Author's Note:
Happy Wednesday (also it's St. Patty's Day here if you're keeping up live with it so happy that also! Hope you're celebrating and rocking the green!). I hope you're enjoying Realization but if you haven't made your mind up about it yet here is one seriously extra long chapter to hopefully convince you! I have absolutely loved coming back to it and coming back here to the Fanfic fam. Thank you for being here and for sharing in this adventure with me! Happy reading!
xoxo
Jess
CHAPTER 3
Claire:
"Fine." Claire muttered to herself as the door echoed with the slam left behind Quil.
He was already gone but she was too embarrassed to turn back around and face her family who'd just witnessed that entire humiliating interaction.
Her eyes, that were already filled with tears, overflowed as the shock wore off and the frustration faded into something much closer to devastation. She definitely hadn't lied when she'd said she didn't know who he was anymore. Seeing Quil violently throw a punch that Bennett's face had to catch had been more than a little traumatizing.
There was a powerful sob building in her chest and her throat felt tight as she tried to swallow it down. Her lungs felt compressed like she couldn't breathe without Quil's warm presence in the room with her and yet she doubted if she'd ever view him as a warm presence after that again.
The worst part was that even though a part of her was so beyond pissed at him that she was dreading seeing him again in an hour, another huge part of her was relieved that it'd only be an hour before she was with him again. That was the part of herself that she was beginning to hate.
Jamie sniffed loudly behind her and she realized that she was still staring blankly at the door Quil had marched through while everyone was still waiting to see how she'd respond. Her shoulders tightened with tension before she took a deep breath and turned to face the room as a whole.
Rachel and Travis were halfway down the stairs and both staring at her like they were waiting for an explanation. Bennett was standing a few feet away, on the other side of the coffee table, with a jaw so swollen that it looked like he'd just gained fifty pounds and been stung by a bee he was allergic to all at the same time, it was already a greenish-blue shade. Jamie was now standing on his feet directly in front of Bennett having obviously just dropped to stand by himself. And Butch climbed out from under the coffee table to stand next to Claire who was too dazed to even put a hand on top of his eager head.
"Quil, broke up with you?" Jamie asked clearly already devastated.
Somehow, he sounded so broken by the idea that it immediately made Claire wonder if her inner voice was secretly Jamie because it had sounded just like that since the moment, she'd left Quil's shop alone, in her pajama's with just Butch for company.
She had to clear her throat as it tightened in response to Jamie's question and tears spilled uncontrolled from her eyes as she turned her body slightly so it wouldn't be so obvious as she used a hand to wipe at them and sniff at the same time, wishing desperately that she was strong enough to make herself not cry, especially in front of Jamie and the rest of her family. She started nodding her head as she continued wiping at her face just as Butch whined quietly and pushed against her more forcefully.
"Ye-yes." Claire squawked still unable to make eye contact with anyone while she tried desperately to pull herself back together.
"Why? What'd you do wrong?" Jamie asked accusingly.
Claire's entire body started to shiver in response as she turned to look at him while wrapping her arms protectively across her chest and squeezing her upper arms tightly while it felt like poison from his words spread through her entire body. What had she done wrong?
"Jamie." Rachel chastised softly, obviously too weak to put any force or power behind her words.
"No." Jamie immediately argued angrily. "Quil loves us, especially Claire. He wouldn't have broken up unless she did something to him. What did you do, Claire?"
"James-" Bennett tried to reason but his voice was muffled by his jaw and his hand still around it.
"NO! What did you DO, Claire?" Jamie demanded persistently.
"I-I don't know." Claire said weakly and her voice shook as she shivered all over in response.
"BULLSHIT! What did you do!?" Jamie suddenly yelled and something in Claire finally snapped out of her shock.
"Jamie!" Rachel said and was obviously horrified enough to put some energy behind it.
"Enough!" Claire said forcefully. "You don't talk like that! Especially not to me. It's not okay, Jamie! I didn't do anything wrong! This isn't my fault!"
Jamie looked like he was about to scream at her before he suddenly seemed to deflate as tears filled his eyes again and he broke his eye contact with her to look down towards the floor before he muttered,
"How can you two just not be together anymore?"
He was so hurt and confused that Claire was finally able to clear her throat though she couldn't stop herself from crying still.
She bent down until she was at Jamie's level before she spoke though her voice was definitely shaking as she did.
"We're still together, Jamie. It's okay."
Jamie immediately looked up at her with something that seemed like a mix of hope and disbelief.
"But he said-" Jamie started but Claire cut across him as she shook her head.
"I know, but he never should have said that in front of you."
"You're still together?" he asked quickly.
"Yes, Jamie. We'll always be together. There will never be a time when Quil and I aren't together. It's just not possible. We have to be." Claire assured him and she meant to sound easy and unconcerned about it, but tears were still pouring out of her and her voice was a little choked.
"But did you break up?"
Claire looked away again unable to make eye contact as she looked to the side and nodded her head. "Yes, we did."
"But you're still together?" Jamie clarified like the difference made complete sense to him. She knew it did, it was why she'd chosen to phrase it this way for him.
"Yes, we're still together. Just like Quil said, he's still a part of this family and he's still a part of my life."
Jamie looked at her skeptically for a moment before he spoke again.
"You promise?"
"Yes, Jamie. I promise. Quil isn't going anywhere."
Her heart broke as she said the words. She suddenly felt like she had just lied to Jamie for the first time in years. She couldn't make a promise like that. A week ago she would have sworn there was no way that Quil was even capable of breaking up with her and now….. now she had no idea what he was capable of doing. How long would it be before he didn't want to have anything more to do with Jamie the same way he didn't want to have anything more to do with her?
The tears (and now snot) were running down her face and she was doing her best to mop up the mess with her hands alone when Rachel stepped forward down the stairs, catching Claire's attention and asking weakly,
"How can I help, Claire?"
