A/N: The good news is, the chapter is here!

"This isn't what Edward would want. Do you understand that?" Bella dug the heel of her hand against her brow, out of her mind with a frantic frustration.

The hospital's front desk clerk sat up straighter but kept his tone even as he addressed her to say the same thing for the millionth time. "Ma'am, his family—"

"His parents haven't even seen him in three years!" Bella blew out a breath, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Sorry. I'm sorry. I know. I know it's policy. It's not your fault." Her eyes had started to well with tears, anger making her jaw tense. She couldn't stand the fact Edward was in this hospital, hurt, and she couldn't get to him. "It's just that you don't understand. I'm his…" She huffed.

Nothing. She was nothing. She had no rights here, and she knew it.

"I'll be here. We'll be here," she said, gesturing vaguely at the main hospital lobby. "When he wakes up. When he asks for me." She retreated, running a hand over her face as she made her way over to the small group of bedraggled hikers.

The way Edward's friends were looking at her might have been funny any other day. They were all over eighteen, but they were watching her with the wide-eyed expressions of children needing an adult to tell them what to do. As overwhelmed with grief, frustration, and anger as she was, Bella didn't want to adult just then. She wanted someone else to be in charge of this situation. They knew more than she did at this point anyway since she'd been invited to this particular party late.

As she walked the short distance to them, Bella reassessed what little information she had, trying to find some reassurance somewhere.

The camping trip was supposed to last four days. Today was the third day—four long hours since Bella had been out to lunch with her friends and received Mike's pained call. The accident had happened the day before.

They'd reached their final destination a decent way up the mountain and were searching for a place to camp for the evening when desperate cries had alerted the group to trouble. They found a pair of hikers, one of whom had slid down an icy embankment and was in danger of falling off a cliff to the rocks below. To make matters worse, the man's leg was fractured. He wasn't coming down off this mountain without help.

Apparently, Edward had sprung into action. He'd sent the two strongest, fastest hikers in his own group down the mountain in search of help. He'd raided all their gear, rigged up as safe a climbing harness as he could, and given instructions. With his friends' help, he was lowered down to the injured hiker. He'd assessed the man's condition, immobilized his leg, and gotten him secure in the hoist they'd rigged up.

It was when Edward was hauled back up again that disaster struck. Tyler let go of the rope securing Edward to pull him bodily back up to safe ground. And that would have been fine except that he braced his foot against an ice-slicked rock. He slipped, landing safely on his ass, but Edward couldn't find purchase. He slid, tumbling down the rockface and off the ledge.

Hiking Mount Rainier in the winter. She'd told him. She'd told him.

It was only because he'd sent people ahead and help was already on the way that Edward survived. At least, that was the gist Bella got. It was hard to piece together information given that the hospital staff wouldn't speak to any of them. They knew he was alive. A royal mess, but alive. He hadn't regained consciousness. Or if he had, he had to be unable to communicate, because no part of Bella believed he would let his parents keep her away.

That was the other thing. Lauren, apparently, had gotten ahold of his phone first and hadn't told anyone. She'd called his parents—he did have their number stored—and had feigned ignorance when the others wanted to call Bella first. It was only after his parents had arrived and gotten them all banned from seeing Edward that Lauren fessed up. She had Edward's phone. That was when Mike called.

Though, to be fair, if Bella hadn't been in some kind of love and sex coma, she probably would have heard the commotion in the studio. Two people being helicoptered down off Mount Rainier was a relatively big story in their little town, especially after word of the heroics filtered down. Bella watched a colleague's' news report on her phone on the interminably long drive from Port Angeles to Seattle.

Siobhan had driven her here, and she was older than Bella. Maybe she would take over the adulting for awhile. Her friend did come over to put an arm around her. That helped. A bit.

Bella took a deep breath, trying to find calm. Her heart ached with every beat.

"They're not going to give us anything if we're not family," she said, fighting to keep her voice calm.

"This is crazy," Mike said, running a hand through his hair. "They got everything all wrong—his parents, I mean. The way they were talking, it was like he was in a shootout or something. It was an accident. Do they think we led him up there to murder him?"

"He and his parents don't get along," Tanya said. She turned to glare at Lauren. "I could have told you that. He wouldn't have wanted us to call them."

"How was I supposed to know that?" Lauren said.

