"We don't even ask happiness, just a little less pain." ― Charles Bukwoski
I spend hours driving around meaninglessly. I've never known where I'm going, that doesn't bother me. What scares me is exactly how long it takes to get myself to stop.
When I come home, I click the door close and lean against it. My chest hurts to breathe and I'm heaving in large gulps of air just to not fall over. My vision does that fuzzy thing again that tells me I might be in the midst of a panic attack. And it feels strange to recognize it at the moment rather than retroactively. I try to shake myself out of it. No use.
Charlie looks up at me from the couch. He might be watching some sports game, but I can hardly focus. He's not in a uniform so he could easily have been home all day since I went to school. His facial hair is more unkempt than it normally is and he has an extra dejected look in his eyes. The same brown eyes I have. I feel caught in a mirror and my throat closes further.
"Bells, hey, I need to talk to you about something."
"Yeah?"
It's all I can muster to say when I keep thinking about Jake's lips on mine and the wrongness of it. I vaguely recall now that he felt too warm, burning hot, and the memory flashes in waves before me. Wrong. Wrong. Everything feels wrong.
"A couple of campers were found dead today about twenty miles north of La Push. The police around there gather it might be an animal attack.
Animal attack.
No.
Not that.
I know better than that.
My feet plant myself to the ground and the freezing pain of fear moves up every inch of my body. My eyes focus on a hazy spot on the wall. It's all I can do to not dissolve immediately.
Charlie makes his way closer to me, "Bella?" He has that look of worry I know too well by now. But I can't look at him. I can't.
"Dead," is the only word that leaves my lips.
He straightens his back and regards me a bit differently. "Yeah, real gruesome, sadly. It's probably a feral animal on the loose. Rabies and all that. I'll be trying to help out with mapping any sightings so we can catch the damn thing. Might see less of me because of it."
I almost choke. Not likely.
"Well, you'll be safe as long as you aren't out in the wilderness," he looks at me pointedly and adds, "right?"
I shake my head and leave my body even further.
Safe, no. Not me. There are more vicious memories swirling around inside of me. But I know very well that I'm not safe. I can feel the rings of the target burn into my back. I can feel a thousand headlights blinding me as I become the deer on the road. I'm close to death. I know it.
"Don't you need to go to the station?" I squeak out.
"Well, there isn't anything we can do about it now, so no. Just want to be super clear that you should avoid going into the woods by yourself, okay?"
"Uh-huh."
Charlie can't find anything else to say to me and I'm too far gone to be grateful about it like I normally am. He turns to plop back down on the couch and resume what little time for himself he now has. I stare at the back of his balding head for a few more seconds before my stomach flips around inside of me and turns the whole room green.
I run to the bathroom upstairs and empty the little contents within me into the toilet. My body has reached a limit and I slump over against the vanity and cry.
Focusing on school doesn't work. Not that it did much last semester. I still wonder how miraculous it was that I passed at all. Especially when the fake Edward haunted my every moment.
Now, another one of his kind lives in my head. Much more dangerous and out with vengeance.
I try not to think about it. It would be a good thing if I was just heading home one day and murdered without a true passing thought about it. That would be good, easy, more than I deserve. I hope that's what happens.
But I don't think it will be. The panic that settles into the bottom of my stomach all day hits a breaking point as soon as the last bell rings. I want to drive to La Push, tell Jake everything, but my feet feel like bricks and I'm too afraid to move outside my routine. I go home and pace around the kitchen.
The home phone finds itself in my hands before I realize it. I'm punching out their family number too. Surprisingly, it's not picked up on the first couple of rings. I bite down on my lip. I wait a bit longer.
Nothing. So I call again.
There's an answer on the third try. I breathe through my nose in relief. But it's Billy's deep voice greeting me instead.
"Hello?"
"Hey, it's Bella. Is Jake there?"
A pause. "No, he's sick actually."
I twirl a piece of hair between my fingers as I lean onto the wall for supper. "Oh, yeah, that makes sense. I haven't been feeling the best myself."
The terror and nauseous swirling around inside me are impossible to differentiate.
"Mm-hm." Billy sounds off, distant and annoyed.
"But can you tell Jake to call me back when he's feeling better?" I press.
"Sure thing."
The line goes dead.
For a moment, I feel nothing at all. I blink and wait to see reality shift around me like I invited the entire conversation. But it doesn't happen. It was real. I can't talk to Jake about the fear threatening to burst inside of me.
