Chapter 7: We Are Family

A/N: There were FF problems when I posted so do make sure that you've read chapter 6 before you move on here. There's cake...and an ultrasound. Mmmmm. Cake.

Disclaimer: Not mine. I donut own them.

The Internet was the biggest enabler known to the history of mankind. It didn't matter what sort of ridiculous thought you had, the information super highway made it entirely too easy to indulge in things that were better dismissed.

Bella's finger hovered above the submit button, sighing and silently cursing herself. This is stupid, her exasperated mental voice kept on reminding her.

A week and a half ago, a couple days after her first ultrasound, Bella had been on Facebook. It was one of those snowball effects. She clicked onto Jasper's wall looking for a video he'd posted the day before and there it was: Jasper has commented on Alice Hale's photo.

Though she tried to ignore those little words, the lure of easy information was just too great. She clicked. Alice Hale, when she wasn't wearing the face of a woman who'd just been told she was carrying a stranger's baby, had a wide grin and mischievous, bedroom eyes. Her head was faced forward but the rest of her body stood in profile, displaying a perceptible bump at belly level. The caption read, 15 weeks!

Jasper's comment was amidst a slew of others...including one from Edward.

That was when Bella made her second mistake. She clicked on his name. In a fit of wild spontaneity- which she would forever blame on the baby - she sent a friend request.

The baby was a sucker - obviously easily swayed by pretty words and earnest eyes.

The atmosphere between Edward and Bella was somewhat surreal as they'd left the doctor's office the day of the first ultrasound. They were both quiet as they descended the steps side by side. There was a perceptible change between them that was a mixture of the wonder they'd both felt watching their baby on the monitor, and the charge - like static - that made them acutely aware of each other. Instead of parting ways quickly as they might have done just a few days previous, Edward had followed Bella to her car. Neither spoke, but it seemed to Bella like there were words on the tip of her tongue - she just didn't know how to form them.

He'd opened the door for her and leaned in, hesitating. "Listen... if you need something, anything at all, you can call me."

As was inevitable, when Edward accepted her friend request the Facebook effect happened. Bella found herself inundated by requests: Alice Hale, Emmett Cullen, Tanya Cullen.

Social networking was evil.

Somehow, clicking through Edward's family's profiles and albums felt better than actually going through his. She quickly discovered that Emmett had manipulated her sonogram picture to make it look like the baby held a tropical drink in its barely there hand.

It was only lucky she'd been alone when she discovered that little gem, because she laughed for five minutes straight. She'd even commented back: Oh! So that's the source of my horrendous heartburn. Cocktail party in my uterus! That had gone over well with the elder Cullen brother - or at least she assumed that's what the like meant. He'd additionally commented: Good luck with THAT little party animal!

In the past, she'd rolled her eyes at the Facebook stalking friends and co-workers had participated in. It was all the rage - and most of the drama - in college. She told herself it was slightly different in her case. There had always been part of her, even as she fought Edward's unwelcome presence in her life, that wanted to know more about his family. For her baby's sake, of course. There were the questions of family illnesses and the like...

But, what she couldn't help thinking about most was the genetics. She looked at pictures of a couple tagged as Esme and Carlisle Cullen - his parents, no doubt - and wondered if her baby would inherit his grandfather's honey blond hair. She imagined a boy who would grow to tower over her like Emmett Cullen, or a girl with Esme's button nose.

They were all lovely. Physically speaking at least, Edward Cullen's genetics were flawless. She'd taken the sonogram picture from where it was on her desk and traced her finger over the baby-shaped mass, wondering how that little person would turn out. She imagined tiny faces with different pieces of all the people that had come together before him. Charlie, Renee, Gran Marie... Esme and Carlisle... Edward. Genes and pretty features had been decided the moment sperm met egg. It was just a matter of letting the primordial mixture bake.

