As always, many, many thanks to my beta MeSh17, and to Ms Meyer for her graciousness about the mess we make, playing in her universe.
Words 5529, first published 2:55ish AEST, 19/7/18
Chapter Seventeen – Vampire
All Jasper wanted to do was keep kissing this beautiful woman, but he knew he needed to tell her what he was. He should have told her first, before he kissed her. But when she said she loved him...he just needed to show her how he felt.
Now the really hard part was here. Telling her about Kate had been awful. But this—she might think it would have no impact, but she had no idea what he was, what he had done.
"Bella, I want you to know—I will protect you. No matter what you decide...even if you never want to see me again, to see any of us again...I will make sure you're safe, okay? You're under no obligation."
"Jasper," Bella interrupted him, "I told you, nothing will change how I feel. Nothing."
"I know you think that darlin', and believe me, I hope you're right. But you don't know—you can't even imagine what I am. What I've done."
"So tell me! Trust me, Jasper. Let me in."
He took a deep, unnecessary breath and let go of her hands, pulling his back—she deserved to have some distance while she heard this. She might not want him touching her at all in a minute. But she grabbed his hands right back, and he let her pull them towards her. How could he deny her?
"Don't do that," she said. "Trust me, remember?"
He looked at their joined hands, watching as she gently rubbed her thumb over the back of his fingers, doing everything she could to soothe him. God, he loved her!
He took another deep breath and looked up into her eyes.
"Bella, I'm—I'm a vampire." He saw her shock and looked away. That was not anything like she was expecting, he knew. How could she have even imagined anything so ridiculous, so horrific?
But as he tried to pull his hands from hers again, she tightened her grip.
"No," she said. "I won't let go of you."
He looked back up at her in shock and saw that she was still gazing at him with love.
"I told you it wouldn't make any difference to me. So you're a—a vampire. So you drink blood? And—oh god—do the people die?" She was still holding his hands in both of hers, but now she looked away. She said it wouldn't make a difference, but he saw, before she broke eye contact, how the idea horrified her. Of course it did! How could it not?
"Not anymore," he said quietly, looking down at their joined hands. "That is, I—we—only drink animal blood. But—yes, the animals die, and before I learned I could live on animal blood, I did kill people. A lot of people."
"So, all the time you were with Maria...that's why you said you were a monster?"
Jasper closed his eyes. "No," he admitted, quietly, "at least, that's only part of it." His eyes back on their hands, he started to explain. "Bella, it was...I was...god! I don't know how to explain this to you." That wasn't really true though. He knew how to explain, he just didn't want to. She was already horrified, by the most basic truth of what he was. How could he tell her the rest? Then again, maybe he didn't have to. If she couldn't accept him as a vampire anyway, she didn't have to know the rest. The thought brought both relief and the very worst despair, at the same time.
But then she moved one of her hands up to his cheek, gently encouraging him to look up at her. And what he saw there almost took his breath away.
She was looking at him with love and acceptance, and at the same time her sympathy was clear.
"Jasper," she said gently, "you don't have to tell me anything you don't want to. I love you. I told you that won't change, and if you need to confess everything to me to truly believe it, then I'm listening. But if you need time—you have it."
"You still love me? Bella, I'm a vampire. I've killed people. I've tortured people! I—I left you! I forgot you! How can you forgive that?"
She looked down again, and he reclaimed her hand as she dropped it into her lap.
"Why did you?" She asked, in a small voice. "Why didn't you come back for me? You've partially explained, but—you said there was more to it. Did you—did you not want me? Once you were a vampire? Did Maria—was she—did you just want her?"
"No! No, Bella, that's not it, not at all." He sighed, realising he would have to tell her everything. It might help her to understand him, and why he forgot her, but he hoped it wouldn't also put her off every being changed herself. If she could ever possibly want that anyway.
