A/N: Thanks so much to LittleLea05 for being my beta!!! :-)

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight, nor any of the characters... But they own me.

All an Accident

Chapter Two

EmPOV

Everything hurt. It didn't matter how many drugs they pumped into me, the pain was excruciating. I felt weak and useless for the first time in my life. I had no control over anything, and I cried, it hurt so bad. I fucking cried. I hated my life.

What would this mean? For the team? For my future? For… everything? I couldn't skate on a broken femur. What if I could never skate again? What would I do then?

I was severely fucked.

My dad finally made it to the hospital. He looked… well… doctor-like. I'd seen that look on his face before, during other injuries, other accidents. But none had been this bad, and I had known it before he'd shown up, but the feeling only intensified when he came. He was a doctor. He knew this shit.

He knew I was in deep shit.

I would graduate in less than a year with a degree of business, if this didn't affect going to classes and getting things done. But what would I do then?

With nothing to do but contemplate life and sleep, I was in a deep depression by the next day, and the meds certainly didn't help my mood. The morphine gave me intense, realistic dreams, which fucked with my head and scared the shit out of me. I'd wake up, sweaty, panting, and heart racing. Too bad they weren't THAT kind of dream.

On the fourth day, they told me I was going to be able to go home. I was rejoicing. All the Jell-O, blank white walls, and terrible TV were rubbing me raw, and I was dying to get home.

My mom gave me a huge grin of encouragement, and her excitement couldn't help but make me feel better. "Emmett, sweetie, I'm really sorry, but I won't be able to stay for much longer to care for you. Your dad and I have to get home to work, and there's no way for you to come home with us. I hate it. I want to be with you. You're my baby boy."

I still had it in me to roll my eyes.

"Sweetheart, Bella Swan is going to move in to your apartment and take care of you for awhile."

I stared at her blankly. "Swan? My place? Why?"

"Honey, you can't take care of yourself, and she will be able to help you with things. She lives in town, you know that. And I know how you two are… but she's agreed to this, and I need you to be helpful and reasonable and nice about it. It's for your own good."

"Ma, don't tell me what's for my own good. It's really frustrating. I don't want Swan around."

"I really don't understand your hostility, Emmett… but in any case, it doesn't matter. I know you're 21 son, but this is truly and honestly final. Bella will come stay with you, and you will be grateful."

The medicines had taken all of the fight out of me. No matter what, I was stuck. Swan was going to stay with me. In MY place. Fucking up MY stuff. Getting in MY life, where she had no place.

Fuck. My. Life.

BPOV

I hate my life. Why did I have to feel guilty? Why did I have to feel even one iota of pity and guilt? I'm such a fucking idiot. I don't WANT to be with Emmett for any amount of time. And now I have to live with him.

There was no way I could get Edward to understand this. He didn't know how much I hated Emmett, mainly because I'd never discussed it with him. Actually, Edward and I hardly ever talk anymore. After all, it's hard to have deep conversations when the guy's deep inside you. I didn't mind one bit, either.

Edward and I weren't dating officially. I certainly wouldn't call him my boyfriend. What we had, what we did together was indefinable. I wasn't ready for more, and he never asked for it. We were just… enjoying each other, if you will.

Still, Edward had a jealous streak that liked to creep up whenever I'd mention my ex, Jacob, the only boyfriend I'd ever had, or any other man I might happen to be in acquaintance with. It was hypocritical, since I knew he at least flirted with other women, including Alice, my roommate, but it existed nevertheless. Edward was old fashioned to a fault, and he wouldn't tolerate me seeing other men even if we had no standing agreement on our relationship was defined.

I ignored it most of the time. After all, it was mostly sex. And boy, was the sex good.

So I knew that Edward wouldn't be happy about me living with a guy that wasn't him. I would just have to explain to him that Emmett was a pig I'd no sooner touch than sleep with the pope.

The afternoon I was moving into Emmett's apartment, I called him to tell him the simply wonderful news.

And as predicted, he hit the roof.

"Bella, I cannot tolerate you living with him. I don't care how much you say you hate him, he's still a man, and I know how we think!"

I scoffed. "The man is going to be under heavy drugs for the next few weeks, Edward. I'm sure even if he wanted to, and even if I let him, which I wouldn't, there's no way he could do it! So please don't worry. He's a jerk, but he wouldn't try anything on me. He hates me as much as I hate him. You know you're the only man I touch."

