Chapter Eighteen

Renesmee and Jacob carefully set down their new couch in the living room of their new house. She stood up straight, put her hands on her hips, and smiled at Jacob. "We're moved in," she said.

They had gotten a new house in Ocean Shores. It was far past time to out. They didn't know how Alice and Jasper did it, but Renesmee and Jacob had been static for too long, itching to get out of Forks. Ocean Shores was only a two hour drive south from Forks, though, so nobody could get too heartbroken.

As soon as they plopped down on the couch, Jacob wrapped his arm around Renesmee. They looked out the window, at the beach. Ocean Shores was different from La Push, but not too different. There was more sand and less rocks, for one thing, but both were quiet. Jacob didn't mind the quiet. Except in La Push, his head was always screaming about something, even after all the other voices went away. In Ocean Shores, his head was quiet. The only voice he heard was his own, and that voice was calm. Thank God.

"I could just stay here forever," Renesmee murmured. "I think I will." Now that she was positive that a forever did exist for her, it was her favorite word again.

Jacob just breathed in, breathed out. In, out.

The sun was starting to set, and it took Renesmee's breath away. Right on the coast, she could see it all, feel it all.

"Pretty sunset," Jacob said.

"Mm-hmm."

"Let's go for a walk."

Ocean Shores wasn't known for being very warm, so people only really visited in the middle of the summer to get the most of the weather. Jacob and Renesmee were alone now. In April, it was cold and windy, but Renesmee had Jacob to keep her warm.

Her pale skin, clad in tiny white shorts and a gray tank top, contrasted with Jacob's dark skin. She noticed this as she looked down at their hands while they walked. She pressed herself to him tight, breathing into his clean blue t-shirt, knowing he'd never let go.

Maybe it was a bad idea to take a walk now, when it was so windy. She couldn't see much of the sunset because the wind made her eyes water, but she knew she wasn't missing much. They would have so many more sunsets.

"Hey, Ness," Jacob said softly, despite the wind being loud.

"Yeah?"

"I need to get something off my chest."

She was still calm. She tried really hard to stay calm. "Go ahead."

"I've stopped phasing for good this time."

She didn't say anything.

"It's okay if you're mad," he told her. "I would understand."

"I'm not mad, I promise."

"Are you gonna be okay?" He was always worrying about her. She wished he would worry about himself just once.

"Are you?" she asked.

"The whole aging thing hasn't really picked up yet," he replied, "but I'll be okay."

"When did you stop?"

"When he split up last January."

So it's only been three months. Only three months. Three months is a long time. Only it's not.

He didn't say he was sorry, all because he wasn't sorry. He was finally moving on in his own life, letting himself live again. If Renesmee was still very dense, she would see this decision as selfish, but she wasn't like her mother - she wasn't dense anymore. The difference between the relationships between Renesmee and Jacob and Bella and Edward were that the former couple consisted of better people who weren't abusive towards each other. Renesmee was grossly proud of that.

So she couldn't be angry with Jacob, because it was the right decision for him. She just needed to get all that she could out of him before it was too late. He wouldn't be young forever.

"Let's get married," she initiated.

"When?"

"In July. Sooner, if possible. I feel like I could lose you any minute now."

And July, it was.

It was the most elaborate wedding Forks had seen in over a century, even though there weren't many guests. It also didn't have a wedding party, but that was fine with Renesmee and Jacob.

She wore a skirt and top set instead of a dress, which Alice initially reprimanded her for. Up until hours before Renesmee got married, Alice hated her choice of dress. "A skirt and lace crop top?" Alice had asked. "That is so old-fashioned, Renesmee."

The entire process of the wedding had gone by very fast. Bella and Edward knew it was going to happen since Jacob had promised it to her at birth; they just didn't know it would take this long. Edward had been ready to walk Renesmee down the aisle since she'd stopped aging.

On the morning of the wedding, right as Alice had finished criticizing Renesmee's attire again, Bella styled Renesmee's hair. She stared at her daughter's face in the mirror, trying to find the pieces of herself and Edward in it. Some aspects of Renesmee were all her own. It was interesting.

Renesmee wanted a flower-child-hippie-love-type vibe to her wedding, which was what she got. She hadn't seen the setup in the Cullens' backyard, but as Bella carefully wove a crown of flowers into Renesmee's updo, Renesmee got even more excited. She wasn't like most brides, absolutely terrified to get married. All she had to be afraid of was time, not marriage itself.

Time sped by as the wedding went through the typical motions. Edward walked Renesmee down the aisle with dry eyes, Jacob wore an extremely well-tailored tuxedo, Renesmee and Jacob promised all the typical things to each other, they kissed, and the ceremony was over. Jacob and Renesmee Black were legally official.

