65. Leaps and Bounds
Whether a first step or a first word, graduating from college or walking down the aisle, a child's achievements were to be celebrated and encouraged. Though the more difficult years could feel endless to the beleaguered parents, a normal human's childhood passed them by with indecent haste. If our daughter continued to mature at her current speed, the better part of Renesmee's youth would be over before we could celebrate her first birthday.
As fast as Renesmee's physical growth was, it didn't compare with her mental advancements. Her comprehension grew at an exponential rate. Her first spoken word was immediately followed by a complete and perfectly articulate sentence.
"Momma," she said, "where is Grandpa?"
I'd already had the pleasure of hearing Renesmee think of Bella and I as momma and daddy, but it was even better hearing her say momma out loud. It had to have made Bella happy for that to have been Nessie's first word, but the shock of hearing her speak so clearly seemed to preclude Bella's enjoyment of that particular milestone.
The smile on Bella's face didn't quite reach her eyes, but with a steady voice, she answered that she didn't know, but was sure he would be by later. Satisfied with that reassurance, Renesmee returned her attention to Rosalie, who held her, and didn't see the look of surprised concern Bella and I exchanged. Rose had already managed to hide her reaction, but I heard her shock in the words repeating in her mind: Renesmee was only a week old!
There'd been no babyish babble, no nonsense words young children used in order to learn how to shape sounds. Renesmee had been learning our words all along; she didn't consider it all that remarkable that she should use them. Now was merely the first time she'd felt a need for them. She had a question she wanted answered, and Bella was out of arm's reach. Rose hadn't known the answer when she'd asked in her usual way, so at last she found a purpose for the spoken language we used, though she preferred the directness of sharing her thoughts. Words seemed an imprecise and laborious method for the exchange of information, but they were good for communicating from a distance.
Only a couple of weeks later, Nessie went directly from taking her first step to walking as gracefully as her mother. These were not a toddler's wobbly attempts, and she'd never bothered to crawl. She studied Alice's movements - the way she balanced on her toes, how her feet and legs moved to propel her forward, combining the bend of a knee and the flexing of an ankle - and when she felt she was ready, simply stood from the floor where she'd been sitting and strolled casually across the room.
It was thrilling, if rather distressing.
To say nothing of her shortened life-span, I wanted to savor those small victories, to draw out her childhood. I wanted her to experience life the way I had wanted the same thing for Bella, and not for her to rush through her life without pausing to really live it.
Jacob had clapped and cheered the way family and friends usually did when a child walked the first time. He didn't even consider the negative ramifications until later. In the moment, all that concerned him was Renesmee and her expectations that we should be as pleased with her new skill as she obviously was. It was only later that it hit him how little time had passed since her birth. I caught him gnawing his lip and would have comforted him if I'd known how, but he wasn't alone in his worry about what the future held for our only child.
Charlie couldn't hide his surprise when he visited that night and saw Renesmee enter the room on her own. Eyes wide and mouth agape, he had to remind himself several times of his need-to-know policy regarding the weirdness that surrounded our family. He returned her wave and smile a little late, watching in awe as our one-month old child walked confidently across the room with a thick book clutched against her chest. She climbed unassisted onto the couch and patted the cushion beside her in invitation for him to join her before opening the book to study the pictures.
Renesmee was rapidly making her way through every book on local flora and fauna in Carlisle's vast study, but as yet, she was not interested in their written descriptions. It was the vivid color photographs they contained that captured her attention. The detailed images of flowers and trees she recognized from our yard or the surrounding forest were as fascinating to her as the real thing.
When Charlie finally tore his eyes away from her, he found Bella and I had followed our daughter into the room. We stood in the doorway watching, but Bella's expression was not one of a doting parent proudly displaying their child's newest skill. A piece of the puzzle fell into place as he took in the worry on Bella's face. She was not as complacent about Nessie's oddities as she was about the rest of the supernatural world. Like Charlie, Bella had a daughter whose differences were strange, unknown and otherworldly.
For my part, while I shared everyone's concerns, there was too much to be happy about to allow worry to be my dominant emotion.
And nor was worry Bella's most prominent emotion. For a reason I couldn't determine, she shot Jasper a frown when he sidled into the room to take a seat and pretend to watch the game Alice had ready. I was quite grateful for the emotional barometer he served as. Bella worried for Renesmee - anyone could see that by looking at her - but it was her euphoria that compelled Jasper to follow us as if he expected her newborn madness to assert itself at any given moment.
Initially, he had indeed felt it his duty to guard her, but as it became evident that Bella was unprecedentedly controlled for a newborn, he found he enjoyed her positivity too much to stay away. After fifty years of tolerating and blunting the edge of my misery, of softening Rosalie's rancor and easing Esme's melancholy, Bella's joy was a radiant, physical warmth that drew him like blazing fire on a chilly night.
