Chapter 11: I'm Losing Myself Just Find A Place In Your Mind

Bella

Is it so odd, really, that I used to hear his voice? That sometimes I purposely do crazy and dangerous things –like riding the bike– to see if I will hear it again? At first I thought I was going insane, but when I think on it now I realise it was my mind's way of holding onto something that was missing in my life. I heard a song the other day on the radio in Jake's garage, some alternative college station or something, that had intriguing lyrics.

I don't normally like to listen to the radio; it brings back the hours I spent listening to him play his original compositions, the stereo system his siblings had gotten me for the truck, the CD he had made disappear when he left. I could not stand to listen now to Debussy, to hear any sort of piano music.

And yet, this song I heard was played on a piano for the most part. I recalled moving my hand towards the switch to turn it off when the words started.

Break through, hoping your demons can't get you, so many people with a good view if you should ever be the one to hit the ground.

I had totally tuned whatever it was Jacob had been talking about as he tinkered with some greasy looking piece of metal, instead focused completely on the words this unknown man was singing.

A heart that's been buried in the ground can't break if it's never found; I spent so much time digging that grave. And even if it's pain that I feel at least I know that it's real; I'd rather be broken than afraid.

Had I buried my heart so deep to prevent it from being broken again? Had I allowed myself to remain so broken out of fear, or broken to keep that fear at bay? Did I want to live this way, shrouded in the pain of his abandonment?

No. I wanted more from my life than just this sad creature I had become. I had looked up and seen Jacob watching me, my hand still extended towards the radio. He said nothing, just looked at me with those deep eyes, waiting to see what I would do or say. To my surprise I felt a smile chase across my face. Jake's lips curved into a tentative mirror of this strangeness.

"I love you."

The words spilled from my lips in a rushed tumble, as if my mouth had to get them out before my heart reached out and clasped them close to the shredded remains. My hand descended upon the radio that now played something so incongruously different from that first life altering song I wondered if I had even heard it at all, pulling the little dial to the left until it clicked and the speakers went silent.

Jake was still watching me, the smile on his face looking strained. I remember feeling the fear build in my chest, the panic rising to my eyes as I stared at him, waiting.

"Do you mean that, Bella?" He whispered. "Do you mean that or are you simply telling me what I want to hear?"

My mouth had felt dry at that moment, my head whirling so hard that the thoughts were not cohesive. I closed my eyes, felt the few tears building. The sudden warmth from his hand on my cheek as he brushed them lightly away steadied the spiralling fall my head seemed to be taking, then his warm lips upon my forehead, his embrace.

"It's true." I replied finally. "I…love you."

"You sound surprised."

"And you don't." I opened my eyes and looked at him questioningly.

"That's because I knew it all along."

"You couldn't have. I didn't know until now."

"You didn't know it consciously." He corrected me. "But it was there. And you know what Bella?"

"No, what?"

"I've always known that I loved you, even when we were kids making mudpies together. What I didn't know was that someday I would have the chance to not only tell you, but show you. I never thought I'd be able to hug you close to me, never thought you'd give me a second glance." He had paused then, pulling back. "When Charlie told us, me and Billy, that you were coming to live with him I never thought I would be able to give you the heart you'd held for years."

Now I think on that conversation as I sit parked at the beach and I realised that for Jake there had never been, would never be, anyone else. Even if I had not spoken with him that day at this same beach, had not taken those few false flirting steps, he would have loved me irrevocably. Had Edward not left Jake would still be there in the background, wishing he could have that which the other guy had gotten first. But Edward did leave; he took with him my heart but oddly enough in its place was something else. It was a small piece of what had been, what could be, covered in the metaphorical stitches of Jake's love.

We were young, there was no guarantee that he would not have gotten over it someday, but deep down I knew that was not true; Jacob would love me until the day he died, whether I was his or not. But I am his, now. I am his and he is mine. Edward had saved me from James but Jake had saved me from myself, and when you got right down to it Jake had had the harder fight to win.

"Bella!" I looked up to see Quil standing at my window. "I saw the truck and had to come ask what the hell you're doing here. So, what the hell are you doing here?"

"Thinking." I replied.

"Well come on down with me. Jake's here."

"I know." I smiled. I had seen them all as they played around in the surf, shoving one another into the icy Pacific waters and throwing sand. Even now I could see Paul, one of the boys I knew less well than I did Quil, as he and Jake wrestled about who knew what sort of slight now.

