Chapter Seven

At 11:00 on the dot, Renesmee's car pulled up to where she had dropped Jacob off an hour earlier. He wasn't done yet, so Renesmee had some extra time to collect her thoughts. Just when she thought she had everything together, it could all fall apart in an instant - she was good at making that happen.

Be calm, be soothing, be understanding, she told herself. Listen to him, don't judge, and don't bring up your own problems. Your problems don't matter. You are fine.

Jacob didn't appear from the building until 11:03, and when he arrived at Renesmee's car, her nerves didn't go away like they usually did when she was with him; they were only much, much more prominent. He usually made her relaxed just by his presence; what was she when nothing could calm her down, but a mess?

"Hey, Ness," he greeted her.

She picked out her words slowly, cautiously. "Hey, Jake," she said. "How was it?" Tell me something beautiful, something inspiring. Tell me it was great and you're on your way to quick recovery so I can have you back for my own selfish needs. I want all of you back.

"It was all right," he said honestly (and he was telling the truth).

"That's it? Just all right?" Don't push, don't push.

He looked slightly frustrated in the face. "Yeah. There's such a barrier, you know? Because I can't tell her exactly everything - or even the start of it, actually - so I can't get to the root of it all."

"I'm sure you could ease into it," Renesmee suggested. She was good at giving weak advice, because, to her, it was better than remaining silent. She didn't understand silence or not explaining herself.

"No," Jacob said curtly. "I won't be able to open up. Not now, not ever."

Renesmee frowned, and Jacob couldn't form any negative feelings about it. He was upset over a few things: therapy not going to work, being stuck here and forever, never changing… But Renesmee understanding how deep his depression was? No. Not now, not ever.

Renesmee was prone to being upset. That's all she was these days, his sad girl. Sad and mad (both kinds of mad). That was the daily life, easily slipping in with breakfast dates in the mornings, criminal justice classes in the afternoons, and movies at night. It wasn't that hard to be sad once one was conditioned to it, and that applied to both Jacob and Renesmee.

It was just only so much harder to feel at least slightly real, in Renesmee's case. And she knew it, and she loved him, and she wanted him.

And, of course, it made all the difference.

People weren't supposed to want to fuck people who weren't completely okay in the head. It was unethical. It wasn't fair. Jacob couldn't forget that he hated himself and the Cullens and maybe even Renesmee for half an hour and then roll over and suddenly remember all of that, digging himself into an even deeper grave.

It wasn't even like the sexual interest was what all that was there. When Renesmee looked at Jacob, she didn't feel weak in the knees because she wanted him in her bedroom right that second, and she didn't feel her heart pound in her chest because the tension was there - right there - and she couldn't do anything to stop it. She felt weak and intense all in one because she wanted to help him, and based on what she had seen in media and books, sex was it. She understood the mechanisms, the steps, the build up, the climax, the resolution, all of it. That was what helped all the normal guys in the normal movies.

Jacob just wasn't a normal guy, and that killed Renesmee. As long as he felt like dying every single day for his own reasons, she would, too, for her own reasons. Abnormality was beyond her and completely present all at once.

"What are you thinking about?" he asked.

She pressed the palm of her right hand to his cheek. What she did was dangerous and - quite frankly - very juvenile, but she didn't care. Jacob heard it all, saw it all, and felt it all. Thousands of images and feelings flew through his mind, and he comprehended every one of them. How much she wanted to be intimate with him, how much she wanted him to be better, how guilty she felt for how he was feeling, how her parents' vision of love had made her feel completely immune to love in general, how she felt so detached from humans and vampires and werewolves, how frustrating everything about her life was at the moment, yet Jacob was depressed. It all flew out the window from her mind to his, and she instantly regretted it.

She pulled her hand away before he could feel anything else, but there was no way. He'd felt it all.

"Let me take you home," she said.

Bella studied Edward's every movement as he moved his graceful fingers along the keys of the grand piano, and she realized that she was blessed to not have his old power. Reading his mind as he played music would be exhausting. She wasn't musical in the least bit, and she wouldn't be able to comprehend at least half of all that was going on. Music was complex: it was mathematical, yet logical, yet emotional, yet creative. In Edward's human head, it was everything. Bella imagined what she would hear. One-and-two-and-three-and-four-and. Key change. F major. Ritardando. I wish I'd copied and taped up my music so I wouldn't have to read from a book.

Something like that.

