Chapter 3: She's Having WHOSE Baby?

WARNING: Without spoiling you for what's to come, please remember that the characters involved have been handed a very big surprise and aren't thinking clearly. What comes out of their mouths may be a little less than sensitive and in no way reflect my own opinions on the matter. Just sayin.

Disclaimer: I donut own them. Stephenie does, and I'm so glad she shared them with us.

Friday

Bella was exhausted. Normally, she loved her job. All the darting back and forth, the chaos - she actually thrived on it.

It wasn't something anyone could have predicted. She had always been constant, seldom changing. Any decision she made about her life took careful consideration, and once she was on a path, it was hard to steer her off course.

But that was what made her good at her job. She was determined to see the production through no matter the obstacle.

Of course, that week was testing that theory something fierce. Despite the fact that she was asleep by no later than eight in the evening the last week or so, she was dead on her feet every day.

Jasper whistled when she entered his office sometime around the vicinity of lunch. "You look lousy, babe," he said plainly. "Aren't you supposed to be glowing?"

Bella chuffed as she laid on his couch. "Maybe this is my punishment for not doing things the normal way," she mumbled, throwing an arm over her eyes. "I get the morning sickness and this god-awful heartburn, but no nice, pink glow."

Chuckling sympathetically, Jasper tilted his head, studying Bella. "You're a bit grumpy today," he noted, continuing his flair for stating the obvious.

"I'm pregnant. Aren't mood swings a part of the whole package? Technically I can murder someone and get away with it, right?" she grumbled.

"Anyone specifically?" Jasper asked, careful to keep the amusement out of his voice.

Bella sighed. "'S'not Victoria's fault that my nose is as sensitive as my tits lately. Her perfume was just...overwhelming. I thought I was going to faint for a second."

"First of all," Jasper said, scoffing, "your boss is a she-devil and I wouldn't put it past her to have done it on purpose. Secondly, the word for her perfume is not overwhelming...it's cheap.

"Well, maybe the glowing comes later," Jasper allowed after Bella lifted her arm to glare at him. Then he brightened and sat at his desk, typing away. "We can google it!"

Bella just waved noncommittally as he searched. As long as it didn't require her to move, she didn't really care what he did at the moment. Jasper pursed his lips worriedly, knowing his friend must be feeling particularly lousy if she wasn't even attempting to humor him.

He found a website and started to read. Then he started to cackle because the text on this site was utterly ridiculous.

"You're eight weeks along, right?"

"Six weeks," she corrected without opening her eyes. Bella absolutely refused to accept the concept of pregnancy math. Most official sources counted a pregnancy as beginning two weeks prior to conception. Bella had cried bullshit on that one from the beginning. She had, she reminded him more than once, literally scheduled her conception date. She knew exactly when it was and no amount of fuzzy math was going to convince her otherwise.

So Jasper just rolled his eyes and clicked on the eight week button with out telling her. Almost instantly, he began to chortle again.

Hoping to amuse her, he starts reading from the website. Apparently, her baby was about 'the size of the rock in Eva Longoria's engagement ring, and is about as heavy as the check Tony Parker wrote to pay for it.' Which Jasper said was bullshit as he had seen Eva Longoria's ring and it wasn't that much bigger than a tic-tac - which is what the website said the baby's size had been last week.

He told her that the baby's heart rate was about 150 beats per minute. Apparently, that was more than twice her resting heart rate even when staring at Brad Pitt.

"Brad Pitt is pretty good looking," Jasper said, "but he doesn't make my heart race. Now if they had said Johnny Depp...oh, or new Captain Kirk."

"Chris Pine," Bella supplied, and Jasper could see her lips were curving up at his constant monologue. "Tell me more," she requested quietly.

He went on to tell her that webbed fingers and toes have begun to develop, as well as eyelids, ears, nose and an upper-lip.

Bella listened with more rapt interest than she let on. Later that night, when she was sitting alone on her couch, she allowed herself to imagine the little alien growing inside her. Jasper had shown her the images he'd looked up. It was alien and tadpoleish at this point. Still, her best friend's words had painted a picture she couldn't shake.

Though she had been thinking about this for months now, had worked so hard to get pregnant, and had been suffering morning sickness and all the other lovely symptoms of pregnancy for weeks now, it only hit her then that there was a living being inside of her. More than that, it was her child.