"You should know, Charlie," I said, attempting to sound serious, "your daughter is every bit as amazing as mine."
At Bella's quelling look, I could no longer resist and gave in to the laughter that constantly threatened to overtake me, as though my amusement were a golden-eyed lion, patiently stalking my every move and ready to pounce the instant I let my guard down. Or perhaps a lion cub, hunting me in a harmless and playful game where losing resulted not in a death, but in mirth. It was a welcome change from the thirsty, red-eyed monster whose murderous tendencies I used to have to fight.
Swallowing his questions unasked, Charlie let out a grunt that sounded like an agreement and took the seat Renesmee had indicated, asking, "Whatcha reading today, Nessie?"
As we had yet to tell her otherwise, she still refrained from sharing her thoughts with him and simply gave him a brilliant smile, pointing at the picture in answer. The two spent the entirety of his visit discussing the book - she wordlessly pointing to things she found interesting or plants she recognized, and he offering a comment or two.
Something other than Nessie's rapid development seemed to be bothering Bella. Throughout Charlie's visit, Jasper was aware of a rising irritation within her, but I could discern nothing that could be the cause.
That night, as we lay our sleeping daughter in her crib, Bella voiced the reason behind her irritation at last, exclaiming, "Yeesh! If I haven't killed Charlie or Sue yet, it's probably not going to happen. I wish Jasper would stop hovering all the time!"
"No one doubts you, Bella. You know how Jasper is - he can't resist a good emotional climate. You're so happy all the time, love, he gravitates toward you without even thinking."
"Oh." She blinked, surprise replacing the irritation on her face, and making her look so much like her human self, bewildered and a bit confused by the supernatural world in which she'd become entangled.
I pulled her into a tight hug - as tight as my arms were capable - wondering if she understood exactly what Jasper's empathic reaction meant. I was elated, barely able to contain my overwhelming joy, yet it was Bella who drew him. As happy as I was, her joy in our life together exceeded my own. If not for Jasper, I would have thought such a thing was impossible. Yet it was undeniably true.
All my fears and worries over what Bella's change would mean, and never had I considered this. As pure, innocent, and sweet now as she'd been as a human, her desire for me stronger than a newborn's thirst, fearless and confident in her new body, Bella was happy. I hadn't condemned her to an eternity of misery which she tolerated just to be with me. No. For Bella, immortality was a precious gift, and every second was meant to be cherished.
My own immeasurable pleasure in our new reality paled when compared to the way it felt to see her so happy, to know it was I who made her that way.
Despite the desire to extend her time as a child, we were all quite ready for Nessie to graduate from the dwindling supply of blood she drank and move on to human food, if she would - or could. If my body could have accepted it, I might even have been willing to forgo hunting in favor of eating my meals in a restaurant with Bella, regardless of how disgusting the food tasted, simply for the experience of taking the woman I loved on a real date. I had tried often enough to know without a doubt that blood was the only source of nourishment for a vampire.
Though I was skeptical of their success, Jacob and Esme were determined that Nessie try human foods, and encouraged her to taste new things any time the opportunity presented itself. Every one of their offerings received a resounding rejection. I wasn't sure who was more surprised when Sue invited Esme to go grocery shopping with her, but my mother jumped at the chance. The two came back with their car loaded with fruits and vegetables, meats and cheeses, and what seemed to be the entire bakery's selection of pastries in the hope that, amongst the wide variety and tempting sweets, something would entice Renesmee to expand her diet.
Whether Renesmee ever gave up her bloody diet and switched to human food or not, none of the food they purchased would go to waste. The werewolves would put it all to good use.
The pack had grown. Jacob, Seth, and Leah were now joined by two others from Sam's pack: Quil and Embry. Once their ties of friendship had been renewed following Jacob's imprint, the defection had been a matter of time. The two had discovered their allegiance had shifted almost without having made the conscious decision. Sam, upon realizing he could no longer hear their thoughts, had switched to his human form and wished them well.
Leah - who, alone among the wolves, retained her animosity toward us - enjoyed the bump in her social status. She'd gone from one of the lowest in Sam's pack to second-in-command in Jacob's, a job which came with even more responsibility in a larger pack. She reported to him regularly, though that required her to enter our house quite often. She would come in, speak with him quietly, and leave without deigning to acknowledge that any of my family existed.
Renesmee, perceptive and sensitive as her mother, could not fail to notice Leah's absolute rejection. It was her first experience with someone who didn't instantly adore her.
"Don't worry about it," I told her when her gaze followed Leah out of the house, the line between her eyes giving testament to her hurt and confusion.
She doesn't like me.
"She doesn't like any of us."
She likes Jacob.
My first instinct, to respond that there was no accounting for taste, didn't seem appropriate given her attachment to the wolf. Instead, I said, "Yes, but if she can't see how wonderful you are, that says more about her than it says about you."