"When a vampire is changed, is created...I already told you a little bit about how disorienting it is. You wake up, after three days of the most excruciating burning, three days where you can focus on nothing but the pain, to a world where you can see everything. Hear everything. You can feel the dust motes in the air dancing against your skin. And the way your brain is enhanced means that you can focus on everything you hear, everything you see, all at the same time. All the while, the burning has concentrated in your throat, and is still taking up more of your attention than your brain could manage altogether, three days earlier.
"And then, into that hell, a warm, breathing, bleeding human is tossed. And there's no time to concentrate on the wet sound of their pulse as their heart pumps their blood through their body, no time to take in the sounds of their sobs as they process what's happening to them, no time to see every pore in their skin, every hair on their head, every laboured breath their lungs drag into their panicking body.
"Because suddenly, every single part of your expanded mind is focussed on the taste of the blood rushing into your mouth. Before you even know that you've moved, the burning in your throat is being soothed by their lifeblood flowing into you. The fact that your teeth cut through their skin like butter, that you instinctively went straight to their jugular, that their heart beat is slowing, that they've stopped breathing—all of that is registered only after you realise that the blood is all gone. That you've drained their body and your throat is still burning.
"And only then do you realise what you are. What you've become. Vampire."
He glanced up at her only long enough to see the horror on her face. He couldn't look at her if he was going to tell her everything. He took another unnecessary breath, in and out.
"Humans only use a tiny part of their brain capacity," he started again. "But once they are changed, the vampire they become can use all of it, or at least, much more. We can concentrate on numerous different things at once, we have near perfect recall, and a seemingly unlimited capacity for learning. But for most of us, those first months are little more than a blur of feeding and learning control.
"Maria changed me to be part of her army. She—"
"Wait, what? She had an army of vampires? Was she part of the war? Was that why so many people died?"
"No. Not the way you mean. The war was terrible anyway. Conditions were awful, much worse than I would ever have let you know, back then. Most of the deaths really were due to disease. Of course, war does make a nice feeding ground for vampires, but no, that's not what Maria's army was for.
"She was building an army to fight other vampires for feeding territory. The southern vampire wars were a nasty time in vampire history, but at the time, they were all I knew. They're still going on, actually, but not to the same extent as they were then." He kept his eyes steadily on their joined hands, taking comfort in the fact that she didn't pull away from him, as he explained the history of the southern territory wars, and the advantage of using newborns—stronger than older vampires and more easily manipulated.
"Nomadic vampires—and those few settled covens, like our family—measure life in centuries and millennia. But in the South, vampires measured life in days and weeks. Very few survived to the end of their newborn year, and most of those who did, were—disposed of, when they got to that point and their newborn strength was used up."
He suddenly realised he was smelling the salt of tears and looked up.
"Oh, Bella, darlin', I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have—"
But she surprised him again, reaching up to capture the hand that was wiping away her tears.
"Jasper," she whispered, "I nearly lost you again. You could have died then and I would never have known."
"Oh, darlin'... in some ways I still think maybe that would have been better. I was dead to you anyway. And then, maybe...we would have been together all this time."
"Maybe we would," she said, thoughtfully. "But then, I would never have existed."
He had to hold back a growl at that idea. "You would always have existed," he said. "You will always exist!"
"Maybe," she said again, "but not like I do now. I mean...I do feel like I'm the same person. When I dream of her—of my life back then, I don't know anything about the me of now, but when I wake up, her memories are my memories. Or at least—everything I dream, feels just like it happened to me. The parts of that life that happen in between the dreams...they're not so immediate, you know. Like, I know they happened, but it's almost like it happened to someone else. Or at least, that it was a long time ago, does that makes sense?"
"Sort of," he said. "Actually, it's a bit hard for me to completely get it, because the vampire memory is so acute. Aside from those first few months, I pretty much remember everything I've ever experienced in this life, like it was yesterday. Maybe it's a bit like my human memories, only the opposite."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, it sounds like for you, with those other memories, the detail is clear but the feelings are a bit removed. Is that right?"
"Yes, that's it exactly."
