Chapter Thirty Three

March 2006 (continued)

"OH! Bella, it's beautiful!" Rosalie crooned as Bella opened a sweet cream colored layette. They hadn't wanted to find out the sex of the baby, so everyone was getting them yellow, cream and green colored clothing.

"Thanks, Lyn," Bella said with a soft smile. "I just can't believe…" The tears started again and Esme handed Bella a tissue. Bella's emotions had been out of whack for a while now due to the hormones and pregnancy.

"Everyone is entitled to a few tears at their baby shower," Esme said with a wink. "It's a very overwhelming thing."

Renee came over and gave her daughter a hug. "I'm so happy for you, Bella. Edward is wonderful."

Bella smiled. "I know."

Just then, the doorbell rang. "I'll get it!" Lyn said as she jumped up. She walked to the door and let out a squeal. "Alice!"

"Alice?" Bella said, fighting to stand up.

Alice smiled as she hauled in a present almost as big as she was. "Don't get up, Bella," she said as she walked over.

"How…I thought you were busy with a movie…" Bella stammered.

Alice grinned and kissed Bella's cheek. "Well, I felt bad I didn't make it to your wedding. I had to get my head on straight and get my butt in gear so I could make it here for this joyous occasion!"

"We're so glad you're here!" Rosalie gushed as she pulled Alice into a hug.

"We're all here now," Bella said, starting off another round of waterworks, though this time she wasn't alone. "All my friends are here now! Now this baby can come!"

"Not yet," Renee said with a wink. "You've still got a few good weeks, honey."

Bella rolled her eyes. "Not literally, Mom. God…"

Everyone laughed and the party resumed amongst squeals and 'awww's.

"Where's Jasper?" Bella asked as Edward brought her a fresh cup of punch after all the 'guests' had gone home. Only the boys and their women, plus Alice, remained. The kids had all gone down to the kids' room with Foster taking his "big brother" role very seriously.

Edward shrugged as he sat down next to her on the arm of the overstuffed chair she was sitting in. "He said he wasn't feeling well. He wasn't looking too hot either."

"Should I take him something?" Alice asked softly. She had come in late to the shower in hopes of avoiding Jasper, but she knew she needed to just see him and get it over with. She realized she still had feelings for him, even after everything that had gone on between them, and she just couldn't let him go.

"Uh…" Edward started.

Bella poked him in the rib with her elbow. "Sure, Ali, I think that would be fine. Why don't you take him some cake? See if he's feeling better? Maybe we need to get him something?"

"Some pussy," Emmett said under his breath, earning him a back of the head slap from his wife. "What?" he asked indignantly. "It's true."

She shook her head. "You may be a multi-million selling artist, Emmett McCarty, but you have no couth."

"Helloooo," he told her with an over-dramatic eye roll. "I'm from the south, dammit."

Bella looked at him and let out a snort before she started laughing so hard, she had tears rolling down her face.

Alice giggled and walked over to the table. She grabbed a piece of cake also a glass of punch for Jasper and made her way up the stairs.

"Jasper, look," she said under her breath. "I know we've gotten off on the wrong foot…" She shook her head. "No, that's not right." She paused and started again. "Jasper, I'm sorry that things got so fucked up between us…" She stopped on the stairs. "Damn it," she whispered. "It should not be this hard to tell someone you love them."

She blew out a breath and continued up the stairs and down the hall toward his room. She sucked in a breath and knocked on the door. "Jasper? I've got cake…" that was brilliant, Alice, she thought to herself.

She waited a moment and said, "Jasper, it's just cake. If you don't want it, just say so." She was getting a tad angry at him. She sighed and pressed her forehead against the door. "Look, Jazzy, I know we got off on the wrong foot. I've loved you from the first time I saw you. I would have taken you in any capacity. That first time we were together…it was like a dream. Then you were scared, I get that. Being with you when I was with James was wrong, I know that. But it didn't change things. We are meant to be. I lived after trying to kill myself. It was wrong and stupid and I regret it and I'll bear the scars for the rest of my life…but I don't regret it. It helped me to see what was needed. Miya showed me the way. You don't need a weakling, Jasper; you need me to be a strong woman and I'm going to be, I swear it."

Still, he didn't answer.

Tears were pouring down her face. "Damn you, Jasper. I need to know what you're feeling. Just open. The. Fucking. Door!" she pounded on it to punctuate each word. There was another moment of silence before she heard a groan and a thump.

"Jasper?" she whispered against the door. She quickly sat down the cake and the punch on the hallway table and turned the knob.

The room was steeped in darkness; only a lamp on the desk in the corner broke through the gloom. It took her eyes a few moments to adjust before she stepped inside. "Jasper?" Silence. "Jazz?"

