a/n. Wow. Sorry for the wait. I suck. Enjoy.

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I had been foolish all my life.

Forceful. Impatient. Selfish.

But right now - the last thing I wanted to do was take away Leah's choice.

A choice in where she decided how her life was to play out.

Of course I wanted her, but that didn't outweigh my need to assert that Leah was not a thing, or an object, or something that could be owned, not like I had with Bella all those years ago.

This was something more.

This was us - me - forcing Leah to turn into a different kind of monster.

Something like me.

Nate had forced the curse of the werewolf onto her, but wasn't I effectively doing the same by forcing the shape-shifting gene to the forefront? Wasn't I also choosing to change her? Without giving her the choice? Without letting her decide? Would she forgive us? Me?

Neither was right, but only wrong choices now presented themselves.

The question also remained as to how?

How could we force Leah's shape-shifting gene to the surface? How could we force something that was dormant, or at least, something had not yet shown itself completely, to bloom?

Blood pumped hotly through my veins, trying to assess all the possibilities, and the solutions, including the consequences.

Luckily for me, the answer walked straight out of the elevator and made it's way toward me.

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The pack ran interference as Carlisle and Edward transported Leah across the hospital to the Research offices.

Removing her from the hospital completely wasn't an option in her state, there were too many variables but we needed the privacy to ensure no one saw or heard what was about to happen.

Bella strode beside me nervously, both our eyes never leaving the bed being rolled in front of us. Edward glanced back at us, not only in concern for his wife but probably because he'd heard the hair-brained idea roll through my mind over and over again. He hadn't shot it down yet, meaning it may actually be plausible or at least not as impossible as I first believed when I had tried to explain it to Bella.

"You think this will work? With me?" my ex-human, ex-best friend asked softly in her all too perfect voice which managed to raise the hairs on the back of my neck. There was something still so Bella-ish about her, regardless of the horrible smell she was now drowned in. "It doesn't make sense, Jake. Are you sure it can't be anyone else?"

I huffed out a breath, ignoring her initial questions, taking us back to a time when I would have done anything to have her look at me how she now looked at Edward.

"Do you remember when you came to find me at home when I stopped answering your calls? Just after my change? You ran into the pack in the back yard."

She nodded, a strange feature crossing her face, the memories probably all but scratched from her new vampire life.

"That day - with the scent of vampire permanently stuck to your clothes plus the screaming match you had with Paul - it caused him to lose his shit faster than anyone else has managed before."

Bella made a noise in the back of her throat indicating she was a least listening to my half-assed explanation.

"Sam used to think anger was the fastest way to pull the wolf forward, to phase... but it's not." I told her seriously, watching as the blonde doctor scanned his pass on the panel next to the heavy metal doors. I didn't want to mention the incident between Sam and Emily's face, or my feelings towards her as a young-teen, even though the one about Paul was just as uncomfortable. "It's jealousy, Bella. Jealously feeds the wolf faster than white hot anger does. In the first few months the wolf is irrational, hypersensitive, like you've suddenly been thrown into an animal version of puberty with no filter."

Touching my arm, Bella stopped me before we could enter the room. "Why was Paul jealous? Did he have a... uh.. a crush? On me?"

"God, no!" I snorted, shaking my head, effectively shifting my arm so her slim fingers were no longer touching me. "Paul imprinted on my sister, Rachel, that morning. He'd seen her through the kitchen window briefly. She'd been on the phone to Leah, talking about school in Arizona and how they couldn't wait to get out of this dump and meet some hot college guys. I know Paul seems - like an asshole more often than not - but - he kept his mouth shut that day and ever since, eager to let my sister live her life without him. You showed up five minutes later on your little rant, swinging that fist straight into his face."

"I still don't know how that's going to help me with Leah." She complained, her golden eyes flicking over my mine.

Turning vamp clearly didn't make people any smarter.

"You are going to make her jealous, Bella. You're going to use me and you, against her."

I wanted to laugh at my own admission. Any one else would have had to seriously reconsidered the confidence in themselves. But the conversation with Embry in my kitchen had cemented my suspicions, and then again at the Cullen cottage. I would never say it to her face, but Leah was jealous of Bella. Of what we once had, or at least of what my girl was thinking may or may not have happened between Bella and I.

I swallowed tightly, hoping I wasn't wrong. Hoping she felt the same way I felt about her.

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After Carlisle had positioned the bed in the pressurised chamber he nodded gently at me.

"I'll let you have a word with her before we start."

I couldn't help but scan the inside of the room. Edward and the pack had helped clear away most of the medical samples and equipment, leaving the room essentially bare. The watching area from outside the room consisted now of only two vampires, Bella and Carlisle. I could tell Bella was nervous as fuck, but so was I. I had just hoped that after this, Leah would forgive me.

I grabbed a stool and dragged it closer to the bed, reaching to grasp her hand in mine.

My girl felt cool to the touch, her temperature much lower than I had become accustom to. Her nose crinkled in annoyance only just slightly, but her lashes never flinched.

It was strange to see, as if her body's reactions and her mind were two separate entities.

"Lee - I want you to know that... whatever happens... your happiness will always be more important to me, than my own."