A fierce feeling of awe and enormity spread over her. It was pure joy and jolting fear all at once. Her uterus, Jasper had informed her, was about the size of an orange. She wasn't showing yet, but she could feel it if she pressed down over her abdomen.

She was going to be somebody's mother.

Bella didn't even realize she was crying until she had to sniffle. Swiping at her tears, Bella was distracted from her revelation by her phone ringing. She sniffled again, frowning at the phone when the number came up as Dr. Snow's office. Dr. Snow was the fertility clinic doctor.

Instantly, Bella felt a tight, uncomfortable feeling at her chest. What could he possibly want. Instinctively, her hand went back to her stomach, curling protectively over the imperceptible bump that was her child. "Hello?"

"This is Dr. Snow's office. It's of great importance that you come into speak to us as soon as possible."

~0~

Sunday

Edward hummed quietly to himself as he flipped the pancakes in the griddle. He poked at them with the spatula, grinning when they met his standards of edible perfection. They were perfectly rounded and crisped to that delicious shade of brown with bubbly, off-white edges.

A tiny hand reached over, snatching one from the plate beside the stove and Edward turned to cluck at the offender. "Alice, it isn't breakfast time yet."

"Pfft. I'm pregnant. Anytime I can eat breakfast is breakfast time." His sister's girl waggled her eyebrows playfully, chewing her prize daintily. She quirked her head to the side curiously. "What's in this pancake?"

"Those are ginger cakes," Edward explained. "Rosalie said you've been nauseous. They're supposed to help."

Alice gave him a slightly guilty look over her treat. She looked over her shoulder and then leaned in conspiratorially, "Actually, the morning sickness isn't that bad for me. I just let Rose think it's worse than it is because she gets all cute trying to take care of me."

"Brat," Edward accused.

Alice looked more proud than anything. "Just don't tell her," she commanded, snatching a piece of bacon from another plate by the stove.

"Oh, I won't," another voice came from the entrance to the kitchen. Alice jumped, whirling to find Carlisle leaning in the doorway looking highly amused. "That's actually a little classic. And devious. Very devious," he admonished, drawing Alice under his arm and kissing her forehead.

"Devious is my middle name," Alice laughed, hugging Carlisle before wandering to the refrigerator in search of juice.

Esme and Rosalie made it downstairs a few minutes later. Morning kisses and hugs were distributed, and Rosalie sat down next to Alice. "How are you feeling today, babe?"

"Alright," Alice said slowly, as if she wasn't quite sure yet- as if she might have been the teeniest bit queasy. Edward was glad he had his back turned so Rosalie missed his eyeroll. "Edward made me ginger cakes. They're really good actually."

"Leave it to you to know a recipe like that," Rosalie grinned as Edward took his seat. "What, did you review some specialty restaurant that caters to the knocked up?"

"It's not a complicated recipe, Rosalie - just pancake batter plus a little ground ginger," Edward said, giving her a somewhat condescending look. "Besides, if a restaurant like that existed - which it doesn't because, let's be honest, pregnant women's cravings would cover way too wide of a range - why would they send me to review something like that? I don't know if noticed, but I can't get knocked up."

"My cravings aren't that bad," Alice grumbled.

"You're not in your second trimester," Esme joined in the conversation, smiling at her children. "Remember Tanya? She claimed to crave lobster tail all the time." She looked thoughtful. "I think she was faking that particular craving though..."

Alice's eyebrows shot up, a scheming look coming over her face and Carlisle had to smoother a smile. "How devious," he said, looking over at Alice with one raised eyebrow. She flushed red at being caught plotting, but luckily for her, a phone ringing in the distance distracted Rosalie, preventing her from seeing the exchange between her father and her lover.

"That's your phone," she murmured to Alice, recognizing the ring tone. "I'll go get it."

As soon as Rosalie had run off, Alice sat back in her chair, grinning smugly at Carlisle and Edward over her glass of orange juice.

The lighthearted atmosphere was broken as Rosalie came back into the kitchen with a worried expression on her face. "I don't understand. Is something wrong?" She listened for a moment, then looked at Alice and hit the mute button on the phone. "It's Dr. Snow's office," she said to Alice, a hard edge in her voice. "They want to see us right away tomorrow."

~0~

Monday

Oddly, it was Jasper who was pacing as he waited with Bella in a cushy office. The nameplates said that the office belonged to a Dr. Parenti. All of it was making Jasper very nervous.