Earlier that very morning, a stray ad caught her eye as she was browsing pregnancy forums. The concept was one she'd seen over and over. You take your photo and the photo of another person, the website blends your combined features to create a child. They always looked weird.

Somehow, that wasn't stopping Bella from what she was doing. She'd carefully paged through each of the photos Edward was tagged in - something she hadn't allowed herself to do before - to find the perfect picture of his face.

Bella almost wasn't aware of what she was looking for until she found it. The picture was a single shot of Edward. He was smiling – not in that lopsided way that made her chest warm or that broad way that made her want to smile back, but a small smile that bordered on a smirk. His eyes seemed to sparkle with amusement in the photo

Objectively speaking, he was beautiful.

Bella grumbled under her breath as she saved his photo and uploaded it to the website. She waited, pretending she wasn't as eager to get the barest idea of what her baby might look like.

The child that popped on the screen was breathtaking. Full lips, fair skin, her brown eyes and Edward's curious shade of hair. The child looked like a girl though Bella had to admit that any boy-child that shared their genetics would probably be very pretty. Even Emmett, as broad as he was, wasn't classically handsome; he was pretty.

Completely unable to control herself now, Bella flipped back to the Facebook page she had yet to close. It was an album under Tanya's profile. In it, Edward was on the grass, mid-wrestle with one of the doll-like twins in the protective cage of his arms. His head was thrown back in a laugh she'd never seen in person... all wide mouth and teeth.

Her over-active imagination placed the child from her generated photograph in is arms instead of his blond haired niece. The image came alive and she imagined little girl giggles mixed with his deep chuckling. Then he looked up, right at her, with shining, adoring eyes. His smile, in her mind, made her heart speed.

Abruptly, she closed the website, and pushed herself away from the computer. Her heart was racing and twisting painfully in her chest. She wanted that picture – my God how she wanted it in that moment. The desperate need in her made her head spin.

She knew, though, that the image in her head was just a little-girl fantasy. Real life didn't look like that for more than a few minutes at a time. Real life was the baby screaming its head off. Babies were loud, and messy, and needy, and totally unaware of what a good night's sleep was. She was ready for that – at least, as ready as anyone who wasn't in the middle of it possibly could be. She had concentrated on that negative stuff before she thought about the tiny clothes, baby giggles, and impossibly tiny toes. She'd wanted to be sure she'd thought of the realities of raising a child before she thought about the idyllic fantasies. She'd thought about it and chosen it knowingly.

But Edward…

Edward hadn't chosen it. Jasper made the mistake of telling her – back when this all began – about the conversation they'd had when they were just two strangers donating sperm to help out friends and family. I don't want to be a dad…I made a decision a long time ago to take myself out of the Dad-pool.

She couldn't fool herself into thinking they would somehow become a happy family. This was not a child conceived out of a mutual love, or even a mutual like. It was entirely possible that, even if he did have completely good intentions, Edward would end up resenting the baby.

He was trying to do the right thing. In this case, he was trying to right by the child he'd accidentally helped create. Bella could understand that. If, somehow, the shoe had ended up on the other foot, she could not have walked away from her progeny, trusting that a stranger wasn't one of those psychopathic parents who taped their kids to walls and the like.

Maybe, if he trusted her, he would leave her alone. She sincerely doubted it, but she also firmly believed that any relationship – friends, lovers, co-workers – needed trust in order to work. She owed it to her child, if Edward was going to be a part of their lives regardless, to gain his trust – and to let him earn hers.

Well, then they would have to start talking about some things they'd been tip-toeing around.

Putting on his shoes, Bella again thought about how if she were him, she would never trust the woman who'd used his sister's sex tape to get ahead. He should know the truth about that – the whole, honest truth.

Whether or not he would believe it was a different story.

~0~

"Auuuuuuunt Rooooooseee," Katrina squealed in that almost sing-song way that kids do. She was currently cradled in Rosalie's arms, her little feet kicking as she giggled.