She was looking around at the mess that was the living room. From Jamie, still wiping tears off his own face, to Bennett with both hands on his swollen jaw, to the puddle of blood he'd spat onto the floor, to Claire, a slobbering mess with Butch lying loyally beside her.
Claire stood up as she sniffed and whipped her nose directly on her hand one more time before looking at Rachel and taking charge of the situation again.
"Can you please just take him upstairs with you and then go lie down." She nodded toward Jamie as she spoke without ever actually looking at him. "Trav can give you your medication from the bag while I clean up all this."
Rachel and Travis just nodded as Rachel grabbed the pharmacy bag off the catch-all by the garage door and Travis came and placed a guiding hand on Jamie's shoulder before directing him up the stairs and following behind him and Rachel until they made their up and then down the hall before the quiet click of Rachel's bedroom door echoed softly through the otherwise silent house.
The sound was somehow the signal Claire needed and she immediately turned to face the kitchen since she didn't particularly want to be left alone with Bennett right this moment… she couldn't blame him completely for everything that had just happened, but she could certainly resent him for his fair share in it.
She only made it as far as the island before she collapsed against it, barely holding herself up as sobs racked through her. She was a blubbering mess, but she heard Bennett take a step toward her.
She couldn't speak, and she couldn't even see with her eyes screwed up so tightly as she sobbed and ugly-cried against the counter with her back toward him.
When she felt his hot hand land softly on her back, she flinched away from him and his touch, immediately silencing herself as she sucked in a large (and slightly slobbery breath) and stopped crying without ever looking at him as she moved farther into the kitchen. She moved purposefully toward the drawer by the fridge before yanking it open like nothing was wrong at all even as she gasped and shuddered because she still couldn't catch her breath after crying so hard. Some of Jamie's words were still echoing through her and she was doing her best to convince herself it wasn't her fault, that she hadn't done anything wrong at all, that Quil just didn't want her anymore, even as she pulled out two Ziplock bags and wondered if she'd said or done anything differently that night she'd gone to spend at Quil's place, if things now would be different…. If they'd still be together.
"Claire." Bennett muffled and it was so distorted that she couldn't tell if it was a question or a plea.
She didn't acknowledge him as she opened the first bag while another gasping shudder racked through her she couldn't control though she ignored it, pretending like everything was completely fine as she held the bag open in front of the fridge and pushed against the ice dispenser.
Fortunately, the ice was so loud crashing out of the fridge that neither of them were expected to speak as she filled and sealed the first bag before opening the second bag and repeating the process.
She finally turned to face Bennett by the counter but looked directly at the bags of ice in her hands as she walked back toward him and nodded toward the counter.
"Sit-t do-down." She muttered as she nodded her head toward the counter at the same time another shuddering dry sob ran through her.
Bennett seemed to sense her distress and that anything he said would just make the situation worse as he complied silently and obediently. Claire took a bracing breath before she forced herself to look up at his face for the first time.
It was definitely a swollen and bruised messed and she groaned in response as she immediately shoved the ice up against either side of his face and he flinched in pain at her less than gentle approach.
"Do you think it's broken?" Claire whispered for some reason though she wasn't sure why.
He was staring intently at her with his dark grey eyes and Claire wished he'd stop as he shook his head in response.
"Can you move it?" Claire probed.
He nodded as he continued to make his too focused eye contact with her.
"Did it dislocate?"
Another head shake. Claire breathed out a sigh of relief in response.
"Did it break?
Another nod.
Claire bit her lip in stress at that answer.
"Is it already healing?"
He was already nodding before she could finish asking, though it didn't make her feel much better.
"Do you wanna call Carlisle? I'm worried it's not going to heal right. What if it needs to be set or something?" she asked worried and concerned and had to sniff again as her nose continued to run from all the crying she'd been doing.
"It's fine, Claire." He muttered reassuringly though in a muffle since he seemed to be moving his jaw as little as possible and neither of them responded for a couple of uncomfortable moments as she stood still holding the ice to his face that was melting incredibly quickly against the heat from his skin.
Claire continued to bite her lip as she stared down at the ice and the bruised flesh under it while she pretended to examine it. Really, she was just using the moment to relive the entire last twenty minutes in her mind, from the words said, to the punch thrown, and then her kicking Quil out as they screamed at each other with all the maturity of a couple ten-year-old's.
"I'm sorry, Claire." Bennett muffled between her two hands and she was suddenly blinking rapidly as she stared up at the ceiling.
"Why did you have to say it, Bennett?" she demanded, frustrated and with a clogged, teary voice as she addressed the ceiling.
"-He deserved it." was his obviously condensed and mumbled response since he seemed to be moving his jaw so minimally.
Her eyes snapped back down as the tears poured out again. "Well what did I do to deserve that!?"
Bennett sighed out a frustrated breath as he lifted a hand from his stool and set it on Claire's hip, using his thumb to rub a soft, comforting path against her side as he simply shook his head slowly but emphatically back and forth and in an obviously regretful reply.
Claire sniffed and forced the tears down again, as she muttered reasonably, "Well regardless, he never should have hit you. That was just stupid…. But I don't know why you had to bait him like that."
Bennett just huffed out one sort of laugh in response as the ice in her hands now turned completely to water and Claire pulled the bags away to inspect the bruising. His face didn't look nearly so swollen anymore but the bruising on it now looked three days old and was blue and purple all over.
"Are you sure you don't want to call Dr. Cullen?" Claire asked nervously and Bennett just rolled his eyes dramatically in response without saying anything.
Claire bit her lip again as she dropped the bags in her hands on the counter and then gently placed her hands on either side of his jaw.
"Open it." She commanded.
Bennett immediately opened his eyes wide and chastised her with his stare as he did a very slight head shake in her hands.
"Prove you can open and close it like normal or we call Renesmee and Facetime Dr. Cullen right now."
