Title: Disillusioned

Genre: romance / hurt / comfort

Pairings: alice/jasper, edward/bella, one-sided: felix/bella

Warning: i'm in crisis

Bella does not get the story till later that Alice used to be mates with the Volterran Tracker.

This revelation, along with the revelation that Alice fucked said Tracker during their brief stint in Volterra, is not the hardest pill to swallow that week. It erupts into much fighting between Edward and Alice on the way home, through first class where Bella clings onto wakefulness if only to get scarps and pieces of the story while still clinging onto Edward's shirt.

"You were disloyal to Jasper." Edward says blithely. "You made vows to be loyal to him, and you broke them."

The stewardess circles their row again, eyes sweeping over them, but neither siblings nor Bella deign her with a reassuring smile as she ambles past. In fact, they rarely break to parry even with human ears within reach. Alice has been playing a solid defense of you don't understand and drop it, Edward, I mean it since the gift shop, but with the flight's end in sight, it seems the fight is also drawing to a close.

Alice does not even look away from her window. "Don't talk to me about loyalty, Edward. You were the jackass that left Bella to die in the woods when you broke up."

Alice says it so casually, so carelessly, it is as if she threw the words like her silk scarf into the air. Arrivederci indeed.

The words hit she like a semi, a twelve-car collision to the chest and Bella is left gasping on her apple juice. Edward spares her a glance and is about to jump into another flawless argument, when Alice snaps—"You put her in unnecessary danger because your dramatic ass simply had to take her out to the woods, leave her where she couldn't find her way out. Seriously, you want to preach to me? You?"

The wind catches them in some turbulence and Bella—for the first time in nearly twenty-four hours—unattached herself from Edward and rises shakily to her feet. "Bathroom," she mumbles, not worrying if they can hear her, or if they care as she zigzags down the aisle towards the door.

If Jasper takes the news well, Bella does not know because Jasper skips town by the time they arrive in Forks. Alice is heartbroken. Edward is self-righteous. Bella near brain-dead from sleep deprivation.

"I saw you destroy your phone!" Alice screams in the baggage claim, her hands hooked into claws and her eyes pinched. If she were able to, Bella was sure there would be tears in her eyes. Instead she is complete in her perfection, voice like music, pain like an anguished angel; even as the paint bubbles and peels back, she's lovely and it's unnerving. "I saw it!"

Edward slips Bella's phone back into her pocket.

After she gets some rest, not much but some, she manages to have a conversation with Edward about boundaries and taking her things and sneaking into her bedroom. These are all no-no's. She is too tired to be dazzled by his amused expression and presses down the law. "I mean it," she says, waking up. "If we're going to make this work, you have to respect my space—"

"What?"

Bella blinks. "I said, if we're going to make this work."

"I heard that Bella."

"I know that." She replies, dumbly.

"What do you mean by it?" He reiterates. "Are you saying that you still want to be with me even after everything I put you through?"

Bella blinks once, twice. "Well, you're going to have to make it up to me." She shifts on her bed. "And respect my stuff. No more taking my camera or photos or phone. Don't do that just because you can! It's disrespectful to me and it tells me you don't understand boundaries."

"I get boundaries."

Bella snorts. "Yeah, we're going to have a talk about that too."

Alice doesn't return to school when Edward does, but she doesn't stave off the excuse of college and early acceptance like Emmett and Rosalie did either. The official story is that she is taking time off school to focus on her health. No one asks about Jasper.

Bella knows better than to do so.

"I wanted to come back," Alice says one night when Bella invites her over. The two of them are sitting downstairs, TV playing as Charlie snores and Alice pretends not to be there. "Edward broke away from us because my visions of you were so full of pain. God, Bella, why didn't you move? Do something? Be human?"

Bella studies Alice's pixie-like features in the glow of the television. Her face is the same, goldenrod eyes and ashy black hair and moon pale skin. She has never changed, but she is so, so different somehow that Bella has to tilt her head to look at her.

