The Flower Moon
Year Eight, Chapter Eighteen
The Box and More Mistakes
Renesmee's Point of View
"Hi honey, all done?" Jake asked, wearily looking up from his laptop. I guess he really was still going through the responses from the now appropriate ad we placed, looking for a suitable replacement, for Jack Fisher.
"Just taking a break. I'm going to need your help later though." That caused his face to fall until I grabbed his hand and used my gift to show him a little preview of what I'd planned (the lingerie I wanted to model for him) before we got to work, reorganizing my bra and panty drawer. Just like I thought, he cheered up immediately.
"Come on," he jumped up and started pulling me towards our house. "Let's go organize that closet."
I pulled back and stopped him. "Not yet. The kids are still awake. Wait until after they've gone to bed." He looked disappointed but I could tell he understood. "Right now I wanted to show you something else. I'm very concerned and not sure what we should do." Before waiting for a response I showed him a replay of the discussion I'd just had with David - about Paul and porn. I thought he would have gotten upset, I surely had, but Jake just started laughing. "Why aren't you more upset about this?"
"Nessie, honey, David is a normal guy. This is not something to be concerned about. You know I can see into his head. I know all about the stash of dirty magazines he has hidden under his mattress that he thinks he's hiding from me. Trust me this is perfectly normal."
"What... I... but -" I didn't know what to say. Was this normal for men? Really? Where did he even get those types of magazines?
"He ordered them online and had 'em shipped next door," Jake answered. Damn-it, I still had my hand in his. "Please calm down. Believe me, it's perfectly normal and very innocent. I would actually be concerned if he didn't have anything. Trust me on this one, please."
I just nodded. I guess I would have to believe Jake on this, as disgusting and appalling as it sounded.
"If it makes you feel better I'll have a talk with him, tonight, after dinner… about uh… the birds and the bees; Felicity too," he sighed. "But right now-" Jake's expression changed, to a smirk, as he resumed leading me back to our house.
"Jake, I told you we needed to wait until the kids go to bed."
"No Ness," he chuckled, "that's not what I meant. I want to show you what's in my memory box, you deserve to know."
"Oh honey, no I don't. It's yours, it's something that seems to be very private for you, I'm sure if there was anything in there that I needed to know about you would have told me already."
"Nevertheless, I don't want to have any secrets from you. You're my soulmate. I should have never kept the box from you in the first place."
As we walked back to our house we passed a just arriving Leah. I was so glad she'd become such good friends with Felicity.
"Hi Leah," Jake called.
"The kids are inside," I added. "Be careful, or you might be tackled by two whipped cream covered monsters," I half-laughed, half-warned her.
"I'm sure I can handle them," she sneered and took off.
Huh? That was weird. I thought she would have been in a better mood; she loved hanging out with our daughter.
"That girl has some issues," Jake just huffed, more to himself than me, before grabbing my hand and continuing to head upstairs.
When we got to the closet he took down his memory box, and showed me its contents, item by item, from the first baby tooth he lost, through his report cards his Father had saved, to pictures of his Mother and Father on their wedding day.
There were a bunch of other pictures in there of his family – one of Jake, Rachel, and Rebecca when they were younger, I'm guessing when Jake was about seven or so, another of Billy and Sarah, shortly before she died, and one of his sister Rebecca and her husband. There was also a collection of other family member's photos - Grandparents, cousins, etc... some in color, other, older ones, in black and white. There was one of Rachel, Paul and Jeremy and another of their new twins.
The box also contained his high school diploma and acceptance letter to Dartmouth that Jake must have put in. And other things that must have been added by Billy – a family tree, a lock of Jake's baby hair, and his first attempt at a Wolf carving… at least he told me it was supposed to be a Wolf, it kind of looked like a deformed squirrel. There was also something in there that Jake told me was a requisite, handmade clay ashtray with "I Love Mom" scratched into it.
Some of the items surprised me. He had the second tooth I'd ever lost. My parents have the first. And a carving he'd made of me as a baby.
