thirty-five.

(Jacob)

The following Saturday, Jacob is in the garage with Leah, Embry and Quil, all enjoying a rare day of being free from responsibility at the same time, when they hear the deafening roar of a familiar '53 Chevy truck chugging down the dirt road.

From where he is rolling back and forth over the concrete floor on the longboard (that he's supposed to be using to check out the Rabbit's exhaust), Quil's head snaps up, his brown eyes bulging disbelievingly out of their sockets. "That's not . . . ?"

"Yep," Jacob and Embry mutter together, exchanging a meaningful look over the head gasket.

"And I was having such a nice day, too," Embry adds quietly, borderline woeful.

Unable to help but agree, Jacob glances apprehensively at the hammock where Leah has so far spent the morning swinging leisurely whilst reading The Awakening. He is still unsure whether she's reading for her own enjoyment or because she's got another test coming up, but he doesn't dare ask — not when she has recently taken to handing her books to whoever is closest and demanding they quiz her. For someone who has turned his back on his education, he knows more about inorganic chemistry than he thinks anyone should.

He can't wait for the day Leah walks across the stage to get her diploma, if only because it means he can purge the information from his brain and she'll finally lose those dark circles underneath her eyes. Her time continues to be filled with going to school, reading, studying, barely sleeping. Her finals start soon, and her stress levels are at an all-time high. It's all Jacob can do to try and convince her to breathe, to slow down — it's not like she's going to be able to write about the primary interests of postmodern literary theory if she keeps falling asleep in the exam hall, is it?

Or something. God, he can't wait for graduation.

Just as he's about to look away, Leah stretches her arm over the side of the hammock and clicks her fingers. "Pay up, loser."

Embry's hands freeze above the Rabbit's engine, evidently having just realised that he's about to be five bucks short — and that's after already losing to Quil twice this morning alone.

He clears his throat. "Now, let's not be hasty. It might not be—"

"Uh-uh," she tuts, clicking again. "I'm not stupid. I said she'd show her face by Saturday; you said Sunday. Show me the money."

"Dammit, woman," he grumbles over Quil's crowing laughter. He reaches down into his pocket for his wallet and reluctantly trudges over to her, slapping a bill into her awaiting palm.

"Thanking you," she chirps, tucking it into her book. "Shall we draw straws?" she asks then. "Or do we have a volunteer?"

"I'm not going," Quil says, throwing up his hands and fervently shaking his head. "Nuh-uh, no way."

Embry hurries back to the car before Leah can pick on him again. "Don't look at me," he says. "Jake?"

"You're a bunch of cowards." Jacob shakes his head slightly despairingly at them as he tightens up the last stretch bolt, but that doesn't stop him from ducking lower behind the open hood as if it will make him less visible. No way is he going out there on his own.

He throws another quick, furtive look towards the hammock. "Honey?" he asks sweetly.

"Are you nuts? She'll kill her," Embry says.

Quil jumps up from the skateboard, his previous reluctance quickly forgotten. "Hell yeah, let's go! I want to watch that. I've got five on Leah. Any takers?"

"That's not much of a stake. You know she'll win."

"I have no idea what you're all talking about," Leah hums lightly before Quil can retort. She idly turns a page of her book, suddenly looking far more involved in what she's reading than she had been ten minutes prior. "I'm perfectly composed. A picture of serenity. I'm up five bucks; I have my book, my hammock—"

"My hammock," Jacob says.

"Our hammock," she corrects boldly. "And despite what you dorks might think, I have no time for a catfight because I'm—"

"I'm graduating," they all intone at the same time she does, and she deigns to lift her head and shoot them a withering glare whilst the three of them grin knowingly, barely containing their laughter. "We know."

"You're real funny," she tells them flatly, unsmiling.

Outside, the truck finally comes to a stop. The silence is almost deafening as its engine is turned off, and the sudden wide-eyed looks Jacob and his brothers gives each other are almost comical.

Leah waves a hand, unruffled. "Someone go see what she wants." A beat. "Embry. You go."

"You're the boss." Embry flicks her a salute, puffing his chest and standing to his full height despite the hint of trepidation still lingering on his face. "Come on, Quil, let's go and take one for the team."

"Attaboy," she says with a spark of mirth in her voice, and Jacob rolls his eyes. They both know she could tell Embry to take a running jump off the cliffs and he'd do it. "If you don't come back in ten minutes, I'll consider getting up to save you."

