ESPOV
"Esmeee!" Emmett whines "It's not working."
I look up from my gingerbread house to see Emmett pouting at his icing-covered hands.
"Emmett, you're supposed to put the metal tip into the bag before you put the icing in." I laugh.
It's the day after Christmas and we are having a gingerbread house building contest in the dining room. We all got caught up in our mates yesterday, and never made it back downstairs for the rest of the Christmas festivities that had been planned. This morning, Alice declared that we are going to do them today instead, which leads us to where we are now. Each couple is making and decorating their own gingerbread house and then we'll take a vote on the best one.
Mine and Carlisle's is very traditional. He piped on the icing outlines around the house because he has steady, doctor hands, and I'm laying gumdrops along the roof. The best part is the little chimney that we sprayed whipped cream on to look like smoke.
Our time limit is an hour and we've almost hit that mark.
"Emmett, let me do it! We're almost out of time!" Rosalie snaps taking the bag of icing out of his hands.
Carlisle chuckles as he sets the "trees" he made onto the scenery around our house. The trees are made out of an upside down ice cream cone and some green icing, and they look amazing. He's very good at this, I can't believe he's never done this before.
The timer goes off right as I place the last gumdrop on the roof of our house.
"Time's up!" Alice yells from the kitchen where she, Jasper, Bella, and Edward have been making their houses. "Everyone bring your houses into the kitchen."
Carlisle carefully picks ours up on the large plate it's sitting on and carries it to the kitchen counter. My mouth drops open when I see Alice and Jasper's creation. That's not a house, that's a gingerbread mansion. It's at least three stories tall with beautiful icing designs all over it. Bella and Edward's is next to it and it's very cute. It has light pink and light blue frosting all over it and a pink swirly chimney. Emmett and Rosalie's is small and simple. Rosalie managed to do damage control and make it look decent.
"Okay everyone you know the rules. Write on one of the papers what your favorite is. Each person will vote individually and no voting for your own house." Alice narrows her eyes on us. "And, I'll know if you cheat."
She hands out small slips of paper to us and sets a jar in the middle of the houses for us to deposit our votes in. It's a hard decision because they're all so different and I like them all in their own way. Finally I choose Bella and Edward's, even though Alice and Jasper's is bigger, I like the design and colors in theirs.
Once all of the votes are in, Carlisle declares that he will count them, apparently the kids have a reputation for cheating.
"Alright everyone, here is the final tally: 1 vote for Emmett and Rosalie, 1 vote for Esme and I, 2 votes for Edward and Bella, and 4 votes for Alice and Jasper. So the winners of our first gingerbread house contest are Alice and Jasper."
Alice squeals and throws herself into Jasper's arms like they just won the lottery.
"Aww man" Emmett groans. "I'm not good at this girly stuff. Next year we're doing something else, something manly."
"What Christmas activity is manly, Emmett?" Bella asks him.
"I don't know. Maybe something with fire or some kind of sports."
"No fire!" Carlisle says sternly and I giggle as I remember the story of Emmett having a bonfire in the living room of their last house.
"Oh alright." Emmett grumbles. "You're no fun, old man."
"We should probably clean up all of the wrapping paper in the living room." I tell them, quickly changing the subject before Emmett can pout any more.
"We can do it, love." Carlisle says.
"I want to help. I'm not an invalid."
"I know" he grumbles and his pout matches Emmett's.
"Come on." I laugh and take his hand. The kids follow us and start picking up the torn paper and throwing it into the waste basket. I clean up around the couch and start pulling scraps out from under it when my finger lands on something else. I pull it out to find that it's a picture. I gasp seeing that it's a picture of Carlisle and I in the mall, but his face has been burned off and so has my belly.
"Esme? What's wrong?" Carlisle asks from across the room. When I don't answer, he zooms over to me. His body freezes when he sees what I'm holding.
"I found this under the couch. Where could it have come from?"
"I umm…I-"
"We're going to go upstairs." Edward says cutting him off and all of them sprint upstairs with guilty looks on their faces.
"Carlisle?"
He looks at me for a second before looking to the ground.
"Carlisle, what is this?"
"It's a photo we received in the mail." He tells me still looking at the floor.
"When? Who sent it?"