Edward did not sound appeased, but he mumbled his agreement and hung up a few minutes later. Not that I needed his agreement. I'd move in with Emmett in any case. Edward did not control me, as much as he'd probably love to.

Although, he does control me in the bedroom… Focus, Bella.

I kept Esme and Renee's sad faces in my mind to keep my head focused on the task at hand. I couldn't let them down.

I spent the rest of the afternoon packing. Emmett was coming home tonight, and I had to be ready. I packed enough for two weeks, though I knew I'd be there for longer. Too long.

At 5 o'clock, an hour or so before Esme would drive Emmett home, I pulled up in front of Emmett's apartment building. It looked cheap but clean, at least on the outside. 17A was easy enough to find, and was thankful it was on the ground floor. I knew Esme, Carlisle and I would've had a hard time lugging Emmett's giant and fragile body up the second floor if we'd had to.

I pulled into the designated space that his now totaled Jeep used to occupy, and took a deep, cleansing breath. I didn't have a job at the moment, since school was just around the corner, so I didn't have arrange anything, and I had no real other obligations beyond seeing Edward and my friends.

I was trapped here.

I fought a feeling of claustrophobia, and pulled a silver key out of my pocket. The key to Emmett's place. Esme had given it to me the day before when she stopped by to thank me for agreeing to help her son.

I of course had melted and no matter my reservations, I was going to pull through this no matter what, even if it killed me. Esme was practically my second mother, and I couldn't bear to let her down.

Grabbing my suitcase, and dragging it down the brick path to his front door, I let myself in and gasped slightly.

The place was a sty. Not dirty, but messy. I mean, there wasn't food or beer cans on the floor, but just things everywhere. I could see he had limited space, but it didn't excuse why he had a pair of shorts flung across the back of the couch.

I wrinkled my nose in distaste when I walked in the kitchen and saw cereal boxes and a loaf of bread just sitting there, though to my distinct relief, they were closed and looked fresh. No, Emmett wasn't dirty or disgusting. He was merely untidy, and I had to fix that. I couldn't live with clothes on the floor. I was clumsy enough without the help.

An examination of the rest of the house found it to be equally chaotic. I found the small bedroom, which was mostly filled with a giant bed. He had a hockey stick attached to the wall above the bed and a giant flat screen TV on the opposite wall. I was surprised to see his bed neatly made.

Must entertain here a lot, I thought to myself when I noted more pillows than necessary for one man on the bed, and snorted when I saw satin sheets on the bed.

Suddenly, I had an alarming thought. Where in the hell was I going to sleep? Emmett was clearly going to need the bed, and I wasn't about to share it with him.

I felt slightly nauseous when I thought about sleeping on Emmett's couch. If he left his pants down there, what else was he inclined to leave there? Who and what it had been touching was less than appealing thought, and I decided right then and there to buy a bucket of Lysol and Febreze to douse it with before I even so much as sat on the thing.

I set straight away to changing the sheets on his bed, using plain white cotton ones, preparing it for his arrival. He'd be living on this bed for the next few weeks or longer, and he had to be comfortable. The multiple pillows would come in handy here.

Then I went to picking up the clothes off the floor so they wouldn't trip when they brought Emmett in. Each article went into a big laundry basket, because I sure as hell wasn't going to take the time to determine if they were clean or not.

By the time Esme and Carlisle pulled up close to the apartment door, the living room was basically clean… as good as it was going to get until I got the chance to disinfect later. Any open surface was first up… I wasn't about to touch the countertops or horizontal surfaces in this apartment until I'd had a Clorox wipe to it.

Everything I'd ever heard about Emmett Cullen told me he was a man whore. And I believed it.

The door rattled, and Esme came rushing through, carrying bags of things from the hospital under her arm.

"Bella, sweetheart, I'm so glad you're here!" Esme gushed, pulling me into a tight hug once she'd dumped the stuff on Emmett's couch, the same one I'd just cleaned off. "Thank you so much," she said, and I could already hear the tears in her voice.

"Esme, don't cry!" I said, trying to make it stop, but my words just made it worse. Esme was well known for her ability to cry at the drop of a hat. Sometimes it drove Renee crazy, but I just knew Esme had a good heart and great empathy for others.

"I'm sorry, Bella, I'm just so emotional right now. I'm sure you understand…"

"Of course I do," I assured her, and reached over to hand her a Kleenex, which she gratefully accepted.

"I'm going to take good care of him, Esme, don't worry."