"Man, this I gotta see. And to think we almost went cliff diving," Quil says, but he's grinning and practically bouncing on his toes. He knocks into Embry, and they playfully begin pushing and shoving each other as they walk out of the garage and into the light rain.

Jacob wipes his greasy palms on his already ruined cargo pants and starts to follow his brothers, but not without making a detour first.

"Make it five minutes," he says, leaning over the hammock. Leah lowers her book and blinks owlishly as he gazes down at her, and he doesn't withhold the smile that he feels creeping into his features. "If I'm not back by then, you come out, and I might even look in the opposite direction when the catfight starts."

Leah purses her lips as if she's really considering it, and his heart melts. Then she nods. "Okay. You're on." She turns her cheek, which he dutifully drops a kiss upon, and she says, "You better go and stop the children before they scar her for life, or something."

He laughs and kisses her again, quickly ducking out of the garage — before he can open his big mouth and tell her he loves her. The overwhelming urge to say the three words has never felt so daunting and exhilarating all at once, and he's had to check himself a hundred times during this week alone just so the words don't spill right out of him.

It's not that he doesn't want to say it. Because, damn it, he does, he wants to. So bad. But what he doesn't want is for Leah to think that he's said it because he feels like he has to, or because he thinks it's just another inevitable thing of the imprint — like it's a done deal. He wants her to feel like . . . like he really means it, he supposes — which he does — but even he's not stupid enough to think that the perfect time to say it for the first time is when Bella is right outside and waiting.

If there ever was a time to not make Leah feel like he's proving a point, it's now.

He shakes himself, hurrying to catch up with Embry and Quil.

"Jake!" Bella calls, finally catching sight of him.

He thinks that she sounds relieved, and he wonders whether she realises this is the first time she's been on the Rez since she took off to Italy. Wonders if she has been stewing all damn week, doing nothing but going over and over in her head all she'd seen and heard on Monday afternoon, feeling unable to talk to anyone about it. Namely her controlling bloodsucking boyfriend, lest she upset him and he shut down any talk about the Pack.

"Hey, Bella. What are you doing here?"

She continues to beam at him, triumphant from underneath the hood of her jacket that's shielding her from the drizzling rain. She's practically gleeful. "I snuck out!"

"That's hard to believe," Quil snorts. "We'd be able to hear your truck from the next state over. When was the last time you got the muffler checked?"

"I'm taking a look," Embry announces, circling the truck and shaking his head in dismay at the condition of it. After Jacob, he's one of the best mechanics the reservation has. "I bet your oil is like sludge."

Bella opens her mouth to protest, but she hesitates at Jacob's minute shake of his head and wisely doesn't say a thing when Embry plucks the truck's keys from her hand.

"Oh man, it stinks like leech in here," he grouses after he hops into the cab. He rubs nose, whilst Bella has to press her lips together to stop herself from getting defensive. "Q, take a look at the dipstick, would you?"

"Only because I feel sorry for you. How many dollars have you lost today? Fifteen, was it?" Quil teases, guffawing loudly when Embry swears colourfully at him in reply.

Once upon a time Jacob might have asked the guys to tone it down a little, but now he laughs along with them as Bella's eyes widen in shock at the vulgar language, her cheeks flushing a brilliant bright red.

He shrugs helplessly at her, unapologetic. She'll get over it — it's not their fault the extent of her curses only stretch to 'Holy crow!'. And her truck is basically getting a free service, after all. It's more than he would have given her.

"What brings you down?" he asks. "I thought you were locked up."

Bella's smile turns nervous. "I had work this morning but they didn't need me, so I thought . . ."

She trails off, her eyes catching on something just behind him, back in the direction of the garage, and she starts to shrink back into her jacket, looking for all the world as if she wants to get back in her truck and drive to safety.

Jacob doesn't need to look behind him to know why. He feels Leah's warm presence before she appears at his side, and he can just imagine her having rolled out of the hammock with the biggest sigh known to man, muttering under her breath and straightening her shoulders before heading out to meet them.

She scrapes her already-damp hair over her head, surreptitiously leaning into his side. Not enough to seem overly possessive, as she has the right to be, but enough that it draws attention. "Hello, Bella," she says politely. "I see the boys have commandeered your truck already."

"I — yes," the other girl stutters in reply. "I don't mind, not really. It could probably do with a time-up."