He also had a picture Aunt Rose took of David, still as a Wolf, just after I'd given birth to him, and another just after Jake had gotten him to phase back. He also had the positive pregnancy test I'd shown him for Felicity.
"I found it, once we'd returned home from La Push. The box was still resting atop the piano," he told me when I picked it up. "I hope you don't mind that I took it."
"No, I'm glad you saved it. I was wondering what happened to it though," I chuckled back to him. I'd actually wanted to save it myself, but when I didn't find it I figured it had gotten thrown out by my family or something.
"What's this?" I asked holding up a small plastic baggie with tiny scraps of string in it.
"End remnants from the promise bracelet I made for you," he replied grabbing my wrist and showing me how the colors matched. "I snipped the ends to make them even once I finished weaving it, to give it a cleaner look."
Jake was more sentimental about things like this than I ever realized. Every item in his box held such significance.
But the thing that surprised me the most, the thing Jake saved to take out and show me last was Billy's late wife's engagement ring.
"I thought when the time was right, that I would give it to David. It should be kept in the family," he added barely above a whisper.
I wasn't sure why, but it looked like Jake was trying not to cry. "That's a perfect idea," was all I said, though. If he wanted to talk about anything that was bothering him, I knew he would bring it up.
Jacob's Point of View
"Help! Somebody help!" Nahuel screamed from somewhere outside.
Damn-it! Couldn't I watch one football game in peace? What could that jerk possibly want now?
I finally had nothing to do. I'd finally found a new intermediary, okay so it had only been six days but still… I had also finished all of my school work, the kids were off grocery shopping (I think it was more an excuse to leave the house than anything), and Nessie was upstairs reorganizing her underwear drawer. We never made it beyond the first outfit last week and after the third attempt I'd been forbidden from helping again. But she was right; those drawers would never get organized if she kept modeling outfits for me.
A moment later Nahuel burst through my front door carrying a limp, unconscious, and very naked Leah.
"What the hell happened?" I asked running towards him from the living room couch, my forgotten popcorn now splattered all over the floor.
Then I saw it - a bite mark right above her collarbone, next to her neck.
That bastard had bitten her! Nahuel was venomous. It was poison to Wolves. She was dying. Oh crap. What the hell was I going to do? It wasn't like I could suck out the venom; it was poison to me too.
And what the hell was wrong with Nahuel? After laying Leah on the couch he curled up in a ball and began rocking himself back and forth like a baby. He was practically catatonic, except that he was mumbling something; it was hard to tell but I think it was something like - "I didn't -" and "I'm sorry, please... I don't want... die" and I think I even heard a "forgive me" in there between sobs.
Was he kidding? Was he really begging me for his life? Now? Did he think that since he brought her back, and didn't dump her lifeless body in a ditch somewhere, that I wouldn't kill him for this? I knew they hated each other, but trying to kill Leah was beyond tolerable.
I would have to deal with him later though. Right now I had to somehow figure out a way to save Leah's life.
"Nessie! Nessie!" I started screaming. In a flash she was by my side. She took one look at Leah's near lifeless body and immediately understood the situation, but dashed out of the room as quickly as she came in.
Huh?
Seven seconds later she was back with a syringe in her hand and plunged it into Leah's heart. What the hell was that? It couldn't be more venom, like Edward had used to change Bella. The metal syringe looked the same, but Nessie knew venom didn't change Wolves, she knew it would kill us. Instead of asking I started screaming for her to suck the venom out. Why wasn't she doing that?
"No, Jake. Look at her; it's too late for that. But I think this will work. Before my family left," she explained to me, "my Grandfather told me about this," she pointed to the syringe. "It's an anti-venom that he developed just in case he ever needed it for you. He made it using your own blood; it's tied to your DNA. I just hope Leah's related enough to you that it will work on her too."