"We received it two days ago. I opened it early yesterday morning while you were still sleeping. It was from…Charles."
"Charles?" I gasp, dropping the picture as if it had burned me. "Why would Charles send this to you?"
"It wasn't addressed to me…it was addressed to you."
"Charles sent me mail?! Here?!" I'm trying to keep my voice level, but it's not working. "And when were you planning on telling me?"
He mumbles something as his eyes stay at the same spot on the floor.
"Excuse me?" I say making him repeat himself.
"I wasn't planning on telling you." He mumbles. "None of us were."
I gasp and step away from him.
"Everyone knew? You all lied to me?"
A tear falls down my cheek quickly followed by many more, and Carlisle's head shoots up.
"No sweetheart, we didn't lie. I just didn't want you to be stressed or scared. I asked the children to keep it from you because I hoped we could deal with it and you would never have to know."
"You lied to me and you know it. Keeping something from me was a lie of omission especially when it concerns my life."
"I just didn't want you to be upset." At any other time, his soft voice would melt my heart, but not right now.
"Well…mission accomplished." I tell him sarcastically with tears fall down my face and a sob building in my chest. I turn and run up the stairs, Samson right on my heels. When I reach my room, I slam and lock the door. I curl up in a ball on my bed and bawl like a baby. Samson jumps up with me and lays his head by mine, licking my face occasionally.
It's only a few minutes later when I hear Carlisle's voice outside my door.
"Esme? Angel, please."
I know the small lock and wooden door are no match for him, but I also know he would never disrespect me by breaking through my locked door.
"I just want to be alone right now, Carlisle." I whisper and I hear what sounds like his head thump against the door.
"Okay angel, but I really want to talk about this. I'll be right here when you're ready."
I don't answer, I just bury my face in Samson's neck and sob. With every sob, I can feel Carlisle's agony and guilt increase and I know he has to be miserable if his emotions are strong enough for me to feel.
"Esme please." He begs after a half hour and his voice breaks. "I can feel how badly you're hurting. Please just let me hold you. I need to feel you in my arms…please."
"Okay" I breathe and less than a breath later, he's broken the lock and is holding me. Samson growls at him menacingly, and I shush him before he can get carried away protecting me.
I bury my face in Carlisle's shoulder and I realize it doesn't matter how angry or hurt I am because of him, he's my other half and I need him.
Carlisle's emotions are mixed with mine and with my pregnancy hormones, it's making me hysterical.
"Baby, I'm so sorry." He whispers into my hair and I swear I feel him sob even though I know vampires can't cry.
I don't respond, mostly because I can't, I just press myself harder into him. Suddenly there's an unnatural calm that spreads through me. I know it's Jasper controlling my emotions, and even though my brain is going crazy, my body is completely relaxed.
"Carlisle" I whimper, pushing against the foreign feelings.
"It's okay, angel. Jasper needs to calm you down, it can hurt the baby for you to be so upset. Just try to relax and let him help you."
I close my eyes and try to breathe deep and embrace the calm radiating through my body. I feel almost lethargic and I wonder how strong Jasper is pushing me before everything goes dark.
I'm woken by quiet voices in the room with me.
"Why is she still sleeping?" That's Carlisle.
"I had to push pretty hard to get her to relax. She was hysterical and the amount of emotions affecting her were enormous. Once she relaxed and submitted to the help I was giving her, she was so tired that she fell asleep. Your vampire emotions are a lot for her and remember she has an excess amount of hormones in her body pushing her own emotions; all of that combined caused her to be overwhelmed."
"I just don't understand how this happened." Carlisle muses.
"We didn't realize you had thrown the picture along with the card when you were angry. It must have slid under the couch and when we hid the card, we didn't know to hide that with it."
"No I don't mean that. I mean how did I think it was okay to keep this from her? I knew that it could hurt her to find out what I did, and I did it anyway. What kind of mate am I?"
"You were worried, angry, and territorial all at the same time. Being newly mated is very intense. You did what you thought would keep her safe. Granted, it was not a good choice, but it's the one you made."
"I can't believe I did this. I caused this. I made her so upset that you had to intervene."
"Carlisle?" I croak, opening my eyes and looking at him.
"Esme" he breathes, clearly relieved.