"Tune-up," Jacob corrects with a snort, rolling his eyes. "Did I not teach you anything?"

Bella flushes for the second time in as many minutes from root to tip, the colour only deepening when she sees that both he and Leah are smirking at her. Jacob only realises it himself when he puts his arm around Leah and looks down to share the joke, noting his expression reflected in hers. Their amusement is combined, almost as tangible as the imprint between them; he feels it from her, and she feels it from him.

In the corner of his eye, Bella frowns at their closeness. And then—

"Are you two dating?" she blurts, and she instantly looks regretful, like she's inwardly cursing herself and sincerely wishes she'd never said anything.

"Oh, boy," Jacob hears Embry mutter, both he and Quil quickly hunching over the Chevy's engine, pretending that they're not looking their way. Which they totally are.

Leah sighs and steps out of his hold. "I think you two need to talk," she says, patting his arm.

"You don't have to—" he starts.

"It's fine," she reassures him, and he is surprised to realise that she genuinely means it — there's not a single trace of doubt or hesitation in her eyes. She smiles softly, then jerks her chin at Embry and Quil. "Those two haven't eaten in about . . . oh, half an hour, maybe. They could probably do with a late breakfast."

Quil lifts his head from the depths of the truck's engine, almost banging his head on the hood and grinning excitedly as if his Christmases have come all at once. "Breakfast? Again? Really?"

Leah rolls her eyes. "See? Go on. We'll catch you a bit later."

"Soon," he promises.

Aside from Bella quietly reminding him a few times that her legs aren't ten feet long, they amble away from his house in awkward silence. It stretches between them, awkward and drawn-out in a way that it has never been before, and they have almost reached the Littlesea's store by the time she clears her throat.

"So, uh — how are you doing, Jake?"

"Great," he replies, and the honest truth of it within his voice stuns her into new silence. He realises that she expected him to respond with some half-assed comment, probably because that's what she's used to. "You?"

"Yeah. Me too," she says, although she doesn't sound nearly half as convincing, and he bets that she's just dying to ask him The Question again.

Are you dating Leah? How? Why? Is she your girlfriend? Why didn't you tell me?

"I feel bad," she adds. "I didn't realise you'd be busy."

"We don't really get to spend time together all at the same time anymore," he explains. "I'm either on patrol, and Embry and Quil are off, or one of them is on patrol and . . Well, you get the picture."

He pushes his way through the thick scrub behind the store that rings the far edge of First Beach, trying to pull as much of it back as possible so that she can slip through behind him, and she hurries through gratefully.

"If you factor in school and Sam ramping up the patrol schedule between all of that," he continues, "we're not left with much of a social life, let alone time to sleep."

Bella frowns, upset by this. His lack of general self-care has always been a sore spot with her, and he steels himself for another lecture — which, unsurprisingly, comes right on cue, predictable as she is.

"You need to sleep, Jake. You could get hurt. I'll never forgive myself if the Pack—"

He waves her off. "Yeah, yeah. You really need to have some more faith in us, y'know? It's kind of insulting."

"You don't have to do everything yourself, is what I mean. Edward and his family—" she starts, pointedly ignoring his scoff of derision that follows, "—they want to help. They are helping."

"Is that what they said they did last weekend?" he asks hotly. "Because—"

"I didn't know. Edward didn't tell me anything, not 'til afterwards."

Figures.

Before they find themselves repeating Monday afternoon, Jacob swings the conversation around. He has a feeling she will be far more vocal about her feelings without her bloodsucker around, interrupting and restraining and controlling her.

"So, you and him, then — you're the real deal again, huh? You've forgiven him for everything?"

"There was nothing to forgive," she says automatically.

"For you, maybe."

Bella falters a few steps behind him as they trail the beach, heading towards the familiar driftwood tree that is bleached white in its entirety and buried deep within the sand.

"It's true. Edward left to protect me," she protests. "You don't understand."

"So enlighten me. I never did get the story — I've barely seen you since you took off, not on your own. What happened? Or is it a secret?" His voice takes on a taunting, acidic edge — one that he has rarely used since finding Leah — but he is past caring. He wants Bella to know that he is still angry at her, that he would be whether he had imprinted or not. The way she had left, jumping at the chance to see her bloodsucker again despite all that she had suffered . . .

"No," she snaps irritably. "It's just a really long story."

"I've got all morning," he tells her. He sits down on the natural bench of the tree, stretching his legs out, and he pats the open space beside him invitingly.