Another soft sound, too soft to be a groan, but not quite a sigh sounded somewhere straight and to the left. She blinked a few times before her eyes grew wide. "Jasper!" she screamed as she ran over to him.

He was lying prone on the floor; he had obviously fallen off the bed and knocked the lamp off the bedside table as he went. "Oh, God…" she said as she saw the needle lying next to him and the belt tight around his arm and she felt the bile rising in her throat. "No…"

She pulled him so he was lying on his side in case he aspirated any fluids, even though he hadn't thrown up, yet, something she had learned from a first-aid class a while back. "SOMEBODY! HELP!" she screamed so loud that her voicebox almost shredded from the force of it.

He was obviously not breathing. She frantically felt for his pulse and found none. "Goddamn you, Jasper; don't you do this to me!" she yelled as she turned him back onto his back and began performing CPR. She gave him a breath, savoring the feel of his lips under hers for only a moment before she began the chest compressions again. "No," she said as she pumped. "I. Love. You. Don't do this to me! I need you, Jasper!" Her voice failed her as she thought; you are everything to me, Jazzy. Without you, I'm afraid my life really isn't anything. I need you in this world, Jasper, even if it isn't with me.

She yelled for help again and finally heard feet pounding on the staircase. Jake and Emmett were the first ones in the room. "Jazz…" Emmett said before he doubled over and vomited.

"Don't just stand there!" Alice bellowed toward Jake. "Call nine-one-one!"

Jake nodded and pulled out his cell phone, dialing immediately.

Rosalie and Lynessa watched in silence as Alice kept cursing Jasper as she continued chest compressions and breaths.

Being a celebrity sometimes paid off and the ambulance arrived only eight minutes after Jake's frantic call.

Alice gave over the reins to the EMT's and she stood numbly.

"Ali," Rosalie said softly as she walked over to her.

It was then that Alice saw the note on the bed. "Nooo…" she said softly as she snatched it up. She read it quickly and quietly to herself through watery vision;

To whoever gets this;

I'm sorry. I can't do this anymore. I've tried, I've tried for so long to be happy, to make everyone else happy, to find myself, whatever the hell I should do, but I can't. I know I'm fucked up. I realize that.

I really hope this works and I'm dead by the time you find this. If I have to go through rehab or some shit, I'm going to be pissed.

Anyway, make sure the people that need to read this, read it.

To Emmett: Bro, I love you so much. You've been there for me when no one else has. You made me a better person, and you kept me alive all through our teenage years. If not for you, I'd have done this a long time ago. So, no matter what; don't you blame yourself for this shit. This is all on me, okay?

To Miya: Forgive me. I did wrong by you by trying to hold onto you when you were just trying to spread your wings and fly. I hope you fly far away and find what you're looking for. You'll always be my first love.

To Edward, Jake, and Carlisle: You guys rock and kick ass. Keep on doing it without me. Let Emmett sing some more than he does now. I know, he can be a pain in the ass, but he really does have some excellent pipes. Let him have some of my parts on the songs, alright?

To Phil: I know, you're pissed. I don't blame you. But, hey, think of all the publicity we'll get from this.

To the girls: Bella, Lyn, Esme, and Rosalie, you four are awesome. Do what you can to keep these guys in line, okay? They'll need you more than you can realize.

And finally, To Alice: I can't apologize enough. Yeah, I know, I should have done that before now, and to your face. What can I say? I'm a chicken shit. I think if I wasn't in such a bad place, we could have been something. I can only hope that maybe we'll meet again in our next life or whatever. So, I'm not going to ask you to forgive me. That's just asking too much. But I hope that one day you can say my name or see my picture without wincing in pain. I love you. I don't say that often, and not to many people, but I do. I've loved you pretty much from shortly after that first time I met you and you kicked our ass in choreography for "As Long As You Love Me". God, to go back to that time…to be in a better place and realize what I could have had…I'm such a dumb ass. I go to my grave admitting it – I LOVE ALICE BRANDON. But it's too little too late, and now I'm gone. I hope you can find some semblance of happy in your life and I haven't fucked you up too bad. I couldn't handle that.

Love,

Jasper

Alice gasped and dropped the paper before she sank down to the floor and began to sob. Rosalie picked it up and read it before she too, began to cry as she sank down next to Alice and held her.

Bella was standing in the entranceway watching as the paramedics carried the gurney with Jasper's body on it out the door.

She felt a sharp pain in her abdomen and gasped as she felt the water gushing down her legs.

"Bella, love? Let's get you to bed," Edward said softly, his eyes betraying his hurt and worry over his band mate.

"No, Edward; we need to get to the hospital."

"Bella, you're in no condition to be sitting in that hospital and their hard chairs half the night while we wait and find out…"

"It's not that," she said. "I...I think my water just broke, Edward. I think the baby is coming right now."