Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
AN: Sorry for the delay between updates! I was SUPER busy the past handful of days. I debated on posting this one today, but here's what I'm thinking... I figure if I get good response on this chapter today, I'll know you guys are still around pre-holidays, so I'll post the last one and the epi tonight. If not, I'll blame said holiday (haha) and will probably wait till the end of the week to finish this up. Either way, hope you all enjoy and have an amazing holiday! :)
Suggested Listening: "Til My Days Are Through" by Sanders Bohlke, "We Ran Faster Then" by Mackintosh Braun
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Bella stood completely still, losing track of the passing minutes as she leaned against the wall of Maddie's room, just next to the door.
She had no idea how long she'd been standing there, but she did know she couldn't walk out of there - not yet. She needed another minute to remember what that day had brought, to remember what it did to her. How much it scared her.
How after everything that happened to her family in the last two years, she could have lost her daughter too.
But she hadn't, and she needed to remember that, too.
It was enough to take her breath away, and she needed to catch it before she could go anywhere.
The hours spent at the hospital, Bella only left Maddie's side once, after the nurse came back and told her "some of her friends were heading home". Nodding silently, Bella tore herself away from her daughter's bedside, slowly making her way to the waiting room to say goodbye to Sam and Emily. When she walked into the room, she also found the rest of the pack had showed up, oversized bodies sprawled over every free chair in the tiny room. After reassuring them everything was fine, she sent everyone home with promises that she would keep them updated on how Maddie was feeling once they got back to the house.
As they walked out the door, Bella lingered for a moment on the two who stayed behind. On Jacob, but more so on Quil, who was sitting in the chair next to his friend, rigid arms crossed in front of his chest and his expression stoic and forlorn.
She lost count of the moments she watched him until he finally looked back.
"Are you going, too?" she whispered. Knowing she didn't want him to but unable to fathom the trouble in his eyes. How he could stand it when she barely could herself.
Quil's gaze held hers for a single moment before he looked away, his expression unchanging.
"Where else would I go?"
It was nearly eleven at night before Dr. Mallory gave Bella the okay to take her daughter home, pushing into her hand a prescription for an epi-pen and strict instructions that it was something she needed to have on hand for Maddie at all times. Bella offered him a heavy acknowledgement, promising him she'd get the prescription filled first thing in the morning.
"Do you want me to get your friends to help you take her to the car?" Dr. Mallory asked softly.
It took Bella only a moment to nod.
A handful of moments later, Quil pushed through the double doors, and Bella could immediately tell a weight had lifted from him. Still, it was nothing in comparison to the flood of relief she saw wash over his features the moment he saw Maddie. How it nearly took her breath away when he smiled, meeting Bella's gaze for a single moment before he moved toward the bed.
Bella didn't say a word. She simply stepped back, watching - staying silent as Maddie's eyelids fluttered open for the first time at the sound of Quil's voice, whispering to her and no one else as he wrapped the white blanket tightly around her body. Her eyes drifted closed a moment later, just before he effortlessly gathered her in his arms, cradling her against his chest and leaving a soft kiss on the crown of her head.
As Bella felt inexplicable tears gather in the corner of her eyes - an overwhelming pressure in her chest, one not born from sadness - the moment she saw one little hand emerge from the cocoon she was in, curling around Quil's t-shirt.
Refusing to let go, even as Bella followed them from the emergency room, holding close the bag the hospital had given her containing Maddie's clothes.
She allowed a single tear to escape her eye when Jacob met them at the front entrance, sliding one arm around Bella's shoulders, leaving a kiss of his own on her temple as they walked out to the car.
The drive home had been quiet. Bella sat in the backseat with Maddie while Quil drove, and neither of them spoke a word, everything from that day no doubt weighing heavily on both their minds. When they arrived at the house, she let Quil take over, gathering their things from the car as he took Maddie inside to put her to bed.
Bella had found him in the exact spot she now stood. It took him a moment to acknowledge her, but when he did, he kept his eyes on the floor, silently walking past Bella and leaving her to say goodnight. Leaving her to her own moment.
Eyes affixed to the floor, Bella finally looked up, releasing a deep breath before she finally remembered she needed to move. Walking silently from the bedroom, she stopped once she reached the hallway, her fingers curling around the doorframe as she did.
As another pair of feet came into view.
Lifting her head, Bella's gaze found Quil just outside the door, leaning against the hallway wall. For a single moment just before she had left her daughter's bedroom, she'd wondered if he would still be there.
But it all made sense - why, of course, he still would be - once she could see him.
His hands were tucked rigidly behind him as he finally looked up - as he caught her eyes. His face was heavy and expressionless, even though his eyes betrayed him. Bella could see it - how even in the darkness, it was still visible in the distant light seeping into the hall from the kitchen.
The troubled haze in them proved that, the entire time, he had been just as scared as Bella. That the remote possibility of losing Maddie hurt him just as much.
And Bella could see something else...how much it had killed him to be shut out, even though she hated it. Even though she had wanted him there.
Something pulled at Bella's insides, weighing her down in a way she hated.
In a way she couldn't ignore.
And it only went away when she took a step toward Quil, lips parting without releasing a single word. Holding his eyes, ones normally filled with laughter and kindness, she could see how they were suddenly black and liquid and filled with all those words Bella could feel just in the back of her throat. A million pleas she didn't understand, still lined with that hint of fear.