The reception didn't consist of many guests, and none of them were that knew. With the Cullens and Tanya's coven as company, the wedding reception looked like a typical family gathering. (Renesmee had wanted to invite Zafrina and Senna of the Amazon coven, but getting a hold of them would have been a hassle.) At the reception, she realized that she missed a lot of people that she hadn't considered inviting. She wouldn't mind seeing Benjamin and Tia again, when she thought about it.

Jacob got a dance with every woman there, but his dance with Bella lasted the longest. They had four dances, actually.

"So you're a married man now," Bella said as they swayed to the music. "How's it feel?"

"Feels pretty good," he said. "When's the stress start kicking in?"

They laughed. Bella really smiled for the first time in a while. It wasn't even fake - it was all real. If she knew one thing that she wouldn't mind having around forever, it was him. (She didn't know he was aging again.)

"Well, hopefully never," she replied, "but if so, give it a couple of decades. I'd say sixty-seven years."

"I'll mark it on my calendar," he said.

They laughed again, and they hugged as they swayed.

"I miss you, Bells," he said into her shoulder.

"Present tense?" she asked into his bicep.

"Yeah."

"I miss you, too, Jake. Present tense."

"And so the Miraculous Friendship of Jake and Bells continues," he said.

She chuckled. "I guess you could say that."

It was like they jumped back over a century in time. It was like how things used to be. She needed this more than anything when she was constantly aching.

"How have you been, honey?" he asked.

"Okay," she said.

Jacob stared across the dancefloor as Edward and Renesmee were sharing a dance under the twinkling lights. They were laughing. She looked so happy and beautiful. She was glowing.

"Is he still being difficult?" Jacob asked Bella. He didn't have to specify who he was.

"Of course," she replied. "But what's new?"

"I'm just saying you could do better."

She wasn't in the mood to explain everything to Jacob right now. She just hugged herself tighter to him. "Oh, Jake."

She closed her eyes and breathed him in, and he didn't smell that bad to her anymore. She wondered why, but she didn't care enough to ask. Right now, all she had to do was relax as she and Jacob went somewhere else entirely. He was the most solid thing she had right now. More recently, she'd been daydreaming about how things would have gone if she had made a difference decision, but she tried to keep those thoughts to a minimum. They would make her too upset if she dwelled on them for too long.

"I miss you, Jake," she said.

"I miss you, too, Bells."

Jacob and Renesmee flew out to Paris later that night for their honeymoon. They had planned on going to Paris, her favorite place in the world, but it wasn't boring. With him around, she was seeing it as a brand-new place.

Because they took one of Jasper's jets, they landed in Paris when the sky was still dark, around two in the morning. Renesmee snuggled up to Jacob in the backseat of the cab as they were driven to their hotel. He was warm, but not too warm.

Upon entering the hotel room, Jacob set their suitcases down and opened the curtains to their gigantic window. Their hotel was far from the Eiffel Tower, but the view from their room was perfect. They could see everything, even the Arc de Triomphe. Both the Eiffel Tower and the Arc were lit up. They didn't even need to turn the lights on in their hotel room.

He held her, and she knew she was truly home. The most beautiful place and the most beautiful man in the world could coexist, and they did, right before her.

She turned to him and put her arms around his neck. She kissed him slow and hard and deep as his fingers stayed at the small of her back, making shapes.

They slowly walked back to the bed, and she sat down, looking up at him. He stood before and put his hands in her hair, and she put his hands on his hips narrow, bringing him closer. She quickly took off his shirt and brought her lips to his bare stomach. It was hard and tight as she kissed it and moved her lips lower. She started to unbutton his jeans, but he quickly stopped her so he could undress her. Bringing his hands to the back of her dress, he pulled the zipper all the way down and pulled the dress off of her body. She was bare underneath, and too damn beautiful.

He sat down on the bed and kissed her. He murmured sweet nothings against her hot skin as she removed the rest of his clothes. They both slid their shoes off, and then he hitched her leg up to him. She gasped and pressed herself even closer, wildly kissing his throat. She murmured words against his skin, but they weren't very sweet or innocent.

"You're a good girl and you know it," he whispered. "You don't have to act so different with me."

"Trust me," she said. "I'm not that good."

Renesmee woke up later that day with the taste of Jacob on her tongue and the feel of him on her body. She felt brand-new. It was a brand-new day, and one less day she had with him than before.

She rubbed her eyes and blinked. Jacob laid next to her asleep, looking like an angel as the Paris sun illuminated the room, bringing him out of the shadows. They were married now. Truly married. They'd both been signed up for it when she had been born, practically, but now it was official - at least by legal standards. He was hers in all the ways she could have him, completely trapped by her incisors. She couldn't feel guilty anymore, though; she could only feel grateful.

And she was.

A/N: There are six chapters left, and I'm going to complete all of them. Either bear with me or not, but I know what I'm doing. I promise.

Thanks,

HS