"Picking Fights"

JPOV

I watched Alice and Rosalie drag my Robyn away from me for some girl time. I immediately felt the sting of her absence, despite the cold war we seemed to be brewing in the truck on the way here. But, I didn't have time to dwell on it for long before Emmett tackled me with some taunting remark meant to incite violence on my part.

It was easy to shake him—and the petty attempt to rile me up—off.

"Come on, man, you know better than that. You're just going to end up flat on your back with a battered rib cage. Why do you always insist on putting yourself through that?" I rolled my eyes at him in an effort to refuse the challenge, mostly in an effort to spare the recently planted saplings around the yard from the damage that would no doubt ensue.

"Well, maybe not. I've been practicing. I think I can take you." Emmett's confidence never seemed to dwindle no matter how many times I beat him in a friendly wrestling match. "Who wants to watch the show?" He offered to the others still milling about the yard.

"I'll watch!" Jacob quickly accepted the offer to become an audience of one.

Edward chuckled at the same moment.

"My money's on Jasper, he'd win even if we made him hold his hands behind his back the entire time." He folded his arms and stood a little further back than Jacob.

I understood the caution, especially after he had literally been dragged into one of our sparring matches when Emmett had the inane idea to tackle me into Edward in an effort to catch me off guard. To his credit, I had been surprised. To his detriment, Edward hadn't been very happy at the time.

"That's a good idea! Jazz, you aren't allowed to use your hands." Emmett declared as he retreated a safe distance away to mount his first attack against me.

I huffed out a dogged sigh and made a show of placing my hands behind my back and locking my wrists so I wouldn't be tempted to use them.

"It's your funeral." I mumbled as Emmett grew impatient and charged in my direction.

Considering the size advantage he had over me, it was in my best interest to dodge and wait for an opening to engage. So, I did. He tried charging at me three more times and every time, I simply stepped aside. Finally, I was ready to launch my own attack. The next time Emmett ran for me, I responded by kicking forward with one of my legs in a sweeping motion when I moved out of the way. I had hoped it would trip him. He stumbled a few times, but managed to stay standing. Still, I was able to take advantage of his momentary loss of coordination by forcefully bring him to the ground in a rough and tumble kind of way, using my shoulders and knees in a syncopated attack that was too quick for human eyes to follow. When the dust cleared, I was left as the victor, kneeling on Emmett's back, his face to the ground.

He sputtered a few times, baffled at how quickly it had all happened. I don't even think he had fully registered how he had lost before I allowed him to get to his feet again.

"No way I'm just going to take that. Double or nothing!" He cried out before launching another attack.

This time, he actually managed to get in a few good blows before I was once more able to take him down. We ended up tangled on the ground again, with my legs firmly wrapped around his neck. I applied just enough pressure to let him know that I would have been able to rip his head off with little effort.

"Satisfied yet?" I asked with a smirk before letting him go free.

Emmett looked down at his feet and scuffed his toe around in the dirt, clearly disappointed.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm done. But just for today. I am going to win one of these of times."

"If it means anything, you are improving technically, but you're still rushing things. You don't take time to study your opponent and pinpoint an opening before trying to force it to happen. Slow and steady. That's the key in battle and in life." Emmett rolled his eyes at my theory, but didn't say anything more. He had never been one for taking advice, but at least he had pretended to listen the one time all our lives had depended on it.

Before long, I smelled and heard a new presence joining me at my side. Alice not so gently pulled me away from the others, explaining in that sing-song voice of hers that it was my turn to be fitted for a tux for the ceremony.

"Look at you, you are covered in filth. Oh, and your pants are ripped, too. How charming. You really are much too old to be playing around in the dirt like a toddler, you know." She pretended to scold me, but her emotions were ones of amusement more than anything else. "I suppose that boys will be boys no matter how big they get."

Alice practically shoved me inside her canary yellow Porsche and we took off at top speed. Where we were going, I wasn't entirely sure, but I had learned long ago not to question Alice when she was on a mission. We hadn't been in the car for long when Alice suddenly pulled off the road into what appeared to be a school parking lot.

"It's summer time. The place is abandoned. We needed somewhere to go that we wouldn't be overheard and this place is as good as any." She answered my question before I could even ask it, as usual. "Now, spill. I thought things were going well between you and Robyn, but that girl is miserable. What happened?"

"Things are going well." I began optimistically. "She's making progress in remembering her human life, and the Robyn that she was then. Her art is fantastic, it's only gotten better since the last time you visited. You should really get her to let you take a look at her sketchpad while we're here. She could easily profit from it if she ever wanted to sell any of it. I've been consulting on a few cases with colleagues of mine. We've got a good life."

As positive as I tried to be, Alice was my best friend. She had always been able to see right through me.

