Chapter 48 Chapter Notes
Nobody will tell Charlie what's going on with Maya. Chief Littlefoot asks him to leave, and then calls the tribal police, to make sure that he does.
Bella visits Jake on the reservation and they have a frank discussion about the supernatural creatures that live on the peninsula. And that information is just about the last straw for Bella.
**There is an aborted suicide attempt in this chapter**
The chapter title belongs to The Beatles
Chapter 48 Do You Want to Know a Secret Halloween
Charlie spins on the spot and stalks out of the Chief's house. He hears the door slam behind him. He's left standing there, on the tiny porch, seething, glad for once that he is not wearing his sidearm. If he had been, he would have shot down the door, thrown Maya over his shoulder and taken her to the goddamn hospital.
He stands for a few more minutes until he hears a car pull in next to the cruiser. Tribal police have arrived. They don't speak to him, but stand guard at their Chief's door in a threatening stance of legs spread and arms crossed over their chests.
Charlie capitulates and drives off the reservation. He needs to work the rest of the afternoon, so he lights a cigarette as he heads back toward Forks. He doesn't know if Bella has plans but trick-or-treaters will be by at sundown for their candy, dressed as princesses and pirates, ghouls and ghosts. And vampires. Every year it's the same. Kids traipsing down the street with their candy bags in one hand and an umbrella in the other.
He leaves work a few minutes early. When he unlocks the front door, he's soothed by the smell of green beans and baked chicken. He can't imagine what's going on with Maya or how to intervene. It's a terrifyingsituation, and one in which he has no control.
Bella comes down the stairs, dressed as Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz. Charlie smiles. "Hey, I like that costume! Where's your little dog?"
"In his basket upstairs. You ready to eat? I gotta get supper over with so I can give out candy."
They power through chicken and dressing, green beans and canned fruit. Bella throws the dishes in the sink as the doorbell rings. Charlie shoos her out of the kitchen. "I'll finish up here. Go thrill the kids."
Bella smiles at her father and runs to the door. When she opens it, about a dozen kids are there with plastic jack-o-lanterns, decorated bags and plain plastic shopping sacks, gaping open for candy. She drops a handful into each and they shriek with delight and run to the next house. In the back, patiently waiting her turn, is a little girl, about five or six years old. She wears the classic cape and fake teeth of a vampire. She holds out her pumpkin and Bella swallows past a lump in her throat.
She drops the candy in the child's pumpkin and closes the door, feeling tears well. The anger she had always known would help her get over the disappointment never had materialized. She takes a few deep breaths and wonders for the thousandth time where her vampire is, hoping he is happy.
Her vampire. Well, not hers anymore. But for the briefest time, she lived a fairy tale, where the monster was truly a prince who had been transformed by an evil fate. The Furies, the three goddesses of vengeance and retribution, hadn't been his downfall, but the flu.
Droves of children make it to her door, and she tosses candy into each of their vessels. Later in the evening, the teenagers make their bid for loot. Bella is torn. Should you be begging candy when you're old enough to drive? To shave? But she puts away her high-minded ideals about who should engage in the fun and tosses them all candy with a smile. When the sweets are gone, she turns off the porchlight and goes to the kitchen for a glass of water. Charlie sits there, alone in the dark, and he startles her.
"Hey, I thought you had gone to bed." She eyes him curiously as she goes to the sink.
"Can't sleep. I'm worried about Maya. They won't let me in to see her and I don't know what to do about it." He taps his fingers absently on the tabletop. "Also, we had a puzzling case on Sunday. Hiker up on Trail 42. Naturalist thinks he was attacked by two different animals and there was a massive wolf print that had dried in the mud. The pathologist said the body had been completely drained of blood."
Bella's glass slips through her fingers and it lands on the floor with a crash. Water and glass fly in every direction, but she stands there, eyes locked on Charlie. She takes a deep, shaky breath. "Crap. Careful, I'll, I'll just get the broom."
Once in the back hall, Bella feels her face burn. She only hopes that Charlie is too distracted to see her sudden consternation. When she returns to the kitchen, he's moved all the chairs so she can sweep up the glass. "You go on to bed. This will take just a minute." Bella smiles at her father, who gives a weak nod and wanders out of the kitchen. He doesn't go upstairs, however. She hears the front door, and she knows he's gone outside to smoke.