"Whereas for me, with my human memories, the detail is hazy—actually, there's almost no detail, just a few images. But the feelings that go with them are powerful."
They were both thoughtful for a while, and he wondered how she was feeling. He was about to ask her, when she brought her eyes back to his. He felt her sadness, but also...relief?
"So why did you—how did you survive?" she asked.
"I—Maria, she was looking for talented vampires. Some vampires...well, Carlisle theorises that when we're changed, we bring our strongest attributes with us...that they become enhanced. And, for some of us that manifests as a, well, a supernatural talent."
"What, more supernatural than the rest of what you are?" She snorted, smiling slightly.
"Well...yes, sort of."
"And you have one?" she asked, curiously. "What is it then?"
"I'm an empath," he said.
"What, like Deanna Troi, on Star Trek? You can feel people's emotions?"
"That," he said, "and—I can manipulate them."
"What?!" He looked into her eyes and felt her shock.
"Not yours!" he assured her, "I promise, I haven't manipulated your emotions. I can't, even if I wanted to."
"What?" she said again. "Why? Explain!" She frowned, and he wondered what she was thinking.
"I can't explain it, fully," he said. "With most people—well, everyone, before you—I can feel their emotions. Even in a crowd, like say in the cafeteria at school, I can pick out all the different emotions in the room, and if I concentrate, I can tell which is coming from whom. If I know the person, I can recognise their emotional signature, and I can even pick them out from a different room. So at school, if Edward or Alice suddenly felt extreme rage, or bloodlust, or, well anything really—I will immediately know about it, because I'm so attuned to them.
"But you—the first day I saw you, I knew you recognised me, because I heard you say my name. But when I tried to read what you were feeling—there was nothing. You were like a blank to me. And, Edward has a talent too. He can read minds." He heard her sharp intake of breath and pressed on quickly, "But not yours—when I couldn't figure out your emotions, he tried to hear what you were thinking, but there was nothing there. If we couldn't see and hear you, we wouldn't have known you were in the room."
She frowned. "So there's...something wrong with my brain?"
"No!" he said, reaching up to cup her cheek, and tilt her face so she would look at him. He gazed at her and tried to put all his love for her into his eyes. "It's just like—you're shielded from our abilities—most of the time."
"Most of the time?"
"When you look straight into my eyes, like now—then I can read you." She looked down and he sighed. "That's why I asked you not to close your eyes before—I hate not knowing what you're feeling!"
She looked back up at him then, and he felt her trepidation, but also her love. Even after everything he'd told her...He let his fingers skim her cheek, down to her lips, and saw her pupils dilate, as he caressed them lightly. Then she pulled back slightly and looked away. He let his hand fall back into his lap, and she quickly interlaced their fingers, but didn't look back up.
"And when I'm looking at you, can you—"
"I can't affect your emotions at all, not even when we're making eye contact. At least," he smirked a little, hoping to lighten things up, "not with my supernatural ability!"
She smiled slightly and looked back at him. "And Edward? Can he read my mind then?"
"No," he said. "It's strange actually because—" He stopped suddenly. How would she feel about them eavesdropping on her dreams? Would she be angry? She deserved to know, either way.
"There's something else I need to tell you. You must have wondered how I knew—that you thought I was dead, that you were—you, at all."
"I—yes," she said, "I figured we'd get to that eventually. But yes, I had wondered. So, how?"
"I discovered—I came over here to check on you, after we'd been away, hunting. Remember when it was sunny the other week?"
"You missed two days of school."
"We did," he said. "And normally we wouldn't have come back until the Sunday night but—I was worried about you."
"You were? Why?"
"I couldn't explain it then," he said. "I didn't know who you were. We were all concerned about the fact that you'd obviously recognised me, and...you knew my real name."
"Where does the name 'Hale' come from?" she interjected.
"It's Rosalie's human surname," he explained. "It helps our cover story when we pose as natural siblings."
"Oh, I guess that makes sense."