Bella hesitates, but after a few seconds she sits beside him and launches into the tale without much prompting.

She tells him that the little psychic leech — the one he'd met the day Harry died — can't see the Pack, and that's why she hadn't seen Bella resurface after the Cliff Jumping Incident; she thought that Bella had committed suicide, and there had been a wealth of information that had been lost in translation between her vampires in the events that followed.

"The fortune-telling bloodsucker can't see us?" he asks excitedly. He can't wait to share this tidbit with the guys, and he imagines all the possibilities and advantages they suddenly have over the Cullens until he notices that Bella is glaring at him, silently rebuking him for interrupting her. He does his best to look abashed by it. "Sorry. Continue."

He learns about the coven of Italian leeches, and how she had escaped with Cullen and the fortune-teller — how Edward had talked them out of trouble, or something, and that, really, it was just one huge misunderstanding that was never, ever going to be repeated again.

And that's that.

Not that Jacob believes her.

"So now you know the whole story," she says. "And now it's your turn to talk. What happened while I was in Florida?"

Jacob has a feeling that she has withheld a great amount of details during her less-than spine-chilling story — really, it sort of just sounds like she went on an impromptu holiday to Europe and met vampire royalty whilst she was at it, inadvertently bringing Edward back with her on her return — but he does no such thing.

Bella flinches and cowers when he tells her the truth of what happened with Paul and how the treaty had been breached. How the blonde male (Jasper, she corrects him; he grits his teeth) had manipulated all of them into unnerving calm to the point that they'd been half-mad with the invisible restraints placed upon them.

"So did the bloodsucker tell you we attacked for no reason, and his totally innocent coven—"

"No," Bella interrupts. "Edward told me the same story, just without quite as many details."

"Huh," Jacob mutters under his breath, reaching down to pick up a rock from among the millions of rainbow-coloured pebbles at their feet before he sends it flying a good few hundred meters out across the water. "Well, she'll be back, I guess. We'll get another shot at her."

Bella's swallow is audible, and she pulls her hands into the sleeves of her jacket. "Can we talk about something else?" she whispers with a pale look on her face from underneath her hood. Far paler than usual, anyway. "I don't like thinking about — about her. Or about you hunting her, or . . . I just don't like it."

"Sure, fine. What do you want to talk about?"

The open-ended question hangs in the air, and he knows the second it flies from his mouth that he has set himself up for her to finally ask what she has been dying to all along — the stories about the Volturi, what happened whilst she was in Florida are inconsequential, nothing more than a build-up to this pivotal moment that is going to change the course of their friendship forever. But he doesn't take it back, and he doesn't regret it.

"Well, I told you a long story," she points out, voice still meek and hesitant. She hides her face behind her long curtain of hair. "Maybe now you can tell me what's going on between you and Leah."

And here they are.

"Your bloodsucker hasn't told you?" he asks. It's cruel, really, reminiscent of the person he used to be — the one that precedes Leah. Because he knows that Cullen hasn't told Bella a damn thing, for some reason going to great lengths to keep it a secret from her. Not even he can figure out why.

Bella frowns. "What do you mean by that?"

"I mean," Jacob replies, inhaling slowly, "that you didn't need to come all the way down here to find out something he could have told you two months ago."

"Two months . . . ? But why . . . ?"

"Beats me," he replies. He gets to his feet, stretching, and when he looks back at Bella she suddenly seems very small on the bench. It's enough to make him feel momentarily guilty; he is not this person, not anymore. This girl was his best friend, once, and he doesn't want to push her away. He still wants to save her from a life of never being able to enjoy the sun. She loves the sun.

"Look," he says, deflating as the rain finally eases up. "I wasn't trying to keep this a secret from you, or anything. I just haven't really seen you to tell you, that's all, and with everything else going on . . ." He shrugs lamely, not that she is looking at him to see — her eyes are firmly on the ground, staring at her feet. "It didn't exactly come up."

"You could have answered my calls," she mutters sullenly. "You could have . . ."

"Yeah," he agrees, because there's a lot of could haves about this situation he once thought he'd do anything to prevent. "I could have. Not really something you want to find out over the phone though, is it?"

When she doesn't reply, he begins collecting pebbles again, unable to get through this conversation standing still — not when she's looking all . . . well, looking like the tiny thing she'd been back in January, with that thinking-too-hard look on her face and like she's about ten seconds away from breaking down in tears.