Bennett stared at her for one second like he was trying to decide which was worse before he obediently yet incredibly slowly began to open his jaw. He immediately flinched in what must have been incredible pain, but he never stopped his steady progress and Claire focused intently on the feel of it in her hands. When he'd opened it enough that she could have stuffed a sock in it if she wanted to, she nodded, and he began to just as slowly close it again.
"It doesn't feel off kilter or anything, but I'm not a doctor. I'm really not sure what I'm supposed to be looking for here." She muttered nervously to him.
"'S fine." He muttered without moving his mouth at all and she noticed for the first time the way all the lines in his face seemed to be scrunched together now.
"Do you want something for the pain?" she asked gently with her hands still on his face. She was too nervous to pull them away, like holding him together would help him heal faster.
"No." he muttered this time not moving at all, either side to side or to open his mouth.
Claire shrugged regretfully before she agreed, "I have no idea how much to give you to be effective and I don't think it'd be safe to give you enough to make a difference anyways.
He didn't respond at all. He seemed to be in too much pain too.
"I think just ice and bed." She muttered nervously as her prescribed treatment. She knew he was healing so quickly that nothing else would help anyways.
He nodded ever so slightly in response and, Claire finally dropped his face as she moved to the freezer and this time opened it and pulled out two cans of frozen concentrated juice before handing it directly to him.
"Come on. I'll take you home. We'll have to take your car though, you're blocking me in."
Bennett nodded his head in agreement. Obviously not in any shape to disagree with her plan as he took the frozen cans from her before putting one directly to his cheek and the other on the counter as he dug his keys out of his pocket and tossed them to her before immediately shoving the juice from the counter against his face.
Claire took Bennett home with him barely holding back moans the entire drive. No one was there when she got to his house so at least she didn't have to explain to his mother how his jaw had broken. She simply dragged him through the door and up the stairs before leading the way into his room and depositing him on the bed. She felt bad for him, she really did but honestly her emotions were so on edge that she just couldn't handle seeing any more pain after feeling so much of her own swirling around constantly inside of her.
Bennett simply flopped on his back onto his bed with a moan and closed his eyes, keeping the frozen juice to his face the entire time. Claire stopped at his door to look back at him, but his eyes were closed, and he actually looked pretty peaceful, so she just left. She had to take his car home with her since she wasn't up for running the five miles back to her house but at this point Bennett seemed to be the most constant presence in her life so she knew she'd just give it back to him the next time that she saw him.
She drove home in complete silence, letting the morning play on repeat in her mind like a bad soap opera. Honestly, she didn't know what Quil and Bennett were thinking, trying to fight it out like that, especially in front of Jamie. It was all so beyond ridiculous, and the worst part was she knew that all of this pain they were all in, all of the stupid drama and confusion, would just end if Quil would just admit that he loved her, quit trying to play the hero, and let them get back together.
Her hands started to shake when she remembered that she had to now go and meet him in less than twenty minutes. She sighed at the thought just as she pulled into the driveway.
The house was a mess when she walked through the door. The kitchen hadn't been cleaned since Bennett had made breakfast and the living room was a mess from Quil and Bennett's confrontation and the dining room, in between the two rooms seemed to have every Lego Jamie had ever owned piled onto the dining room table or else spilling over onto the floor. Claire wanted to cry at just the sight and panicked for a second when she wondered what her mom would say when she got home and how much time she had to clean it up before she did. But then she realized it had been at least a week since her mom had been home at all. At least as far as Claire could tell she hadn't been home. She hadn't seen her or her car, but Claire also hadn't gone into her room to check for signs of her either.
She stopped by the door to drop her purse and pulled out her phone and shot her mom a text, finally breaking the silence between them to simply ask her when she would be home again. Butch whined softly at her from beside her and it was the first time she realized he had been waiting for her attention since she walked in the door.
She patted his head absentmindedly and then she turned to face the living room. It wasn't that hard to clean seeing as it was mostly putting away remotes and video game controllers, she folded up the throw that had ended up on the floor and then rearranged the throw pillows before really getting down to business and finding the spray bottle of disinfectant and a roll of paper towels and kneeling down on the floor to clean up the giant mess of blood and spit Bennett had left there.
She bypassed the entire Lego situation and simply started piling the dirty dishes in the sink, knowing she didn't have time to actually deal with them and simply used the bottle in her hands to spray and wipe down the counters.
It wasn't perfect and her mom would still probably freak out when she got home but it was a marked improvement and at this point in her life that was all Claire was ever looking for. She checked the clock and realized she was late for meeting Quil when Butch whined at her again.
She sighed and made her way upstairs to Rachel's room with Butch following silently behind her. The door was opened a few inches and she peaked her head in to find Rachel and Travis completely asleep on the bed with Travis spooning her and no Jamie in sight. Claire softly closed the door before making her way down the hall and looking in the open door of Jamie's room where he was intensely focused on the Lego project (apparently, he had left some Legos upstairs after all) he was building on the child size table against the far wall of his room.
Butch immediately went to stand beside Jamie who muttered "Don't touch anything" to the dog without ever actually looking up.
"Hey, James." Claire sighed.
"I'm sorry I yelled at you." He said without looking at her. She wasn't even completely sure she heard it since he hadn't missed a beat and was still so focused on the Legos he was working on.
"Oh," Claire said surprised, "that's okay." She paused to take a breath as his apology sank in, "I know it's been a rough week for all of us."
Jamie simply nodded in response while never pausing his intentional movements with his hands.
"So, I need to go to the park to meet Quil now. Want to come with me?"
"Not really." He muttered while still not looking at her and she sighed in discouragement. This parenting thing was turning out to not be nearly as much fun as it was cracked up to be.
"Please, Jamie. I'm late to meet him already and I don't want to leave you here without supervision."
"I'm fine by myself." he muttered as he focused intently on trying to snap a rounded dome roof piece onto whatever walls he'd just built.
