My cell vibrates in my pocket. I'm determined not to phase today, so the pack can reach me by phone, like everyone else. And I don't want to phase because then everyone will know my thoughts, and I'd rather they not, 'cause I have a lot on my mind. This past week has been… wow. I don't even know the word. First Edward sneaks into my room and then that thing a day later in the woods… it's got my head reeling. Nobody in my pack knows yet; I'm discrete with my phasing. If I phase and hear so much as a peep from someone else's mind, I go right back to human.

I flip open my phone and answer with a, "Yeah?"

"Jacob, hi."

"Hey, Edward!" I say, way too brightly. I rein myself in to ask, "What's up?"

"It's Bella. She and I got into an argument and she left… I don't know where she is, but I'm really upset… can I come over?"

I look around. I'm not really at home right now. I'm sitting on the sand at First Beach. "Um, I'm at the beach."

"I'll be right over."

I say, "Sure, sure.", and hang up the phone, looking at the horizon.

I wait about four seconds and he's there beside me. "Hey," I greet, not breaking my stare at the ocean. I know that if I look at Edward, I will lose all sense of composure and I'll resemble a schoolgirl rather than a sixteen year old boy with some control over himself.

"Hello. How are you?"

"I'm good, but I hear you're not."

"No…" Edward trails off as he leans his head on my shoulder. I lean my head on his in an attempt to be comforting. "And now I don't know where she is."

"What was the fight about?"

"You," says Edward without hesitation.

"Me?!"

"Yes, you. Bella'd grown irritated with me that I hadn't been spending a lot of time with her recently. I couldn't very well tell her why, that my heart is elsewhere entirely. So I said that I'd been over at La Push, breaking rules, and reasoning with you to leave her alone. Can you blame me? It was the first thing that came to mind. In any case, she got extremely upset and stormed off. I let her go, let her hold onto her naivety that you can run away from a vampire. I owed her that much."

Edward's words came out so fast I barely had time to register them. "That's fair. Where do you think she'd be?"

"I have no idea! I can't smell her anywhere, and I can't hear her, which is damned inconvenient at times like these."

I nod. "Hmm. What can I do to make you feel better?" I ask. I'm no good with making people feel better.

Edward slides his head away from mine and looks at me. His golden eyes tell me he's been hunting. I like the shade on him; it's better than black. When he has eyes this color, they make him seem less like a vampire, and more like a human. I can almost see what he looked like back then, back before I or even my dad was born. I picture him with those gold eyes, only because I don't know what color they were before, and he looks magnificent.

"Green," he murmurs. "My eyes were green. Other than the eyes, you've got it exactly right." He smiles at me crookedly, and I feel myself get hotter than usual. Ugh, Jake, you pansy.

Despite the blood rush to my face, I smile back. "Thought of anything yet?" I inquire.

Edward nods sheepishly. Edward shy? That's something I've never seen before. It, like the eyes, looks good. He should be modest more often. "Oh, shut up," he replies to my thoughts and leans in to kiss me. I go the extra inch or so to meet his lips with mine. I'd obviously forgotten how explosive his kisses were, in just a few short days. I revel in the fireworks in my head, the desire in my heart and the sense of adventure in my fingers, five of which I weave through his hair, and the other five I grasp his cheek with.

But something breaks this moment. Something both of us hadn't heard or expected. Of course we should have heard the footsteps in the sand coming closer, and Edward definitely should have smelled her out a lot sooner. But I think it was because we were enveloped in passion that neither of us noticed Bella until she stammered something that sounded like both of our names mixed together.

I lean back from Edward with a start, and Edward does the same to me. "Bella," we both say at the same time.

"What the hell?!" she exclaims. I prepare for far worse than this, though. After all, if you caught your boyfriend and your best friend, both male and both sworn enemies, kissing on a beach you happen to have been wandering on, you'd be a lot more upset than that.

"Bella," Edward says gently and quietly. "Words cannot begin to even marginally describe how sorry I am… I'm confused, to be frank, and Jacob was just-"

"Save it, Edward! Aren't you supposed to love me?"

"I do, Bella. So very much that it hurts me to even think of your departure from my existence-"

"You should have thought about how much it would hurt me! I can't even be angry at an appropriate level! Why, Edward?"

"I'll take this," I offer. Nobody objects, so I continue. "He was confused and upset after your fight, and one thing led to another. You know better than anyone that people can be illogical."

"I am in no mood, Jacob! I'm sorry if I expected my boyfriend to love me when he said repeatedly that he did, and I am sorry that I expected my best friend to be on my side! I can't even- ugh!" Bella screams and storms off. This time, Edward doesn't let her walk away. He gets up and follows her, begging and pleading, saying that I'm nothing to him.

