Toxic Rose
Chapter 28: The Choice is Hers
Bella couldn't sleep at night. She couldn't do so when Rosalie's words ran in her head. The blonde's story had been gruesome. She had had to suffer so much in the past and Bella had the distinct impression there was more to it that Rosalie hadn't shared out of consideration for Bella's sanity, but what she had imparted, painted enough of a sickening picture on it's own.
She just couldn't get over it. Who did such a thing to children? Who took poor and unloved kids and forced them into hurting one another for sport? It was sick. So sick, and Rosalie had had to endure that. Had to engage in such terrible trials at a young age. No wonder she had so many issues. Bella didn't begrudge her that. And Rosalie had also said that Bella had once reminded her of her childhood crush, that was why she had acted so erratically towards her when they first met. It certainly didn't excuse the blonde's reprehensible actions but it explained them some what.
As Bella flopped onto her side on her bed once more, seeking to find some comforting position that would put her to sleep, she let out an annoyed grumble. Seriously, she wanted to sleep, so she could stop her racing mind from thinking about these things. But it wasn't working. No matter how she tried to silence her thoughts they kept coming back to her. With a huff she threw back the messy covers and went over to her laptop. It looked like it was one of those nights again, surfing the web until she fell asleep once more.
Booting it up, she pondered at the glowing screen, her mind going in circles over the biggest topic yet: what should she do about her relationship with Rosalie? Bella still liked her very much. And she trusted her more now that she had been given the full details of the story. When Esme had told her that Rosalie had abused her past lover, she had thought the worse. She had wanted out of this relationship right away. But when it turned out Marie was just a girl in the ring that was 'abused' because of the harsh conditions the two young children had been placed in...well, that was different. Very different.
Bella did want to continue a relationship with the blonde, but it was rough going. It seemed like everyone was out for them. Jake, Leah, all the Cullen kids, Esme. Only Carlisle was on their side. He was the only one who supported her and Bella's relationship. Carlisle had warned that it would be hard, and not just in navigating Rosalie's temperamental moods but in keeping it a secret, in having other people accept this relationship. Bella had been naive to think his words too solemn for their own good.
Sighing heavily, Bella rubbed her forehead. What was she to do? She knew she wanted to be in this relationship, but her trust had been tossed back and forth relentlessly. She didn't know who to trust from moment to moment and it was seriously stressing her out.
Why couldn't things be easy?
During her inner contemplation Bella had scrolled to her old email account, deciding that deleting old emails would be a therapeutic idea. It was a mindless enough task. Just shift and click. Except when she logged in she saw a bunch of emails from Rosalie's father.
Oh shit, that's right! Bella had completely forgot about this. She had been so wrapped up in her own teenage dilemmas that she had forgotten to even check if the man had writ anything back to her. And from the looks of his twenty or so emails, he had. Each one more desperate and impatient than the other. She quickly read through all of them, wincing at her own inability to have answered to them before.
The man had sent her photos of records documenting that Rosalie was his legit daughter as well as documents about who he was. He looked to be a middle aged man with graying hair at the temples and a simple job as a mechanic at his local garage in Iowa. He wanted to meet Rosalie and was asking Bella when that could happen.
Shoot, what do I tell him? She wanted to tell Rosalie about how her true father wanted to meet her, but the man in his emails begged Bella to keep it a secret because he wanted to surprise her and he was also worried Rosalie wouldn't want to meet with him otherwise because she might hold ill feelings towards him for abandoning her.
Tapping her chin in thought, Bella typed out her first email.
So sorry to keep you waiting, Aaron. I was merely wrapped up in some dramatic events that were occurring to me and loved ones. But I am ready to help you set up a time and place to meet with your long lost daughter. Let me know what times you are free and I will let you know when we are free to meet.
Then she sent the email out and busied herself with deleting old junk mail from her account. She didn't know how Rosalie would feel about meeting her real father. Would she be upset? Would she be happy? Indifferent? Bella wasn't sure, but she knew Aaron deserved to at least see his daughter one more time, to see what he had passed up raising by giving her away. She wondered what happened to Rosalie's real mom. Was she still alive? Or did she simply not want to meet her daughter?
Trying to drag her thoughts away from this, for it would do her no good to think over things she didn't know, she spent most of the night clicking away on her computer until she finally got tired enough to go to bed.
During his lunch break, Charlie went to go visit Jake on the pleas of his old friend Billy Black. Billy had been suspicious of the Cullen's, stating that his son couldn't be mentally unhinged like they claimed him to be and that his words had to have some merit. Charlie wasn't sure- Carlisle was the doctor, not him. What could Charlie determine about Jake that other's could not? But Billy felt something suspicious was brewing, for Paul and Embry had been present at the time Jake had been injured yet they weren't saying anything about it.