"Jamie." Claire intreated, and waited patiently until he finally stopped and looked up at her for the first time. "Please. I'd like you to come with me."
For a moment he looked like he was about to argue but then he simply sighed and said, "Fine." as he looked away from her again and bent under the table to dig out a pair of flip flops and shove them on his feet.
He was wearing gym shorts and a long sleeve pajama shirt from last night that had a Lego batman on it and smelled distinctly like syrup, his hair was a mess and at a minimum Claire felt that he should wear closed toed shoes to the park but kept her mouth shut as he shuffled his way out of the room with Butch following behind him. Her eyes filled with tears as she hit the light switch and tried to clear her throat before following the pair down the stairs. The one thing Claire was still certain about, that she felt adamantly about deep in her core, was that just because Quil had dumped her or her dad had died did not mean that Jamie's level of care should be affected or decline in anyway. Seeing how much of a mess he was, as he made his way out of the house and towards Bennett's car, she knew that she was failing him.
She had to keep her face pointed away from the backseat as she climbed into the driver's side after watching Jamie and Butch climb into the back of Bennett's crossover. She sniffed a little as she wiped the tears off her face, refusing to let herself think about what her eye's must look like after all of the crying she had been doing.
"Ready?" she asked brightly, barely managing to hide her feelings of devastation.
"Yup." Jamie replied stoically and she adjusted the rearview mirror until she could see him in the back. He was staring out the window and it was clear that whatever was going on with him (and there were so many possibilities of things he could be upset about that Claire didn't even want to speculate on it) that he would rather be home basically alone working on Legos than in a car with her.
She blew out a shaky and exasperated breath before sticking the keys in the ignition and starting the engine.
It took about ten minutes to drive the very short distance to the park since Claire was driving so slowly they could have walked there faster. It was a combination of potential dread and sheer mental and physical exhaustion.
As soon as they pulled up Jamie seemed to finally gain some enthusiasm as he looked at the park in the unexpectedly sunny weather.
"Can me and Butch go play on the slide?" he chirped.
"Sure." Claire sighed as she parked the car. She had just spotted Quil sitting on the bench across the way.
He still wasn't wearing a shirt and he was so dirty she was positive he'd phased and gone on a run, he had his hands over the back of his head as he leaned forward against his legs, it was probably the most stressed out posture she had ever seen him adopt, and the thought didn't bode well for her.
Jamie was already out of the car with Butch hot on his heals before Claire had even turned off the car.
"Stay where I can see you!" she yelled a second too late as he slammed the door and was already running across the grass. "Great." She muttered under her breath to herself. She took another bracing breath as she kept her eyes trained on Quil with his head still braced under his hands. She wished her heart didn't beat faster in response to seeing him, she wished she could blame it all on nerves but the truth was her heart knew it's home and even just seeing him across the park was enough for it to beat in acknowledgement of it.
She quickly got out of the car and locked it with the key. Her feet dragged as she moved and she suddenly flashed back to that night last winter when Bennett had first phased, Quil had left her in the garage and she had to force herself up the stairs and into his apartment where she'd just seen him getting a little too comfortable with Leah.
The thought strangely made her feel numb. She couldn't call back any of those feelings from that moment anymore. Things in her life were just too different… she couldn't even remember what it'd felt like to see Quil getting on with it with Leah…. The anger and horror were all gone, it all seemed so irrelevant now.
Quil never looked up the entire time she walked across the grass, even when Jamie squealed running down the slide, or Butch barked in response. She wondered what was stressing him out so much, whatever it was, it obviously had to do with her. She wished she had worn jeans instead of a dress so that she could stick her hands awkwardly in her pockets. The thought made her remember for the first time the dress she was wearing, and her head snapped down to confirm it was in fact the dress she had worn on her and Quil's 'first date'. The dress that hadn't made it through the entire night and had instead ended up on the kitchen counter. She'd had to wear his boxer-briefs home because he'd ripped her panties off of her. Claire's face heated drastically at the thought and when she looked back up, she was only five feet in front of him still staring at his feet and shaking like he was trying to breathe with his arms pressed over his head.
Claire cleared her throat because she knew if she gave herself any time before he noticed her, she'd panic, especially with thoughts of that night still bouncing through her head.
Quil dropped his arms as he snapped up into an upright position, he looked right at her and her probably tear-smeared face for a single second before looking down at the phone in his hand.
"I know. I'm late." Claire stated quickly before he could say anything.
"You brought Jamie?" he asked skeptically, and his tone immediately made her feel frustrated and defensive.
"Obviously." She huffed without really looking at him before going to sit down on the bench so that they didn't have to face each other, and she could keep an eye on Jamie. "So, what did you want to talk about? Did you leave a T-shirt at my house that you want back or something? Or is it custody of Butch? you're pissed that I never sent him back after that night."
Her face reddened again as soon as she'd said it, immediate feeling regret. His whole argument against being together was that she was too young and immature for an adult relationship and she hated giving him any power or ammunition against her with immature remarks like that, but honestly he made her feel so crazy she was slightly relieved that she wasn't equal parts clawing at his face in anger and begging him to take her back out of desperation.
Quil cleared his throat and looked off to the side away from her for a second before he shook his head and turned to face her. He was sitting in the middle of the bench so even though she'd sat at the very end there was less than a foot between the two of them. She wished he'd scoot farther away, it messed with her too much to have him that close. She felt too drawn to him, like she needed to scoot closer until she could feel his body heat warming her. It was taking most of her focus on just maintaining distance.
"When were you going to tell me about the baby, Claire?" he said evenly as he looked back at her face again, for some reason his intensely focus gaze like that made her blush in response before his question caught up to her.
She looked away to stare at the grass as her face scrunched in confusion about how he even knew about the baby before she remembered Rachel's ultrasound that morning and that he must have overheard about it.