She's finished in the kitchen in a few minutes and runs upstairs, trying not to hyperventilate. It certainly isn't Edward. Victoria? Laurent? Have they come looking for her? She wouldn't be hard to find, if that's the case. And a giant wolf print?
She calls the only friend she has in the whole world. Could it be true? Could the Quileute be transforming into wolves to protect the tribe? There's no way she can tell him what she knows about the Cullens, but she needs the comfort of his quiet, calm voice.
He answers right away and Bella frantically tells him what Charlie had told her. Before he can answer, she stammers, "Jake, I'm scared. And I can't even tell you why."
"I'll be waiting outside, Bella. See you in half an hour."
Halloween late
When Jacob hears what Bella has to say about the hiker, he is momentarily speechless. After the day they've all had, finding Henry's body and listening to his poor mother screaming, he's exhausted. But this is serious. Jacob hangs up and puts his head down on the table. Billy sits across from him, working on his blue folder. He closes it and looks seriously at his son. "What's the problem?"
"Charlie told Bella about that hiker that was found, drained of blood, right next to a giant Wolf print, on a trail near Forks. She's completely freaked out."
"What are you going to tell her?" Billy looks longingly at the empty coffee pot, and Jacob smiles.
"I'm telling her we are an insane family for drinking coffee at this hour." Jacob brews a pot and in minutes, the aroma fills the small kitchen.
He pours Billy a cup and places sugar and creamer on the table. "The truth. About the footprint and what the Council thinks. She dated the guy for months. I think she has the right to know…at least that part of the story. If it ever gets resolved, she can hear the rest from somebody else." He thinks for a moment. "And if Sam doesn't like it, tough."
Jacob waits outside for Bella. He thinks about her silky hair and the tiny dimple in her cheek, and all the little things that make up the woman he can never have. He decides that he's going to taste her lips, just this once. Then afterward, he can move on without her.
In thirty-one minutes, Bella's truck roars up to his house. He's there to lift her out and she grabs her bag before the door slams shut. Billy nods to her as she comes in and sits at the battered table. She fetches out her math and starts to hand it to Jacob but he waves her away, deciding he wants to tell her in private. "I told Billy that we're going to talk, Bella. He knows what's going on."
Jake gestures her out of the house and once at the truck, absently gets in the driver's seat. She frowns, getting in beside him. "I can drive my own truck, you know."
He smiles a sad smile. "Yeah, I know." The truck rumbles down to First Beach and Jacob pulls onto the hard-packed sand. Bella struggles with the wonky passenger-side door that never gets used. Jacob walks around and wrenches it open. She slides off of her seat and into Jake's arms, but he doesn't let her go right away. When she looks up at him, he takes her face tenderly in his hands and presses his lips to hers.
Bella stiffens, and then a curious thing happens. She presses her body to his and opens her mouth. She kisses him back. For a moment. For just a moment, she kisses him. Jacob feels his body yearning toward hers in a very adult way, and breaks the kiss. He steps back and smiles down at her, and on instinct, she slaps his face.
He swallows and makes a wry face. "I had to do that at least once."
She takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders. "Don't ever touch me again." Her eyes blaze. Jacob wonders if she's going to slap him again. Instead, she spins away and walks quickly toward the water.
"Wait, Bella." Jacob touches her shoulder and she reaches back her hand to swat at him.
When she reaches the driftwood carcass, she stops and turns. Her face is blazing crimson and she looks near tears. "What made you think you could put your hands on me?"
"I'm sorry, Bella." Jake isn't really sorry. He wouldn't trade that moment, the only one he can ever have.
Bella holds her hands up. "I'm going to be mad at you later. But now I have to talk to somebody. I don't know what to do." She sits on the driftwood and faces the sea.
Jacob tips his head back, thinking about all that he knows and what he can tell. He decides that what he owes Bella, what they all owe Bella, supersedes any edict about priorities based on silly, preconceived rules.
"Let's walk. I'll tell you as much as I can."