Bella was distracted from jumping in on that argument by her phone buzzing at her hip. She glanced and winced. "Oh, god," she muttered under her breath, eyes welling with tears of sorrow now. "Mel and my dad are here. What am I going to tell her?"

Siobhan said nothing but rubbed her back. There was nothing to say. This was the reality of parenthood. She had to be the one to make her daughter cry.

She wiped viciously at the tears that squeezed passed her closed eyelids and took deep breaths, trying to put walls around the most extreme of her emotions. Fury. Grief. Fear. She needed to be calm, because as horrible as she felt, this was going to be the worst day of her daughter's life to date.

By the time Charlie came through the main doors, Melody on his hip, Bella was as calm as she was going to get. Her heart ached. The way Mel was already clinging to Charlie's neck, her face buried against him, told Bella she was in freaked out mode. When she saw Bella, Mel lifted her head and reached out.

"Mommy!" Her lower lip trembled, and she breathed in those big, pre-meltdown gasps as Bella took her into her arms.

"Melly, Melly, Melly." Bella hugged her daughter tightly to her, stroking her hair.

"I want Daddy." Mel hid her face on Bella's shoulder, voice plaintive. "Grampy said he's hurted."

Bella met her father's eyes over her daughter's head. Charlie reached out and squeezed her shoulder comfortingly. She sighed, resting her cheek against Mel's hair. "Let's talk a second, baby."

"No. I want my daddy." Mel began to whimper.

"Shh. I know." Bella sat down in the lobby chair, settling Mel on her lap. She stroked her hair and back. "Listen to me, okay. I know this is scary, but I'm right here. And Grampy. And all these people."

"I want Daddy."

"I know." Me too, baby girl. "But listen to me. Daddy went hiking on the mountain, remember?" She cupped a hand under Melody's chin and smoothed back her hair to look in her eyes. "He fell, and he got hurt. But there are a lot of good doctors here. And good nurses. They're all working so hard to make your daddy better.

"Right now, Daddy is sleeping. He hit his head, and he can't wake up yet." Her voice cracked, and she had to press her tongue to the roof of her mouth to keep from losing it.

"We can kiss him, Mommy," Mel whispered. "We can kiss him better. We can kiss him, and he'll wake up."

"I wish that was how it worked. But Daddy is too sick for that right now. He needs doctors, not kisses."

"But can we see him?"

Bella pressed her lips into a thin line, trying to find the right words. She didn't want Melody to know the grandparents she'd never met were the ones keeping her daddy away from her. "The doctors aren't done with him yet." That might have been true. She had no way of knowing at this point. "We're going to wait a little bit right here. Or maybe we can go to the cafeteria. Are you hungry?"

Melody shook her head, plastering herself to Bella as she sniffled. Bella rocked her gently, her eyes stinging. She watched as her father took a seat next to her. They had a brief, silent conversation, and when he furrowed his brow, she knew he'd read between the lines. She'd already told him Edward's parents were here.

Charlie had been the one Edward had gone to, tail between his legs, after the last time he'd talked to his parents around two years before. He'd managed to move into his own apartment, but some months into renting, he had gotten in over his head with money problems. Nothing major, but he hadn't wanted to turn to Bella or Charlie for help when they'd already done so much for him. He'd felt like a failure sometimes in that first year of Melody's life. He struggled to take care of himself and done as much as he could for his daughter.

So, at the end of his rope, he'd called his parents for help. They had, as they'd promised they would, reminded him he'd made his bed, and he hadn't tried to talk to them since.

Bella's blood boiled. For the life of her, she couldn't understand what they thought his life was. He'd kept his nose clean and done well for himself. His friends, huddled together and looking so worried for him, were good, hardworking young people. His parents were treating them like they were dangerous gang members.

And Melody. Did they think their granddaughter was inherently bad just because she also belonged to Bella? It was possible, if they knew she was here, they would let Melody see her father, but without Bella? Not a chance. Bella didn't want Melody to hear whatever they had to say.

She gasped. "Emmett."

No one had called Emmett. Or maybe his parents had. They had a weird, strained relationship. Emmett had never tried to reach out to them for any kind of help after he'd relapsed. He talked to them, though. Just talked and never about his struggles to stay on the straight and narrow.

At the very least, he'd tell Bella what was happening. It would be good to have him here. If he was in bad financial times, Bella was sure he'd let her buy him a plane ticket under the circumstances.

