, he and Jasper got along form the start, he and Rose have some strange connection that's almost invisible, and he tries to be closer to Emmett too. There all just so small you can hardly see them but he's working on making them better. You were the only one that was so strong because you pushed for it a lot more. I don't mean that to sound bad, you pushed him when he needed it but he just felt swamped with all of you, all the time and when it was us alone he felt it was easier to deal with."

"I just…I just wish you would have told me."

"I'm sorry but he made me promise. I wanted him to go to you. I felt like I it…it just spun out of control, before I knew it, it turned into this crazy blur after the fire." That's how it happened. I was so blind to my feelings before then.

She nodded silently, taking in my words.

"I'm wrong. I know I am." She told me through her crackled tone, her usual sing song tone completely gone as she wiped tears away. "I'm, I'm just jealous. Its stupid and I can see that but he went to you. I just feel like he doesn't need me anymore." She had held on so tight to Edward, her constant following him around and checking on him over the years. She felt that she should be the reason of this new developing Edward and she felt like she wasn't.

"But he does." I protested. "He just deserves to have what you have with Jasper, you can't be mad at him for that."

She shook he head. "I'm not. Really I'm happy he has it, I thought he never would. I didn't think he would ever let anyone in that far."

"But he did." I pointed out. "If it wasn't for you and all the pushing you gave him in life he might never have been able." She had a huge influence in his life whether she seen it or not. Edward's worry was always his sister too but he knew there had to be a point that it wasn't always put on her. She had been the only one he could depend on in life until college had started. It was now the time that he would grow up from the little boy he had been in high school and he was changing in all the right ways.

She sat and looked at the table; her face was broken and sad. "I just didn't think it would be so soon and not with my best friend."

"I know, but that's how it went and you can't be anything but proud of the changes he's trying to make.

"He's only making those changes cause he wants to please you." she gave out flatly.

"Yeh that's one of the reasons." I knew it was true, I had used it to barging with him, there was no escaping it. "But he wants to be part of the family, he want to feel like he fits in. You had just expected a little too much from him, he isn't like you." I laughed lightly. "No one is like you." I added. "The two of you go from one end of the scale to the other."

Alice nodded knowing it was true and tried to hide the small smile n her face.

"But he loves you and he needs you." I spoke honestly. "And I love you and need you but I won't take this anymore, Alice. I won't let you talk to me like you do and I wont let you do it to Edward. I'll fight you on it if I have to but I refuse to let you hurt him anymore because he is the only one who this is truly affecting." My words were firm.

"I know." She told me. "I'm sorry. I really am." She sighed as she hid her face in her hands. "I don't want to lose you. I really don't and I don't want to make things harder for Edward. You both mean the world to me I just wish I was told and didn't have to walk in on it."

I could understand that. I would never have chosen for her to see us like that. For her to find out as we sneaked about.

"We were going to tell you." I promised.

"I know. I have listened. I just pretend I don't." she looked up and smiled through her tear streaked face.

I laughed a little at her honesty.

"I need to go to Forks and I need to know that you will be there for Edward, that you won't say things. I'm not worried what you say about me but he is honestly about to snap with the way you are acting and if he goes over that edge I'm worried I might not see my boyfriend ever again."

She nodded understanding. She wasn't blind to him; she could surly see the pain he was in over it.

"You don't need to be my friend. Just stop with the petty games and help Edward out a little." I told her firmly.

"I will." She nodded her head. "And I really do still want to try and be friends. You know, maybe start over?" she shrugged questionably as she wiped at the damp on her face.

"I would like that." I reached out and placed my hand over hers.

I knew we still had so much more to go but least it was a start.

"I need to be going. Please, just try to be there for him, I don't want his mind thinking too much about me not being here, I don't want him to worry. Maybe try and take him out with Jazz." I suggested. He would need all the distraction he could get. If he got through this weekend without bother he should manage a little easier in the future. I hoped.

"We'll take care of him, don't worry. Maybe I could talk to him too." She shrugged hopeful.

"Yeh, I think he would like that." I was positive if Alice went to him with all the positivist she usually radiated he would be happy to spend time with her and work on there relationship.

"I need to go." I nodded as I stood up, backing away.

"Thank you Bella." She was thanking me now? I was a little stunned to say the least but I wouldn't knock it. We were moving forward and finally beginning to leave this mess behind once and for all.

I said one final goodbye as I headed out to my truck and got on the road to Forks. Alice was another one knocked off my list, Charlie was next and I was a little hopeful after my chat with Alice that I could at least let my demons rest.

Pulling up outside my old home I saw his car. It was Jakes. He was here.

I had no idea if he knew I was coming here, if he wanted to see me or was just stopping buy by chance. I didn't know what reception to expect.

Walking in the door I called out for Charlie. I hadn't expected him to be home from work yet and the cruiser wasn't parked outside. Was Jake here by himself?

I swallowed had at the thought that he had came to see me.

There was a shuffle from the kitchen before he burst through to the living room, his face full of thunder.

