Chapter Nineteen Notes: For those of you who live in a bubble and haven't seen Rocky, all you need to know for this chapter is that Adrienne is his soft-spoken woman who loves him unconditionally and runs to him, accompanied by swelling movie music, following his bloody boxing match at the end of the movie with Apollo Creed.

CHAPTER NINETEEN: Hallowed

"Do you want to explain why there's a pumpkin on your nightstand?"

"Only if you'll clue me in on why you're sporting a purplish doughnut around your left eye."

Jake and I squared off in the few feet of open floor space in my bedroom. Originally, we'd planned on spending the night slaying the homework demons that plagued us so we could attend a Halloween party down on the reservation on Saturday. Now, though, our plans crumbled thanks to the poorly concealed secrets we each desperately held onto that made normalcy unattainable. Neither of us would give in because the evidence against the other established we were hiding something. That evidence was vivid and impossible to ignore, screaming to Jacob in a vibrant shade of orange that something else had captured my attention and to me in muddled hues of black and blue that violence had somehow become part of his life.

"It's Halloween. Almost. I wanted to be festive." I arched an eyebrow at him, determined that his vault open first.

"I tripped." He took a step toward me to let me know he refused to back down.

This was not the beginning of our fight. Act One happened when he showed up on Charlie's doorstep looking like the end of Rocky and I wouldn't play the part of his Adrienne, refusing to coddle him and admire his machismo. Instead, I was wary. When my 'what the hell happened to your face' met with his 'I don't want to talk about it,' it started. I refused to reward him for likely losing his temper and getting half his face bashed in for undisclosed reasons. Conversely, Jake demanded resolution to my recent evasiveness, mainly centered around why I had a detention the day before that forced me to break off my plans with him Both of us asked too many questions, and we couldn't understand why the other had a problem with that.

Now, our anger simmered under a frustrated silence. Jake was stubborn, I was worse. Neither of us uttered a syllable for a solid twenty minutes.

I never fought with Jake, not when I was his friend who was a girl and not now that I was his girlfriend. I didn't know what to do. A heartfelt apology might appease him, but I wasn't sure what exactly I'd be apologizing for.

Needless to say, I had soul-crushing guilt over whatever it was that had ignited and spun out of control between Edward and me, but an 'I'm sorry' wouldn't smooth over that catastrophe. I couldn't even put what I was feeling into words, so explaining it to Jacob would be impossible. He'd interpret it the wrong way and think I was leaving him when it was the last thing on Earth I wanted to do. Maybe he'd ask me why I didn't just stop talking to Edward, why I didn't simply cut him out of my life. I'd be unable to lie. And then everything Jake and I had together would implode. He'd never be able to trust anyone again, and I'd condemn myself to the isolated, self-loathing emotional hell I deserved.

At most, I could apologize for not telling Jacob about all the little moments Edward and I shared at school, about how we spent the lunch hour talking nonstop about nothing and everything and English class exchanging knowing looks and hushed whispers when we disagreed with Mr. Berty's assessment of literary masterpieces. Cluing Jake in would be an obvious mistake, like confessing to drinking and driving when all you'd drank was two sips of an O'Doul's. After all, technically, I hadn't done anything wrong.

Still… I felt like the anti-Christ. Through my calculated omissions, I was deceiving the person I loved most in the world. The worst part was that I couldn't stop. Edward was oxygen for me. At last, I'd made a friend within the walls of Forks High School, someone to keep me sane amidst the socially exhausting monotony.

If only every nerve ending in my body didn't crave his touch like nicotine.

If only both my waking and unconscious existence didn't revolve around the thought of him running his long, white fingers over my exposed skin.

If only I didn't compulsively lick my lips when he crookedly curled up his.

Fortunately, my hormonal jail cell imprisoned only me. Even if I was too weak to resist him, Edward certainly had no problem resisting me. The evidence was everywhere, in the way he jumped a mile when I "accidentally" brushed my arm against his in crowded hallways to how he vanished off the face of the Earth at the end of the school day, not once asking me for my phone number or if we could grab a coffee after class. I was blind with lust and awe when it came to Edward Cullen, but to him, I was just the semi-amusing entertainment that made the school day pass by a little faster.

I frowned at Jacob, who glowered at me from under a crinkled forehead. I supposed Jake deserved to be mad at me, but there was no way he was angry for the reason he should have been. He couldn't possibly know I'd developed one-sided, non-platonic feelings for the unattainable Adonis across from me at the lunch table. I was perturbed but curious, so I bit the bullet and asked, "What do you have against pumpkins?"

He threw a glance over my shoulder, glaring at it like it just insulted his mother. "It's on your freaking nightstand, Bella."