"Mel, sweetheart. Will you sit with Grandpa so I can call Uncle Emmy?"

Mel scowled but then seemed to consider. "Will you tell him to come? Daddy needs him too."

"That's exactly what I'm going to do." Bella stood and transferred her daughter back to her father's arms.

Siobhan shot her a tight smile. "I'm going to see what's available in hotels around here for everyone. It looks like it's going to be a long night."

"Thank you so much." Bella flipped through the contacts in her phone. She found Emmett's name and put the phone to her ear.

"Bell," Emmett greeted her, his tone somehow more somber than his usual boom. "I was going to call you on the way to the airport."

"They did call you then."

"Yeah." He sighed. "I'm sorry, Bella. I know they're being a pain in the ass about this. I've been trying to tell them for years Edward is as reformed as anyone can get, but they don't trust either one of us as far as they can throw us. And this is exactly where they said we'd end up. In a hospital, knocking on death's door. They won't believe the reason is innocent."

Bella gripped the phone. "Emmett…" Her voice was raw. "He's not… I mean… He's… Death's door?"

"Ah, hell. I'm sorry. No. He's not… Well, he's fighting. Not gonna lie. It sounds like he's fucked up pretty good. Collapsed lung. Multiple breaks in his ribs and left arm. But the main thing is the swelling around his brain. They don't know if he's going to wake up."

"Oh, god. Oh, god." Bella's head spun. "This is not happening."

"He's fighting it. You know he's stubborn."

Bella clenched her jaw, trying not to collapse right there.

"Listen. I'm on a plane in an hour. I'll be there in four or five. I'll talk to my parents. I'll make them see."

"Yeah." She swallowed hard. "I need to see him, Emmett. And Mel… Oh, hell."

"I'll be there. I swear."

~0~

Mel wasn't at all happy to be dragged out of the hospital, far away from her Daddy, that night. She'd made clear several times that night the lobby was already too far away. She threw a tantrum the likes of which Bella had never seen right there in the hospital parking lot. She cried and screamed until she wore herself out, and then collapsed in her mother's arms, fingers tangled up in her shirt.

Bella only held her and rocked her, telling her over and over again how loved she was. She cried her own tears quietly into Melody's hair. What mother could bear to see her child in such an unfathomable amount of pain? And Bella knew that pain only too well. The need to see Edward twisted under her skin. She didn't care what he looked like. She needed to touch him. To hold his hand and tell him.

This wasn't how their story ended.

Some time later, she'd finally settled her daughter in a hotel bed. Siobhan had gone home. As had Tyler and Lauren, but the rest—Tanya, Irina, Mike, and Charlie—had stayed, hoping Edward's parents would figure out they were there to lend their support, not cause trouble.

Bella stretched out beside her daughter, stroking her hair to soothe her back to sleep when she woke fitfully. As she did, she kept up a text conversation with Emmett who told her he was leaving the airport to head to the hospital and that there'd been no change with Edward.

With a hand over her eyes, Bella tried not to weep. She failed. With her other hand on her daughter's small form, Bella cried. Fear and helplessness threatened to drive her to hysterics.

Her father's gentle touch on her back kept her grounded. She turned carefully and clung to his neck, not caring that she was far too old to need her Daddy. She let him murmur soft comforts. Edward was young and strong. He had a lot to live for.

And when she had cried herself to exhaustion, Charlie put his blanket over her, tucking her in as though she were four years old again. He stroked her hair until she fell into a fitful sleep.

In the middle of the night, she woke to an eerily quiet room. She blinked a few times, not remembering at first where she was or why. When the haze of her thoughts cleared, she grabbed for her phone.

There were several messages from Emmett.

He looks… I guess he looks like he fell off a cliff.

But then—

So, I brought my girlfriend with me. Rose. I told you about her. She's… Well, she yelled at my parents. It was awesome. And scary. She and Mom almost got kicked out of the hospital, but long story short? My parents are willing to meet you, and they want to listen.

Bella's first thought was a resounding fuck. Them. Why the hell would she have any interest in talking to them? They left a path of destruction wherever they went.

But…

She needed to see Edward. At almost any cost. Disgruntled, she deleted her original text letter by letter, watching the all caps "fuck them" disappear from the screen. Instead, she wrote a simple message.

See you in the morning.

A/N: The bad news is, Edward still isn't out of the woods.

I'm on it. Promise.