"Anyway, we were all concerned but my feelings went deeper. I didn't want to admit it, even to myself—though Edward did his best to make me—but I just wanted to see you again. And...it made me anxious, to be away from you, even then. I just didn't know why."
She smiled at him, and he could feel her pleasure at his admission. Maybe she wouldn't be too upset.
"So we came back early, and I came over here to check on you—I'll explain some of our theories to you later, it'll probably give you a good laugh. But really, I just needed to be near you. But, when I got here…"
"What?" she said, "Don't keep me in suspense!"
"I could feel you," he said almost reverently, remembering how peaceful it had been, staying outside her house that first night. Until her dreams had turned sour, and he'd felt her emotional switch flip—which he now knew was when she'd started dreaming of the past.
"You could feel my emotions?"
"Yes, while you were dreaming I could feel everything you were feeling, just as though you were looking right at me. And then—please don't be upset but we still didn't know who you were or how you knew me. So, the next night Edward came back with me."
"And he could read my mind?"
"Yes—as long as you were asleep, he could. Mostly it was just the normal dream jumble, but when you started dreaming of the past—of our past—he said it was just like listening to someone's thoughts while they're awake. He can see what they can see, as well as the thoughts passing through the surface of their mind. And when you started dreaming of the past, he could see and hear everything through your thoughts, but it was like he was seeing directly through nineteenth century Bella's mind. There was no sense of you as an intermediary."
"Oh. That's…kind of creepy really. Has he been back?"
"A few times, yes. That's how I knew, yesterday, that Mary had been by, and—" he felt her spike of pain at the reminder. "Sorry," he said.
"It's okay. You're not dead, you're right here. It's just—in my dreams, when I go to sleep, you're still dead. And now I know…you're not coming back for me. I am going to have to marry that, that friend of Papa's…" He growled at that, he couldn't help it, and then cursed himself as she gasped.
"Sorry! Oh Bella, I'm so sorry. The idea of you being forced into—" He almost growled again. He had to control himself! "I just want to kill him. I want to go back in time and rip him limb from limb. I can't—"
"Shh," she said, squeezing his hands. "It's okay, Jasper, it was a long time ago."
"I should have been there!" he growled, "I should have been there for you!"
"But you weren't," she said sadly, "and you were explaining why…"
"Yes," he said, sighing. "So…the way I described waking up as a vampire. In Maria's army, most of the first months are like that. She would keep us half starved—newborns need to feed often—in order to control us. And then she would use us to fight her battles, and reward us with a day or two of unlimited feeding.
"For me, as my talent developed, it was even more hellish, as I could feel all the other newborns' bloodlust and desperation as well as my own. But gradually I also learned to control it—my bloodlust, and theirs too—which is what made me useful for Maria.
"But at the very beginning, when I first woke up to this life, which is a nice way of saying when the burning stopped and I could think and function again, all I could focus on was the burn in my throat. During your change it's like—you stop being you. All you are is the pain, the burning.
"Actually, I shouldn't say that as though it's the same for everyone. Emmett—Carlisle changed him after Rosalie saved him from a bear, and he talks about how he thought Rose was an angel. She stayed with him through his change, and although the burning was still all encompassing for a while, having her there made a difference."
"Did he know her beforehand?" Bella asked.
"No, but when he was finished with the change, and after his first meal, Rosalie and Carlisle talked to him about who he had been—they drew out his memories to help him hold on to them.
"I had the opposite experience. I was changed to fight, and that was what I did more or less constantly, in between feedings, those first few days—fight with other newborns. And to begin with they fed me twice a day, encouraging the bloodlust, to ensure they could use it to control me afterwards.
"Many newborns didn't even last a week, if they weren't sufficiently controlled. We killed each other, and Maria liked to destroy at least one herself from each new group she created, just as an example to the rest." He paused, thinking back to that time. It was true that much of it was a blur, but there were moments that stuck in his memory, and none of them were pleasant.