Charlie had already done Billy the favor of interrogating the two boys and they had seemed extremely uncomfortable in his presence. They had fidgeted and shot each other looks but they stuck by their resolution that Jake was simply acting crazy and they wouldn't budge on that point, nor offer more information about any such incidents.
So Charlie had to let them go, since he couldn't legally force more answers out of them. And now he was going to talk to Jake and see what the boy had to say on the matter. When he entered the hospital room he found that the boy looked better. His reported leg wound had healed up nicely but still caused him pain when he walked. So he was to be here for another two weeks to receive walking therapy to strengthen his muscles. From the looks of it, all of his muscles could use some more use, for the boy seemed to look a bit smaller than Charlie last remembered, or mayperhaps it was the white bed he was on that made him look smaller and younger. His scruffy beard was gone and his eyes were clear as he turned them from the TV he had been watching to the cop.
"Good day, Charlie," he smiled gently. "You here to interrogate me too?"
"Just wanted to hear your side of the story, on the orders of Billy," Charlie said as he pulled up a chair to Jake's bedside.
"Not much to tell really, since it seems Paul and Embry don't want to admit they where there with me," Jake shrugged.
"I got that feeling from them too, that they were hiding something," Charlie mussed. "But what was it they were hiding?"
Jake sighed at this and averted his eyes, something like shame and pain filling them. "It wasn't my …..best moment, so I can understand why they behaved like that. I had...I'll admit to it, a mental breakdown of sorts and I tried to hurt people during it. I hurt Leah, my good friend, and I will never forgive myself for that. But I also tried to hurt Bella and that too I can never forgive myself for."
"What happened exactly?" Charlie pressed, sitting forward more on his seat. Jake wanting to hurt Bella? That was strange! The boy cared for her too much to do such a thing!
"Bella went over to Leah's house to talk to her about my recent behavior. How I wasn't eating right, sleeping right, or something of that sort. I wasn't really there so I can't imagine what exactly they were talking about. But I know they were talking about me when I got there and I was mad. I got so mad because Bella was being blind. Blind to the error of her ways."
Charlie furrowed his brows. What had Bella been doing wrong? His daughter was a good girl. She would never get mixed up with the wrong crowd so it couldn't be that...surely.
"The night before that I had attacked Rosalie Cullen."
"Physically?" Charlie asked softly.
"Yes." Jake nodded his head in shame. "I was...I was ready to end her if I had to because I was so worried. So worried for Bella!" Jake picked his eyes up to look at Charlie at this, willing the cop to see his earnesty. "It wasn't the best idea but at the time I thought it was the right thing to do. And Paul and Embry were there and they were appalled by my actions. I don't begrudge them that. They had every right to be so. I was a mess, an emotional wreck. Luckily, they were able to stop me, and Rosalie fought back too, she wasn't going to let me hurt her that easily. Which I am grateful for right now because if she hadn't, we'd be talking in a different setting. A prison cell." Jake gave a dry humorless laugh.
Charlie swallowed deeply at this. What had caused Jake to go off the edge like this? What had occurred? He had heard the Cullen's side of it, heard it straight from the doctor's mouth when he brought a frightened Bella home, Rosalie tagging along. But now Jake was giving him a different take. Which one could he trust? The doctor's, or Jake's?
"But Bella was also there, and she stopped me-"
"Wait, why was Bella there?" Charlie cut in.
"This was outside your house," Jake blinked slowly at the cop as if Charlie should have known this.
"It was?" He hadn't heard anything, sleeping soundly through the night like a baby.
"Well, not exactly right outside it, but more to the woods," Jake explained, trying to paint a picture using his fingers in midair. But he gave up when he was unable to do so, waving the thought away. "That's not that important."
"Why was Rosalie outside my house?" Charlie's mind suddenly pointed that out to him, a fact stranger than Bella being there.
Jake gave a dark smile at this. "Oh, that's because Rosalie has been visiting Bella for a while now."
The way Jake said that left chills going down Charlie's spine. "What?" he asked, not sure if he had heard that right.
"Hold on, I'll get to that point. First let me finish explaining what occurred. So, Bella came and stopped both of us from fighting anymore. She and Rosalie than ran away leaving me and the boys behind. I was bleeding from my leg because the blonde bitch had stabbed me," at this his pitch lowered a bit. "And I wanted to go after them. I wanted to stop them from running away. I wanted to get Bella back so I could protect her. But Paul and Embry wouldn't let me. They knocked me out and took me back home. There I woke up the next day, really pissed off. I was still worried for Bella's safety-"
"But Bella was home," Charlie countered, confused by what Jake was telling him. "She was there when I woke up."