Before too long I saw that Nessie's theory was right. Leah's breathing was returning to normal, her heartbeat was picking back up, and the wound on her neck was beginning to heal; slower than Wolves normally heal; but healing just the same. After breathing a sigh of relief I glared at Nahuel.
This feud between the two of them was beyond ridiculous. And now Nahuel had actually tried to kill her.
On the bright side now I finally would be able to do what I'd wanted to for years.
I didn't care if we were in the living room.
I didn't care what furniture was damaged.
All I cared about was ENDING NAHUEL.
He'd hurt, NO, he'd tried to KILL a member of MY Pack. MY FAMILY!
This was it. It was time for him to DIE.
In one breath I leapt away from Leah and Nessie, phased into my Wolf form, and pounced onto Nahuel's chest.
"No," I barely heard the weak plea from Leah, still lying behind me, as my teeth were closing around Nahuel's throat, to rip his worthless head off. Her voice was almost inaudible, so low I barely even heard it over my growls, even with my enhanced Wolf ears. Why didn't she want me to kill him? He'd obviously tried to kill her. I didn't respond directly to her, but I didn't bite either, choosing to back off a couple inches and growl at the soon to be pile of ash.
"No," she cried again, slightly stronger than the last time, but still incredibly weak. "I... I love him. Don't... hurt him... please. It was an accident," she said, growing stronger with each word.
What? An accident? Yeah right. How do you accidentally bite someone?
Wait did she say she loved him? But they hated each other. What the hell was going on?
Just then I noticed that Nahuel was in his boxers and it dawned on me what they must have been doing when this "accident" occurred.
Eww, gross. I cringed as I backed off of him and phased back.
"Leah, are you -" Nahuel cried, finally snapping out of his daze and crawling over to her. "I thought I'd killed you. I didn't mean to hurt you. I'm sorry, I just... I wanted to keep... I wanted us to be together, forever. I wanted to make you immortal like me."
"She already is immortal, you idiot!" I screamed at him.
"She is? You are?" He seemed shocked as he looked from me to Leah and Nessie and then back to Leah.
"As long as she continues to phase, which is something that you would have known if you had bothered to ask her."
Nahuel ignored me and began hugging and placing gentle kisses on Leah's face as tears fell down his own. I could feel the bile rising in my stomach as he deepened their kisses. It was beyond... strange to see the two of them like this. It just seemed so messed up, so wrong, so gross.
Nessie had covered Leah in a blanket and we watched as her condition continued to improve over the next twenty minutes.
Nessie was using whatever medical training Carlisle had taught her over the years to monitor Leah's condition. The look on her face had me worried. "Something's wrong," she finally said. "The venom's been neutralized but I think she's lost too much blood," Nessie said, looking at her now closed neck wound.
"What?" Glaring at Nahuel, I growled again. "You DRANK from her?" But it wasn't really a question, more of an accusation. "You do not need to drink to change a person. Why -"
"I... I... I..." he stammered. "It was habit."
Habit?
Habit!
"HABIT!" I don't remember what happened next, but the next thing I knew I was back into my Wolf form and Nahuel was lying unconscious on the floor with a deep gash across his neck.
I don't think I'd killed him, but if he didn't survive I'll apologized to Leah later. She never Imprinted on him, she'd get over it... eventually. And thinking back to Nessie's recovery after giving birth to David, I'm pretty sure the bastard would survive.
"She passed out again, Jake. What are we going to do now?"
We still had some blood in the freezer next door, that Carlisle had re-stocked last time the Cullen's had visited for Nessie's birthday. Blood expired, right? Was it still good? It had only been a month. And it was frozen so it was probably okay. I wasn't one hundred percent sure, but there weren't a lot of options. We couldn't exactly take Leah to the hospital with her one hundred-eight degree body temperature. And I didn't know how we could explain her being down a few pints now that the wound was gone.
After phasing back to two feet I gently picked Leah up and carried her over to Carlisle's old office, where the frozen blood was, along with all of the first aid stuff, and medical equipment. Grabbing five of the bags I zapped them in the microwave.