I followed Quil down the rocks, letting him give me a hand; my clumsiness is known throughout La Push. At least if I fell and hurt myself here I could be certain no one would attack me should I bleed. As I stepped onto the cold sand I looked up and caught eyes with Jake, a sudden spark going off in me. I swear my heart skipped a beat as he grinned at me and rushed over to swing me around, pressing a hard kiss to my lips that softened, made me melt in his arms.

"Oh geez, get a room!" Jared yelled at us. I laughed and pulled away from Jake in time to see Jared defy his own words and plant a kiss on his girl Kim. I had never met the girl before, but Jake had told me that Jared had imprinted, the second one to do so; it was supposedly a rare thing and Jake had frowned throughout the entire telling of the imprinting myth and Sam's and Jared's descriptions of what it felt like.

What would it be like to imprint? Neither Sam nor Jared had been able to really tell what it felt like, only that they had known there was no other, never could be. Even Emily had been at a loss. She had told me that despite the need she'd felt she had been angry; Sam belonged to her cousin and was not hers to claim. She had run her fingers over the scars as she remembered, her eyes going soft as she recounted the moment she'd finally allowed it to take her over.

"What are you thinking about?" Jake's deep voice whispered into my ear and I gave a little shiver as I huddled closer to him.

"Jared and Kim, Sam and Emily…" I hesitated. "You and me."

If he was surprised by my lumping him in with those who had found their true mate he did not show it. Instead that familiar grin stretched across his face as he briefly crunched my shoulder into his chest with a squeeze of the arm he had around me.

"It's beautiful, isn't it; knowing that there is that one person out there who will do anything for you, love you unconditionally. Even when you fail them they are there to help you through the fall." He looked down at me, catching my eyes with his and again I felt that little skip in my chest. "It's the most impervious bond ever, one that cannot be broken even in death. Bella,"

"Don't, Jake." I shook my head. I was not sure what I was negating, but whatever it was I didn't want to hear it. He closed his mouth, his lips drawing into a tight line. He sighed, then, and placed a kiss on top of my head.

"Come on, let's go hang with the others."

~O~

It is difficult to really cuddle with Jake when we watch movies because of his size. Neither my couch nor his is nearly big enough for him to stretch out on, and even if he manages to find a comfortable position there is no room for me. We came to an arrangement where he sits and I lay down with my head in his lap, and this is how we were sitting now.

We were watching, ironically enough, I Was A Teenage Werewolf on some random movie channel we'd discovered. It was rather hilarious particularly because of Jake's double life.

It had just gotten to the part where Michael J. Fox, the actor playing this wolf boy, had learned about the proverbial skeleton in his father's closet when I closed my eyes and gave a small sigh. Jake's hand, which had been stroking my hair, stopped.

"Bella?"

"I'm okay." I said automatically. I was fine; I had just not been paying any particular attention to the movie, instead thinking incongruously of my future. Somewhere in the course of the movie I had begun thinking about my own prospective children. If I married Jake someday, if we had a baby, would that baby be born a wolf already, or would it require the advent of vampires nearby to change?

"Is something wrong?"

"No…" I responded slowly. "I was thinking."

"You seem to do a lot of that. Careful, you don't want your head to explode." A wry grin stretched across his face. "What about?"

"Children; more specifically, our children."

"Our children?" His voice sounded a little incredulous. "Why Bella, I didn't know we were at that stage yet."

"We aren't." I stuck my tongue out at him. "I meant, like, hypothetically if we should someday marry, would our kids be wolves from the start or would the vampires have to come back?"

"The way I see it is that they will have the potential to become a wolf, but unless the pack is threatened by a large influx of the leeches they will not be able to phase. The current pack is plenty big enough to protect us against the threat that was here recently."

"I see." I nodded.

"Don't do that." He gave me a little shove, forgetting his strength, and I tumbled to the floor in a flurry of arms and legs.

"Jacob Black!"

He looked contrite, I had to give him that. "I'm sorry, Bells, but you really can't be moving around and all like that when you're on my lap."

I felt my face grow hot as I realised what he was getting at. I mean, to my knowledge we were both virgins and I had no desires to change that at this particular moment or really even any time in the very near future. Yeah, I loved Jake, but I didn't think either of us was ready for that particular step.

Jake reached a hand down to help me up, but instead of letting go and allowing me to steady myself he purposely pulled me down so I fell again, this time onto his lap, and kissed me hard. His hand let go of mine and trailed up my arm as we settled into a comfortable position, stopping when he reached my face. His thumb brushed along my cheek and he wrapped his hand around the back of my neck as he deepened the kiss.

