An Occasion

Disclaimer: all characters and copyright belong to SM.

A/N-thank you for reviewing the last chapter.

Part Fourteen-Loneliness

It had been three days since she had last seen Jacob and Bella was going out of her mind with worry. After their fraught conversation during his last visit, all she had gotten from him ever since was radio silence. He didn't call. He didn't visit. When she called him, Billy had been the one to answer, he had told her that Jacob was out with his friends – Quil and Embry- and he promised to pass on the message that she had been in contact.

He didn't call her back.

Even though she was still supposed to be recuperating, Bella was so desperate to see Jacob that she risked driving her truck over La Push. She knew if Charlie found out that he would go mad. He didn't leave her alone often, but on this one occasion, he had been forced to in order to pick up some groceries because they were running low on supplies.

When Bella arrived at the Black's little redwood house, she had found it empty. All the lights were off. Still, she made sure to look through all the windows, all that greeted her was darkness. Frustrated, she also checked the garage, but the doors were bolted shut, there was no way she could get inside.

Bella was close to tears on the drive back home. She was practically inconsolable. Charlie came home to find her sobbing her heart out on the sofa. Concerned, he asked her what was wrong, and pleaded with her to let him help her. Bella latched onto his sympathy, babbling a load of incomprehensible nonsense at him about Jacob and Billy seemingly disappearing off the face of the earth.

"Jacob's always returns my calls, Dad. I'm really worried." Bella sobbed in his arms.

Her fear and panic infected Charlie. He called Harry Clearwater to see if he had seen Billy and Jacob in the last few days. Bella waited by his side, anxious, as Charlie chatted to his old friend, the conversation seemed to go on forever before the subject finally turned to the Blacks. It seemed Harry had been in the hospital…. some kind of tests for his heart. Bella saw her father's face pale as he demanded Harry take better care of himself, but Harry blew off his concerns and turned it into a joke. It was only then that Charlie asked about Billy and Jacob.

Bella wanted to snatch the phone out of her father's hand, she was so agitated and worked up with impatience. She twisted her hands together as she listened to his side of the conversation, the constant hmms and yeahs, driving her to distraction.

Then….

"What?" Charlie demanded, his tone changing. "Can't he take five minutes to just talk to my daughter?"

Bella stopped wringing her hands together and became motionless. Was Charlie actually speaking to Billy? She waited tensely, her heart slamming hard against her ribcage.

"He's just left?" Charlie snapped. "I find that very convenient, Billy. Don't take me for a fool." He hung up, his face registering his disappointment. He took a second to compose himself before facing Bella. "The Blacks are fine, kiddo. You don't need to worry."

"Was Billy there?" Bella pleaded. "I wish you hadn't hung up. I'd like to have spoken to hi – "

"They were both there, Bells." Charlie sighed heavily.

"Jake was there?" Bella asked hoarsely. "And he didn't want to speak to me?"

"I'm sorry, kid." Charlie pulled her into a comforting hug. "I don't understand what he's playing at. Have you two had a falling out?"

"No." Bella said dully. She extricated herself out of Charlie's arms and sloped toward the stairs. "I'm feeling tired. I'm going to lie down for a while."

"Okay." Charlie's brow was furrowed with worry. "I can have a word with Jake if you like." He offered. "Maybe…."

"No thanks, Dad. I'll sort it out." Bella tried to muster up a smile for Charlie's benefit, but it turned into more of a grimace. She could see he still didn't look convinced, but she was too emotionally exhausted to make anymore effort. "I'll see you later." She mumbled, running up the stairs before he had a chance to answer.

Bella lay on her bed staring at the ceiling. She had pushed Jacob too far. That was the only explanation she could come up with as to why he was avoiding her. She knew he had been struggling with all the latest revelations, but she had kept on pushing, insisting that she was right. And now this was the end result….

She had no one else to blame but herself.

Hours turned into days and then a week. Every day she waited by the phone, hoping that Jacob would make the first move at reconciliation and call. She cheated a few times and tried to call him, but no one ever answered.

With Charlie having to go back to work finally, she was left in the house alone. She still had another week of recuperation to go before she returned to school. Some of her friends, like Angela and Jessica, offered to keep her company. But Bella was too distressed to see them. Mike Newton, incorrigible as ever, dropped by a few times, but Bella hid behind the sofa when he knocked, waiting with baited breath until he had gone.

And then there was Edward and Alice….

What was she supposed to do about them? How long could she keep ignoring their attempts to contact her before she caved into her loneliness and accepted their calls. One morning she had awoken to find a long, flowery letter of apology from Edward lying on the door mat. He must have shoved it under the door in the early hours of the morning. Bella knew the wolves were still guarding the back of the house at night, so he must have quickly sneaked around the front to post it in order to avoid them.

As always, Edward's penmanship was wonderful. The letter was filled with love sonnets, wrapped up in bouquets of the sweetest and most heartfelt apologies. When he wrote of how much he missed her, and his desperate longing to hold her in his arms once again, the tremble in his pen strokes became more pronounced. Bella's tears smudged the fountain pen ink as she read about the aching loneliness he was enduring in her absence. She could relate to that, accept it wasn't him she was missing, it was Jacob.

By the time Saturday rolled around Bella's sadness and loneliness had turned to irritation and anger. She had decided she didn't deserve to be treated like this. Her only mistake was trying to be supportive to Jacob, and this was her reward? To be shunned and ignored.

Enough was enough!