"What? Don't you want to be my baby, Katie?" Rosalie asked innocently. She cuddled Kate closer and rocked her like she was an infant.

"Kate is a bbaaaaayyyyybbbyyyy. And I'm a big girl," Irina cackled from her spot. She was wedged between Emmett and Edward, showing her uncle her fascinating collection of leaves…and weeds…and pine needles. Edward was pretending to pay rapt attention.

Tanya had needed a night out with her friends, so Emmett had enlisted his siblings to help him baby-sit. He didn't need the help – he was an able, hands-on kind of dad – but he did like hanging out with his brother and sister.

"She's a natural at the whole kids thing," Emmett mused, watching their sister with his daughter and smiling. He turned his attention back to Edward. "Tanya wants to take the girls to the observatory tomorrow. It should be all kinds of cute. Mom is already beside herself with the thought of all the pictures she's going to take. You want in?"

"Can't," Edward said, a little regretfully. Outings with the twins were often hilarious. He could just imagine Tanya yelling at Emmett now 'Don't let them touch anything we can't afford to replace!'

"You have a date or something? What's his name?" Emmett asked, waggling his eyebrows suggestively. Despite Edward's repeated assurances that he wasn't looking for a significant other - aka, it wasn't like he didn't get action, but he certainly wasn't going to bring those girls home to meet the folks - Emmett continued to question Edward's sexuality... or sex drive...or lack thereof.

Edward frowned a little. "No. Well, not really."

Before he could explain, a timid little voice interrupted them. "Daddy?"

Both the men looked down to find a squirming Irina looking up at them with huge, sorrowful eyes. "I had an asi-dent," she confessed.

Emmett sighed. "Irina, why didn't you tell me you needed to go?"

She pouted her little lips and batted her eyelashes. Edward had to cover his smile with his palm. Emmett was going to go insane when these girls hit dating age. "I forgotted."

With another sigh, Emmett turned to Edward, "Dude," he started.

"Oh, no," Edward said, holding his hands up. "That's Daddy-duty."

Emmett stood, taking Irina's hand. "You should get some practice in. This will be you soon enough," he said over his shoulder.

That kind of innocent remark still shocked Edward to his core. It was like cold water being thrown in his face, or that sensation you got when you fall in a dream. It made him feel out of sorts with his own reality.

He sat back on the couch, watching his sister play with his niece. It was easy to see her as a mother. She was a natural nurturer. When he'd gotten sick when they were kids, she'd tended to him even when he didn't need tending. She would bring him water, and orange juice. She'd made him wear a cap on his head because she'd read somewhere that most body heat was lost through the head so, obviously, if he was going to get better he just needed to keep his hat on. When he got cuts and scrapes, it had been Rosalie he ran to instead of his mother. She'd clean his wounds and bandage him up, even though they were both so young that the bandage was always lopsided.

Rosalie had wanted kids of her own since she was a child herself. It was one of the reasons her path with Royce had been so surprising and disappointing, and one of the reasons that her peace with Alice was so relieving. It was putting right a picture that had been tilted off-kilter for too long.

Emmett, too, had taken naturally to being a father. He made it look easy - like their father always had. His easy going nature made things like throw-up all over his new shirt and Play-Do in the DVD player no big deal. A week ago, Emmett had fallen asleep on the couch only to be awaken when Katie squirted her juice box in his face. That would have annoyed the shit out of Edward. Children had just not been part of his life plan. He couldn't imagine his day to day life with a baby in it.

The ultrasound had been a turning point for him. Up to that point he'd been taking the steps he needed without really considering the enormity of his situation. When the room had filled with the baby's heart beat and he'd seen this obviously living, moving creature on the screen... the feeling that had come over him was overwhelming. He'd seen his nieces' ultrasound picture and had been filled with a giddy kind of wonder, but this was wholly different.

Regardless of circumstance it was theirs - his and Bella's child. The awe that had filled him at that moment was a feeling that he'd never experienced. He'd felt the sting of tears before he'd even put words to the emotions that turned in him. His heart seemed to grow, and for long moments he couldn't even breathe.