Smelling the blood, Nessie's thirst kicked in, but she managed to fight it and start a drip. After the second bag Leah's condition began to improve. And after the forth she was almost back to normal.
Now that I knew she would be fine, I allowed myself a chance to think.
This explained Leah's recent strange behavior. I'd been wondering how she found out about the... incidence with Ms. Price. I certainly didn't tell her and I know Nessie hadn't either. And to the best of my knowledge we also had been able to keep it from the kids. I hoped so, anyway.
I hadn't even considered Nahuel as her source, the thought of the two of them voluntarily talking to each other, even to spread gossip seemed highly unlikely to me.
And while she never confronted me about it she'd been giving me strange looks for over a week, now. At the time I'd wished she would just phase with me, just once, so we could clear up any confusion. But every time I'd caught her as a Wolf she immediately phased back.
I hadn't been entirely sure if she really knew or not, and I didn't want to verbally bring it up and stick my foot in my mouth and embarrass myself, and possibly her as well, if she didn't.
I guess once she's better I'll have to have a talk with her and let her know the truth and not just what Nahuel told her. Damn. This was going to be awkward. Nahuel was a jerk, but she apparently, for some unknown, inconceivable reason, loved him.
Would this new information change anything between them? Would the events of today? I mean I know she didn't want me to kill him, but surely she wouldn't continue seeing him after this. Right?
Leah deserved to be happy. Especially after all the crap she'd been through with Sam. Not to mention having her life turned upside down when she became a Wolf. Now this.
Maybe I shouldn't even bring it up.
Renesmee's Point of View
I thought Jake might actually become friends with Nahuel one day, but things kept happening that pushed them more and more apart. How much was this incident with Leah was going to set them back? Maybe one day, now that all competition between them, over me, was gone, it might happen. At the very least they could start being civil to each other.
"So… you and Leah?" I didn't want to influence anything Nahuel was going to say, but also wanted to know if what he said the other day was true or if he was just trying to keep Jake (or me) from killing him.
He blushed and I knew that he had been telling the truth yesterday. He didn't even need to say anything, but I had asked and he answered. "I never thought it would happen," Nahuel told me. "Leah is amazing. I finally found my mate, the one I'll be with forever." I don't think I've ever seen him smile so much.
"Renesmee…" Nahuel hesitated.
"What is it?" I could tell there was something important he wanted to tell me.
"I wanted to explain…" he trailed off again. "The reason I did what I did yesterday… Why I bit Leah, it's… well we were making love, and after a few round she told me that even though she hadn't Imprinted on me she thought I was who she was supposed to spend the rest of her life with. She knows what I am. I thought she was asking me to… I honestly didn't know what my Venom would do to her. I wanted to change her so we could always be together. I didn't know she was already immortal."
He looked so guilty. And sad.
They were two immortal creatures. Vampires and Half-Vampires mated for life. If what Nahuel told me was true then he was eternity bonded to Leah now. Did she realize everything that that implied? Only Leah's possible future Imprinting could split them up. If that happened I wasn't sure what it would do to Nahuel.
Until then it meant that she and Nahuel would be in our lives, in one form or another… always. Nahuel couldn't live in La Push, so Leah would have to be in Jake's Pack.
After dinner that night Jake and I discussed the situation and compared notes on what I had found out.
Jake thought it would be best to talk to Leah about it, make sure she knew exactly what she'd gotten herself into, even if it was too late to do much about it. Since Jake was her Alpha, he assumed he was the best person to do it. But I disagreed. Leah and I'd never been friends exactly. Actually she barely tolerated me, but this was a conversation that needed to take place between two women. And Jake wasn't even close to happy about the whole situation.
"How are you feeling?" I asked from her bedside. We'd set up, yet another, makeshift hospital room in Carlisle's office. I was starting to question why we kept reverting it back and forth. Leah was still recovering, and was just now waking up.