"Oh." She muttered before she looked back at him and blushed again in response. He immediately sucked in a breath and put his head back in his hands and leaned forward again. Apparently, her response had been the wrong one based off his reaction and she noted it as she continued with her statement she'd already started. "I don't know. I didn't really have a plan for it. When it became relevant to you, I guess."
Quil's hands actually started shaking on his head in that way that made her nervous he was losing control before he huffed a sarcastic laugh and muttered, "When it became relevant to me!?"
Suddenly he sat up unexpectedly, making Claire jump before he turned to face her again, "What the hell, Claire! How can you even say that!?"
Claire was shocked by the intensity of his reaction and the way he was shaking. It was worse than Bennett that day she'd held him to keep him from phasing in the cafeteria, it was worse than that day on first beach when she'd kept Quil from shifting, worse than she'd ever seen him shake or shudder before and he was making the whole bench quake with him. She suddenly jumped up and backed away from him wearily, hearing every warning he'd ever given her about never playing with fire when it came to a wolf phasing run through her mind. She took three or four steps back away from him before holding her hands out defensively in front of her instinctually. "Quil." She muttered calmly, reasonably, "It's gonna be okay."
He wasn't shaking anymore, and he suddenly looked regretful when he seemed to realize she was afraid of his reaction.
"Claire." He muttered as he reached a hand out to her. She immediately set her hand in his without stopping to think it through. "It's okay, Claire."
He was suddenly the one comforting her without any acknowledgement that she had been trying to calm him literally two seconds previously. She realized that she was now the one shaking and looked down at her hand in his.
She suddenly hated the way it looked so small and childlike in comparison to his and pulled away again as she used her hand to cover her mouth and turn away again under the pretext of looking at Jamie on the playground but unable to actually comprehend anything in front of her.
"Claire." Quil said, obviously trying to get her to look at him but she just couldn't as she wrapped her free arm around herself and kept her shaking hand in front of her mouth, it somehow made her feel more secure.
When she didn't respond after a moment he spoke again.
"Look, I'm really sorry, I didn't mean to scare you. I would never do anything to hurt you. You know that." He said it so emphatically, but Claire immediately thought of his voice asking her if she thought that Sam would ever do anything to intentionally hurt Emily. No, but it had just happened.
"I think I should go now." Claire whispered in a shaky breath.
"NO!" Quil said emphatically as he suddenly jumped up to stand next to her. "Please, Claire. Please don't go. Just stay and let's talk."
Claire's eyes filled with tears in response to his begging and her whole body started to shiver with the conflict of what her body unequivocally wanted to do and what her brain was telling her she should do… until she suddenly felt his forehead against the bare skin of her neck with his face pressed against the strap of her dress and shoulder.
"Please, Claire?" he whispered as he placed his hand against the back of her dress, her eyes snapped shut but she maintained her fairly rigid postured against him, somehow feeling simultaneously more whole and broken in equal parts in reaction to his contact. It was the first time he had really voluntarily touched her since her dad had died. "I'm sorry, Nino." He whispered. "Stay... please, stay."
Claire shook her head with her eyes closed, more in confusion then in response to him when he suddenly upped the ante by doing something completely unprecedented, something he'd never done before.
He blew out a frustrated breath before using his free hand to softly caress her arm from her elbow to her shoulder before he lifted his head enough to press his lips directly to the shell of her ear and whisper to her, "Nayeli, Yá̱·x̓wa. Hitk olli taslili. Nayeli."
The words sounded so smooth, like velvet washing over her. Claire's entire spine tingled as his voice hit her.
He almost never spoke Quileute, and she didn't think she heard him say anything in it in the last five years since his grandfather had passed.
She'd never be fluent in Quileute, it was almost a lost language, not even all the wolves knew it, but she'd grown up around the tribe since a child and though her translation wasn't perfect, she knew most of the individual words, the 'I love you's most of all. There was the twin spirit's or something akin to soulmates, she wasn't sure exactly. And sick without you or maybe it was I can't be anything without you or maybe it just meant, I need you.
It was the best she could make of it, but the meanings weren't lost.
"Quil!" She whined in either protest or affection, she wasn't sure.
His hands were on her and she could feel something coming from him, it was such confusion that she didn't even understand it underlying the deep love he had for her. Why was he so confused when he loved her so deeply? It shouldn't be this hard or complicated. Tears were pouring out of her eyes and she finally turned her head into him, accepting him, showing she was willing to stay when she muttered roughly, "Quil-Quileute…"
He pressed his lips to her cheek, not quite kissing it as he held her close and pulled her in tighter to his dirty chest. He nodded against her and she suspected that his eyes were closed just like hers.
"You hit Bennett." She suddenly muttered like an argument.
She had no idea where they were going from here but knew that they needed to clear the air before they did.
"I know." He muttered against her, still sounding unconcerned about it. "He deserved it."
Claire smiled to herself at the repeated conversation before she repeated, "Did I deserve it?"
He shook his head against her silently in response while a stronger mix of confusion and love poured out of him.
"I'm sorry." He whispered only to her, and she knew he wasn't sorry for hitting him. He was only sorry for how it had hurt her.
Somehow that was enough for her. It shouldn't be. She knew that. And yet somehow, probably because she wanted it to be so badly, it was enough.
She nodded against him as she wiped the wet tears off her cheeks and cleared her throat, before speaking with her face still pressed against his leaning into him, she wondered vaguely if anyone was watching them standing in front of the bench but couldn't make herself open her eyes to look. She didn't want to pop their bubble anyways. It was something she'd missed too dearly, even if it'd only been a few days since he'd broken up with her and a few weeks since he'd stopped being so physically affectionate.
"So, where do we go from here?"
He took a deep breath and then softly dropped his hands, she suspected it was because he didn't want her to feel whatever he was feeling in response to the question. "Can we sit down again?" he asked with his face still leaning into her.