When I can't see them anymore, I walk home to wallow in my misery. My dad's still not home, he's still out fishing with Bella's dad. Good. I don't wanna bug him with this.

When I get to my room, my hands start to shake. In an attempt to stop myself from phasing right now, I yell one long syllable. That reduces my anger, but I need to outsource it somewhere. I can't have a burning rage in the pit of my stomach, so, unthinkingly, I reach for the first thing I can get my hands on. My mattress. Without so much as flexing, I manage to rip it in half. I hope dad won't mind…

---

I hear a quiet rapping on my window at around two in the morning. I rub my eyes, get off my floor and check it out. If it's a robber or a murderer, - unlikely on the rez, but it can happen - they don't stand a chance. As it is, though, it's not a robber or a murderer. Well… Bella's said that Edward's murdered before, but that doesn't qualify. I don't think.

I open the window. "What the hell are you doing here?!" I hiss.

"Bella went back to Jacksonville, back where I can never pursue her… she's gone, Jacob! She really left!"

I sigh. "Come in, then."

Edward's in some state. I know, bloodsuckers look like they're tired all the time, but he looks like… a whole other level of tired. Like he's run out of tired and all he has left is a corpse-after-a-month look. I feel bad for him, really bad. So when he comes in and hugs me more tightly than I'd ever been hugged before, I don't put it past him. I just hug back and will my spine not to break.

Edward looks at me after he stops doing the boa constrictor thing. I don't even think, I just reach my hand up and brush from the apple of his cheek to his chin with the back of it. He looks shocked at my contact, and he starts breathing really shallow. I say, "Edward, jeez! Calm down."

He nods, but he continues until he starts hyperventilating. Now, I know humans aren't supposed to, but I don't know the protocol for vampires. Nonetheless, I sit him down on the floor where I'd been sleeping and rub his back. "Shhh, shhh," I coo. "You'll be okay. She'll find her way back to you." I wince at the actual pain I feel at the thought.

"But- I- don't- want- her- to!" Edward's breathing makes him talk monosyllabically.

"Why not?"

Edward coughs a sound like a sob, but no tears fall. "Because I want you!"

I laugh a little incredulously. "You don't know what you want right now, Edward. You're upset."

He sucks in a calming breath. "Yes, I am. But I'm clear on my priorities. In a way, I've just been emancipated from my chains. We can finally be together!"

"Woah. Who said I was in agreement to this?"

Edward's eyes widen, and he seems confused. But his mouth twists into a wry smile. "Your thoughts gave me the impression you wanted very much to be with me."

Damn it all, I curse inwardly. "But there's our families to worry about, and my dad doesn't even know I'm gay yet, and your family isn't going to like the guy who chased Bella away, and they're going to try and rip my throat out, and-"

"Hush for a second, would you? You don't have to tell him. Just introduce me into your and his life gradually as your friend. He'll understand the time together and make his own assumptions. As for my family, they love whomever it is that I love. They know what makes me happy, and there's nothing they care for more."

"Um, Edward… that sounds good, but they're pretty old-fashioned, what with being born in eight thousand B.C."

Edward smiles. "That may be, but they'll come around. Alice already likes you. As does Jasper. He's felt how happy thinking of you makes me, and Alice has seen… various… futures for the two of us, and in all of which, the two of us are elated. What else matters?"

"The crazy blonde one that doesn't like Bella."

"Rosalie isn't crazy, per se. She just doesn't warm to people quickly. Oh! But you and Emmett will get along fantastically, I'm sure. You remind me of him, and vice versa. Very intense about life and all."

"Then there's your parents to worry about." I don't know why I'm making so many excuses not to go through with this. Maybe because I've never had a bona fide boyfriend before…

"Carlisle is the most caring, compassionate person in existence. As long as I like you, he will. As for Esme, she'll love you, as well. How could she not? Despite her nature to love every creature on earth, you are perfect. And I am honoured to be your first real boyfriend."

I feel myself blush. "I didn't say that out loud."

"Regardless."

"Well, thanks."

"Has anyone ever told you how absolutely adorable you are?"

"I think you did once," I state, fighting a smile.

"It deserves to be said twice," Edward says, grinning.

"Same to you. Hey, uh, you're not worried about meeting my dad?"

"Jacob, I know what he's thinking in real time as he thinks it. I can make the ultimate first impression. You've nothing to worry about."

I stop fighting the smile and let it win. "Alright," I pretend to concede, when I'm actually all too happy. "We'll give it a shot."

Edward rolls his eyes and kisses my cheek quickly before he leans into my shoulder and rests his head there. "I love you, Jacob Black," he affirms again, like he had the first time.

"I love you, too, Edward Cullen."

"And that is all that matters, agreed?"

I nod. "Agreed."