Well, it's fine. I couldn't tell him much anyway. I can't tell the Cullens' secret. But I could cry into his shoulder about the dead hikers. Tell him I'm terrified of the same fate. He might rub my back and tell me that I'm worrying for nothing. No one is after me.
It could be real.
I try to use that imagined memory to help me fall asleep at night. I try to press away from the feeling of falsehood that seeps into my bones. And I try most of all to ignore a different pair of mahogany eyes that steal away my pragmatic thoughts, replacing them with a silent and quivering yearning.
I call every afternoon for a week.
Towards the end, Billy stops picking up altogether. No matter how many voicemails I leave. No matter how close I get to begging.
Each day I feel sick and I cry.
I can theorize that he's ignoring me. It's not too hard to tell what is happening here. I've upset him. I ran off when he tried to get close to me. To open up to me. And now he believes I don't want to be there at all.
I can't say I don't deserve it. Especially when I'm calling to be comforted for my own sake. I think I'm going to die soon and I'd like a friend to be there beforehand. It's probably actually really awful to make him see me if he'll just be attending my funeral shortly after. It's cruel. The universe knows my intentions aren't pure and therefore I do deserve this. It's a hard line of thought to argue against.
Charlie is staying late at the station every night now. I make dinner for both of us, but I barely pick at my servings. His plate of leftovers must be eaten in the middle of the night when he comes back. I'm so dead tired that I don't even hear him enter.
More guilt weighs on me when I realize I don't want to talk to him when he's here anyway. He'll only tell me of more murdered people around the area. He'll scratch his beard and ponder new ways of tracking down an animal he'll never be able to catch.
I'll pretend it has nothing to do with me at all.
I didn't know I could feel as destroyed as I did when he first left again. But this time, there's an awareness clawing at the back of my head, begging to get out. I can't be as destroyed because I'm more lucid. And that makes it all the worse.
Jessica and Angela aren't real replacements for Jake. I understand how they're their own people, but the longing for a friend with the best sense of humor and mechanical skills never leaves me. If they notice my hollowness, they've probably learned by now not to comment. A sad reality.
The time without Jake has now doubled to two weeks. I'm not handling it any better.
Just when I thought I was done with the withdrawal symptoms, the craving for something, even a stinkin' cigarette to remove the pain, hits me once more. Jake would be pissed if he knew how much I suddenly wanted it. Him and someone else.
I keep looking inside my empty altoid kin to see if drugs have randomly appeared inside again. I grow more frustrated with each opening. I even dig through the underside of my bed and beneath my pillows to see if I missed anything in my initial purge.
I didn't.
I cry all night long.
This can't be sustainable.
He can't ignore me if I show up at his house, right? I realize there's a pretty good chance that Billy will turn me away, but I try to knock loudly enough that it will wake up everyone sleeping in the small house. Not the nicest, I know. But I deem it necessary.
"Bella, he's very sick," Billy says to me. His expression is one of deep sadness. It's been a while since I've seen this level of pity and it does not evoke amazing memories for me. I become irrationally annoyed.
"For weeks now!" I groan. I run my hands through my hair, not believing his excuse at all.
"I will have him call you-" he's cut off.
Jake approaches from behind his dad's wheelchair. I nearly jump back a foot in shock at his appearance.
His hair has been cropped and he has that same tribal tattoo on his left arm that Sam does. That's all I think when I see him. He looks too much like Sam. His muscles are even more defined and if possible, he looks taller too. Seeing him confirms my suspicions that he hasn't been sick at all. Only choosing not to see me and have Billy be the liaison for that message.
Jake scowls at me as if he knows exactly what I'm thinking. "I'll talk to her, Dad. Better to get this over with."
He walks out towards his garage, without acknowledging me at all. I need to take many quick steps to match his gait. He doesn't even look back when I huff in annoyance.
When he turns back towards me, he hangs his head in shame, but his contorted features tell me of the rage simmering underneath it all. I shiver, hoping that feeling is directed towards me. But my intuition screams that it somehow is.
"Bella, we can't be friends anymore," he tells me, refusing to look at me directly.
"Are you serious?" I demand.
"Yes. It would probably be best if you didn't come here at all," Jake admits, scratching at his arms. His tone is harsh and my eyes water without any more prompting.
How could he possibly be doing this to me? The same thing Edward did? He's told me how much he resents Edward for that. And to turn to do the same thing? I would be hurt, angry, torn apart if I wasn't so disbelieving at the moment.
"What about my bike?" I gape open at him.