She falls in step beside him and they meander down the beach. "Right here on this very beach, a few months ago, I told you that my tribe was descended from the Wolf. That my great-grandfather made a treaty with the Cullens back in 1936. They told him they were blood drinkers but said that they didn't kill people."
"Yeah." Bella says this uncertainly, as if she's not going to be the one to give anything away.
Jacob sighs. "It's all true. Descendants of Ephraim Black transform to protect the tribe, but only in the presence of the vampires. After the treaty, the Cullens stayed here for a few years, and four Quileute transformed. When they left the area, it stopped. Since they've been back, it's started up again, and so far, twelve tribal members have undergone what's called the initial manifestation. Twelve of us have now transformed."
"Transformed." She stares at Jacob, her voice almost a question.
Jake stops walking and strips off his tee shirt.
Bella narrows her eyes. "Why are you taking your clothesoff?"
"Watch me, Bella. Don't look away." Jake kicks off his shoes and shucks his ragged shorts but keeps on an equally shabby pair of undershorts.
He begins to run, and in a few seconds, the russet Wolf bursts forth.
Bella stumbles backward in surprise. She gasps, then falls to her knees. The enormous Wolf walks slowly toward her, face down, tail wagging.
"It's true," she whispers, almost to herself. "The legends, they're all true." Bella reaches out a tentative hand and pats the animal's shaggy head. The Wolf closes its eyes and drools onto her shoulder. After a moment, it runs behind the driftwood and as Bella walks toward it, Jacob appears, pulling on his shoes.
She stops, mouth open, looking at Jacob as if she's never seen him before. "Is that why you grew? Like, a foot?"
"Yeah. It's what was going on when Billy told you I had the flu. I was transforming."
"It makes you sick, the first time?" Her expression is full of wonder.
"Really sick. And didn't you wonder about the temp of my skin?" My lips?
"Um, yeah," Bella says, a hard edge to her voice. "I did."
"We run about 106 degrees."
"So, the giant wolf print was made by one of the Quileute who had phased?"
"Yeah. Brady left the reservation without permission and stepped in mud, up on Trail 42, and left that print behind. Jared was on his way through the woods when he heard Brady's thoughts. He said Edward attacked the hiker, then ran around behind him and choked him. Jared said he then lost contact with him, and it could be that Brady was badly wounded and had lost consciousness, or died."
Bella looks at Jacob with a wary expression and he shakes his head. "Look, let's not play games. We know the Cullens are vampires. We know all about them. They're 'vegetarians'. Whatever. So, you know about them and we do as well. You're not giving away their secret by talking to me."
Bella shakes her head back and forth. Her mouth is set in a grim line. "I can't believe this! How long have the Cullens lived here? And not one person has been hurt or killed. Because they don't hunt people!"
Jake holds up a hand. "I know, Bella. This is just what Brady thought. Listen."
Bella nods and Jake says, "This morning, we found my cousin, Henry, dead in the alley behind Main Street. He'd lost a lot of blood but his body wasn't drained. Just…chewed. His…neck had been chewed." Jacob looks out onto the roiling ocean, remembering Henry's mother, and how she had wept when she'd seen her son, lying in the muddy, bloody water with his throat eaten away.
Bella grabs his arm. "Oh, Jake, that's terrible." She looks stricken.
Jacob sighs. "We weren't close, but he was a good kid."
"But you know that Edward didn't do that, right?" Bella is beginning to sound panicked.
Jacob hesitates for a moment, then says, "Billy told me that our Chief had called Alice and asked if Edward was with them, and she told him she couldn't 'see him'. He hadn't gone with them to their new house, but on a road trip. When she finally looked for him, she couldn't locate him anywhere. Apparently, she can't see anything to do with the Quileute."
There's a pause and Bella finally says, "Alice lost track of Edward?"
Jacob sighs. "Yeah, but Sam says it isn't a Cullen. He didn't recognize the scent on Henry's body. But Brady said he'd seen Edward attack the hiker. So, there's some…disagreement about who is responsible. But one the one thing that everyone agrees on is that there's a cold one in this area, because we keep transforming."
Bella frowns. "It isn't a Cullen, Jake. None of them would do that. They're not bloodthirsty killers. All of them are committed to their way of life." She waves her hands. "And I don't care what Alice says. Edward isn't here."