And he was fucking terrified.

"Jesus, Edward. You look like someone's got your balls in an iron grip," Rosalie's voice interrupted his pondering.

Edward's head snapped up, his eyes narrowed in disapproval. Then he realized that Katie wasn't in the room anymore. She must have run off to find her dad and sister.

Rosalie studied him carefully before sitting down beside him. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he said, too quickly.

She snorted, giving him a look. Edward stared back stubbornly. Their conversation was silent but clear. He couldn't lie to her. He could try, but she would figure it out as surely as if she'd read his mind. That was just the way they were.

"What did she say now?" Rosalie demanded.

Tiredly, Edward ran a hand over his eyes. "You're so quick to assume that she's said something wrong. In all honesty she's being pretty damn understanding with this whole thing." He sighed. "She said she wants to talk tomorrow."

"I don't understand how you trust her at all. Mark my words, anything you say will end up on broadcast television. She's just waiting to get the best story she can," Rosalie groused, crossing her arms.

Edward was very tired of this argument. His sister had been very vocal, and downright worried, about Bella going to the press. Rosalie's choice of partner was not something she was ready to discuss, and definitely not something that she would enjoy hearing gossip rags hypothesize over. She was content with her celebrity status. As it was, she wasn't bothered too much. She was photographed when she was seen out and about, and she was content with how she was portrayed currently: a diva who walked into every public function with an amazing wardrobe, a sassy attitude, and left the same way she came in - alone. Most people assumed she could have her choice of leading Hollywood bad-boys. Most people assumed she'd already been with the majority of them. Her public persona - the bitch with a tongue as quick and scalding as a whip – enabled what she did for a living.

It wasn't the only reason she was worried by a long shot, but part of Rosalie wondered if she could still be successful if people knew that her partner was female. As it stood, she knew many men lusted after her. It wasn't the only reason she was nervous, but it was one of them.

"Your name has not come up once in conversation," Edward pointed out. "If she were going to break the story, she would have already."

"Come on, Edward," Rosalie bit out, a little exasperated by how Edward defended Bella so automatically. "It's not like she wouldn't be interested. I know for a fact that her boss treats her like shit – I've seen it. Not that it isn't exactly what she deserves. But you know they're not going to keep her as a production assistant if she breaks a story like this."

"You know what I don't understand?" Edward snapped back, irritated at his twin's distrust of Bella. "If you're so g'damned nervous about having the threat hang over your head, why don't you take away her fire? I mean, what is it that you're planning on doing – keeping Alice and the baby in the shadows forever?"

As he knew it was going to, that accusation struck a chord and Rosalie's glare faltered into a pained expression. "You know why I hid-"

"Yes, I know," Edward cut her off. "You were trying to protect her from what all the gossip rags will say, all the cruel questions, all of that. Well, you know what, Rose? Alice chose to be with you. She knew exactly what the whole package of you came with. She knows all of your past, she knows what you have to deal with in the press sometimes, she knows all of that and she chose it anyway. How do you expect to be a mother to a child you won't acknowledge?"

For a split second, Rosalie looked absolutely devastated by that remark, and Edward regretted it immediately. He knew that she was struggling with this situation. He knew how badly it was affecting her - the idea that her child wasn't hers in any way. Her insecurity was staggering. She was, in so many ways, just as scared and lost as Edward and Bella were.

But the vulnerability was quickly replaced by an ice cold glower. "How do you expect to be a father to a child you don't even want? Don't you dare judge me, Edward. Not you, and not about my baby."

"Hey!" a loud voice interrupted their bickering.

Both Edward and Rosalie looked over to find Emmett staring at them with his arms crossed and his daddy's-about-to-put-someone-in-timeout expression.

He also had a tiara on his head.