"Take it."
"You know I can't."
He shrugs, not a single care in the world. "Not my problem then."
"Why are you doing this?" I cry.
"Because I have to."
"You really don't," I scowl at him.
"Things have changed."
I push back the obvious memories and force myself to say the next bit. "Because of Sam, huh?"
He snaps up to look at me, angrier than I've ever thought possible. I take a step back from him and hit my foot against some metal tool, likely a wrench. It clatters against something else and makes me wince as if I've been hit myself.
"Yeah, everything has to do with Sam it seems," he hisses through his teeth.
"I...I," I stutter without a real sentence on my lips. There's no way he knows, right? Heat floods every inch of my body as I ponder that likelihood. Not unless Sam told him. But would he do that? I suppose he has no loyalty to me…
"Get out of here, Bella."
"Okay," I whimper.
A feeling inside me tells me there's nowhere else to go but to the La Push beach. I can't go home. No one is there. And if a vampire is here, then I suppose I'll die with a nice view.
In the past, I didn't think I was much for morbid thoughts. But the world changed, or I did, and now to cope from thinking about perishing violently, I try to negate it with humor. It doesn't work, of course. Nothing ever does.
When I pull up as close as I feel I should without letting my truck gets damaged by the incoming tide. There's no one else as far as I can see. It brings me relief and sadness. I know what it is to be alone, but sometimes, often, it hurts.
I'm walking on the beach before I know it. Kicking sand and pebbles as far out as I can. Which can't be very far with my weak leg muscles. Still, I watch the small rocks roll and stop somewhere further away from me. It's momentarily transfixing.
I walk to a series of much larger rocks next to the shore. The land-facing side is dry so I run my hand along them and feel my skin prick and tingle. It is the closest thing I have to remembering that night…
But when I pass onto the other side, I see her. Leah Clearwater. Her long hair defiantly floating in the wind though she makes no move to brush it aside. She looks completely taken by the ocean before us, making no move to indicate she's heard or seen me.
"Oh," falls from my lips before I think otherwise.
With that she finally turns to look at me, keeping her face passive, but still strikingly beautiful. The way the sun hits her amber skin makes her look more alive than anything I've seen in months. I've spent so long thinking no one but a vampire could look magnificent in the sunlight but seeing how wrong I've been just makes me think of how wrong I am in general.
"I'm sorry!"
I rush the words out, but she shakes her head at me. I'm turning to leave right away, but she almost, almost rolls her eyes at me.
"You can stay."
The shock of her acceptance freezes me, but as soon as I nod back, she's turned away again. Weighing my options, I decide it would be rude to leave now so I make my way to sit on a large boulder a few feet away from her.
There's too much, and somehow still not enough, running through my head to talk.
"Why are you here?" Her voice is sharp, but not entirely judgmental. Still, she looks me over with quizzical eyes.
It takes a lot to draw out the confession from my own lips.
"Jake...um, well, he won't talk to me anymore."
Leah stares at me for a second, unblinking and unmoving. But she looks away right after, eyes to the ocean. I look down as my cheeks burn in shame.
We sit there, silent but somehow together,
"I figured. I saw his new look," she admits, finally turning back to me.
A whole rush of feelings comes to the surface and I feel the need to explain it all to her. "He was afraid. He said they were watching him. I know he didn't want this."
Leah shakes her head, "That's how it goes."
"But what is it?" My voice breaks on the last word and I tear my eyes away from her impenetrable gaze.
She can do nothing for me but shrug. "I don't know. But Sam must be fucking persuasive."
"But he didn't try any of that with me," I say.
This causes her eyebrows to raise, "You've talked to him?"
"Only a little." And it's not a lie. We really haven't talked that much. I can't tell if she buys it, especially with how hot my cheeks are growing each passing second.
There's a sadness that passes over her and I wonder if she can read me like an open book like Edward could. And god, oh Edward. The thought of him clenches my stomach, bringing the nausea back once more. He'd be so disappointed in me. The real him, not just the hallucination. I can't even consider how I might cope with that.
"Not like he would tell you anyway," Leah finally says. "If he wouldn't even tell his fiancé, he's not gonna tell anyone."
For the second time in a minute, my stomach drops.
"His fiancé?"
She smiles, but it doesn't reach her eyes, "He proposed to me years ago. Obviously, it didn't work out."
"Oh."
Oh.