Jacob skims a few more stones across the ocean, and he watches them fly until they disappear on the horizon before turning back. Bella ducks her gaze again quickly, embarrassed to be caught staring at him.

He sighs. "Did I ever tell you about imprinting?"

That catches her attention. She looks up, frowning questioningly as she pulls her hood down. "Imprinting? Like . . . baby ducks?"

Jacob laughs and sits down by her feet, leaning his head back on the bench and smiling at the sky. He's more humoured by the thought of calling Leah a baby duck than anything else — or her calling him a baby duck — and he immediately resolves to never tell her. He'd never live down.

"No, Bella."

She's not laughing. "What does it mean then?"

"It's one of those bizarre things we have to deal with. It doesn't happen to everyone. In fact, it's the rare exception, not the rule."

"But what is it?" she prods insistently.

"Imprinting . . . It's hard to explain. It's like . . . It's the way we find our mates. Our soul mates. When we see her for the first time, really see her, gravity just kind of . . . moves." He thinks back to Harry's wake, and afterwards — the day he'd told Leah: her reaction, the tears and all that had followed . . . He had felt it back then, too, this unrelenting need in his chest to be with her, wherever she was. Wherever she is. "Suddenly it's not the earth holding you anymore — it's all her."

Bella snickers. "What, like love at first sight?"

"It's a little bit more powerful than that," he says soberly, unsurprised that Bella is unable to understand. "More absolute."

"Sorry," she mutters when their eyes meet and she sees the critical, disapproving look in his. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"Yeah. I am."

"Love at first sight?" she questions, dubious. "But more powerful?"

He nods. "More powerful than anything even you have seen before."

"And . . . Did it happen to you? This love-at first-sight-thing?" she asks quietly, although it's painfully clear she already knows the answer.

"Yes."

He waits. One minute. Two. Three. Then, hesitantly, he clears his throat and looks up at her. "Bells?"

The sound of her taking deep, gasping breath breaks the silence, and she hurriedly scrubs at her face with the sleeve of her jacket as if trying to hide the evidence of her silent crying.

"Aw, Bells." He reaches out for her, but he lets his hand fall when she flinches. "C'mon, don't cry."

"I'm not," she lies, turning her head away. "Really. I'm . . . I'm glad. It's good, right? I'm happy for you."

Jacob allows the silence to encompass them for a while, listening to her draw ragged breaths and attempt to calm her broken sobs. He doesn't try to touch her again. Comforting Bella used to be something that came so naturally, something he would do without a second thought; he knew what it took to be able to calm her down, to bring her out of those dark depths, and now . . . That's not something that he can do anymore. Not something that is his responsibility to do — if it ever was to begin with.

He knows now that it wasn't.

"When?" she asks when her sobs have eventually faded into sniffles. She keeps her wet, reddened eyes trained on the grey horizon, looking anywhere except his face, but the anguish within her voice is still very much a present thing. "When did it happen?"

This is the last thing. The last break.

"The day you went to Italy," he tells her.

A fresh round of tears starts dripping into her lap then, thick and fast and without reprieve, without end. She doesn't speak again after that.

A/N: As so many of you guessed, we have finally reached the moment that (THIRTY ODD CHAPTERS LATER) *finally* folds in with the prologue (which I'm sure is actually a preface?! I really need to change that). I can't believe it. We did it! This fic was never meant to be anything long, maybe ten or fifteen chapters at most (yeah, I'm really laughing at myself now), and I have said time and time again how fabulous you all are but please let me tell you again. Because you are the best lot of people, ever, and the only reason I've made it this far. I would have given up long before now. Thank you, thank you and thank you for still reading and reviewing. Reviews are like fuel.

As a present to myself, I have decided to ignore Quil imprinting on Claire (potentially just for the moment, potentially forever). Or, in other words, I am anal-retentive and cannot extend my outline by another chapter or two (again) to properly acknowledge/write the amount of drama it will require. Our boy deserves more. Let's just say that he's spending most of his spare time with Jacob, Leah, etc, so he doesn't see her when she visits Emily.

A Delayed Disclaimer: In preparation of this update, I have read Chapter 4 and 5 of 'Eclipse' too many times to count. Anything you recognised from this chapter, especially in the form of (gasp) line lifts, does not belong to me. I may or may not have also 'borrowed' a line from the movies - did you notice? Sue me. (No, don't, really.)