"Hey." I called to him. Old habits dying hard. It was always the way we greeted one another.

"I was just dropping something off. I was going to leave a note but you can just tell him to click it in like how he took it out. He'll know what to do." he told me curtly without meeting my eyes.

I nodded but he wouldn't have seen me as he looked down at the floor.

"I didn't expect to see you here." I told him a little dumbfounded that he was here when no one else was. He was welcome to, it was just unexpected, it was like he had been avoiding Charlie.

"Ditto." He told me flatly, his eyes still looking down at the flooring.

"I...I came for a visit." I didn't need to mention the reason why I was up here was to explain to Charlie why I had ended up cheating Jake.

He nodded slight as he clenched his fists.

"I was hoping I would see you." I told him honestly. I was hoping too, I just let Edward know if I did, he had nothing to worry about.

"I still don't want to see you." he told me as he finally met my eyes.

I nodded taking in his words. It wasn't what I wanted to hear but it was to be expected.

"I…I just want to try and explain."

"Explain why I caught you in bed with another guy." He bit. I took it. I deserved it.

"I never wanted you to find out like that."

"No you just wanted to keep cheating on me and pretend I never existed."

He was still mad and he had every right to be.

"I wasn't like that. I loved you, I still do. It just changed somewhere."

"And what you love him?"

"Yes I do." I told him softly, he wanted the truth but he cringed at my words.

"And I was just nothing…?" he asked.

"No. You weren't nothing. You know what we had-"

"We had a future." He reminded me about the plans we had made that were all now shattered.

"I know, but things change and in time you will see that we were never meant to be. Not really. We just weren't meant to last." I believed it. He had come into my life and helped me through it but now it was time for us to move on. We had got each other through life, our youth, we grew up and we slowly grew apart.

"You think that's it. That you didn't cause this? He asked full of venom.

"I know what I did was wrong and you will never know how sorry I am but my heart changed…" I could never express the way I truly felt to Jake, it would hurt too much.

"Your heart just changed…Nothing to do with him trying to get you into his bed." Alice was having a go at me earlier of me taking advantage of Edward and now I had Jake tell me it was all Edward. I wasn't and I wasn't standing for it.

"I fell in love with him. We happened because we cared about one another, because we are in love." I practically shouted it at him and the look on his face looked as if I had slapped him.

I couldn't believe I was getting into this again. Like this, so aggressive.

"I'm sorry…" I mumbled, I knew it was the last thing he really needed to hear was that I was in love with someone else.

"You will be, when you go to him and find him in bed with some other girl."

I shook my head at his lies. Edward would never do that to me. I knew deep in my heart he wouldn't. He couldn't.

"Jake, I want us to be friends. You were such a big part-" I was cut off.

"Friend, are you for real, you think we can be friends after this. Bella, our parents aren't even friends anymore." He shouted at me.

Wait, What? What had happened between Charlie and Billy?

"What?" I asked completely perplexed.

"We can't be friends." he grunted.

"No, the other part. Do not take my mistakes out on Charlie, you are his family." Why was he even here if that's what his story was?

"Bella you think the world is just going to keep turning the way it was, it won't. I don't want this to affect them but it has, they will get past it but right now I can't face him and my dad is struggling because Charlie seems to think it's ours to deal with."

"It is ours to deal with, I'm his daughter he can't turn his back on me, don't make him choose like that, it's not fair." Tears filled in my eyes at the thought of Charlie being pushed away because of this. He couldn't do that to me and it wasn't right he had to pick a side. I knew he loved me and Jake but it was me who was his daughter.

"Wait." I could see it now. "You're avoiding Charlie, he gave you some crap excuse for you to come over and you sneak in while he's at work so you don't have to face him." I shook my head in disgust at the treatment he was giving him.

"I cant face him, I'm not asking him to choose, I know I wont win that one and I don't want to. I'm not competing with you for your own dad. I just need some more time."

"When did you see him last?" I asked.

"The day before I went down to Seattle." His eyes fell down to the floor, he didn't like the thought either. "I…I just need more time." He tried to explain.

I nodded. "Just don't let it all go to waist, I can understand that Billy hates me, and that you hate me-"

"That's the thing Bella; we love you, that's what makes it all so…so hard." He sighed. "Charlie and Billy will work it out, but you and I are done. I wasn't lying when I said I didn't want to see you ever again. You took my heart out and tore it apart. I can't forgive you for that, that, I hate you for."

It hurt a lot more than I thought it would have. I could understand the hating me and not wanting to see me, and never forgiving me, I could understand it, but the pain was more than I could bear.

I felt myself fall back into the seat beside me, my legs unsteady and unable to hold me.

"Just tell Charlie I left it for him." He told me as he headed for the front door. "And Bella," I whipped my head up to see him stand at the door. "I really hope you never have to walk in on him like I walked in on you, you deserve it, but I hope it doesn't happen. It's a lot of pain. Remember that." He nodded once and then headed out the door and out of my life.

I sat back on the seat and felt defeated; my small win earlier with Alice had been washed away with the down pour of the end of my life with Jacob Black.