Edward, not the total prodigy he had once been but no longer a mere student on his eighth or ninth year, still loved to play music. He loved to listen to it even more. He listened to it all the time, every day, sometimes listening to the same pieces more than once or twice or three times, just to really feel it. That was the entire point of being human again, wasn't it? The feeling part of it?

Bella couldn't help but mumble, "The guy's still good," as he played through a piece, either Mozart or Beethoven. (She couldn't tell the difference just by sound, but there was clearly a difference that one would detect, even someone human like Edward.) In the main house's living room, everybody gathered around to hear Edward play, but only Bella really focused on him. He just wasn't that brand-new anymore. Edward simply wasn't as amazing now as he was good, but Bella would never tell him that. She also would tell him that she'd been cheated and was now with a less-than-amazing man that she had definitely not agreed to marry over a century ago. It would break his fragile heart, or worse: he wouldn't feel bad about it at all and it would shatter her armored heart into a trillion jagged pieces. That would be much worse.

Suddenly yet subtly, Jacob walked into the living room, and nobody but Bella paid any attention to him. He was like the family pet, never noticed, not even when he was whining. All he got was a shush. It was just Jacob, in the way as usual. Bella noticed, though. She was either his best friend or his worst enemy, but she needed a best friend these days.

She nodded at him to acknowledge him and led him out to the kitchen area. "What's going on?" she asked.

"Can we get out of here for a second?"

In Jacob's garage, Washington's little Taj Mahal as they had called it so long ago, Jacob wasn't Renesmee's and Bella wasn't Edward's. They could breathe here and Jacob and Bella. She took in the clean air.

"I am so goddamn sorry, Bella," he told her with a low voice and sincere eyes.

She furrowed her brow. Jacob was the least problematic person she knew these days, so there wasn't much to be sorry for, in her eyes. "What happened?"

"I've failed you and Edward, but mostly Renesmee," he admitted.

A long time ago, Bella would have pinned Jacob to a wall in a chokehold, asking if Renesmee was at all hurt and telling him she would kick his ass as soon as possible. Not now, though. Things had changed.

"Jake, I still don't understand what you've actually done," she replied. "You haven't failed anyone, as far as I know."

His voice remained low and bleak. "Renesmee isn't happy. She's in so much pain because of my depression."

Everything went still. Bella heard a fire truck's siren go off six miles away. Jacob bit the inside of his cheek so hard that he almost drew blood.

"Jacob," Bella slowly began, "we both know you're a smart man, so please, please do not blame yourself for your depression, or let others blame you for it."

"I fucked up," he said. "Bella, I fucked up because of my depression."

"No, you didn't. It's not your fault."

"Even though it is."

"Stop being like this, Jake. You can't blame yourself for everything. Why is that everyone's fucking deal around here? Everybody is always trying to -"

He interrupted her tangent. "Well, fucking humor me, Bella. Try. What would you know about depression or pain or any of that shit?"

Hell. "I would know that you helped me out of it."

He was silent.

"I still remember that, you know," she added. "Are you fucking humored now?"

He clenched his jaw. She clenched her fists.

"This is going to sound a bit off," she said, "but I think what you need to focus on is yourself. I know there's the imprint, but right now, you're more important. Renesmee might have some hurt feelings because you can't always be there, but you just can't, and she's going to have to learn how to deal with that"

Jacob's expression was beyond confused. Bella didn't even have a word for it. "I can't believe you're telling me to forget about loving her."

She just shook her head. "Nothing lasts forever, Jacob, and love certainly doesn't last forever. And I'm not telling you to forget; I'm telling you to refocus."

"You jumped off a cliff," he reminded her.

"I guess I'm not the best person to discuss coping with," she admitted, indulging in self-criticism. That skill was getting easier and easier everyday. Becoming a vampire to begin with had made her so high and mighty; it was like every critique, every truth, was knocking her down a peg. Soon, she would be nothing.

"No, Bella, I appreciate it," he told her.

This was the most lopsided conversation Jacob and Bella had had in a long time. Maybe it was because they couldn't hug and make up. Maybe it was because they were no longer real people, but pieces that couldn't even come together to form something solid.

Maybe nothing was solid.

A/N: I've had a birthday and gotten a new job and it's now a new year and I'm a horrible, horrible person, but I've finally updated after 4 months as you can see. It's still Thursday, though. I shouldn't make specific promises anymore. It's really risky.

Happy (belated) New Year and thank you,

HalcyonSeasons