As soon as she was showered and dressed, she reached for the phone, determined to give Jacob a piece of her mind. She dialled, and then waited impatiently for the call to connect. It caught her off guard when Billy answered on the second ring.

"Hello?" He sounded tired.

"Billy, it's Bella. I want to speak to Jacob. Can you put him on, please?"

"I'm sorry, Bella." Billy said quietly. "He's not in."

"It's early. I know Jacob likes sleeping in." Bella replied curtly. "Where could he possibly go at this time of the morning?"

"He's giving some friends a ride up to Port Angeles – I think they're going to catch a double feature or something. He's gone for the whole day."

Bella breathed deeply as she tried to contain her anger. Billy was clearly lying. It wouldn't surprise her if Jacob was standing right next to him. Her fingers gripped the phone receiver so hard that her knuckles turned white. It was clear that he wasn't missing her like she was missing him. She had been sitting here, lonely, worried…. fretting about what she had done wrong to ruin their friendship, only realising now that their week apart hadn't had the same affect on him like it had on her.

"Can you give Jacob a message for me?"

"Of course, Bella."

"Tell him I think he's a coward and to go to hell!"

Then she slammed down the phone, collapsing into a flood of tears as she sank to the floor.

By the time Charlie came down the stairs for breakfast, Bella had managed to pull herself together enough to appear almost normal. "You, okay?" He asked her cautiously.

"Yes." She lied.

Charlie glanced at the phone receiver which was sitting awkwardly in its cradle. "Did you phone Jake again?"

"Yes." Bella said tonelessly.

"Is he coming here, or are you going there?" Charlie adjusted the phone absentmindedly.

"Neither." Bella admitted stiffly. "He's going out with his real friends. It seems I am no longer one of them."

Charlie frowned. "What do you mean?" He demanded.

"Leave it, Dad. It doesn't matter. Jacob is nothing but a kid. I don't know what I was thinking hanging around with him anyway. I've got other friends…."

"Not the Cullens!" Charlie cut in sharply.

Bella scowled. "I'm talking about Angela, Jessica….and….and…. Mike." She floundered, wondering why on earth she had added Newton to the list. "Look, can we drop the subject. What do you want for breakfast?"

Charlie grimaced. "I'm going fishing today…. Harry called last night and…."

"Of course, he did." Bella mumbled.

"I could always cancel." Charlie offered.

Bella did her best to appear indifferent. She really didn't think she could cope with Charlie fussing around her all day. She was better off alone while she tried to work through her feelings. "That's okay, Dad. You deserve a day out. I'll be fine. I'll probably call Jessica. She can come over and keep me company."

Charlie brightened up. "That's a good idea. You've been spending so much time with Jacob; your other friends probably think you've forgotten them."

Bella smiled wanly. "You know what, I think you're right."

When Charlie left, Bella didn't call Jessica like she had promised. Instead, she went back up to her room and began the unenviable task of wiping every trace of Edward and Jacob from her life. She had decided she was done with boys forever. She took down the photographs that she had pinned to the corkboard by the bedroom window of her and Jacob at the impromptu birthday party he had thrown for her in La Push. It had been one of the best birthdays she'd ever had, but when she looked at their smiling faces in the photographs, it just made her feel sad. She packed them away, along with the other bits and pieces he'd left at her house when he'd spent time there. She did the same with all of Edward's stuff.

Lastly, there was only one thing she had left to do. Tears in her soul became tears in her eyes, she carefully unclasped the silver bracelet that Jacob had given to her as a birthday present, from around her wrist. She couldn't shake off the cloak of melancholy as she returned it to the little woven cloth bag it had originally come in. The sadness clung, the anchor to her feet, the reason she couldn't find the surface or the sunshine, that feeling of soft joy that lives in happy memories of the past. They were all tainted now.

It was done.

Bella hid everything in the back of her wardrobe, determined to return everything to their original owners someday. Right now, she wanted to watch a sad movie and wallow just a little bit. She was about to do just that when a knock on the front door signalled the arrival of an unwanted visitor.

When Bella opened the door, she was confronted by the sight of two dark-skinned boys on the front porch. One was slender, almost as tall as Jacob. His black hair was chin length and parted down the middle, one side tucked behind his left ear while the right side swung free. The shorter boy was burlier. His white t-shirt strained over his well-developed chest, and he seemed gleefully conscious of that fact when he saw Bella stare at him incredulously. His hair was so short it was almost a buzz.

"You must be Bella." The shorter boy said, grinning widely as he held out his hand for her to shake. "I gotta say Jake's description did not do you justice."

Bella ignored his outstretched hand. She hadn't met them in person, but she had heard enough stories from Jacob to recognise who the boys were. "You're Quil." She guessed.

"Yeah." Quil's grin turned into a smirk.

"Hey, Bella. I'm Embry." The taller boy introduced himself. He smiled shyly. "You probably figured that out already, though." He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans in embarrassment.

"Um…. nice to meet you." Bella said curiously. "What can I do for you? Jacob isn't here if you're looking for him. We don't hang out much anymore."

Quil and Embry exchanged a loaded look before Embry spoke again. "That's kind of why we're here." He ventured cautiously.

"We're worried about Jake." Quil added. "He's been acting weird…avoiding us and stuff…."

"More than that." Embry cut in. "There's something really wrong with him. He locks himself in his room and won't come out. Something is clearly bugging him. We thought…." He glanced at Quil again.

Quil rolled his eyes and took over the conversation. "Did you dump him or something?" He asked Bella directly. "Because he's acting like a guy who has had his heart broken."

A/N-thanks for reading!