Bella just felt sick to her stomach - but that wasn't new. She saved her panicking for whenever Dr. Snow would finally arrive.

"Jasper," Bella complained when she couldn't take her friend's nervous energy anymore, "You're making me dizzy."

"I'm sorry, sugar," he apologized, sitting down instantly. "But how can you be so calm?"

She sighed. "Dr. Snow is a fertility specialist. If there was anything wrong with my pregnancy it wouldn't be him calling, it would be my normal doctor. So whatever it is... I can handle it, I'm sure." She ran her hands over her still-flat stomach. "As long as the baby is okay. That's all that matters."

Just then, they hear the muffled sound of a woman shouting near by. Whoever she was she sounded pissed. For some reason that Bella couldn't figure, the sound was vaguely familiar. She and Jasper looked at each other, curious as to what was going on. Thankfully, or perhaps regrettably, they did not have to wait long to find out.

Dr. Snow, speaking slowly and extremely apologetically, explained that on the day Bella had been inseminated, there had been another young woman in the clinic. He said the same nurse collected both semen samples. Because the clinic often dealt with anonymous donors, the samples only held numbers and not the man's name. It was only when she was catching up with paperwork, over a week later, that the nurse - a Lauren Mallory - had realized that she'd switched the samples accidentally. It had taken her all these weeks to summon the courage to admit her mistake.

"I don't..." Bella stumbled, feeling lightheaded. "But...who..."

She couldn't seem to formulate the words. She felt a sense of violation, knowing that her baby was part her and part some stranger. Anger and horror hit her in equally strong intervals.

"The...donor is actually here. He and the other patient, and her partner, would like to meet with you, if you're amenable," Dr. Snow said.

"The other donor," Jasper began, glaring at the doctor as he rubbed Bella's shoulders soothingly, "He have kinda reddish hair? Trying to help his sister's partner?"

Dr. Snow nodded, a gleam of hope in his eyes. "Do you know each other?"

"No," Jasper snapped. When he went to Bella's side to look her in the eye, his tone was a lot more gentle. "I talked to him, I think, when we were waiting. He's... gorgeous, actually Bella. And a really nice guy."

"A really nice guy?" Bella repeated, numbly. Then, abruptly, she was furious. "A really nice guy? You think I should be okay with this because he's a nice guy?"

"Shh," Jasper placated, rubbing her hands in between both of his. "Baby, I don't know what to say here, okay? I don't know what you want to do but..." he looked up at the doctor hesitantly, "I do want to meet the ... you know. Whoever got my..." he gestured helplessly.

"Of course," Dr. Snow nodded, "I can take you to them right away." He looked up at Bella then, "Miss Swan?"

Bella breathed deeply, trying to reel in her raging emotions. "Is Nurse Mallory available to speak to?" she asked darkly.

At that, Dr. Snow hesitated. "She's been let go, of course. Any information we can give to you will be provided-"

Bella waved her hand cutting him off. "I need to think about that but yes, I want to meet the others."

"Of course," Dr. Snow said again. "Right this way."

He lead them down the hallway to his office which was quite a bit larger than Dr. Parenti's had been.

The first thing Bella saw was a shock of gorgeous, bronze colored bed head attached to face that would have made Aphrodite herself weep out of pure jealousy. Oh yeah, if this guy had starred in a major Greek myth, he would have been completely fucked over by the gods. Bella had heard the term dumb struck before, but it had never applied directly to her.

She might have felt like an idiot but it seemed he was similarly frozen.

The moment was broken by a shrill shout. "You have got to be kidding. You?"

Bella's head snapped to the side, her eyes going wide as she finally saw the other two people in the room. One was a very little, very pretty young woman with jet black hair. She was tucked under the arm of the more statuesque woman - perhaps the only person who could have matched the bronze-haired man in beauty. Unfortunately, unlike the demi-god, Bella knew very well who the blonde was. Her mouth must have dropped straight to the floor.

"Rosalie Hale?" Jasper asked, incredulously. Then he looked back and forth between Rosalie and Alice, totally confused. "But... Wow, okay, I didn't see that coming."

"Rose?" the bronze-haired man asked. "Do you know them?"

"Know them? Could this day get any worse?" she cried dramatically.