He shifted to allow the hand not around my neck free, running that one along my thigh. My response was purely primal and I threw my arms around him. Without thinking I nipped his lip and I felt him chuckle as he pulled back. He finished off with three quick little kisses before breaking away completely.

"You're not ready for where this is going, Bella." Once more his thumb brushed my cheek and he brought the hand on my leg up to stroke the other side. With his hands framing my face I realised just how strong he was, how much he'd shot up from the boy who had been shorter than me just last year. "I had to stop."

I couldn't speak. Jacob knew me in a way I barely knew myself, right down to the basics. He knew I didn't like the radio on in the car; he knew I liked to keep things neat; and he knew I was not set to lose that integral part of me yet. My body had ideas that my head did not condone, and even though it was clear that Jake did not have any inhibitions about those actions he understood that.

"Besides," he finished, "my couch is not exactly the right place, and our dads will be here at any time. That would be embarrassing."

"Charlie would kill you." I said sweetly.

"I know; that is another reason I stopped. I value my life." That amused grin I loved so much settled into place. "I love you Bells, and when you are ready I hope to be the one you choose; but I'm not going to push you. If I think it's getting out of hand I just want you to know, I will stop."

I studied him; the planes of his face, the way his skin looked brighter with the soft light from the TV flickering over it. His dark eyes and the way they watched me, the tiny creases at the corners. Without really thinking about it I allowed my hand to come up and stroke his cheekbones the way he had stroked mine, to let my fingers run through the short crop of hair. He was growing it long again and it was pulled back into a tail. I brushed the small hairs at the base of his neck lightly and then exerted pressure to bring his mouth down to mine again.

I had totally blocked out the rest of the room, focusing only on him and our kissing, so when he pulled away once more I blinked and looked at him enquiringly. Instead of answering me he looked over his shoulder and then moved away quickly. Rearranging our bodies so that instead of my being sprawled over his lap we were sitting next to each other I wondered what had gotten into him when the door opened and there was my dad pushing Billy's chair in. Now I understood.

"Hi dad!" I said brightly. Charlie gave me a scrutinising look.

"Hi Bella." His eyes shifted to Jake and then back to me. "Did you have a good afternoon?"

"Sure," I replied easily. "We're watching this silly movie about a teenage wolf."

Billy stifled a laugh and took over. "Come on Charlie, let's go put these in the kitchen. We can have it tonight for supper. Sue gave me her secret recipe."

"I don't cook…" Charlie began as he pushed Billy and the fish towards the other room.

"That was close." Jake muttered. He picked up my hand and twined his fingers through mine. "But didn't I tell you I'd look out for you?"

"Yes, and you did splendid." I giggled. "But next time, instead of tossing me around like a doll, just tell me."

"Will do!" He chuckled.

We could hear our dads making a racket in the kitchen and suddenly my father's voice called out in a worried tone. "Um, Bella? Could you come here…"

"I'm not sure I want to." I muttered and Jake snickered.

"Need back up?"

"Please," I stood up and began to move away. He followed me, reaching out to hold my hand as we joined our respective parental figures. I stepped into the kitchen and gasped; in the course of five minutes they had managed to make a mess of the fish, the stove, the table…every available surface.

"A little help?" Charlie looked sheepish.

"Dad, please tell me that you two weren't going to try Sue's recipe without supervision?" Jake looked horrified as he surveyed the room.

"Well…" Billy hesitated, trading a look with my father.

"I can fix it." I sighed. "Where's the recipe?"

Billy held up a damp, flour covered piece of paper. Charlie held out the frying pan. I took one sweeping glance at the room and sighed again.

"Thanks Bells." Charlie looked relieved.

"Out, both of you." I commanded. "You, stay here." I had to grab Jake's waistband as he tried to make his escape with the disaster twins. "I need help from someone who has a dash more coordination."

"In that case, maybe you should sit and let me do the cooking." Jake teased. That comment earned him a punch on the arm that hurt me more then it did him. He leaned in and kissed me softly, then snatched the frying pan I'd taken from Charlie and began to gather the needed ingredients.

I watched him work, a half-smile on my face. He barely glanced at the paper with Sue's recipe, but from what I could tell he still did everything correctly. I can only assume he had seen Sue do this before or asked her about it.

The most he would allow me to do was hand him things; it amused me to see him acting so domestic, a side of him I had not really experienced before. I knew he had to know some form of domesticity, taking care of Billy after the girls left and all, but it was one thing to know and another to see. It made me realise what a great husband he'd make someday, a thought that made me wonder about where I wanted this relationship to go.

I loved him, but did I love him enough for that, someday? I wish I knew all the answers.