"Liar." She wasn't angry that I hadn't been honest with her, but she wasn't happy about it, either. "You know as well as I do that she isn't really remembering anything, and she doesn't want to. You're a lot of things, Jasper, but blind isn't one of them. You have to know how unhappy she is. You need to drop it before you lose her. It's not too late yet, but it will be if you keep trying to force it on her. It's unhealthy at this point to keep making her memories your only priority—not just for her, for both of you."

"It's not my only priority." I argued. "I just think it's an essential part of her adjustment to this life. I wasn't lucky enough to have anyone there for me to help me remember, and as a result, I totally lost the man I was when I was human. The Major was born as a result of me forgetting my humanity."

"Your mind forged the Major to ensure you survived impossible circumstances. Robyn isn't like you were then. She hasn't forgotten her humanity. I don't remember my human life. Have I forgotten my humanity?"

"No, you're different. You don't eat humans."

"And Robyn does. So what? You do too." She pointed a righteous finger at me before I could dispute her. "And before you argue, I know you better than anyone. I know that many of the times when you have claimed to have 'slipped', it was a lie. You intentionally hunted humans several times even after switching to an animal diet. Why? I have no idea. But, I can only assume it was for the same reason that Robyn does. Human blood gives you greater control over your ability. It may be torture to feel their pain for all of the two seconds it takes you to eat them, but afterwards, you're able to turn it off. Human blood lets you turn off feeling everyone else's emotions for just an instant."

"That's not fair. I haven't hunted a human in decades. Not since way before Robyn was even born."

Alice slowly, sadly, shook her head.

"You're still lying to me. You hunted a human in Biloxi. You wore sunglasses for three days afterwards, but I know what you did. You may be more use to feeling emotions now, better able to handle them, you may not have needed to turn it off in a long time, but you needed to after Bella's birthday. You tried to resist it, you tried really hard, but as soon as we were away from the others, you hunted. Do not condemn Robyn for something that you yourself have done. That isn't fair to her, and it isn't fair to you."

I turned my head away in shame and stayed quiet for several long, tense minutes.

"Robyn's a better person than I am. I want her to succeed where I failed."

"She's not perfect. No one is. She isn't the same Robyn that she was when she was human. None of us are the person we were when we were human. And you wouldn't want it to be that way. You knew Bella as a human. Would you really want that same Bella back? She's better like this. Stronger, more confident, less awkward. She is so much less cringe worthy as a vampire. You know what I'm talking about. This is the Robyn that was always meant to be. Instead of always trying to find the human Robyn, get to know the vampire Robyn. Vampire Robyn is so much better. I promise she is, you just have to give her a chance instead of trying to force her humanity back on her."

"Sometimes I think that human Jasper was a better man than me. If I could get that back, I would. I don't want Robyn to have those same regrets."

"Now you're starting to sound like Rosalie. Vampire Jasper is a good man. Vampire Robyn wants vampire Jasper. Vampire Jasper needs to let vampire Robyn have him. She is your mate. You love her. Now accept her and show her just how deep that love runs."

"Alice, I . . ." but before I could finish my thought we both heard the tiniest of noises in the bushes. "Stay here!"

I leaped out of the car and chased after the noise, but whatever it had been was gone now. I sniffed the air and for a second I thought I could smell another vampire, but the scent faded away as quickly as it had come. I frowned in thought as I tried to pick up the trail again, but failed miserably.

"It's nothing." I lied to Alice when I returned to the car a short moment later. "An animal, probably a squirrel."

She opened her mouth to say more, but I cut her off with a sharp shake of my head.

"No more. This conversation is over." I said, overly authoritative. "I will kindly ask you to butt out and mind your own business in the future. What's between me and Robyn stays between me and Robyn. I don't need you interfering in my relationship on top of everything else. Now, are you taking us back to the house or am I running back? You know my tux sizes, you don't need me for a fitting, and I would like to visit with the rest of my family now."

I knew that I had offended Alice. She was right—I wasn't blind. And I knew that she was only trying to help, even if she was putting her nose where it didn't belong. She cared deeply for me and Robyn and only wanted us to be happy together. But, it was easier for me to shut her down than to admit that she might have been right. Maybe, I was wrong to focus so much on a version of Robyn that may not ever return. Maybe, I was lying to myself about the reasons I hunted. Maybe, I was holding Robyn to too high of a standard. Maybe, I would lose her if things didn't change.

At the moment, I wasn't capable of admitting any of these, not to her, and especially not to myself. Instead, I turned my mind to a problem I knew I could solve. I needed to get back to the house and call Peter. If I was right about the disappearing scent in the bushes then we were about to have a very, very big problem on our hands. I refused to allow anything to ruin Nessie's wedding.