She doesn't seem as perfect anymore.

She's not flawless, untouchable, unmovable—

Alice's lips pressed into a line. Her eyes are glazed for a moment before they snap back with intense focus. "You're about to say something very mean, and I didn't like it."

"Was it honest?" Bella asks.

"Yes," Alice says after a long moment. "Yes, it was."

Bella pulls her afghan tighter around her. "Tell me about Demetri." And Alice, not seeming to expect this, balks. Bella has been gathering a quiet study since Volterra—the ex mate that Alice left for America (Edward), a Tracker (Aro), a 'prissy fuckin' Italian' (Emmett), and someone that loved Alice very dearly, deeply, obsessively.

"He was," Alice looks wistful a moment and studies the television and the game show that drones on in the distance. She seems to fixate on it for a second, brow crunching as if puzzling over the answer. Bella almost thinks that she might dodge the question, but Alice says, flatly, "He is the only man I never saw coming."

Bella decides to leave a message with Billy, "Could you tell Jake to call me? I just went to make sure that my ex-boyfriend didn't commit suicide and I had to meet the vampire equivalent of judge, jury, and executioner. Yes—oh, yes, I'm fine. Tell him to call—? Oh, he's there? Yes, I can wait . . . um, hello? Jake? . . . Jake, is that—oh, hey. Yeah, yeah, I'm at home. You hungry?"

Edward doesn't say anything about her hanging out with Jacob, but she knows he doesn't approve. She can tell from the long stares, prolonged silences, and spontaneous dates that Edward is silently griping over the fact that she refuses to drop Jacob. It had come to a head in the first week, not their first fight, but a fight just the same, in the school parking lot.

Her boyfriend is leaning against his car. "Jake's picking me up. We're gonna meet the guys and get pizza."

Edward gave her a long look and sighs, his beautiful face turned into a stone image of pain and agony and—

"Just be careful, Bella. They can hurt you. Really hurt you."

Bella feels her blood close to boiling. "Well, you hurt me, but Jacob at least has the manners to only bring that up when I tell him you're being a dick."

Second beat between them, and then, "W-what?"

"I said: you're being a dick." She enunciates a bit louder, luring a few unwanted gazes. Bella can feel the heat in her chest, the hole beginning to tear and burn. She can hear the motorcycle before she sees them, Jake idling against the curb, head tilted curiously. "Look, I am hanging out with Jacob. He's not going to hurt me? Okay?"

"He can't help it. He's an animal."

"You—you know what? I don't want to talk to you right now. You're the only one that's hurting me, Edward Cullen."

With Carlisle and Esme working on the house, Edward griping, and Alice moody, it makes going to the Cullen house a less than fun affair. She is almost ecstatic when Rosalie and Emmett return even if it means for more awkward exchanges.

"So, you slept with Demetri." Rosalie says once they're behind the wheel of her Rolls Royce Wraith. It's an insanely old car, built like a tank, and on the way to a car show in Port Angeles it is perfect to stretch across the backseat and think.

Alice looks witheringly from the front seat. "Are you going to lecture me too?"

"No," Rosalie says, her brow and voice incredibly smooth. The open window of the Wraith sending tendrils of her long hair flying. "Because that's what Demetri wants. He wants you to feel isolated. He wants you to feel like you have no where to go, and no one but him. I'm not leaving you."

Alice reaches across the console and Rosalie locks their fingers together.

Bella watches the moment with a guilt seeping in her chest. She just feels so disillusioned from the faerietale that Edward—no, that she made for herself. She doesn't know how to move on once her view on the world—Edward's world—has been shattered.

Alice looks back at her, frowning. Bella sinks back against the car seat.

Rosalie continues, eyes snapping to Bella's in the car mirror. "So, we need a plan of attack."

hello! this was originally titled 'roulette' but i decided 'disillusioned' sounded better.

this started as a fun dabble, but now i'm in too deep. we'll get more demetri later

- cafeanna