He looked between the two of them and plucked the tiara out of his hair, proffering it to Rose. "It's Pretty Princess time, and I know you're a lot prettier a princess than I am."

Rosalie's smile returned as she settled the crown primly on her head. She tossed one final glare over her shoulder, and took off toward the girls' room.

As soon as she was gone, Edward released the breath he hadn't known he was holding, slumping down on the couch with a hand over his eyes.

"That was pretty harsh, dude. She can't have the one person she trusts the most to have her back getting her down," Emmett said, sitting beside him.

Edward snickered. It wasn't because he thought Emmett was wrong. He knew Rosalie better than anyone on the planet, except for Alice perhaps. There was a reason Rosalie came to him with her worst fears, and he'd been there for her. What he was struggling with was that it was normally a two way street. Despite how badly they could bicker, they'd always been each other's best support. This time though, her problems had overshadowed his.

He didn't tell his brother any of this though. He just explained his reaction. "You're such a dad." He grimaced. "Like it's just natural. I think you got all of Dad's dad genes."

Emmett burst out laughing. "There's nothing that comes natural about being a father, Edward. And believe me, if I let myself think about it at all, I'd start second guessing pretty much everything I do."

Edward raised a questioning eyebrow at his brother.

"Look, I know you're struggling to wrap your mind around having a kid, and I don't know what you want me to say, little brother. Being a dad – it's a mind fuck and a half." Emmett's face, as he spoke, was surprisingly serious... contemplative. "It's more love and more fear and more frustration and more…I don't know, elation than you've ever felt in your life – sometimes all in the space of the same hour. And you never know what you're doing – not ever."

He looked at his brother carefully then, and Edward knew him well enough to understand that he was trying to find the right words. Emmett spoke without thinking frequently, but he wanted this to come out right. "You know I love my girls. I wouldn't trade them for anything. But I know a lot of parents who just don't seem like they get it. It's like they just had kids because someone told them that's what they were supposed to do. They have this … you feed it, you get it to be as quiet as possible outlook, and I think that's sad. But I also think not everyone is cut out to be a parent."

Edward was quiet for a moment, trying to dissect that statement. "Is that what you think about me?" he finally asked.

"You're great with the girls. Hell, you've always been good at anything you've set your mind to. But being a dad – I mean a dad, not just a sperm donor - is mostly about heart." He laughed then, though in an oddly wry way. "And, unfortunately, I don't think it's something you can really know for sure until you're in the thick of things. I'm really not the one who should answer that question."

"You know, Dad told me almost exactly the same thing."

Emmett grinned. "Well, fuck. I guess there are a lot of things worse than being like Dad."

~0~

Bella was still worried and lost in her thoughts about her upcoming conversation with Edward when she got to her father's house that evening. She wished she could tell Charlie about the baby, but she just didn't know how while the current situation was making things so complicated.

As it turned out, her plans on how and when to tell her father were a moot point.

"Hey, Bells," Charlie greeted as she came in the door. He was peering hard at something in his hands, his tongue sticking out just slightly as he struggled with whatever it was.

"What do you have there, Dad?" Bella asked as she plopped down in the chair beside him at the table.

"It's this damn cologne," he muttered. "I can't get the pump unstuck."

Just as those words came out of his mouth, a thick spray of heavy-scented cologne shot out. The smell overwhelmed Bella, making her head swim as she swooned. She fought the darkness and the nausea, but one of them was bound to win. She supposed she was lucky that she didn't throw up all over herself as she passed out.

When she woke up she was on the couch, and Charlie was hovering. Charlie didn't hover. She must have scared him half to death. She bit back her initial response that he shouldn't be lifting heavy objects, knowing that would not go over well, and simply accepted the water he handed her, sipping slowly.

"You have something to tell me, Bella?" Charlie asked, and she could tell it was an effort for him to keep his voice steady. She knew by the look on his face that he was jumping to all the wrong conclusions - and after the ordeal he'd been through, she couldn't blame him.