"I know you will, sweetheart." She smoothed my hair, just like my mother, and gave me a reassuring smile. "I hope that you guys can get along just for awhile."

"We'll try," I said, smiling, though I knew myself the promise was fragile at best.

Twenty minutes later, Emmett was tucked safely into bed, completely knocked out with medications, and Carlisle and Esme were talking quietly in the kitchen. I was trying to arrange my sleeping area for later. I wouldn't have time to clean the couch until tomorrow, so I doubled up on sheets and blankets in the meantime.

The entire time, I tried very hard to keep images of Emmett out of my head.

Though we went to the same school, and were practically siblings (though unwilling and feuding ones), I hadn't actually seen him in several years, since freshman year of college. I went out of my way to avoid him in general, even when we were in high school.

And the thoughts that were running through my head were anything but sisterly to him.

His body was huge, just like I remembered, but broken. I'd never seen him look so weak. And his face, which was still healing from cuts and bruises, had never looked so vulnerable or beautiful.

Emmett had barely broken consciousness to be wheeled to his bed before he was asleep in bed again. Seeing him, so big and unable to use his strength, was disconcerting.

I tried to ignore his handsome face and broken body. Both unnerved me more than I cared to admit.

"Bella, we're going to call for some dinner, what would you prefer?" Esme suddenly asked, phonebook in hand.

"I'm fine with whatever you'd like, Esme."

She frowned at me. "That's not helpful, Bella! What do you want?"

"Chinese sounds good," I offered.

I stretched out on my new "bed", while Carlisle took a stool from the kitchen, and Esme sat in a worn out old armchair. All of Emmett's furniture looked like it had come straight from the side of the road.

Esme, too, didn't like the look of the apartment.

"He never really did know how to take care of himself," she sighed, assessing Emmett's "artwork", which consisted of posters of Wayne Gretzky and a red Ferrari. She took in the threadbare couch, and tears filled her eyes.

"He's so independent," she said, looking as though she was about to cry at any moment. "This is going to be so hard on him, being waited on."

Great, I thought. A difficult patient.

She seemed to sense my apprehension, and reached her hand out to soothe mine.

"I'm sure he'll be good for you, Bella. And if he isn't… call me. I'll straighten him out. I raised him to be a gentleman."

I held back my sarcastic snort.

Carlisle had been quiet nearly the entire time he had gotten here. From the wrinkles in his forehead, I could tell he was worried.

"Bella, recovery isn't going to be easy… both physically and emotionally," he finally said. "Actually, physically is going to be a lot easier. Not that mending a broken femur is easy… but Emmett is a strong young man. He's never had to worry about his health before, and now suddenly his career is on the line. His entire future is at stake."

I could hear the fear in Carlisle's voice clearly, and Esme's expression matched perfectly.

"I understand."

"Good," Carlisle said, with a nod of his head, and went back to his lo mein.

The rest of the meal went quietly. Esme and Carlisle were tense, despite their shows to the contrary.

Carlisle spent over an hour explaining the process of healing, and the things I'd need to do to make Emmett as comfortable as possible. Esme made sure to add all of the things he liked, as far as movies and food went.

By ten at night, I was emotionally exhausted. I fell asleep on the couch without so much as brushing my teeth. I have no idea where Carlisle and Esme slept.

The next morning, Esme woke me before the sun was up.

"Bella, we have to go now." Her face was full of worry and regret. "I hate doing this to you, I really do. I'm his mother, I should be able to-" and she burst into tears again.

"Esme, it's OK," I soothed, hugging her and this time I was the one to smooth out her hair.

"I'll call you every day," she promised. "You're going to get sick of me, I'll call so much." She chuckled, but it came out closer to a sob.

"I'll miss you, Esme."

"I'll come back in a week or so. I'll be here as often as I can. Carlisle may not be able to, what with the hospital's demands, but I'll do my best."

"I'll see you then," I told her. "We'll be fine here."

"I wrote a list of instructions, and procedures to help him. I hope that it will be enough, but if it isn't, I've left you all of my numbers, and Esme's as well. Call any time," Carlisle said, emerging from the bathroom.

"I will," I promised.

Several hugs, and an emotional family scene in Emmett's bedroom later, they met me again at the front door, and I waved them goodbye as they drove to the airport.

I collapsed back on the bed, exhausted and hating the lumpy couch cushions.

"Bella?" Emmett called weakly, minutes after I'd gotten comfortable.

And so it begins…