I didn't have many words to offer, so I kissed her palm and nodded to Carlisle through the glass to re-enter.

"Will pulling her out of the coma hurt?"

The doctor glanced at me as he adjusted the lines leading into Leah's veins as he made his way back inside the chamber. "It will be... uncomfortable."

"When - fuck - when I phased the first time, doc, I felt like my skin was being torn apart. Like my whole body was on fire. Burning."

"Jacob," he assured me, sliding the thin needle from Leah's skin to stop the medication that was essentially keeping her under and in a semi-unconscious state. "Are you sure you want to be here while it happens? If what your saying is true, Leah will begin to experience the same feeling, are you going to be strong enough to see it through without stopping?"

My eyes drifted back down to her face, my fingers skimming the dark hair that had fallen across her cheek.

"I have to be."

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"Jacob," Bella started, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth. "You need to stand outside. I can't... with you here. I can't."

"I can't leave you locked up inside this 2x2 room with her, Bells. If she does shift, its the last place you're going to want to be." I told her seriously, crossing my arms over my chest.

"I'm stronger than I look you know." Bella shot back in annoyance, huffing out a breath. She eye balled me for several moments before I conceded, not because I was still her lap dog, but because I needed her to do this and if this was one of the rules, I'd have to obey.

"Fine," I snapped, before pulling myself together and leaning down to kiss Leah's temple.

With several whispered words to my girl, I left the room, only to stand in front of the glass, body tense; waiting and hoping for a miracle.

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They say dying is hard, but it's living that really sucks.

When you're alive you feel love, happiness and joy, but you also feel hate, sadness and pain.

When you're dead, it's nothingness.

No feelings, no people who have passed on visiting you, it's just empty.

Void of everything life had once given.

'I've always loved him.'

The sound of a voice caught me off guard, the gentle tone, hushed musical notes. Clearly female.

'Ever since I was little. Ever since I first saw him. Him and that smile.'

It felt like I was submerged under water, as if glass separated my conscious thoughts from the mess that swirled inside me. Tendrils of cold fear spun around me, tightening heavily inside my whole being. Pain existed, but I couldn't pinpoint where it was coming from. Just that it was there.

'He was my first friend, Leah. My first real friend. He didn't care that I looked different, or spoke differently. He just saw me... as me. Saw inside my heart.'

Darkness continued to crash around me, pulling and pushing, but I felt like I was stuck. My intention was to claw at the darkness, fight it, but my body was absent, as if I were suspended in it's void. Unable to move or fight.

'Jacob-'

Pain ricochet through every fibre at his name, sparking an implosion of emotions to pulsate. Fear. Longing. Sadness. Happiness. Love. It swirled like bright lights, like I was looking directly into the sun while being spun around on an office chair in the middle of an open field.

'He saved me in so many ways, Leah. Ways you will never understand. Ways you couldn't.'

Slowly, painstakingly so, the voice continued on. Clearing with each syllable. The smell of rancid perfume soaked over me, causing my stomach to roll in fits.

'I didn't deserve him. Not really. I don't think anyone ever will.'

Heat bloomed over parts of me, in both despair and panic. She was talking about my Jacob.

'We have history, Leah. Secrets between us. He will always be my Jacob.'

Bitch. History? Seriously? Did she know who she was talking to? Motherfu-

'No matter what, I will always be in his life. I'm his best friend, Leah.

You're... temporary...

There is nothing he or I wouldn't do for each other...

and when he imprints...

you'll just be another girl...

just like the girl in the park all those years ago...'

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Bella had strategically turned her back to the glass while she spoke to Leah and I couldn't get a tell on anything she was saying. My nerves were about to shoot straight out of my skin, and I contemplated dragging Edward into the room by his collar, just so he could read Leah's mind.

"No need, Black. My wife has her shield up. She wanted complete privacy... even from me." His vampire voice announced as he entered the room and stood beside me.

I couldn't deal with their melodramatic marriage at this point, I really didn't give a shit about anything but Leah.

"Do you know why she didn't want you in there while she was talking to Leah?"

Taking a deep breath through my nose, teeth clenched, I relented. "Why?"

"Because even though you're making Bella do this, she won't lie to Leah." He murmured softly, his shoes shuffling against the clean hospital floors. "She's telling her the truth. Or at least... her version of the truth. You see... even though Bella chose me... she still wishes she could choose you as well."

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Understanding the universe was fruitless.

Self realisation; far more attainable.

My own self realisation came then and there in the depths of the darkness -

I was going to tear Isabella Cullen's heart right out of her fucking chest.

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Movement caught my eye through the glass.

Leah's eyes hadn't yet opened, but her index finger twitched so violently and quickly that I had almost missed it.

The lights flickered around us in cold comfort, causing my iris to contract slightly with the change in light.

"What is it?" I asked Edward, noticing the way his posture suddenly tensed. "Can you hear her? What the fuck is happening, Cullen?"

My voice sounded pathetic, desperate.

"No," he articulated softly, his head cocking to the side. "Not Leah. But we have company."

The lights flickered again, twice, before the power shut off completely.

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