EPOV

I pretended to be locked in interest with whatever was on the television at the moment but my eyes constantly wondered down to my phone in my hands.

"Edward she will call you later. Forget about it just now." Alice piped in.

I had got a text earlier from Bella saying she was at Charlie's but that she was a little caught up with things to call.

I couldn't help the gnawing feeling in my gut at an image of her being caught up with him. I shook it from my mind knowing it was ridiculous. I trusted her, she had picked me. I was just letting my anxiety get to me and let my mind wonder off on its own.

"You know what's she's like, she will be making Charlie enough hot dinners to keep him going for the next month." Alice smiled across from the other side of the room in Jaspers lap.

"She has a point." Jasper added with a small laugh.

When I got in earlier Alice had came to me and said that they had spoken, that they were trying to get past it. I found it hard to believe in Alice's sudden change of heart but she told me that it was Bella that had stood up and spoken on the matter first.

She had finally kicked Alice's arse into gear like I knew she could, like she had done to me in the past. I was proud of her.

Alice had tried to get me to leave the apartment with her and Jasper but I refused. I wanted to speak to Bella and I was worried I would miss her call if I was out and never heard my phone ring. So instead Alice has pushed herself upon me with Jasper, along with DVD's and popcorn.

I had no idea what the film was, something about some daft brat thinking it was a good idea to fall in love with a vampire. Irony I think they like to call it.

Alice swore blind she had no idea what it was about and offered to change it. She remembered the days of my taunting as clear as I did. I said it was fine; I had yet to actually focus on one word of what had been said in it.

My eyes were still firmly on my phone.

"Edward I swear if you don't put it down I'll fight it out your hands and throw it out the window. She is busy, she will call you when she can, relax, you know you can trust her." I was a little surprised at Alice's support.

I placed the phone down to my side and tried to forget all about it and watch the movie.

The movie was over and so was the next one, still no Bella.

I paced around in my room griping at my hair. What the hell had happened to her? I wanted to call her but knew she wanted me to stay strong and wait.

Was this a test? Was she seeing how long I could last before I tried to call her?

My mind was driving me crazy. Too many thoughts pushed it in to over drive.

I heard a light knock on the door and Alice floated in with a small questioning smile.

"She hasn't called me back." I bellowed to her.

"Something must have come up. She wouldn't do that, not to you." Alice moved into me, pulling herself into me, hugging my waist.

I accepted it, it wasn't Bella but I could see she was only trying to help me.

"Why hasn't she called, just even a quick call." I stammered out.

"Maybe her phone died." She tried.

"She packed her charger this morning after she charged it overnight." I told her flatly.

"Maybe it broke." She tried again.

"Or maybe you're right, maybe she's been caught with her knickers at her ankles again."

She smacked at my chest hard, I looked back down at her stunned.

"I was mad, ok, she wont do that, stop it, stop it right now." She hammered her foot down to the ground like a child. "She loves you. I don't know why she hasn't called but I know something must have happened for her not to call, something important."

What was more important than letting me know how she was, ok I could understand her need to speak to Charlie and no doubt her mothering nature she seemed to bestow upon him but this was ridiculous. Surely she would know how I was feeling.

What the hell was she trying to do to me?

"I'm going to sleep in with you in my old bed." Alice told me. Did she really think I needed babied that much.

"Alice, I'm fine." I told her coldly but she paid no attention to my icy tone.

"Edward, if I'm here you can talk to me if you need to." I knew I could talk to her. I always had, it had only been the past months that it had shifted to Bella, but now Bella wasn't here.

"I'm fine." I spat. I didn't want to talk, I didn't want to even try and think about it. The images in my head were too much and I didn't need to keep thinking about it to keep them there.

She sighed heavily. "Edward…"

"Alice, just don't. Don't try to give her any more excuses." I fell on to my bed, Bella's bed, our bed. It stood for nothing without her.

"I'm not trying. Just don't let it get to you. There must be a reason."

"She's either screwing Jake or some other guy." I told her with a snap.

"Is that what you really think? Is that what you think of her, you think that little of her?" I didn't know what to think anymore, I though Bella knew me better than anyone but clearly, I was wrong.

"I don't know what to think anymore." I told her honestly. "If anything bad had happened to her…" I didn't want to think about it. It would kill me.

"Nothing bad has happened, nothing like that, we would know, Charlie would have called us…" the thought was obviously lingering in Alice's head too. "Wouldn't he?" she asked wearily.

A moment passed between us and Jasper came in.

"Guy's stop it already. She had things to do; she must have got caught up. Give her more time." He told us as Alice went to him and wrapped her arms around him.

I had no one, no one to wrap my arms around. I was cold and alone without her.

I needed to know. I needed to hear her voice.

With the need to be sick and the need for Bella, the need for Bella winning, I picked up my phone and held on to my stomach and went to the last number dialled.

a/n: oh man – where has Bella got to? Any idea?

What...You didn't think i didn't have one last curveball to throw at you before the end!! Really?! hehe

Please review!! xx