Claire bit her lip and nodded her head nervously in response before he reached down and took her hand in his and pulling her to sit on the bench. They sat down together and she watched him anxiously as he looked forward out toward the grass and the playground a little in the distance while he wrapped an arm around her on the back of the bench and used his free hand to squeeze his thigh and rub down toward his knee almost like he was nervous.
"That's up to you, Claire. I just want to support your decisions, we're in this together, we'll always be in this together."
He sighed it out in a little stress, but he obviously spoke sincerely as he used his hand to rub her shoulder and the other his leg.
Claire's eyes filled with tears again, this time tears of relief as she grabbed her face in her hands and laugh-cried in response. If it was up to her than it was all incredibly simple where to go and what to do from here. She wiped her eyes and turned to look at him watching her before she grabbed his face and kissed him. It was brief and more of a peck than anything, he didn't even seem to have enough time to respond to it, but it was still a relief to feel his lips against hers again.
"Really?" she asked in more happy-shock than disbelieve, "What changed your mind?"
Quil suddenly cleared his throat like he was uncomfortable and brought the hand from his leg up behind his neck, almost like he felt guilty or something.
"What?" Claire asked a little suspiciously but with a laugh that seemed to ruin the effect. She couldn't help it, she was so drunk with relieved happiness, she didn't think that anything would bring her down at this point.
She cleared her throat and forced herself to be calm enough to say, "What's the real reason, Quil? Even this morning you were set against us not being together. I mean you even tried to tell me not to go to Vegas, remember? I mean that was a little crazy…. So why the change of heart now?
Quil hadn't quite looked at her and was still staring toward the playground when he cleared his throat uncomfortably again and finally turned to look at her.
Claire was surprised by the look he was giving her. She'd been expecting that look of love that use to brighten his smile when he looked at her but instead, he looked almost…. entreatingly at her.
"I'm not going to lie to you, Claire. I know you want to hear about how much I love you and how nothing else could ever matter but I can't do that. I still think this is wrong, I think you're way too young and that I'm stealing so much from you that I can never give back. I'm stealing your entire future out from under you and if it weren't for the baby changing things, I don't think I could ever justify something like this."
He paused to take a breath and Claire's heart gave one hard thud and then seemed to drop down into her stomach.
"-Wait." She said cutting across him in confusion as she tried unsuccessfully to catch her breath and play catch up at the same time. "What are you talking about?" she asked critically. "You are my future. How could you be taking that away from me unless you take YOU away? And what does the baby have to do with-"
She cut off with a gasp as all his words since she'd approached him there in the park hit her in hyper speed with the force of a Mack truck. She was frozen for a solid second as her face burned and everything repeated through for her again but this time with a lens of clarity and understanding.
Her voice shook when she turned to look at him staring out at the playground again. "You … you think I'm pregnant?"
"I know you are." He replied brusquely. "I can't believe you wouldn't tell me something like this." He said in frustration before he ran a hand gruffly through his hair.
"With your baby?" she clarified since it seemed like every step of the way they'd had major miscommunications today.
He just turned to look at her with a scathing look on his face. "Whose baby would I assume it was?"
Claire turned to look away as her heart filled with a hate so powerful it almost knocked her off her feet. It felt poisonous, cancerous.
The hate wasn't for Quil beside her though but for herself because for just one single moment when Quil looked at her she considered the unthinkable. Don't tell him! I can fake a pregnancy. I even have an ultrasound from this morning in my bag! She thought in a desperate attempt to not lose him again, it was followed by thoughts of trying to actually get pregnant, followed immediately by the most self-contempt she'd ever felt. She'd known since that morning that there was a part of her that was desperate to be with him, to keep him even when he didn't want to keep her. But she'd had no idea until that moment how deep those feelings were or how far they could make her consider taking things just to keep him.
It hit her in the face like a wake-up call. She was NOT okay. She was not healthy. How could she consider lying about a pregnancy? To try to create one? It hit her in her stomach, right where her heart seemed to be beating anyways, with a nauseating twist. She suddenly wondered if she might vomit when her stomach clenched uncomfortably.
"I'm not pregnant, Quil." She muttered lifelessly.
She could feel him staring at her, but she was staring in a daze at Jamie trying to push/encourage Butch to climb up a red plastic slide without actually seeing any of it. Quil had already been looking at her skeptically, but she saw it intensify from her peripheral as he scrunched his brow.
"I heard you, Claire." He pointed out like he thought that this was the course she took where she lied. "I heard you and Rachel talking about the ultrasound this morning when you left for the doctor."
"-I don't want to be together anymore." Claire muttered in the same lifeless tone as she quickly wiped at the tear leaking out of the corner of her eye before it could make any progress. For feeling so numb she was surprised she was still producing so many tears.
She reached across herself into her purse when his words registered about overhearing them that morning.
"What?" Quil asked in confusion at her seemingly random direction change.
"You said you'd support whatever I wanted to do. I don't want to be in a relationship with you anymore. I don't want that." She said in a shaking voice while focusing on her hands in her purse instead of looking at him.
Quil shook his head in confusion just before she handed him the copy of the ultrasound of Peanut that the tech had printed out for her as well as Rachel after she'd had such an emotional reaction to watching the screen.
"Shit." Quil whispered almost completely silently to himself as he looked down at the image in his hand before using his free hand to wipe down and then up again on his face, like this was all becoming too real for him.
Claire cleared her throat a little before she pointed at the name in the top corner of the image, printed in white against the staticky black and grey background; Young, Rachel Lee.
"It's not our baby, Quil."
He immediately snapped his head over to look at her in confused disbelieve.
"It's Rachel's baby. Not ours." She said certainly, sitting next to him in silence while she waited for the facts to catch up with him.
"Rachel's pregnant?" he asked as he looked back down at Peanut.
"Yes." she answered certainly with no emotion in her voice. She was feeling so raw yet numb inside that though she was currently managing to hold it together in the moment, she knew she was about to fall apart, and hard.