"Rose!" the little raven-haired woman admonished. She looked very stressed but she didn't think that called for Rosalie being that insulting to the other party.

"That," she seethed, pointing at Bella, "Is Isabella Swan."

Recognition instantly crossed the others' faces. The woman looked surprised. The man turned to glower at Bella automatically.

Before Bella could jump into the fray, Jasper stepped forward again. "This is hardly the time or the place for that discussion," he said with an air of finality. "It seems to me there are many more important things at hand." With that he looked over at the petite woman and put on an apologetic smile. "I'm Jasper Whitlock."

"Alice Hale," she replied back, taking the hand he offered and shaking it.

"I didn't realize Rosalie was married," he said politely.

"No one knows that," Rosalie snapped. "And I'd prefer to keep it that way for the time being."

Jasper looked over at Rosalie, exasperated. "Will you calm down? Like I said, there are more important things to talk about besides your love life."

"It's not you I'm worried about," Rosalie spat back, crossing her arms and glaring at Bella again.

To Bella's absolute horror, as she opened her mouth to defend herself, again, she felt a rush of dizziness hit her right at that moment and she swayed on her feet. The bronze haired man stepped forward, steadying her.

A light, painless buzz of energy flew between them as he guided her into a chair, and they both stared at each other, hard expressions melting for just a second.

"Edward!" Rosalie hissed.

"What?" he said defensively, stepping away from Bella quickly. "Rose, Jesus, I didn't want her to fall."

"That's just great," His sister continued to scowl. "Sure, be nice to her after-"

Edward's anger flared. "I don't know what you want from me," he all but bellowed at his sister. "Look, Rose, you're the only one in this clusterfuck who doesn't have any...biological component at stake. I think you need to back off."

The minute he realized what he'd said, Edward's eyes went wide. "I didn't mean-" he started, but Rosalie cut him off.

"No. Whatever. I'm out of here. I'll let all of you with a real, biological, say in the matter talk," she hissed scathingly.

"Rose!" Alice called, but it was too late. Rosalie was up and out the door before anyone could stop her. "Shit," she cursed, bowing her head as tears flooded over.

Edward sighed. "I'm sorry, Alice. I really didn't mean it. I'll go get her."

"No," Alice said forcefully. "Look, none of us knows what to say or do right now. She needs a minute and we all need to talk." She straightened up again, wiping furiously at her tears. Bella got the sense that Alice didn't like the raging pregnancy mood-swings any more than she did.

"Are you feeling alright, Bella?" Jasper asked quietly, squatting beside her chair.

Bella had to laugh. "No. But I'm not going to faint if that's what you're asking."

"Fair enough," Jasper said grimly. He stood and pointed to himself. "Jasper Whitlock." He pointed to Bella, "Bella Swan." To Alice. "Alice Hale, and," he pointed to Edward raising a questioning eyebrow.

"Edward Cullen," Edward supplied, leaning against the wall and crossing his arms.

Jasper nodded and then looked at Dr. Snow who was sitting behind his desk and trying desperately not to wring his hands at all the chaos. "Talk to us, Doctor. Where do we go from here?"

"Well," Dr. Snow began, clearing his throat. "Of course, you'll find that the fees you paid have already been returned to the accounts they came from." He made his voice low and unassuming. "If either of you choose to terminate the pregnancy, we would also take responsibility for those charges."

"You're damn right, you would," Edward muttered darkly. "You're going to pay for the best damn doctor we can find."

"Wait," Bella said quickly. "Who said anything about terminating the pregnancy?" Her hands flew instantly to her stomach. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Alice making the same motion.

Edward turned to look at her, his eyebrows furrowed. "Why would you want to have a stranger's baby?" he asked before he could think about what he was saying.

Bella stood, glowering at him full on now. "This isn't anybody's baby but mine," she said, wrapping her arms protectively around her middle.

They stared at each other, both looking incredulous, but Edward seemed to realize that anything he had to say was probably not going to come out right at all.

Then, Bella let out a breath. "I can't... I've got to get out of here," she mumbled, and then quickly pressed passed Edward to the door.

Jasper looked over, cursed under his breath and sighed. He crossed to Dr. Snow's desk and quickly scribbled something on a pad of paper. Walking over to Alice, he gave her the paper and squeezed her hand, looking apologetic. "I gotta go after her. Please. Call me whenever. We do need to talk, okay?"