He reached up in that moment, unexpectedly, one hand cupping her cheek. The heat soaked into her skin, a part of him still trying to comfort her. To be there for her. She wanted to tell him she didn't need it - that she was fine, that even if she wasn't she would be soon, because Maddie was okay and so was she and he was there.
Quil was there…
She wanted him to know that, too. That she was glad for it - thankful for it, still.
That she never wanted him to feel shut out again.
That he belonged there. Right where he was, and she didn't want him to leave. Not in the next few minutes. Not in the next hour.
Not tonight...
And there was a sense of urgency to it, prompted by the day's events and hundreds of days worth of baby steps when she leaned into his palm. To tell him, even though Bella allowed her exhausted, burning eyes to close, taking a breath through her nose and drawing in that scent...
The one she noticed all the time now.
Every single day. Every time Quil was around, she noticed it.
And it filled her, in a new way. In a way she hadn't allowed herself to feel.
In a way all its own.
Opening her eyes, Bella held the air in her lungs, turning her face. Bringing her other hand up, she held Quil's where it was, letting her lips brush gently against his palm.
Seeing that same darkness in his eyes when she looked back, except now, it was accompanied by something new.
By a fire she wasn't expecting. One she suddenly craved all the same.
Releasing a sigh thick with inexplicable relief, she didn't have to speak a word. Somehow, Quil knew as he pulled her to him, folding her into his arms as Bella closed her eyes on it all. As she let her other senses compensate for what she couldn't see, hearing Quil's sharp intake of breath the same moment she felt its warmth on her mouth. As her hands pressed against his chest a second before she tasted his lips on hers.
And she clung to him, not because she needed him there.
Because she didn't want him to go. Ever.
And Bella didn't want to hesitate. She didn't want to waste another day, knowing tomorrows were never a promise, and knowing all too well how fragile life really was.
Which is why everything about it was needy - urgent, like it could be the only moment they had. The way his mouth moved against hers, how his fingers clung desperately to her cheeks - the way she leaned into him, hands curling into his chest. It screamed of a closeness they both wanted.
Bella's feet left the ground, barely registering the heat from his hands beneath her thighs, soaking through her jeans. Seeping into her skin and flooding her veins, it made the warmth inside her worse. It made it excruciating in the best kind of way when she wrapped her arms around Quil's neck. When she felt him move beneath her and she tipped her head toward the ceiling, lips parted, a wordless gasp escaping her when a heated mouth drifted along her pulse.
As a visceral shudder tore up Bella's spine when he dragged his teeth along that same spot, his tongue peeking out to soothe it.
She lost track of how they made it to her bedroom, of how much it took for her to pull herself away. How she leaned back against Quil's hold, inexplicably steady fingers finding the hem of her shirt. Pulling it over her head, it disappeared somewhere in the darkness before she leaned forward, taking his face between her hands and recapturing his lips with a fervor and a need that rivaled any before.
Quil's arm tightened around her body until Bella suddenly felt the bed against her back. Quil's broad frame hovering over hers, she refused to let him go. She refused to stop kissing him, allowing the heat from his body to reach out - to fuel the fire inside her as her fingers found the edge of his shirt. She released him only so he could pepper kisses along her neck, her clavicle, and against the swell of her breasts just before he lifted himself for a single moment, allowing her to pull the shirt from his body.
He didn't return, kneeling in front of her instead. The room was dark, but the light from the porch outside spilled through the bedroom window, illuminating Quil's features just enough for Bella to see his eyes mapping paths across her body. To catch him taking in every bit of her as his hands moved, deft fingers removing the clothes left on her body.
He took his time, and Bella held her breath, body trembling at the way he watched her. At the way he smiled - her smile, a muted version of the grin that had somehow become a source of light in her world.
It wasn't long before she couldn't stand it. Before she couldn't wait any longer, reaching for Quil. Pulling him down until his body was flush with hers. Until she could feel his hand push through her hair as his mouth recaptured hers. Until she could feel his body pressing hers against the mattress. Until she could feel every inch of his searing flesh against hers.
Before his hand was on her thigh, guiding it to his hip.
Heavy, impatient breaths pierced the silence in the room as Quil pulled away. As Bella clung to him, eyes closed and lips parting, her head desperately seeking respite from the fire inside her even if she wasn't sure she wanted to find it.
"Are you sure?" he whispered, his lips brushing against hers as he spoke.
Suspended in that moment, Bella took advantage of it, feeling the muscles in Quil's back beneath her hands. She traced the lines in it with her fingernails, opening her eyes long enough to look into his.
Long enough to make sure he would see her smile and every reassurance - every word she suddenly meant with all her heart - she hoped it would carry.
"I want this. I want you..." Bella whispered, pushing a strand of hair from his eyes. "I'm ready..."
Sighing against her mouth, Quil smiled, too - just before he kissed her, every bit of it purposeful yet gentle the moment she wrapped her arms around his neck. The moment he shifted above her and she hitched her other thigh around his hip.
Every word, every reason, and every day leading up to the moment suddenly made an imperfect kind of sense as he pushed forward. As Bella cried out against his mouth the moment their bodies joined, just before Quil's lips gently swept the sound away.
As Bella took a single moment to savor it, to remember the way he felt inside her for the first time. The way he felt against her. How she felt when his hands touched her.
How every last bit of it was something she never felt before. How what Quil said to her earlier that day suddenly made sense.
It was different, but suddenly she could see it. She could feel it.
How Quil - how what they were - was everything she needed from that moment on.
I'll just let this one speak for itself... :)
Thoughts?