There's another long lapse of silence. I can't think again. My head spins. I remember laughing with my friend in his garage. It distracted me from all the confusion and pain. All of the terror I've put myself through. It made me feel like just for a second I didn't deserve it all. But I do.
"Jake's not going to tell me either then." It's not a question. The certainty of it settles into my skin and I can't shake it off.
Leah's eyes tell me the same answer.
And it's freeing, somehow. To know I might not have to keep calling, keep knocking on his door, because he's not going to choose me. He'll choose Sam. And Sam will choose...well, not me either.
"Make him."
"What?"
"It's the biggest regret I have," she admits, her voice losing that slight always-composed feel it has. "Sam knew exactly what to say so I wouldn't keep asking. I shouldn't have let it work."
"I'm sorry," I say again.
But her eyes grow fierce and she looks at me with all of the courage she might have wished she could have summoned for herself. She stares at me as if to impart this on my very being. But my frail heart almost buckles under the pressure of living up to this ideal. I am not strong like Leah Clearwater.
"Don't be me. Push until you get answers."
I chew on my bottom lip again, "I'm not sure…"
There's a deadset look in her eyes. And finally, some of that strength makes its way into my body. I feel a calm breeze shudder pass through me. Then, a desperate urge to know.
I want to know about Jake and Sam. I want to know if their torture can be broken. I want to be involved.
Leah gives me one last word of advice: "Don't you think you deserve it?"
I don't think I actually tell her that I do. But I justify it with the belief that the truth must stand on its own. That's a common theme in the many classics after all.
It's a rare night that Charlie comes home for dinner. Despite the surprise, I get to work on a shepherd's pie for him, the kind of simple meal he likes. I wrinkle my nose at the smell of canned carrots and wonder if they were from a bad batch.
By now I can brown ground beef without looking, it only takes a few stirs with a spatula and an ear out to hear if the sizzling becomes too intense. Naturally, I find myself staring out the kitchen window, my thoughts a garbled mess.
I don't understand why the loss of the shadow of Edward doesn't hurt me as acutely as it did when he first left. Perhaps I've really gone numb altogether. But that doesn't seem quite right either. I know I'm anxious about Jake, about why he isn't answering me. And there's always the thoughts of another person lingering in the back of my mind as well.
Unable to help it, I think of his eyes. Round and hooded. His gaze pierced me the most, more than anything else. I wonder why I'm now remembering it more intensely. His chastising of my drug and alcohol use was surely deserved. At the moment though, I didn't care. I just wanted another fix. Now, for no reason at all, the cravings are gone and I see his face much more clearly.
The image of his eyes shifts right in front of me as I remember something else. Laurent's chilling voice shivers down my spine. And the giant black wolf appears before me. Suddenly, very obviously now, something clicks.
I push away from the stove and gasp, looking again outside, but the mirage has disappeared. It doesn't take away the realization, however.
"Dad, it's wolves," the words fall out of my mouth.
"Hm? What did you say, Bells?" Charlie turns to me from the couch.
I pivot my whole body to face him, spatula still in hand, "It's giant wolves who are killing the campers. I saw them in the forest."
"Saw them when?"
Shit. I shrug as best I can nonchalantly, "A while back. Not recently. But it makes sense, right?"
He stands up in the living room and walks over to me. "Crap, I guess so, Bella. But how giant are we talking?"
"They were a foot taller than me, at least."
The memory sears itself on my retinas now. I remember the giant black wolf staring into me, looking as if I was about to break in two. But they ran after Laurent instead. Why would a vampire be a better snack than a human? Maybe there's something I don't know about the properties of venom.
I swallow through this line of thought. I only narrowly escaped being eaten myself, but both Laurent and the wolves. It was only because they threatened each other that they took their eyes off of me.
I sway a bit in the kitchen. I reach out to steady myself and quickly turn the stovetop off. The meat is done anyway. No need to increase a fire hazard with my propensity for accidents.
"You feeling alright?" Charlie asks.
I turn to him and nod, "They could have eaten me, Dad. They were somewhat far away, but still."
"Well," he says gruffly, "you're not going back there then."
"Definitely not," I laugh dryly. What was I thinking anyway? Why should I want to go out to the meadow when the real Edward can't be with me. I mentally shake myself some more. My actions and thoughts are a mess these days.
I finish preparing the casserole to put in the oven. Charlie decides to sit down at the dinner table to wait and I join him. He asks again about school but picks up easily enough that I'm not feeling the urge to divulge the latest trivial assignments. Thankfully he doesn't seem to want to mention that I should be calling Renee more. I very much do not want to be doing that.