"Something took a bite out of Henry's neck."
Bella wrings her hands and worries her lip. "I think I might know who it is, and if I'm right, she could be after me." She extends her hand. "Look at this." She shows him a scar on her hand. Jacob peers at the crescent shape, then runs a blazing finger over it.
"It's cooler than the rest of your hand. What is it?"
She tells him the story of meeting up with the three vampires at the baseball game. "James was a tracker. He wanted me, but Edward got in the way of that. To protect Charlie and me, the Cullens took me to Phoenix. He found out somehow, though, and beat us there. He tricked me and I ended up alone with him. I nearly died."
Before Jake can cluck about this, she says, "The Cullens destroyed James for what he'd done to me, but he had two companions, Victoria, who they thought was his mate, and Laurent, who told the Cullens he was leaving the group. But Victoria was all over Forks when I was in Phoenix. She knows where I live, Jake."
Jacob's face tenses. "Billy thinks that Edward is still in the area in defiance of the Council, but believes Sam when he says that it wasn't Edward's scent at the scene of Henry's murder. Chief Littlefoot is still undecided. The Wolf that made the print is still missing. When we get permission, we can look for him, and we could search for Victoria as well. If that's her scent, we'll find her."
"Permission?"
"Well, we have to get the okay to go off the res in our Wolf form, and then we have to promise to stay out of sight. Jared was high in the woods when he heard Brady's thoughts. And before you ask, we can hear each other and communicate telepathically when we're phased."
Bella jumps up and flings her hands out, seeming to have reached the end of her tether. "Fine. Fine, fine. I get it. No problem. Just werewolves and Indians and vampires. Immortals and blood drinkers. Telepathy. Transforming into other creatures. Everyday stuff. So, what else? The Virgin Mary is camped out in a tent nearby? Gates of Heaven guarded by giant stone gargoyles that come to life under the light of a full moon?"
She spins away from Jacob, from the explanations, from the insanity of it all. A small voice behind her says, "Not werewolves. Shapeshifters."
Very slowly, she turns around to face him. Jacob watches her for a moment, standing by the sea, her body bleached of color by the shadowed moon. He stands directly in front of her but she looks past him, to the sheer cliff that borders the western edge of the beach, and up to the trees beyond. "So, have you broken up with Lydia? Or do you kiss all the girls that you can overpower?"
"I made her up. There was never a girlfriend."
Bella pulls her eyes away from the cliff and looks at him. "Why would you do that?"
Because I can't love you. And you can't love me. "Sam is so going to kick me out of the Pack for telling you this. You're part Quileute, on Charlie's side. Not only that, but you're related to Ephraim Black, and no two people can mate who share that bloodline."
"What?"
"I think I was falling in love with you, Bella. And I didn't want you to fall in love with me, because we can never be together. I told you that to force us to keep some distance between each other."
"And you call what you did tonight 'keeping your distance'? And why didn't anybody tell me I was part Quileute? Does Charlie know?" Bella feels the tightening in her throat that always happens right before she howls like a baby.
"I don't know if Charlie knows. I'd guess not, or he would have told you. And Bella, I can't have you, but I wanted to feel your kiss, if only once."
Bella doesn't say anything more. She just walks past Jake and gets in her truck. She doesn't offer him a ride home or even look back. Her thoughts are a giant muddle right now. The waves crash on the shore, and she almost thinks she hears the ocean calling her name, Bella, Bella, Bella. Maybe stress brings on delusions. But how would she know? Life seems to be one, long, never-ending hunk of stress.
Why did she drive over here? She hadn't learned anything to help her. Victoria is probably the vampire in the area, causing the Quileute to phase into giant dogs.
She knows where Charlie and I live.
And I'm eighteen years old before I find out that I have ties to the Quileute?
She's not surprised that Jake said he was falling in love with her. That was written all over his face. The puppy-dog friend is gone forever, replaced by this bigger, more mature person who doesn't act like a sixteen-year-old boy, but like a man
She's never felt quite so without hope. Where is Edward? If Alice can't see him, there are only a couple of possibilities. Either Billy is right, and he's on the reservation somewhere, or… or… Bella can't bring herself to think about the alternative.
