Disclaimer: This story is based off of the characters written by Stephanie Meyer in the Twilight Saga. I do not own any of these characters.

Bella

Emmett took me out hunting just the two of us. We headed out to the Goat Rocks soon after Jake had left so we could find some more interesting prey. I knew I would be fine with the local fauna but Emmett thought it would be a good idea to get out a little further and let out some aggression.

I had to admit even running this far made me feel much better. Getting away from all the realities I was facing was a good change of pace and once again I felt the pull of the nomadic lifestyle many vampires take to.

Emmett slowed his pace but didn't stop completely, I found myself focusing my hearing on the heavy foot falls to the north. Emmett turned to me with a wide grin, wiggling his eyebrows. He adjusted direction and headed to toward the bear.

I followed after him and leapt up into the trees.

I was interested in getting a taste of an animal as big as a bear, but I was more interested in seeing what it looked like for Emmett to take one out. I continued to hold my breath as Emmett grew closer to the giant ball of fur.

Emmett let out a deep growl as he came in sight and the beast turned to him. Emmett began to circle the creature and the bear let out a warning growl of it's own. Emmett laughed and lunged in, mocking the beast. The bear stood up and swung a claw at Emmett, and he dodged left.

The two of them danced around each other for a few minutes, the bear was irritated and Emmett seemed to be having the time of his life. The beast got a good hook in, swiping the side of Emmetts shirt, it tore the upper sleeve over across the center of his chest. Emmett paused for a minute, assessing the damage and tsked in disapproval.

"Bella, I'll break - you feed." He grunted, hunching over ready to pounce. My eyes widened but I crouched on the branch myself.

Emmett charged gripping the bear, he swung around and pulled it down on top of him snapping his neck effectively. I leapt from the branch as Emmett pulled himself from under the beast and I pounced sinking my teeth into its neck. I relished in the blood as it coated the back of my throat.

This was the first time it felt I felt like I was able to savor the meal, though it was still over fairly quickly. After I'd drained it, I stood up and wiped my mouth on my sleeve and met Emmett's eyes.

"Did you enjoy the show?" He asked spreading his arms out so I could get a good look at his shredded shirt.

"It was certainly and experience," I laughed and he joined in. "Next time, I think I'd like to have a go at it though." I said.

"Are you still thirsty? I'm sure we can find another one before we need to head back." I stared at him for a long minute.

"20 bucks you can't even take it out yourself." He said with a challenging grin, I narrowed my eyes.

"You're on."

We bolted through the trees again and I listened for more sets of heavy footfalls. Surprisingly it didn't take long before I caught the sound, I inhaled deep and shifted my direction to the bear. I heard Emmett's giant body leap to a branch, it creaked as he landed and I snorted as the tree swayed heavily from his weight.

I didn't play around the way Emmett had, as soon as I had eyes on the beast I whistled for it's attention. Emmett's laugh rung from above me as the bear turned. I growled and crouched low. The bear took two steps toward me, it was larger than Emmett's had been and after a brief millisecond of hesitation I shot forward. I tried to mimic the way Emmett had taken the other bear down, but as I attempted to swing around I was thrown backward.

Emmett's laughter grew louder and I hissed at him to shut up.

I leapt around behind the beast and shot forward again, I latched on to its back and squeezed my arms around its neck. As I heard the snap of it's neck breaking I sunk my teeth in. While I was pulling blood into my mouth it toppled backward and pinned me beneath it. I finished draining the second bear and laid there with its weight on me for a moment.

I heard Emmett land with a light thud before he was standing over me.

"You owe me 20 bucks." I said, he was grinning and shaking his head.

"That was a mess."

"You're one to talk, at least my shirt is in one piece." I retorted.

"I wouldn't be so sure of that."

I frowned and rolled the bear off of me, I looked down and the left side of my shirt was ripped from my belly button to my hip, The fabric of my jeans was torn where my shirt overlapped and I my frowned deepened. I looked back up to Emmett.

"Whatever, I still took it down myself." Emmett shook his head.

"Yeah, yeah. I'll get you your money. Let's just head back."

"If I beat you there, I double my winnings." I challenged.

"No way, you've got newborn speed." Emmett retorted.

"If you can't handle a second loss that sounds like a you problem," I smiled sweetly and his lips pursed.

"Fine." As soon as the word left his mouth I took off. He was screaming after me, something about cheating as I raced forward following the path we'd came.

...

I sat in Emmett's preferred spot on the couch as I waited for him to catch up. Rosalie was also in the living room and it only took a few minutes before I could hear Emmett's approach. He was grumbling as he ran and Rosalie and I shared a smile.

"You're a cheater, and you'll pay for that." He growled as he stomped past us to the stairs. He ran up to what I assumed was his bedroom and was back down in a second, he flicked the 40 bucks at me in the form of a paper football and I caught it between my thumb and index finger.

I looked up at him beaming, "Even if I had given you a head start I would have beaten you home, no contest." Emmett glared at me and I stood up. "Now if you'll excuse me, I should probably change."

I had taken to borrowing Rosalie's clothes when mine needed to be washed, but the only clothes that belonged to me were now shredded. There wasn't really a way for me to get any of my old clothes back and aside from the 40 I'd just scored from Emmett, I didn't have any money to go out and buy anything new.

I quickly grabbed a long sleeve t-shirt and pair of jeans from Rosalie's closet and slipped into them. I brought my wrecked clothes down stairs, passing Emmett on the way, and looked to Rosalie. "It would appear we'll be sharing a little more often, I hope that's okay."