"After a few days," he continued, "Maria brought me a meal—a human girl who looked a lot like Mary." He paused, playing absently with her fingers. "I killed her," he finally spat out. "I didn't even pause. I killed her just as quickly as all the others. But afterwards, I broke down. I hadn't thought of her—of anyone, or anything from my previous life—until that moment.
"Maria asked me if I'd known her, and when I explained, she told me to never think of her again, to never think of anyone I'd known again. She said that if I couldn't forget, I would end up going back and then I would kill everyone. She said she'd seen it happen.
"I believed her implicitly. She truly seemed sympathetic, and although I didn't yet have control of my gift at that time, from what I can tell from my memories she really did want to spare me that pain. But she also needed to control me, and how much easier was that to do, if I remembered nothing and no-one but her?
"But after that, whenever anything brought up a memory again, I squashed it. I never once allowed myself to remember anything from my past, until after I met Alice. I spent eighty years with Maria—running her army, doing to others what she had done to me. By the end of that first year, I didn't have to repress the memories. They'd stopped coming." He looked up at her then. "And to some extent Bella, she was right. If I had come to you then, I wouldn't have been able to control myself. I hate that I wasn't there for you. It enrages me to think about, but Bella, I couldn't be. And I'm so, so sorry."
Now she knew everything. She knew the monster he had been as Maria's right-hand man. And she knew what was equally shaming—that he would have killed her, had he come across her then. But she was looking at him with love and understanding. He shook his head in confusion.
"Bella...why aren't you disgusted? You should be running—or at the very least throwing me out of your home. Do you understand?" he asked, almost desperately. "I would have killed you!"
"I know," she said simply. "Or at least, I know you believe that."
"No, Bella, it's true! I don't want you to be under any illusions. I need you to understand."
"I do! I do, Jasper."
"Then why are you looking at me like that?"
"Like what?" She frowned, and he could feel her confusion.
"Like you still love me," he whispered.
.
"Jasper..." Bella tightened her hold on his hands and then let go to place her hands on his cheeks. How did she make him understand? "I know you think I should be...upset. Or angry, or something. But I'm only angry with Maria. She took you from me. She made you into that monster. But that's not who you are, Jasper!" She gazed into his eyes, willing him to understand. "Centuries from now, that eighty years will only be a small part of your history. And whatever else happens between now and then, I truly—fervently—believe, you will always come back to the kind, loving, wise soul that I grew up with."
He took her hands and placed kisses on each palm, but then looked down into his lap, as if he didn't want to read what was in her eyes.
"But what if I'm not that person anymore, Bella?" he asked, quietly. "You think I'm the man you remember, but I'm not! Being with Maria changed me. Being a vampire changed me."
"No, Jasper, no. It didn't, not really." She frowned. "I mean...I don't mean to belittle those experiences and what they mean for you. I know you are different—just like I am—but you're also the same."
"That doesn't make sense, Bella." But he smiled, as he looked back at her, as though he was starting to believe.
"I know, but I thought about this a lot last week. Was I just using you, to replace my Jasper? You reminded me so much of him, not just in how you look, but the way you talked to me. How kind you were. I realised that even if you didn't remember me, even if there was never any explanation, I was still falling in love with you, all over again. Because you were still you."
She pulled one hand away from him to place it back on his cheek, and leaned in, maintaining eye contact with him, letting him read her love and relief and utter joy, until she couldn't focus anymore. Then she let her eyes flutter close, as her lips found his.
It started as a soft, gentle kiss, but when she felt his lips open under hers, she couldn't stop herself from pressing closer. She slid her hand into his hair, her other hand coming up onto his chest, as his arms went around her. She felt herself lifted back into his lap, as he gently sucked on her bottom lip, and she heard herself whimpering into his mouth. His moan all but undid her. By the time he pulled back, she was panting as though she'd raced him to their tree, back in Texas. It was a pretty perfect moment. Until her stomach growled.
Jasper frowned. "Bella, we've been talking for hours. You must be starving!"