Or you and Mommy and… In her mind was a blur of faces, the image of one member of our family after another.
Her eyes, startlingly intelligent in her young face, met mine from across the room, but I could only shrug. Leah had cause to dislike me. I was far from innocent, something I was not yet prepared to explain. Of the rest of us, only Carlisle matched Bella's purity, but as the head of our family, Leah held him responsible for all our actions. Her dislike of Bella stemmed from Bella's need for, yet rejection of, Jacob - something else I was not prepared to explain.
"Leah will come around." Jacob, cheerfully plopping down beside Renesmee with a new book in his hands, leaned close to whisper conspiratorially, "Werewolves don't usually get along with vampires. She just needs to unlearn her prejudices."
His glib reassurance didn't soothe away the hurt and confusion in her eyes.
Feeling some kind of explanation was necessary, I said, "It's because of our diet." I could feel Bella's eyes on me and wished - for the millionth time - that I could hear what she was thinking as she rolled her lips between her teeth. "We're blood drinkers, and the werewolves don't approve."
"Well, sure, not when it comes from people, we don't," Jacob said. "I guess eating a hamburger isn't that much different from what you guys do."
Nessie reached for Jacob and replayed her memories of his attempts at convincing her to eat with him. I could feel the wordless question she conveyed: Would Leah like her more if she ate the same kind of food the werewolves did? And… would Jacob? He was a werewolf too, and she wanted his approval.
"I dunno," he mumbled. "Maybe she would. I like you no matter what you eat. But it would make me happy if you tried regular food."
Without sparing the book he'd brought a glance, Renesmee marched into the kitchen and began searching for something that didn't smell atrocious. Her little nose wrinkled as if she were a human child whose least favorite vegetable had been heaped onto her plate, but she resigned herself to eating something, and finally settled on a small selection of fresh fruits.
It wouldn't help to laugh at the faces she made, but I commiserated with her dilemma. The residual scent of strawberries in Bella's hair from her shampoo had been delightful. The taste of the fruit itself, not so much. Renesmee determinedly ate half a dozen of the bright red berries before shifting her attention to another of Jacob's previous offerings. She didn't enjoy any of it, but appeared to suffer no ill affects from her consumption of human food.
Renesmee's impromptu meal may have filled her stomach, but it did little for her thirst. Nor did the water she consented to drink. Sensing her growing discomfort, Jacob relented and fixed her a cup of blood himself. When he offered it to her, she reached past it to express her regret that she had disappointed him and sent a desire to understand why it bothered him so.
Sidestepping her question with a sheepish shrug, he said, "You're a growing young vampire. If blood is what you need, then that's what you should drink."
If she never adapted to another diet, at least he had accepted her needs. While I was grateful for the loss of his animosity, I would have preferred a natural acceptance of our nature through mutual understanding rather than this overwrite of his own. She desired his approval, and so he approved.
I had Bella's love by her choice. Jacob had none. His change of heart regarding our diet was prompted solely by his imprint. It made me uncomfortable, but it was an aspect of being a werewolf, a natural part of him as much as needing blood was a part of me.
I supposed I should just accept his words without dissecting his motives and be grateful.
Nearly every morning, Alice and Rosalie would decide it was time to update Renesmee's picture album. Like a living doll, they dressed her in outfit after outfit. Even Bella, who had never cared about fashion, seemed to enjoy the activity, and Nessie certainly did. The different fabrics and patterns were pleasing to her, as was the evident pleasure of my mother and sisters.
Since she was aging in hours what should have taken weeks, we had to make it seem like more time had passed than what truly had. Esme took pictures with each clothing change, sometimes with Nessie alone on the floor or perched on a chair in one room or another, sometimes with one of us holding her. In a short time, Esme would take enough pictures of our only child to add what seemed like several weeks' worth of experiences to her growing collection of photographs.
Quite in her element, Alice insisted that if Renesmee was photographed in different outfits, we all should be too. Who would believe we wore the same clothes for weeks on end? Never mind that no one would see the photo album but us. Jacob cheerfully allowed her to pick out changes of clothing for him to wear. Nessie wanted it, and her encouragement was all the incentive he needed to cooperate. It was a game to her, and she wanted him to play along, and so he happily did. The sweet sound of her laugh as she clapped her approval at seeing him dressed up was reward enough for his patience and participation.
After witnessing Quil's memories of his young imprint, I supposed Jacob was lucky Renesmee wasn't into princess crowns, make-up, and tutus.
Thankfully, my preference for the same basic clothes took much of the onus away from me. I had put my foot down with Alice many years prior, and although I let her shop for me - it was easier - she had long since ceased her efforts to widen the variety in my wardrobe.
