I decided to go to the Cullens house first and check on Jasper, since it was on the way to La Push. Since I hadn't told Sam when I was going to see him today, it wasn't an issue.
I pulled up to the Cullens house, and started to text Alice, "I'm here. Where r u?" when she texted me, "Main house, kitchen." I laughed at her ability to see the future.
I got off the bike and went inside. Inside, Carlisle and Esme were standing by the sink in each other's arms, Rose and Emmett were standing by the wine rack, and Alice was sitting in Jasper's lap playing with his hair at the kitchen table.
"Thank you for coming," said Carlisle.
"Did you think that I wouldn't?" I asked.
"We just know this is a stressful time," he said.
"Well, when it rains it pours," I said. "Isn't there a time in the ER when everyone and their brother is in a car wreck?"
"Six at night," he said. "Everyone tries to die at six at night."
I smiled at him.
Walking over to Jasper, I saw him stiffen a little.
"I think we need to talk," I said. "So do you want to go somewhere private, or do you want your family here so they can help figure out what to do?"
"I want everyone here," he said.
"Okay let's all go to the living room and sit down. More comfortable. Help you relax."
He nodded, and Alice took him by the hand and we all went into the living room. Jasper sat on the couch and Alice snuggled up with him. Rose and Emmet sat on the other end of the L-shaped sofa. Carlisle sat in his professor's chair, and Esme sat in his lap, and I sat on the ottoman.
"Alright Jasper," I said. "Tell me your version of what happened."
"I went hunting and I couldn't stop eating," he said.
"Okay, can you tell me why?"
He shrugged.
"Lots been going on the last couple of days," I said. "Why don't you tell me everything that has happened from your side of the story since about Wednesday or Tuesday, and how it made you feel."
"Okay, well Wednesday, you went to go hang out with the werewolves, which I didn't like cause Alice cant see you, and you had a seizure and turned into a werewolf."
"How did that make you feel?"
"It freaked me out," he said. "I didn't know if you had been attacked or hurt. Then, we decided to keep you on La Push so the werewolves could take care of you, but they wouldn't call us and say if you were doing any better. They picked up when your mom called, but they said you were throwing up blood, and running a fever, and they wouldn't let Carlisle see you."
"And how did that make you feel?"
"Mad. I didn't know if they knew what they were doing, or if they even cared about you enough to take care of you. Then we finally break the treaty and you come out, and your better, but then your telling us that you have to move and your telling us goodbye, and you will only see us for sessions and stuff."
"That probably made you really depressed."
"Yeah. And I can't do anything about it. I mean what am I supposed to do? Make you turn back into a vampire and live with us? Bella says that the werewolves have more freedom and stuff."
"I think it sucks either way."
"Well then it got worse, cause we heard today that one of the werewolves who supposedly takes care of you apparently doesn't have his head on straight. And I was scared he was gonna do something stupid.
"Then Bella gets sick and I go see her to make her feel better, and I feel her emotions are just spiraling down and I can't help her cause she is just in such bad shape. So I just came home, and then… I couldn't stop eating."
I sighed. "Okay, that was good. Listen I am gonna tell you what my mom tells me. Vampires are kind of the exact opposite of werewolves. Werewolves wear their hearts on their sleeves and get upset and excited about every little thing. Vampires, we don't care about anything unless we want to. Think about Edward. He didn't have a girlfriend from 1918 to 2005 cause he didn't care. So the fact that you care that I got sick, and Bella got sick, and it affected you is amazing."
"Really?" Jasper asked.
"Yeah. And I know you want to beat yourself up because you got upset, but the fact that you showed emotion and got upset is progress because newborns don't think like that."
Jasper smiled.
"Now about the stress eating," I said.
His smile faded.
"I'm worried but I'm not that worried about it. Let me explain. Let's say a recovering heroin addict gets upset, they go through a break up or something, and they want to use heroin, but go buy a tub of ice cream and eat it all. Is it healthy? No. But, they didn't relapse. They still need to deal with the break up, but in a moment of crisis, they chose the better option. Get what I am saying?"
"Sort of."
"Apply it to you. You basically are a recovering human blood addict."
He laughed.
"You are! You have cravings, and withdrawal symptoms, you're in therapy to make sure you don't hurt anyone. I mean basically you're addicted to human blood. Agree?"
"I have never thought about it like that, but yeah, I guess."
"It's okay, every vampire is. Anyway, stress is a common trigger for every addiction. There was a ton of stress going around the last couple of days. You were around Bella, who you care about, and who was suicidal, basically, and despondent, and that made you really stressed out. You knew Sam was suicidal, and even if you didn't care, that must have stressed you out. Then everyone else was stressed out about Bella and Sam. I know I was. So your mind must have been going crazy. Jasper, when you get stressed, you go towards your addiction. It's natural. So you had the choice to stress eat on some humans or Bambi, and you chose Bambi. That is okay. I'm actually really proud of you."
"Really?"
"Long term, if I do my job, I want you to talk it out instead of stress eating. But today you were fine."
"I thought you would be mad," he said.
"No, you did great. I'm so proud of you."
I hugged him, not minding the blood. "Don't beat yourself up at all. You did two amazing things. Expressed emotions, which most vampires turn theirs off, and feed on animals instead of humans. You should tell Alice you want to do something special to celebrate."
Alice came up and put her arm around him. "Oh we will," she said. Jasper's eyes widened and he smiled.
Laughing, I said, "Okay, I'm gonna go check on my other patients. Bye."
"Bye Sisi," said everyone.
"Thank you," said Carlisle.
"Of course," I said.
"I feel bad for making a big deal out of it now," he said.
"No, I needed to come. You know some people get a mole on their neck and they think it's cancer and it's just a mole. They still need to go to the doctor. I will say this, if he is doing it a lot, meaning he is feeding instead of talking about his emotions, we have a problem. But you know, it's a bad situation. He hasn't had a session this week, and I haven't got to do a lot of work with him yet, so I am fine that this happened."
"Well, I was fine that it happened to. Alice called because he was so disgusted with himself."
"When was he bitten?"
"1863."
"When did he become a vegetarian?"
"1948/1950."
"He has been on human blood for about eighty five years," I said. "It's gonna take eight-five years for him to get off of it."
"Yeah," he said.
"He needs to be gentle with himself," I said.
Alice jumped out of the window and walked up to us.
"You leaving?" she asked.
"I got another house call," I said.
"I can't see you. One of the wolves?"
"That's confidential."
She rolled her eyes, and hugged me. "Thank you for bringing back my husband."
"He's gonna beat himself up for a while. Your gonna have to take care of him."
"Always," she said smiling. "What are you wearing?"
"My clothes won't fit. I had to borrow Leah's stuff."
"Unacceptable. This Saturday, shopping."
I laughed. "Fine."