"I'm not, really," she said. She kind of was, but she still felt a little queasy too.
"Was that not your stomach I just heard growling at me then?" he teased.
She felt her face flush. "Okay," she admitted, standing up, "I guess I'm a little hungry. I'll have some soup. Will you stay?"
"Until you tell me to go," he assured her, following her into the kitchen.
She smiled as she dished herself up a small bowl of soup, adding some stock out of a tetra pack in the fridge and putting it in the microwave to heat through. "I like the sound of that," she said.
He frowned as he watched her bring the bowl to the table.
"Bella, that's not much food. And it looks like it's mostly water. That can't be very nourishing."
"It's not water, it's stock. That's super nourishing!" she explained. "Besides, I—well, with the stress of the last few weeks...I just haven't been feeling all that well. This will be enough."
"Because of the dreams you mean," he said, frowning darkly. "Because I'm not there."
"Jasper, it's not your fault Maria took you," she said. "Anyway, you were away at war. Even if she hadn't, you still wouldn't have been there. It's my father's fault for insisting I marry someone against my will—for not respecting my choices."
"I wish I'd spoken to him when I had the chance."
"You remember that?" she asked.
"Sort of. Edward told me of a dream when you were thinking of meeting with me under our tree, and—"
"So you remember our tree?"
"Again, sort of. When he described your dream, I had a flash of memory of being with you, under an old oak tree, and he said you looked exactly the same, in my memory, as in your dream. Or rather, you were wearing the same dress. And the tree was the same too."
"We always used to meet by that tree. Ever since we were little kids, escaping our mama's supervision."
"The last time I saw you...I told you I'd speak to your Papa the next time I was back, didn't I?"
"You did," she agreed softly. "But Jasper, I don't think it would have made a difference. Mama told me—just this week—that he would never have accepted you. And anyway, once you disappeared…"
They fell into silence as she forced down a few more mouthfuls of soup. Then she realised that Charlie would be home before long.
"Oh," she said, "Charlie will be home soon. Do you—that is...do you want to stay, or..."
"It's up to you, Bella. Do you want me to stay? I will want to meet him at some point. He needs to know that I'm going to be in your life now. From now on. But it's up to you if that happens today."
She thought about it for a bit. She didn't want to hurt Jasper's feelings, but...
"Maybe not today," she said slowly. "I do want him to meet you, and you to meet him too. You'll like him better than my Papa, I think."
"I hope he'll like me better, too!" he interrupted.
"He will, don't worry." She smiled at him. "But maybe...I'd like to tell him, first, if you don't mind?"
"Of course I don't mind, Bella."
"I guess you should go then," she said reluctantly, getting up to walk him to the door.
"Okay, but Bella, I won't be going far—there's something else I need to tell you."
"Okay..." that sounded slightly ominous. She turned to face him, the front door still closed behind her. "Wait, Edward isn't still listening to my dreams, is he? Please don't let him do that! I don't want you to have to hear it."
"No! No, that's not it. We met with the—oh—with some allies of ours, last night. It seems there have been some nomadic vampires hanging around Forks. Some human drinking vampires."
"Oh! Has anyone...have they killed anyone?"
"Not yet," he said. "Not that we know of anyway. But these allies—they pointed out that our scents are all around your house, between Edward and I hanging around at night, and Alice coming to visit you on the weekend."
"And, is that bad?" she asked nervously.
"Maybe not. But, I'm concerned it might attract them. So one or two of us will be close by all night, okay? Just in case. And hopefully they will leave soon."
"So they can kill someone somewhere else," she said, sombrely.
"Bella..."
"Sorry!" she exclaimed. "It's just—"
"Don't be sorry," he said. "You're right. That's the reality of it."
"It's just, it makes it feel a lot more real."
"I know," he said. "I'm sorry you even have to know they exist."
"But they do," she replied, "whether I'm aware of them or not. At least I know you're out there, keeping me safe." She tried to smile, but suspected he wasn't fooled. Then she had another worrying thought. "But Jasper," she said, "you won't be in danger will you? Promise me you won't do anything dangerous."