Alice nodded, smiling a small smile just for Jasper. "I will. And please tell Bella that my brother-in-law is not usually such an asshole," she said, glaring up Edward for emphasis.

Giving Edward a wary glance, Jasper nodded at Alice. "I'm sure she'll be in touch once we've all had time to process this." He straightened up and frowned at Dr. Snow. "I'm definitely sure we'll be in touch with you," he said brusquely. Then he was out the door as well.

As soon as he had gone, Edward slumped into the chair that Bella had vacated. "Shit," he muttered under his breath.

"Yep," Alice said shakily, "That about sums it up."

~0~

As Jasper drove Bella home, he texted Jacob for back up. Jake met him at Bella's apartment. She needed them both, but Jasper also needed time to think things through for himself. He was in quite a different boat than Bella was and he wanted to have already considered things when Alice called.

So while Jacob made Bella some tea, Jasper made sure it was okay to leave her. Bella being Bella understood that he needed to talk to Peter. Part of her wished she could be there for him, but her head was spinning and she felt sick in so many ways. Instead, she hugged him fiercely and whispered that she was so sorry that this had happened. He just told her there was nothing to be sorry about.

Jacob managed to coax her to her bed. He laid down with her, wrapping her up in his safe arms as she finally let go and cried in earnest. She cried, remembering the loathing on Rosalie's face and the incredulity in Edward's expression. She cried because of the ugly feeling of violation, that there was an unknown component to the beautiful creature inside of her - this was not what she planned or wanted. She cried until she fell asleep.

When she woke up again, the room was dark. She sat up, looking around, and saw a light coming from her living room. When she stumbled out into the living room she was surprised to find Jacob sprawled out on the couch, asleep.

She woke him but instead of leaving, Jacob merely pulled her down with him on the couch, holding her tightly and asked what she wanted to do.

In all honesty, Bella didn't know what she was going to do. She didn't know if there was anything she could do at that point.

Then, slowly and carefully, Jacob said, "You know...if you wanted to start over...no one could blame you for that choice, Bells."

"No," Bella said firmly.

No, nothing could change her mind on that front. She loved her baby - deeply and truly. She would do anything to protect it. No, that was the one thing she was sure of.

There was only one real choice. She would have to wait to see what Edward Cullen would do.

~0~

That evening found Edward at Emmett's house. He hadn't known who to go to, who to tell, and why he had chosen his brother he would never know. Emmett didn't have any answers for him, and tact was very far from his forte. He just stared with his mouth opening and closing like a big fish.

After a moment, Emmett sat next to his brother and patted him on the back. "Look at it this way, bro. You're like...the only guy in the world who has to tell his parents he knocked up a total stranger...and it really wasn't your fault."

"Not helping, Emmett," Edward growled into his hands. He straightened somewhat, pinching the bridge of his nose as he tried to keep calm.

"I don't know what to say, little brother," Emmett said, his voice sincerely sympathetic. "I mean…all things considered, this chick obviously wanted to go it on her own right. You could just…walk away."

Edward balked at that but he didn't know what he wanted to hear anyway. There wasn't some magical erase button that would set this situation right.

The price, though, of this mistake seemed too high.

He knew what he wanted, or, rather, what he didn't want. He wanted the same thing he always had - to be an uncle, not a father - but, at the same time, it felt entirely wrong, on so many levels, to just walk away.

No, he was fairly certain that was the one thing he couldn't do.

Edward had barely gotten home before his doorbell rang. He opened it, not at all surprised to see his sister standing there, looking uncharacteristically small and lost.

"Twin," she said in an almost childlike voice.

Edward was almost programmed to respond that voice. Rosalie never called him twin unless she was scared or uncertain. She was definitely scared now. Hearing that voice made him automatically push aside his own worries – at least for that moment. He gathered her in his arms and hugged her tightly. "It'll be okay, Rosie," he murmured to her because she needed to hear it.

He only wished he could believe it for himself.

A/N: Yeah, so again...just a reminder. Anything said and done in this chapter was a result of extreme shock. I'm just saying.

Most of you saw that coming. Hehe.

Well, do check out the lovely, LOVELY banner that Ms. Ambrosia made for this fic. It's lovely - have I mentioned that? Thanks to josieswan for beta work.

Soooooo... ::clears throat:: what are we thinking? If you've been pregnant, what's the weirdest thing YOU craved?