The tension between me and Alice on the short ride back to the house reminded me so starkly of the tension between me and Robyn. What was wrong with me lately? Why couldn't I seem to talk to anyone anymore? The two women who were the most important people in my life were the two people that I always seemed to hurt the most. I knew that I would have to apologize to both of them eventually.

But, right now, the most important thing was keeping them safe, and that meant making a call to Peter. If he and Charlotte checked out the area and didn't find anything, I would feel a lot better. I couldn't risk asking anyone else to do it. It would just cause wide spread panic that wasn't needed right now. I could ask Sarah to investigate, but she'd tell Seth and Seth would tell Jacob. Emmett and Rosalie might be able to handle it, but they were too close to the rest of the Cullens and wouldn't be able to keep it to themselves for long.

I almost forgot about Edward as I mused over the situation. If he read anything in my thoughts, then he would naturally alert everyone else and again, there would be pandemonium. I quickly started thinking about what it would be like to be with Robyn. To see her naked, to be intimate with her. I let those images play over and over in my head until I was sure that Edward had read enough of my mind to know that he needed to keep out.

Once back at the house, I locked myself in the room that had been mine every time I visited and made the call to my Captain.

"It's probably nothing Peter, but I would feel more comfortable if you and Charlotte took a look. The way that scent disappeared was just too similar to the way it disappeared in Texas. If the General's here, that means she isn't far behind. Just sniff around, check out the local news for reports of gang activity. They might speculate that it's similar to the activity from a few years ago."

"Yes, Sir, Major. We'll let you know we find." Peter hung up after just a minute or two, just long enough to get all the details he would need to investigate the noise at the school.

My next call would be of a more serious nature. I couldn't come all this way and not follow up with one of my long-term patients, one who had managed to make an impact on my life that not many patients did. Gabriel Waters. He was a product of the foster system. His foster brother had gotten him involved in a gang and he ended up being shot for his efforts. I had sent him to stay with the Cullens while he recovered and once he was healed, he had moved to Portland.

Gabriel's cell phone went straight to voicemail which wasn't too unusual if he was at work. I left a brief message for him to give me a call when he could, but couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong. I mused it over for a few minutes before deciding to call the construction company where he worked. That call sent a chill over my body in a way that very few things did.

"Are you sure he isn't there? Maybe at a different job site?" I asked the foreman one more time.

"Doc, what did I just say? He ain't here. This is the only job site there is. He didn't show up this morning. That's all know. The office tried his cell. He didn't answer. The kid's gone AWOL. Do me a favor though. If you talk to him before I do, tell him he's fired. You only get one chance in this line of business. And his no show today means he's blown it."

I hung up with the foreman and went downstairs to join the rest of the family in the living room. Out of habit, I was drawn to Robyn's side. In spite of the tension between us, I needed to be close to her, to smell her, to feel her. I could tell she felt the same way from the way her hand twitched, from the longing that flooded her emotions. But, instead of reaching out, she turned away. She wouldn't even look at me, not that I could blame her.

"Everything ok, son?" Carlisle asked me with a concerned glance.

"Fine." I lied. "Peter and Charlotte just wanted to know if they were invited to the wedding too."

I forced a jovial smile on my face.

"Of course they're invited!" Renesmee chimed into the conversation. "I can't believe I forgot to send them a formal save the date! I tried so hard to get everyone on the list. Garrett, Kate, Tanya, Eleazer, Carmen, of course. The Amazons. The Irish. The Egyptians. Even Alistair made the list. I'm waiting until after the wedding and then I'll send the newspaper notice to the Volturi as a courtesy. I'll tell them I wanted to keep it really small. Jacob and I did agree though that one wolf gets to come for every vampire. That means all the Quileute shifters, plus a small group of shifters from a tribe in Canada will be here."

"Why so many people, Nessie? Is that really wise? Wouldn't it be safer to keep it to the immediate family on both sides?" The question came from Seth.

He was really starting to sound smart beyond his years. I blamed Sarah for that.

"They were all there for me when I needed them. They were all willing to stand up as a witness for me. For us. I want to reward them for that by letting them share in my joy now. Some of them have already sent back regret cards accompanied by a handsome check. But I at least had to give them the option of attending if they wanted to." Nessie explained in the same innocent, heart-felt way she always spoke. "We can get along just fine together if we put our minds to it."

She gently placed her hand on Seth's, and even without seeing for myself, I knew she was showing him pictures of times she remembered when vampires and wolves got along with each other. When large numbers of vampires were able to tolerate being together without competing for territory.

"See. That's all the proof needed. Everything will be fine. Better than fine. It'll be perfect."

I wanted to believe that, but I wasn't sure I could.