He smiled at her, a look in his eyes that she couldn't quite interpret. "I won't do anything dangerous," he said.
Unconvinced, she grabbed his hands. "Promise me, Jasper. I can't—nothing can happen to you now, okay?"
"Darlin'," he said, smiling wryly at her, "I will be completely safe, I promise. The fact is, you don't survive eighty years in the vampire wars easily. I am very hard to hurt, okay?"
"So you're saying you're tougher than them?" She smiled back at him. "You always were pretty good in a fight."
"I was?" he asked.
"You don't remember when my brother decided you weren't good enough for his little sister, and needed to be taught a lesson?"
"I—no? What happened?"
"Well, suffice is to say, he came out worse than you did."
"Oh well...that's good, I guess?"
"I was pretty angry with him at the time, so yeah, it was good!" She took a step closer to him and looked up into his eyes. "But even so, Jasper, be careful, okay?"
"I will," he assured her. "I'd better go." He bent down and kissed her gently on the lips. She leaned into him, unable to stop herself from trying to deepen it, but he pulled away. She pouted.
"You want me to go before your dad gets home, right?"
"Yeah, okay," she said, "I do."
He reached past her and opened the door. "I'll see you tomorrow, darlin'."
A/N
*sigh* I do love me some Jasper-kisses...
Okay, happy now?
What do you think? Reviews make me dance (and dancing is good for the soul AND good exercise. So, yeah. Let me hear it!) :)
I didn't give this a final read through after I went over Meha's suggestions (she had a LOT of extraneous commas and words to get rid of this time!), which I would usually do, and I find more mistakes practically every time I read it, so feel free to PM me with them this time, haha! I just want to get it up for y'all, and I have training to write for a session I am running tonight and have yet to fully prep for. Gah! Plus it's my husband's birthday this weekend and I have yet to buy him a gift. And it's school holidays. And I am out the next three nights in a row. Do you need any more excuses?
On the update front – Meha is going to be pretty busy over the next few months, AND I am coming up to my busiest time of the year for my business, AND I'm past the point of having lots of chapters written in advance. I'm still staying a couple ahead, but the thing is, as I write a chapter, I often need to go back and edit one of the previous ones, so I like to keep at least a couple of chapters ahead.
And sometimes I might be writing several chapters in the future to figure something out and then I come back to the chapter we're up to... so anyway, all that means that gaps of more than a week are likely to be more common than not in coming months. I will still do my best to keep it as close to a week as I can, and not go over two weeks (though sometimes that may mean you get it un beta-read).
QUESTION: Do y'all like it when authors paste a little clip from the end of the previous chapter at the top? Would that be helpful now as the gaps are getting bigger?
(And in case you were wondering, we're maybe half way through... Or maybe not quite. So there are still months of updates to come!)
Recs:
Here's a current one I've just discovered – incomplete, but still being regularly updated by the author, and with 33 chapters already written. It's a three-way B/J/Em, which I have mostly steered clear of, because I just can't imagine sharing Jasper with anyone, LOL (of course, in this case it's him who has to share). But I am loving it, so far. It's very M rated, so don't go there if you are underage/not into erotica.
Double Temptation by OzLilDevil
When your heart is in tatters, torn to shreds, sometimes it's the unexpected that stitches it back together again. And the love of your life is not always who you thought it was. It can be a temptation you never saw coming, & it's just too hard to resist. From the remnants of tragedy, sometimes something even better blossoms…eventually. Mature content M/M/F Bella x Jasper x Emmett s/12544511/1/Double-Temptation
Now here's a complete Bella/Jasper story for you – a nice little novella (12 chapters). It was only published this year, so it's not exactly an oldie, but it is finished:
Too Late, by orchidluv
Jake pleaded with Bella just a bit too long when she was leaving for Italy, resulting in Edward's successful suicide. Alice freaks out. /s/12938409/1/Too-Late