The tightness in her throat becomes almost unbearable and she pulls the truck over. Before she can twist the key, the tears pour out and she screams her sorrow, there in the night, in the dark, on the empty highway between La Push and Forks.
After Edward left, she felt completely empty, at the bottom of the barrel, absolutely without a care for tomorrow. It had been inconceivable that there were depths unplumbed, that she could fall farther. Is there no bottom? Will she continue to plummet, until she's so far down that light and faith and promise are just fading dreams?
And then she hears it. Bella Bella Bella. It's the surf, pounding onto the shore just a mile away. On impulse, she wrenches open the truck door and stumbles out, planning to run back to the ocean, to peace.
To death.
But across the road is a big puddle from the recent rain, and because she'll only need a fucking tablespoon, Bella runs to it. Without thinking about the consequences, without worrying for once about how people around her will cope, she simply falls face-first into the muddy swamp.
After about fifteen seconds, she needs a breath but she just can't bring herself to inhale. Unfortunately, her breathing reflex kicks in when she's just about to push up out of the water, and she gets a lungful of dirty rainwater.
It burns like fire! She rolls over and coughs repeatedly, feeling it run out of her nose. Feeling like the biggest coward in the world, she crawls out of the muck and pulls herself up with the aid of a cedar sapling. After staggering back to her truck, she sits sobbing for about ten minutes, and then feels able to drive.
Tomorrow is a school day, but Bella Bella Bella can't summon the energy to care. Maybe she'll skip. Maybe she'll trek into the hills above La Push to see if she can find Edward.
And maybe she'll summon the guts she needs to finish the job. She'll go back to the ocean and simply walk into the surf until her lungs are filled with briny water. And she'll never have to think about Edward or shapeshifters or any of this, ever again.
Charlie has left the porch light on for her. She enters the house quietly, flips it off, and stumbles upstairs. After a quick shower, she realizes that her schoolbag is still on Jake's table. After growling for a few minutes, she resets her alarm, realizing she'll just have to drive up to La Push in the morning to get it. If she lives that long. A tablespoon of water is all I need. Just a tablespoon. I could manage that in the kitchen sink. I wouldn't even have to leave the comfort of my home.
Bella stands at her window and peers out into the murky darkness. She doesn't know what to do with all the information she got from Jake tonight. The only thing she cares about is Edward.
Why can't Alice see him?
Will she ever find out? Or will she spend her entire life wondering?
Sleep is a long time coming, as she sobs and tries not to imagine how a vampire destroys himself. She drops off sometime in the wee hours of the morning, only to wake when she hears her window, slowly sliding open.
Her eyes fly open and she's momentarily confused. Her heart begins to pound and she fights with her covers, finally flinging them all to the floor. Open mouthed, she squints into the darkness.
"Edward?" she whispers, not allowing herself to believe that it could possibly be him, but still hoping with all the yearning in her heart. "Edward?" If it were him, he would already be at her side. Fantasy and reality, longing and terror, reign side by side, as she considers her intruder. Before she can run toward the window or away, a heavy, musty odor fills the air. She knows right away that it's not Edward, come to rescue her from her drab, human world, nor is it Victoria, come to annihilate her, which she would pay money for about now.
It's Jake.
Bella grits her teeth. "What are you doing here?" Her fingers flutter toward her alarm clock, itching to throw it. It wouldn't hurt him, but it would give her immense satisfaction to hear it ping off of his head.
"Hey, I brought your bag," Jake whispers. "You left it on the kitchen table at my house."
"You couldn't leave it on the seat of my truck like a normal person?" she hisses, as she crawls off the bed. She feels more up to the task of berating Jake if she can stand before him, face to face, but her voice trails away as she sees him in silhouette, featureless, with the moonlight shining behind him.
His shadowed form radiates a grandeur that is as impressive as it is intimidating. She thinks he must be over six and a half feet tall. Why didn't she notice this earlier tonight?
He shakes his head and turns to leave, but she reaches out and touches his arm. "Hey, thanks."
"Yeah. No problem." She watches as he climbs through her window and jumps down, landing without a sound.