Jake shrugged. "I can't speak much to that since I was knocked out and at home. All I know is that Rosalie and Bella rode off somewhere together. Maybe she came back when we left. I admit, I would have run away and not come back until I was gone too."
Bella and Rosalie...going off somewhere together? The thought made Charlie a bit angry. But also even more confused. Rosalie had protected Bella in a way? And Bella had stood up for Rosalie? Something wasn't adding up right here. Why would they be so nice to each other? It made sense for Bella to be nice. She always was. But Rosalie?
"But then the next day, just as I was going to go up to the Cullen's house to harass them for Bella, I saw her truck parked outside of Leah's house. And I went in and I...lost it," Jake admitted regretfully, his eyes shining with unshed tears. "I hurt Leah and I scared Bella badly. I didn't behave the way a friend should and it was all because of that stupid blonde bitch! She somehow found where we were and shot me in the leg!" Jake cried out angrily and clamped a hand over his mouth trying to hold back his anger. It was choking up his words.
Charlie leaned back into his chair, never having seen the boy acting in such a manner. It was frankly concerning. The boy was calm and gentle by nature, not this temperamental beast.
"I love Bella. I truly do. And to see her with that demon made me want to tear my own hair out," Jake said when he could speak once more. Charlie knew this was true. The boy had loved Bella plainly for so many years. Everyone but Bella could see his love.
"What do you mean, see her with that demon?" How and why had Rosalie come to save Bella? The way the Cullen's had explained was that it had been mere circumstance, a lucky happenstance. But could there be more to it?
"What I mean is that Bella and Rosalie are dating." The admission hung in the air. There was silence for a good five minutes as Charlie's brain processed everything. And subsequently found it absurd.
He gave a hearty chuckle. "Jake, that's impossible. Why would-there's no way they would-"
"I'm not lying," Jake said in a steely voice, his jaw set and his eyes dark with anger. "It's true. I saw it with my own eyes. Plus Leah told me, she told me everything."
"Everything as in?" Charlie still said with a huff of amusement.
"Bella confessed to Leah that she liked Rosalie and that they were dating and that if Bella didn't date her then Rosalie would attempt to kill herself once more."
At this Charlie's mouth went dry. Rosalie had hurt herself before and in Bella's room of all places. He had often wondered why and Bella had been vague in her explanations and he hadn't pressed for more, fearing to trigger her. So could Jake be...right?
Jake went on. "And Leah in turn turned to me about this. And when I heard it I couldn't believe it either. I was in denial for so long. But then my curiosity got to be too much so I started following Bella around and lo and behold, she would be there with Rosalie. Take for consideration that one day when I found Bella alone in the woods, it was because she was running away from something. She claimed to have gotten lost during a hike, but I knew as soon as I brought her home and saw Rosalie on the front step of your house that Bella was being chased by her. And so I fought her, wanting to get her off of Bella's case. But Bella stood up for her and even shooed us away, leaving herself with Rosalie. All alone. I didn't know it at the time, couldn't see it, but they were dating."
Charlie gave a snort at this. "That can't be true. Bella knows better than to do that. She was only working on a project with Rosalie, who is her classmate, that day. And Bella is naturally clumsy and bad with directions. She honestly could have gotten lost." He stood up at this not wanting to hear more. He couldn't hear more or else he would start to entertain Jacob's sick thoughts. "You're just being delusional." Charlie shook his head. "I know you love Bella and her rejection of you must have occurred during that time, that was why you became so unhinged. To love and be unloved for so many years-"
"It's not because of that!" Jake snarled, pounding his fist on the bed. "I would have suffered my heartbreak in silence if only I knew that Bella hadn't chosen to be with Rosalie!"
"Bella's not gay," Charlie stated calmly. "And she would know not to date Rosalie. They've only had weird coincidences in why they've meet so much, but that is it." Charlie added some steel to his voice, almost as if he was trying to convince himself and Jake with his words.
Jake sensed this was a losing battle. "Carlisle has poisoned your mind. You believe his words over a family friend's?"
Charlie felt a twinge of guilt at that. But he brushed it aside. "No, I take Bella's word over everyone else. And if she says nothing is happening, then nothing is." Then with that he left.
Jake watched him go, working his jaw furiously. "You are a foolish man. Blind too. I shall have to show you the truth." Then he turned back to the TV, plotting his big reveal.