"You know," he continues on, "the Quileute believe the wolf is sacred or something. Was always a bit weird to me."
My hand stills. I was seconds away from bringing a glass of water to my lips, but I instantly let go of it and just stare at my father.
Quileute, sacred, wolf.
"What's sacred?" I cough as I ask.
"That they're protectors of the forest, I think. Old legends, anyway."
Protectors.
The word is familiar.
Strikingly so.
Then I remember Jacob's complaint once. He referred to them snarkily as 'the protectors of the tribe.' It makes sense all at once. Sam and the others are involved with the wolves, somehow, some way.
My throat tightens.
"I need to check on the food," is my weak excuse to Charlie to stand up and leave.
When I look down at my hands, they're shaking. I blink, but the feeling doesn't leave me. It's all so very confusing. I try to rack my mind for the possibilities going on here.
They're probably sacrificing people to the wolves. Or maybe the wolves have some sort of system that lets them know which campers deserve to be eaten. Maybe it's a mix of them and vampires. It could be any number of horrific things.
But I know who might tell me. And I know that Jacob doesn't deserve to be involved in this mess.
I'm banging on his door in the rain. Losing feeling in my knuckles but I'll keep going until he answers. I can't even name a single emotion I'm feeling. Nothing but desperation, and maybe behind it all, shame.
Sam opens the door quickly. Of course, he does. He cuts into the time I expected to spend on internally panicking some more. When he regards me with a stunned look and sleep-dazed eyes, I don't stare at his features. I don't. I look directly into his eyes to make my statement.
"Take me instead," I say.
"What?" he scratches at the buildup between his eyelids and looks at me like I'm completely alien. I suppose in a way I am. But no more than he and his group are either. With whatever the hell they are doing.
"I'll take Jacob's place. In your group."
His mouth parts open, "Bella…"
"Don't," I say. I don't know what I'm saying it about. I hug myself as the rain drenches all the clothing I have on. My shirt becomes a second skin to me, but the numbness in my arms can hardly complain. My fingers press into my bicep muscles.
I know Sam sees me shiver. He looks down at me with a frown on his face.
"Why don't you come inside?"
"No," I grit out. "I want to know if this deal can work for you. Me for him."
He looks away from me and shakes his head, "I can't."
"Why the hell not?" I yell. "He's terrified of you. I know he is. He didn't want those changes to happen to him. We talked about it, okay? But I'm not afraid, so take me instead."
A whisper: "It doesn't work like that."
"Well, make it work," I seethe.
Sam doesn't say anything else to me. I feel the rage build up inside of me, warming my body despite the dropping temperature. I'm going to explode on him, I feel it inside of me. And it's the least he deserves, for taking Jacob away. Nothing else I'll think of but that.
And then my friend's voice. Jake comes running out from the treeline to meet me as I stand on Sam's doorstep. The shock of it reignites my susceptibility to the rain. The cold swarms back.
"What are you doing here, Bella?" Jacob asks. His tone lacks the usual note of compassion he has for me. In fact it could even be biting. I try not to let that affect me.
I look back at the man in front of me. At the body I once knew for a night. I shiver more. "I'm asking Sam to let you go."
Sam's brown eyes blink slowly, but he shows no change of emotion.
I can practically feel an eye roll behind me, "Stop it, alright? I told you to leave it alone for now."
Jake puts a hand on my back and with his strength, easily pivots me away from Sam and towards my truck. But I throw my arms up and force both to look at me.
"You stop it! I don't care what it is! I know it has to do with the wolves, okay? I know."
Both also freeze and look at me in complete denial. I shake my head at them.
"If you need someone to be sacrificed to them, or monitor them, or whatever, I'll do it."
But Jake's hand finds the middle of my back again and he turns me more forcefully. My balance almost dissipates entirely. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Sam's body lurch ever so slightly forward.
"You don't know anything, Bella," Jake's harsh voice pricks my eyes. They can't see if I cry though, thank the rain for that.
Jake cocks an eyebrow at Sam and it looks something akin to a warning. But the older man stands firm and doesn't take his own gaze off of me. I nearly crumble under it.
I look at Jacob once more before he motions with his head for me to get back into my truck. I swallow. I can see my only path being defeat at the moment. But there are other paths. Hundreds of others. Leah is right. I deserve some sort of truth here.
"Stay away."
I won't.
A/N: Damn Bella, so close but so far. And Jake is such a cockblock. Dang, why do I write these things?