Chapter Eleven

Edward's POV

I was stunned. I couldn't speak at first. "Bella?" I whispered. She looked like she was going to cry. I was about to at that point, too.

"Edward!" she shouted, and ran across the room to me so fast even my eyes couldn't really catch it. She threw her arms around me, and I hugged her back. Breathed in her scent. It was like Nessie's, lilacs and honey.

"Bella, you remember me?" I asked. She let go of me, still smiling.

"Yes, yes I remember everything now. I'm so sorry about before. I obviously wasn't myself." She smiled at me. "I love you. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you sooner."

I smiled back. Even though her remembering just made everything more complicated, it felt like a dream come true. "I love you, too," I said. I tipped her chin up and kissed her. She was back. Bella was back. She stared at me for the longest time with her sharp red eyes. I desperately wanted to know what she was thinking, but didn't want to ruin the moment. Suddenly, she frowned.

"Edward, what about Renesmee? Where is she?" I was confused. Hadn't she seen Nessie the other day?

"Bella, you met her already. She was with me when we showed up at Chris's house."

Realization dawned on her face. "That was Renesmee? How fast did she grow?" Before I could get a word in, she had already moved on. "It doesn't matter. Can I please meet my daughter? Our daughter? For real this time?" I wasn't sure if she should yet, but she seemed incredibly in control of herself for a newborn.

"Of course," I said. "Wait here." I opened the door and found Nessie already standing there. She was crying, but had a huge smile on her face.

"Alice sent me up. Said you'd be coming to get me in a minute anyways."

I stood back and held the door open for her. "Go on," I said, and she walked into the room. Bella grinned when she saw her, and was crying tearless sobs.

"Renesmee? Is that you? Oh, you're so pretty!" she said, and threw her arms around Nessie.

"Mom?" said Nessie, hugging her back. Bella nodded.

"Yes, it's me honey, and do remember you this time, I promise." Nessie laughed.

I walked up and put my arms around both of them. It felt nice, to have them both there with me. It was something I always envisioned, but always thought would never happen. Nessie stepped back first.

"Mom, you should be really proud of Dad," she said. "He raised me all alone in the woods, you know.." Bella frowned.

"You left?" she asked. I nodded, I wasn't sure yet if she mad or not.

"I couldn't stay here. I had to leave. Everything was just a reminder of you. I wanted to get of rid of all it. Except for this one, of course," I said, gesturing to Nessie. "Nessie really helped me out. You should be proud of her. She practically raised herself."

"Wait. Nessie?" said Bella. "Is that what you call her?" Nessie nodded.

"I hate Renesmee. No offense to you, it's just kind of a mouthful. It's too formal for me." Bella nodded.

"Nessie sounds nice, too I guess," she said, but I knew all the careful planning that went into picking out Resnemee's name, and Bella seemed a little mad that Ness didn't like it. I almost wanted to laugh. It seemed so trivial compared to what we had been through. We heard a knock at the door.

"Can we please see Bella now?" came Alice's voice. "You know what, you were going to open the door anyways," she said, and opened it.

"Bella!" she squealed, and ran across the room to hug her.

"Hi, Alice," Bella said, hugging her back. "I've missed you." Everybody got a turn to say hi to Bella, except Rose, who stood in the doorway, sulking.

I went over to her. "Rose, please," I said. "I'm pretty sure this was always going to happen. Bella becoming a vampire, I mean. So please don't be angry. It was bound to happen at some point."

"Still," said Rose, "She should just be dead by now." She left then, and her thoughts were so carefully guarded I still couldn't get exactly what exactly she meant. I didn't really care to follow her. Alice was dragging Bella past me out the door at this point, claiming she had something for her she had fixed up years ago before Bella had 'died'. Her mind was blank, so I assumed it was a surprise for me, too. We followed Alice outside to a little grove of trees to where a small cottage stood. She had fixed it up, though, to the point where it really looked like a nice little house. Nessie grinned.

"Dad, can we live here now?" she asked. She was still kind of mad that she left most of her stuff in Wisconsin, but would be happy to live here. "I mean, look at it. It's beautiful." She ran ahead to follow Alice in the door, and I walked up to Bella, who was just standing there, staring at it. She started crying, then for some reason.

"What's wrong?" I asked, taking her hand.

"This should have been our life," she said. "We should have lived here together with Renesmee and she could have grown up with both us and the rest of her family. And I had to go and ruin all of that. Now she's just a stranger to me. She'll never know me like she knows you. I lost every year of her childhood."

"Bella, listen to me," I said. "She knows you. She used to have dreams about you. I told her every story I could, because she begged me to tell her about you. Every year for her birthday, we'd go out and look at the stars, and I'd tell her about you, even to her last birthday, when she was all grown up, we'd still go out to the dock and look at the stars. She wanted to know you her whole life. Now you've got all the time in the world for that. It's not your fault, what happened. And we will get back every year we lost. I think Ness and I can move." Bella stood very still.

"What are you thinking?" I asked.

"Thank you," she said. "Thank you for taking care of her. I just wish I could have been there. It seems you gave her a good life, though. Thank you." I put my arm around her.

"You're welcome," I said. Nessie came running out.

"Mom! Dad! This place is incredible! Come on," she said, grabbing Bella's hand and started dragging her towards the house. I followed them inside. It really was very a nice place.. Renesmee had a room, and there was a huge room for Bella and I with a closet that Bella despised but Alice loved. It was perfect.

After a while, we went hunting, mostly because even though Bella had extremely good self-control, her thirst was starting to get the better of her. Nessie found a herd of elk within five minutes. She had a crazy good sense of smell.

When we came back, I heard tires crunching on the gravel outside, and a familiar human scent came to me.

Bella recognized him, too.

"Crap, it's Chris," she said.