"Nahuel?" she panicked, jerking her body to a sitting position on the medical cot.
"No, no. Calm down. He's alive," I assured her, gently pushing her back down before she could hurt herself. While she was out I'd called my Grandfather and explained everything that had happened. He seemed convinced that she would make a full recovery, but would need to rest for a day or two.
"What happened?" she asked, after taking a deep sigh of relief. "Where am I?"
"Carlisle's office. How much do you remember?"
"I didn't hit my head," she scoffed, "I just need to know what happened while I was out."
Charming as ever. Maybe Jake was right and he should have been the one to talk to her. Oh well.
"We brought you up here. You had lost too much blood and I needed to give you a transfusion. There was some donated blood still in the freezer here. You should be back to normal by tomorrow, but it took four entire bags to replace what Nahuel drank."
"Oh, well thanks." It seemed like it was a struggle for her to even get the words out. Sheesh.
After that I explained about the syringe, since she was concerned about what I'd injected her with, and then I closed my eyes, too chicken to look at her when I spoke, while I asked her about her and Nahuel.
"Don't worry, little girl," she sneered at me. "Getting almost eaten wasn't exactly the highlight of my day, but look on the bright side, this is better than some stupid Imprinting. I got a choice. I got to pick who I wanted to spend eternity with. No one was forced on me."
It was strange, while Nahuel hadn't realized about her immortality, she'd gone into this – whatever it was, fully understanding what she was getting into. I guess that made sense. She'd already known everything, about my relationship with Jake. She had a backstage pass to all of the intricacies of our relationship; she saw everything in Jake's mind over the years. Much to my relief, sort of, she already understood that since Nahuel saw her as his true mate, they would be stuck together, forever.
She'd always said that she was over Sam, but now I was beginning to wonder. Did she really love Nahuel? Or was she just looking for someone who wouldn't, couldn't leave her... again?
I wasn't going to play her game though. I wasn't going to lash out, and yell back at her, and I certainly wasn't going to let her upset me.
But why was she trying to hurt me? Was that even her intention, to make me feel bad? Convince me that Jake didn't have a choice, that he didn't really choose me and didn't actually love me? Well it didn't work. I knew Jake and I truly loved each other. We belonged together.
And maybe they did as well. The more I thought about it the more it seemed to me that they belonged together. They were these two lost souls that just needed to find someone as desperate for love as they were.
It took a lot of coaxing on my part, but eventually, I got Leah talking, almost civilly.
She told me that their relationship had started last Christmas. That was a shock.
"We tried to keep everyone from finding out about us." No kidding. She and Nahuel had fooled everyone into thinking they hated each other.
I couldn't think of why they'd want to do that. "Why?"
"Oh please," she snorted. "Jake hates Nahuel, and he's your ex. Nahuel dumped you. And you can't stand me. Why would either of you want to see us happy?"
I was going to object, but she kept going.
"That's why Nahuel brought Jennifer to Brazil last year. Introducing her to his Aunt's mate was just a cover. The real reason was so that your mind reading Father wouldn't hear the truth about us in Nahuel's mind. He didn't trust himself to successfully hide his thoughts around Edward. Same reason why I refused to phase at the same time as Jake," she shrugged.
Then her face turned sour. "I lost months with him." I knew that if she had been feeling better she would have started growling at me, but she was barely able to talk. "Nahuel would have come back sooner, almost immediately after the Cullens went back to France, but he was trying to convince Jennifer to come back with him. He knew it would look weird without her, but I missed him and was tired of waiting. So I called him; threatened that if he didn't I was going to go find him."
I was starting to think Leah was insane but watching her now talk about Nahuel, I saw the same glint in her eye Nahuel had in my kitchen the morning he first came back. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it just wasn't desperation to not be alone, that pushed them together. I think they were actually, truly in love with each other.
I was sort of happy for both of them. And glad they found each other. Someone around here should be.