"How are you feeling, darlin'?" Jasper asks with a smile.
"Worn out. I feel like I ran a marathon."
"That's common with the amount and intensity of the emotions you were feeling. You should relax for the rest of the night. You also need to eat and drink plenty of water, you need to get your strength back up and I think your peanut is demanding it." Jasper says with a smile.
I smile as my stomach gurgles.
"Okay."
"Esme?" Carlisle says hesitantly, and with a nod from Jasper, he's gone. "Can I get you some food, and we can talk?"
"Yeah, I think we should."
He nods and pulls himself out of bed slowly. With a sad smile, he leaves the room. Samson jumps up onto the bed and sniffs my face as if to check on me. He licks my cheek experimentally and I giggle and swat at him.
"I just warmed up some leftover chicken from the other day, I hope that's okay." Carlisle says, coming back into the room carrying a tray.
"That's fine." I scoot back to lean against the headboard and he sets the tray in my lap. There's enough food on it to feed an army, including some cookies for dessert, but I know this is his way of taking care of me. He carefully sits next to me on the bed like he's worried I'm going to kick him out.
"So I think I should start off by saying I'm so unbelievably sorry. Looking back, I can't believe that I kept this from you and on top of that, I asked the others to do the same. All I could think about when I got that card in the mail was that I had to keep you safe, and that included from your own fear. I shouldn't have made that decision for you, and I'm sorry." I take small bites of my chicken as he talks and I think about what he's said.
"You shouldn't have kept this from me or made the kids do the same, but what hurts the most is that you didn't feel like you could be honest with me. What did you think would happen? You've said that you worried I would be afraid, but I'm going to afraid of Charles forever until I am finally free of him. I understand that you want to keep me stressful for the baby, but you were honest with me about the private investigator, why was this any different?"
"I was worried that you'd run." He says after breathing out a long sigh. "I know that you would protect others over yourself every time and if you thought Charles was coming here, you would run to protect us. I can't…I can't lose you. I finally found you after centuries of searching. I couldn't bear the thought of you leaving, so I didn't tell you, and that was the wrong decision. I'm sorry."
"Carlisle" I whisper and frame his face in my hands. "I would never run from you. I don't think I could. Am I scared for you? Yes. Do I know you're indestructible and yet I still worry about you? Yes, always. You have to understand that I'm in this just as much as you are. Don't think that I don't feel our connection as strongly as you do. Stop assuming that you want me more than I want you. I may not be able to do all of the physical things with you that I want to because of my messed up brain, but don't doubt my connection to you. It insults me, it insults you, and it insults our relationship. I forgive you for lying to me, but you have to understand that we don't run, we stand up and fight anything that comes our way. Together."
"Together." He whispers and plants a soft kiss on my lips.
"Will you show me the card you were talking about?" I ask him.
"Yes, love, but after you eat. You have to keep yourself healthy and our baby healthy."
I nod and start eating again. I didn't realize how hungry I was, but I managed to clean the whole plate and most of the cookies. Carlisle takes the tray downstairs and when he comes back, he has a white envelope in his hands.
"This is what we received in the mail. The photo was inside the card."
I'm surprisingly calm when I read Charles's words. I've known that he thought I belonged to him since we met, the only thing that scares me is that he says he's coming to get me.
"What do you think this means?" I ask Carlisle after a minute.
He takes the card carefully from me and puts it back in the envelope.
"I don't know. Jasper thinks he is trying to 'smoke you out' so to speak. He thinks that Charles knows you would run scared at this note and once you are out in the open, you would be easier for him to find. There's not much we can do about it, other than to not publicly react. You don't want us to seek him out, and I will keep that promise. However, if he comes here, I wont let him within sight of you before killing him. I can only control my instincts as your mate for so long. An immediate danger such as Charles close to you would be too much."
"I understand." I kiss him softly because I know that he desperately wants to protect me, but he won't eliminate the only threat to me simply because I asked him to. I can't ask him to hold back if Charles comes on his land, and I'm not sure I want to.
"Thank you." He breathes against my lips.
"For what?"
"For understanding, for forgiving me….for loving me."
"It's easy. You're the other half of my soul." I whisper before tangling my hands in his hair and pulling on top of me, effectively ending that conversation.