He looked back at her before asking, "But you're not pregnant?"
Claire just pressed her lips together and then bit on the bottom one to keep from tearing up again as she shook her head in response.
"How can you be sure? Just because Rachel's pregnant doesn't make you NOT pregnant. It's not like there are a finite number of pregnancies in the world and she just took the bullet for us." He said a little emphatically and Claire could tell that whatever headspace it was he was in; it wasn't a very rational one.
"I had my period last week, Quil. You were still around for that, remember?" she pointed out as she turned back toward where Butch was chasing Jamie around the swings since her eyes had started to fill with tears again.
He was silent for a second before he turned back towards her again, "My sister said she had some bleeding with her pregnancies. You could still be pregnant. Have you taken a test?"
"No, I haven't taken a test!" she said defensively while suddenly refusing to look at him. "You talked to your sister about this!?"
"No. It's just something I remember hearing her say to my mom. I'd really prefer if you just took a test, Claire, just so we can be sure." He said like he was suddenly being reasonable. Claire wanted to shake him. Hard.
"I am sure." She muttered while clenching her hands into tight fists around the strap of her crossbody purse in an effort to keep them from shaking.
"We didn't use birth control, Claire." He reminded her softly as he put an arm around the back of the bench again and rubbed her bare shoulder gently. She flinched forward a few inches, just enough to get away from his touch before she snapped her head around to look at him.
"Yes, we did, Quil!" she corrected, mirroring the way he was talking to her like she was the one who just wasn't getting it… talking at her. "I'm still ON birth control, Quil. And I went through a hell of a lot of pain to get it so, yes I'm a hundred percent sure that I'm not pregnant."
Her phone started buzzing and vibrating in her purse just as Quil seemed to stutter, "Claire, how can you be sure that's a real thing? Whatever they inserted inside of you, we have no idea if it's effective or not."
Claire snorted out loud as she hit ignore on her mom's phone call and shoved her phone back into her purse. She wondered for a second why he was so desperate to prove that she was pregnant when he clearly didn't want her to be before she realized that if there was no chance of her being pregnant then he'd just have to own up to all of the hurtful bull-shitty things he'd done and said when he thought she was -including breaking Bennett's jaw.
"An IUD IS a real thing, Quil. Just because you don't know about it, doesn't make it ineffective." She said with contempt while refusing to look at him before standing up and starting to walk away without any further explanation. "I've got to go."
"Claire!" Quil called.
She stopped in spite of herself.
She stopped because he called her and because she couldn't not stop. She stopped because the part of herself she was quickly learning to hate so deeply she wished she could cut it out of her heart and head and kill it forever, that part of her still hoped that he wanted her to stop because he wanted her.
She was still facing the playground with her back to him as she waited for him to speak, he seemed to struggle for just a second before finally asking in a desperate voice, "Are you sure you're not pregnant?"
"Yes, Quil!" she whispered back without looking, almost begging him in her mind to just believe her.
"Will you please just take a test?"
His voice asked it simply but desperately.
She shook her head in pure exasperation as she scoffed and lifted a hand from her purse into the air before slapping it against her thigh and then walking away again so quickly she was almost running.
"Jamie, we need to go!" she yelled desperately as she marched past the playground and Butch sprinted to catch up to her.
"But-" Jamie started from halfway up a slide he was climbing.
"Now, Jamie!" she yelled without letting him finish and by the time she made it to Bennett's car he had caught up with her though he'd had to sprint to make it to her.
"What's going on?" he asked in confusion as she opened the door for him and Butch hopped in uninvited.
"Mom's home." She replied as she marched back around to the driver's side and then stuck the key in the ignition, revving the engine before even shutting her door.
"Really?" Jamie asked hopefully as he slammed his door and then hurried to secure his seatbelt across his booster seat.
When Claire didn't respond other than to throw the car in gear and then forcefully pull out while hitting the gas hard, she realized that for once she had never looked back at Quil again. She gave herself at least one mental point for that though after today, she was sure she was in the negatives when it came to where Quil and her dignity were concerned.
Jamie interrupted her internal monologue to whisper, "Are you okay?"
She didn't want to lie to him for a second time today, so she just didn't say anything at all.
.
Their mom was standing at the kitchen sink washing dishes when they walked in the door a moment later. Claire didn't look at her, but Jamie screamed, "MOM!" and ran directly to her before wrapping his arms around her legs in a desperate hug. She barely responded to him before saying, "What is going on, Claire!? Where were you and why did you leave the house in such a careless state!? You know better than that."
Claire didn't respond at all and barely heard the exclamation about filthy beasts in the house as Butch followed closely behind her as she ran up the stairs and slammed her bedroom door shut behind her before locking it.
She moved into the bathroom and immediately yanked the bottom drawer open and dug her hand in just as the door from Rachel's room opened beside her.
Claire froze with the box of pregnancy tests halfway out the drawer just as Travis looked at her and started to say, "Hey, what's going on down-"
He froze when he saw what was in her hand and looked back up at her curiously just as she said blankly, "Mind giving me a minute?"
He raised his eyebrows curiously before raising his hands in surrender and turning back into Rachel's room and closing the door tightly behind him. Claire continued on with Butch beside her as if she'd never been interrupted. She looked down at the box in her hand that said it came with three tests. She knew that Rachel had taken two the night she found out she was pregnant but looked inside to see the last one still sealed in its plastic wrapping. There were no instructions with it though since Rachel must have chucked them out with the tests but the instructions on the box were very straight forward so Claire grabbed the test, forced Butch to wait by the sinks as she locked herself in the toilet closet, peed on the test end in the most aggressive way possible (there was really no way to do that but she at least told herself it was aggressively since she felt like she was conceding so much by just doing it) stuck the cap back on it before came back out to slam the stupid thing on the counter and wash her hands. She didn't even pause to look at it, she knew it wouldn't give her a reading for a few minutes anyways. She grabbed it and marched into her room with it.