I left them to their fashion fun, escaping the clicking shutter of Esme's camera as quickly as possible to engage in activities my brothers and I found more appropriate for letting off a bit of tension. We all needed down time from the pursuit of new lines of research or the endless debates of old ones. I much preferred to need a change of clothes because they'd been ruined by over-enthusiastic wrestling.
Bella wasn't quite as lucky. I thought she would have preferred to watch Renesmee's fun, but Alice wasn't going to let her get away with staying on the sidelines. Bella would thank her one day, she was sure. Fifty years later and Alice still hoped that eventually we all would learn to just listen to her, but until then, my psychic sister patiently steered us toward the future she knew would make us happiest.
I lost track of the number of times Alice said, I told you so! to Esme as she began to make her way through the bags of clothes with which she'd filled our ridiculously oversized closet. She may not have known why such a wide selection was necessary at the time, but she had known they would be needed, or at least used in some manner.
Not all of the bags were filled with the evening gowns and silk dresses which Bella flatly refused to wear.
"They're supposed to be pictures of our every day life!" Bella protested. "No one in their right minds would believe I was wearing that around the house. Nu-uh, no way."
But it seemed she would wear them at some point. The image of Bella dressed up like a supermodel about to step out onto the runway was clear in Alice's mind. My sister was just as certain of it as she'd been that Bella would become a vampire. No matter how adamantly I'd protested and fought against Bella's fate, time had, as usual, proved Alice correct. While I adored Bella's casual style and loved seeing her lounge around in the baggie tee-shirts she preferred, I looked forward to the day when Alice would be proved right about this, too. Just the image in Alice's mind made my breath catch. I could only imagine the effect Bella would have on me if - when - I got the chance to see her dressed to the nines.
Some of the bags simply held blouses and slacks, which Bella donned with only a few eye rolls and huffs. Part of me wondered if Alice wasn't putting on this daily show solely for my benefit. The cut of the shirts she chose for Bella to wear accented her delicate-seeming figure, hugging her curves in a way that made my hands ache to caress them, and the colors set off her new skin as if designed with vampires in mind. Which, considering Alice's contacts and philanthropy, they probably had been.
Of course, Bella could have worn a potato sack - or nothing at all - and would still be the most beautiful woman in the world.
Many other bags held clothes that were patently too small for Bella. I could only assume Nessie would wear them one day soon. Her room didn't have a closet. Ours had plenty of space to hold all of the clothes she would grow into.
And grow, she did. The pace continued to decrease, but day by day, the differences noticeable sometimes from one hour to the next, Renesmee grew with frightening speed. Having lost most of her babyishness within the first weeks, she looked very much like a miniature adult, but few adults had ever displayed the wide-eyed wonder with which she viewed the world.
If there was one thing she shared with human children, it was the endless desire to know why and how, but with a vampire's unwavering attention, focus, and perfect recall. Her desire to learn encompassed every aspect of our lives, and her questions were becoming more difficult to answer with complete candor. I wouldn't lie to her, but felt a strong need to preserve her innocence as well as her positive perception of herself and of us. I didn't want her haunted by the demons that had long tormented me.
A human parent might field such questions as why the sky is blue, or how the tiny people got into the television, or even the dreaded where do babies come from. I would have chosen any subject over discussing the details a vampire's food source, but it was of utmost importance that she understand why we wanted her to eat human food, and why the werewolves disapproved of a vampire's diet.
"It's time we take Renesmee hunting," I announced abruptly.
All eyes were on me, but I kept mine on my daughter, who was looking back at me with interest. Beside her, Jacob's mouth gaped open while he slowly shook his head in disbelief.
"Yes," I muttered. "I am well aware that she is little more than a month old, thank you. Another month or two won't change anything."
"Indeed it would," Carlisle corrected. "I am already having trouble obtaining enough units to keep Nessie fed. It would be far better for her to transition now, rather than a month from now when there may be no other option."
"'No other option'?" Jacob barked out a humorless laugh. "Uh, what about regular food?"
"She is still a vampire, Jacob. Human food may be capable of sustaining her, but she does not exactly find it palatable, and we cannot be certain that it is meeting all of her needs. Would you want to live on a diet consisting of nothing but bread and water for the rest of your life?"
"Thank you, Carlisle." When Jacob continued to silently object, I threw my hands up in exasperation. "Well, what would you have us do? She can walk and talk and is all but indestructible. The only thing out there that could hurt her is Sam and his pack. Do you believe they pose a danger? No? Then, what are you afraid of?"
...just that she's growing up too fast…
Speaking with a bit less vehemence, I said, "I know. But the sooner we wean her off the units Carlisle only has access to while we remain here, the sooner we can leave to seek out ways to slow her growth rate down."
Setting his jaw, he nodded once. "When? Where?" ...can I come?
"No time like the present. There's a whole mountain range out there, and I know almost every inch of it. And… yes. I suppose so. In fact, why don't we all go?"