Rosalie shrugged and looked at me, "I'm fine with sharing," she closed the book she was reading and set it down next to her before looking back at me. "But if you decide to speak with Alice again, I know she would love to find you some new clothes." Rosalie gave me a soft smile and I grimaced slightly.

She eyed me for a moment, "We haven't really talked about things since you agreed to have them come back. How are you feeling about it?" She asked softly.

I sighed and planted myself back on the couch, I looked at my hands for a moment before meeting her eyes again.

"Honestly I've been trying not to think about it." She nodded thoughtfully.

"Well, speaking from experience, it's not easy to live with people you don't want to be around. I don't want to push you into facing things, but you sort of did that yourself by agreeing to this. So all I'm going to say is you might want to start thinking about it." She gave me a soft smile, picked her book up and went upstairs.

I fell back against the couch staring at the coffee table in front of me. I knew I couldn't avoid it, but every time I thought about what I wanted to say to them, I sent myself into an angry panic. I'd been able to get some of that fury out when I'd seen Alice which made it a little easier to think about what else I wanted to say to her. Maybe that was the key? It wasn't as though Edward deserved anything more than to see just what he'd done when he left. It was his fault I felt so angry and betrayed.

The more I thought about interacting with him, the more sick I felt. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath as I did I heard the sounds of paws racing through the trees. I smiled to myself, thank you Jake for the distraction. As he stopped in the tree line to phase I stood and headed to the door not wanting to stay in the house.

I sat down on the stairs and Jake trotted to his place near me.

"How ya holdin' up Bells?"

"I'm doing alright, glad you're here." I said, he smiled.

"Me too, this morning has been a little hectic."

"Why's that?"

"My dad and I went to help figure some things out with the service. Charlie and Renee were arguing the whole time so it took a while to get a solid plan put together." Jake looked at me, "Your mom doesn't seem to understand why I'm insisting on helping plan the whole thing. Got any tips on how to get her to stop fighting it?"

I grinned. "She's a stubborn woman, just keep doing what you need to do." I shrugged, I couldn't imagine why it mattered to her whether Jacob was involved in planning the service or not. "Did they end up getting anything accomplished?"

Jacob gave me a look, "Renee set the date for the service and confirmed with the church. She was pushing for the 24th but Charlie told her ten days wasn't enough for them to plan the proper service for you. He convinced her to stay through the 31st." I nodded, still not understanding what my mother's rush was. If I could see her I'd be able to tell what she was thinking, but from here it just seemed like she wanted nothing more than for it to be done so she could leave.

Without realizing it, I had been gripping on to the wood slat of the banister. In my frustration I crumpled the slat in my fist. I looked down at it in shock.

Jacob was quiet for a long moment. "I really don't think she's fast tracking it because she wants it to be over with. I think she's struggling, but she's also trying to get Charlie out of his head about things." He paused as he watched me dust my hand off. "Both of them love you, grief just does weird things to people."

I turned to face him, tears that would never come pricking at my eyes again. Without thinking about it I slid across the stairs and hugged him. His skin was a nearly uncomfortable hot, but I didn't care. His arms wrapped around me and a sob broke loose from my throat.

I'd never imagined that this was what my life would look like, that at seventeen I would have to grieve the loss of my parents and my old life. When I'd thought about wanting to become an immortal I had only briefly considered how hard it would be to let go of my old life. It hadn't been anything extraordinary so I thought it would be relatively easy, but losing Charlie and Renee was the hardest thing I've had to endure - it even matched the seething pain of my transformation.

We sat in our hug for quite some time, until I was able to collect myself enough to sit back. Jacob gave me a sad smile.

"I know it's hard, but it'll be okay."

"Eventually." I sighed, running a hand down my face. "Was there anything else they figured out?"

"Yeah, Charlie is going to use one of the plots he'd bought after his parents died for you. Renee wasn't a huge fan of that idea. So she'll be buying an urn so she can 'take you anywhere.'" His tone shifted at the last bit as he mimicked my mother's words. I choked out a laugh and Jake joined in.

"That does sound like Renee." I said, shaking my head with a smile. "Thank you for keeping me updated, I'd be going crazy if it weren't for you."

"You're going crazy anyway, you just hugged a werewolf." He teased.

"You hugged back." I said, and we both laughed.

"I guess we're both a little crazy." He shrugged.

"Guess so." We sat staring out over the lawn.

"So, the rest of the Cullen's come back tomorrow." Jake said, shifting uncomfortably.

"Yeah, they do."

"How are you holding up?" He peered at me from the corner of his eye.

"I'm not really looking forward to it, but I would have had to face him at some point."

"Would you have, though?" He turned to me, "I mean really, even living forever, there's so many places you could go. How likely were you to have run into him if this weren't the scenario?" I let out a low breath.

"I could have avoided him forever, yeah. But I don't think I would have." I caught the look on Jacob's face and shook my head. "You're misunderstanding. If things were different and this wasn't something that made sense to do right now, I would still want to seek closure at some point. I deserve to have him hear my perspective. The way he left wasn't right, and I owe it to myself to make sure he knows what he did."

"Closure." Jacob repeated the word. Our eyes met and he didn't quite seem to believe me.

"Closure." I told him. After a few seconds he turned to face the lawn again. We were both quiet for a while until the subject changed to the pack and how they were taking the rest of the family coming back to Forks.

We talked for a while longer before Jake decided he needed to head home. He offered a hug goodbye before heading out. I sat back down on the stairs as he ran past the tree line and started to think more about what the next coming days might look like.

The rest of the family would be arriving in town tomorrow, and there was a lot that needed to be unpacked.