It was a week later and Jake still hadn't calmed down. The more he thought about it, the angrier he seemed to get. Currently he was having trouble being in the same room with either of them. He was irritated with Leah, because she seemed to overlook all of the, um... flaws he saw with Nahuel. He thought she deserved better. She tried to explain to Jake that she loved Nahuel, even after everything. I didn't mind as much as Jake did. As long as they loved and cared for each other, wasn't that all that mattered? It's not like Nahuel would try to change Leah again.
Their relationship seemed to be destroying all the others around them.
Jake took issue with Leah for keeping her relationship and everything else from him, but as upset as he was with her, he was naturally and more justifiably pissed at Nahuel for almost killing her. All this led to Leah avoiding our entire family altogether. Even though Leah always seemed to be at Nahuel's house now she'd been actively going out of her way to avoid us and Felicity felt like she'd lost her only female friend.
Then there was David. He wasn't happy that his former friend, as he now referred to Nahuel, had taken a bite out of his Great-Aunt. It just piled onto all of his grievances, not wanting to live here anymore, being the top one currently. Weekly, daily some times, he continued to bring up his want to live in La Push.
But Jake and I were his parents. I knew, we both did, that we were partially being selfish. That we needed to let him go, that keeping him here was making him, and everyone around him, with his souring attitude, unhappy. We gave him more freedom, but we couldn't let him go entirely yet. There was so much about life we still wanted and needed to teach him.
And then there was me. Recently I'd been having more of a problem controlling my thirst. What started as a mild ache had grown. And it was getting worse every day. I wanted, no needed more blood. A lot of it. And not animal blood. That wouldn't have been a problem.
What was happening to me? I thought, after all of the donated bags my Grandfather had gotten me for my birthday, two months ago that I wouldn't be craving it like I'm now. But the scent of human blood, after Leah's injury, it seems to have re-awakened my cravings. Only this time it was different. I've never craved blood this bad before. I didn't understand what was going on. I needed to talk to someone about it. It couldn't still be from my pregnancies. Could it?
But who could I ask? My Grandfather thought I would be fine by now. Obviously he was wrong.
Who else could I turn to for answers?
Nahuel? I needed to go talk to him, maybe he would have a solution. His sister had given birth. He might know something about what had happened to her.
"It's because you have stopped growing," he replied simply, the next day when I stopped by his house, after Leah left for work.
I was glad he was willing to talk to me after everything that was going on between us, but I was also pissed. He knew this was going to happen to me and had said nothing? Of course he knew. It must have happened to him and his sisters as well.
"It was a long time ago," he continued, "but I do remember the need for more blood as I became fully mature. It will dissipate over time, but it will take a while. I'm afraid."
"How long?"
"There's no way to be certain, it was different for each of my sisters and me. Both the start and stop, and duration, but it took place sometime between each of our seventh and eighth years."
I was glad that this wasn't going to be permanent, but what was I going to do in the meantime? Animal blood didn't seem to be doing it for me anymore. What I wanted to do was... well, I couldn't bring myself to say it. I could barely even think it, but I just wanted to sink my teeth into my Jacob. But it's not like I would ever do that.
"What am I going to do?"
"What's the problem Renesmee? There are certainly more than enough animals around here for you. Why do you look so upset?"
"I'm not craving animal blood." Why couldn't I get my voice to come out louder than a whisper? No matter. Nahuel would still be able to hear me.
"Ah! You want human blood, then? That shouldn't be a problem. Carlisle could certainly arrange something for you, even from France. And even if he could not, I'm sure he would come back here for you if necessary to buy some more."
"No that's not it. I want blood, but not animal blood, and not donated blood. There seems to be a particular person's blood I want, but I can't. I won't. He... I... I can't drink from him."
"Oh, that is a problem, then," he agreed understanding what I meant.
He didn't need to seem so happy about it, though.
A.N. - Had I make Nahuel and Leah's secret relationship too obvious in previous chapters?
Thanks for reading, please review and let me know what you think.