"Come here, Butch." She muttered to him as she yanked her desk drawer open and pulled out a yellow pad of post-it's and a thick black sharpie.
She threw it all down on the desk before yanking the cap forcefully off the sharpie so hard that it bounced off the desk and landed on the floor where she ignored it before grabbing the post-it's and writing,
Congrats, you're
not a daddy!
-C
And then yanking the note off the pad.
She grabbed the tape from her still open drawer and barely paused to read the negative result she'd always known would be in the test window before covering it with the post-it and then wrapping it all the way around the white plastic stick and wrapping the tape all the way around the note on both sides, making sure it was securely stuck in place.
She leaned down to Butch standing obediently beside her before using the tape to wrap around his canvas collar and then all the way around the pregnancy test until it hung unobtrusively against his neck.
She finally paused as she looked at him so patient and obedient and wondered for the first time if she should really use him in her petty fight against Quil. She immediately leaned forward and wrapped her arms around his neck as she whispered softly to him, "No matter what happens next, I'll always love you. I'm sorry but we still need to figure out a custody agreement and you've been with me the past three weeks already. I need to send you home to Quil for a few days now."
He gave a soft yap that was less of a bark and more of a chuff from behind her head and she somehow felt that he understood her, at least emotionally if not completely practically, and that he would be okay.
She kissed him forcefully behind the ear for a second before standing back up and grabbing onto the strap of the purse across her chest that she had never taken off.
"Come on. We can do this!" she muttered more to herself than to Butch before moving to the door and unlocking it.
She was relieved no one was waiting for her on the other side and she could hear Jamie chatting excitedly to her mom about all his Legos downstairs so she put on her game face and then marched/ran straight down the stairs and out the front door without looking at anyone and completely ignoring her mom when she called her name and then asked her where she was going.
She only paused for a second at the driver's door of Bennett's car to let Butch jump in ahead of her and then hopped in, irrationally locking the doors shut behind her before starting the car and then gunning the engine so she peeled out as she rushed away.
She blew a sigh of relief when she was clear of the house, but her heart immediately started to pound, and her entire body filled with tension as she approached the shop. She reminded herself she needed to just get it over with as she pulled up and slammed the brakes, barely taking the time to throw the vehicle in park before leaning forward across Butch in the passenger seat and throwing open his door beside him. She kissed his head again and scratched behind his ears before saying,
"You're such a good boy!"
She gave him a gentle shove toward the open door. He barked happily at her before he jumped out and ran straight to the side door of the shop taking the stupid test with him and then slipped right through the door even though it was only open a few inches.
Claire blew out a breath since she knew Quil was home, otherwise the door wouldn't be open, before she threw the car back in drive and twisted the wheel, pulling forward so that the passenger door slammed shut with the momentum and her eyes filled with tears for the millionth time.
She had to drive slow because she could hardly see past the sting of tears she was doing her damnedest to refuse to shed but eventually she pulled up in front of Bennett's house. She parked in the spot where he usually did in front of the walk and made her way blindly out of the car and up the steps to the door.
She let herself in and made it halfway to the stairs before the first tears fell just as she realized that the house, she thought was empty, actually had people in it.
She gasped and jumped as she wiped the tears off her face and said quickly, "Mrs. Callahan! I'm so sorry!"
She looked back at the door she'd just come through as if it could offer her some sort of explanation before looking back at Bennett's mom in the dining room looking at her curiously from where she was sitting next to his grandfather at the kitchen table with a deck of cards spread out in front of them. It looked like she was helping him with a round of solitaire.
"That's okay, Claire!" She said easily as if it was nothing unusual for Claire to come storming into the house uninvited as she burst into a stream of tears. "But I don't think Bennett's here. I haven't heard from him in a few hours."
Claire nodded her head gratefully just as more unwanted tears escaped and came pouring down her face uncontained, she looked away to try to hide it better.
"I left him sleeping upstairs. I had to borrow his car, so that's why you probably thought he wasn't here." She explained while never looking into her too discerning eyes, just like Bennett's.
"Oh!" Mrs. Callahan muttered as if that was all reasonable and explained the confusion. Claire finally looked up at her to note that Bennett's grandfather had never looked up to notice her as Bennett's mom continued incredibly gently and softly, "Is everything alright, Claire? Bennett seems to think you've been having a hard time since your dad passed…"
Claire couldn't even hold back the tears anymore at those words and they came flooding out along with a sob as she covered her face and tried to nod.
She was terrified that Mrs. Callahan was about to try to hug her and tell her it'd all be okay when it so obviously wouldn't, so she just kept nodding emphatically behind her hands and said in an incredibly shrill voice, "I'm fine! Is it okay if I go up now?"
"Of course, sweetheart." She replied in that same too kind voice that made Claire think she could see straight through her.
Claire dropped her hands as she basically sprinted up the stairs and then directly into Bennett's room. He was still asleep, sprawled diagonally to fit his too large body across the queen size bed, with the two thawed juice cans rolled a few inches in each direction from his cheeks and purple bruising that made his otherwise normal looking jaw look like he just had a really thick five o'clock shadow.
She didn't pause to give him a chance to wake up before she climbed directly over him to get to the far side of the bed. He grunted a little and opened his eyes when she accidentally kneed him in the gut but she didn't stop until she was lying next to him, curled up on her side under his arm with her arms around him and her face almost pressed into the armpit of his t-shirt against his rib cage and then she finally let the sobs go.
And they went. She cried and cried and cried some more as he tried to hold her and get the story out of her in discombobulated pieces until she was pretty sure he thought that Quil was upset that Rachel was pregnant instead of her but didn't have the strength or energy to correct him while she sobbed until she couldn't sob anymore, and then hiccupping cried herself to sleep as she held tightly to Bennett, squeezing him as if he was her only lifeline.