"It's nothing bad, Dad," she assured him. Her recent swoon and conflicting emotions about the other half of her pregnancy made her voice less than convincing. She'd always been a horrible liar, and the worry on Charlie's face got exponentially more pronounced. Bella sat up all the way, fighting a wave of dizziness as she did. "Really," she said more firmly. "I'm just..." This was surprisingly difficult to say. She almost felt like she was a teenager who had to tell her father she'd gotten knocked up accidentally. "I'm pregnant."

Charlie's face was completely frozen except for the sporadic blinking of his eyelids. Then his nose kind of twitched and his lips quirked - up, down, up down, as if he had no idea how to react. It made his mustache dance comically on his face, and Bella couldn't help but laugh.

"I didn't realize you were seeing anyone," he said carefully, letting a smile creep out even as new worries began to occur to him.

Bella's smile fell ever so slightly. She found she was far from ready to tell Charlie the whole truth. It would have to be careful half-truths then. "I'm not. I went through a clinic," she admitted.

She told her father most of the story, not correcting him when he assumed she'd gone with an anonymous donor. After that, Charlie was all broad grins. He kept on repeating, "I'm gonna be a grandpa," over and over as if he couldn't quite believe it. Bella respectfully ignored it when he got teary eyed over the sonogram picture she'd been carrying around in her wallet for him.

Toward the end of the visit, though, his face grew serious. "Bella...tell me truthfully," he said gravely. "You didn't do this because of me, right?"

Bella paused, remembering when he was so sick that it didn't look like he was ever going to get better. He had sighed, during a moment of weakness, that he only regretted that he'd never hold his grandchild in his arms.

It had left its mark. He knew it. Jasper had known it. Even Jacob had known it.

"You're the reason I thought about it," Bella answered truthfully. "But I thought about this for a long time before I went through with it. I want this," she assured.

Charlie looked at her as if trying to gauge how much truth she was telling. "It's just that you never really showed an interested in kids before."

"I know," Bella admitted.

"It's a lot to go through alone," he continued, his voice worried. "It's a lot to go through when there are two of you. Having no one to have your back when you have to tag out for a minute – that's really hard." She knew he was thinking about the summer weeks when it was just the two of them. She hadn't been oblivious to his struggles, and she knew she'd been a relatively easy child.

"I know," Bella said again, looking down at her feet and trying not to think of Edward. "The thing is, Dad, I don't really mind being alone. I never have. You know, I've always enjoyed my freedom. Relationships...they're a lot of complication and compromise - they're a lot of work, you know?

"But I started to think that I had a lot of love to give, and even if I didn't want to put all that time and energy into having a good relationship... I don't know, it feels different when I think about the baby. The effort and energy it will take seems worth it. I like the idea of not having to answer to anyone for anything, including how I raise my child," she summarized, again pushing thoughts of Edward to the far, far corner of her mind.

She looked up at her father, smiling. "I mean, I know it had to have its moments of loneliness, but you didn't turn out so bad for not having a significant other all the time. And for what it's worth, I think you're a great dad."

Charlie's lips quirked and he looked away, a little embarrassed. Neither of them were great with shows of affection, but he seemed pleased. "Well," he said, turning back to her, "I have faith in you, kid. You're going to make a great mom." He chuffed a little then, getting distinctly teary-eyed. "Wow."

"Yeah," Bella agreed, letting herself cling to her father as he pulled her into a rare hug. She was so relieved her father knew. His happiness and wonder added to her own, letting her feel the joy that was so often tapered with confusion these days. "Wow."

A/N: Oye vey. Sorry about the delay. My mojo fucked off. Threw a finger at me as she left and everything. The NERVE. But she came crawling back so here we are. Hopefully she won't get pissed off again.

Did I just refer to my mojo in the third person? I did, wanna fight about it? Hehe.

Thanks to josieswan for beta.

So…how did mom and dad take your news? Did they interfere? Offer TOO much advice?