True, it was a little weird to sleep inches from an overgrown squash, but I absentmindedly had carried it to my room two days earlier after my pumpkin patch excursion with Edward and hadn't yet bothered moving it to the corner of the porch where it would keep my mother's and my tradition alive. How could Jake have such hostility over a misplaced pumpkin? "I meant to move it, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. Since when did you get so selective over nightstand décor?"

He marched across the floorboards and relegated the pumpkin to the floor, revealing the remainder of my bedside clutter. Among the empty water bottles and discarded tissues were a worn photo of Jake and I taken the day he first got the Rabbit up and running, a plastic mood ring Jake had won for me at a local carnival, and a framed four-leaf clover we'd found in my backyard. The photo had a recently acquired tear in the corner, and the frame had fallen over so it was face down against the tabletop.

Everything about him was tight and severe, his voice, his posture, the way he narrowed his eyelids. "I used to look at this table and feel like, in a way, I was sleeping next to you every night. The fact that you put this junk on display made me feel like I was special to you. For weeks now, you've let it all fall apart, like you don't care anymore."

"Subtle, Jake," I spat, my voice sharp and a bit shrill. "Spare me the obvious metaphors. I've been busy and haven't been cleaning my room. Plus, as you already know, I'm buried up to my eyeballs in Calculus homework and this stupid essay on the Brontes for English. It's nothing personal."

"Stop looking at me like I'm crazy. I keep telling you the same thing, but you won't listen: You're not my Bella these days, and I hate it." His hands tore at the curtain of hair hanging in his eyes, forcefully tucking a strand behind his ear. "I have absolutely no idea what's going on in your life. You have a detention, but you won't even tell me why. You're creepily quiet whenever we're together, and lately, you kiss me like a friggin' robot."

Something inside me snapped. He was critiquing my kissing? Mr. Handsy McTonsil Hockey thinks there's something wrong with how I make out? I loved Jake to pieces, but our physical relationship certainly didn't compare to the emotional bond we shared. He kissed with passion, but I always wondered if it was because he was kissing me or because he was a sixteen-year-old boy kissing a girl with a pulse.

Maybe it was the baseball-sized bruise encircling his left eye that he refused to explain or maybe I'd just lost all compassion for anyone beyond myself, but whatever it was made me blurt out, "Well, at least I don't shove my tongue down your throat in some slobbery attempt to prove that I love you. At least when I touch you I'm doing it because it's you and not out of some hornball teenage lust. I swear, Jake, sometimes I think you kiss me for you and not for me, not for us."

Back in Phoenix, my mother kept old copies of Cosmo as reading material in our bathroom. I retained very little from those glossy pages, but I still recall an article entitled "Rules for Keeping Your Man," which told me that if I hoped to hold onto a boyfriend, I should always give him alone time with his friends, never interrupt him during the Big Game, and never, under any circumstances, criticize his kissing prowess. I wasn't too upset about letting Cosmo down, but the look on Jake's boyish face confirmed that I was indeed some sort of satanic spawn.

Both our bodies tensed into rigid poses, though I was unfairly the one in attacking mode while Jake's shoulders crumpled defensively. Quick, stupid, take it back. Fix it before it's too late. "I love kissing you!" I screamed, desperation drowning any truth he otherwise may have found in my words. "I do! I swear it!"

He didn't answer. Instead, he walked out of my room, slamming the door with unbridled fury. I raced after him, moving with the fastest pace of my life. He'd reached the front door when my feet collided with each other and propelled me face first down eleven uncarpeted, wooden steps. I'm not sure which started first, my blood-curdling scream or the series of crashing thuds, but once I reached the entryway below, all I heard was deafening silence. My surroundings spun as I braced myself, nervously twitching different body parts to discover which bone I inevitably broke this time.

Even without unsqueezing my eyelids, I knew Jake was standing over me, horrified. "Bella!" He crouched down and gently placed a hand under my neck for support. "Can you hear me? Are you okay?"

"Uuuuuuh." My series of cautious trembles told me nothing seemed to be broken. The bruises, however, would put Jake's eye to shame.

"Bells! Open your eyes, for Christ's sake! Look at me!"

I complied, and my eyes met his, making me feel like even more of a monster. "The kissing thing was total crap, okay? I am such an idiot, I—"

He winced but shook it off. "Later. Just tell me you're okay."

"I think…" I twitched my ankle. "I'm fine." Bruised and battered but not broken. At least, not physically, though I deserved to be.

"Good," he exhaled. He extended his hand and gingerly helped me to my feet.

I refused to release the fingers he'd momentarily wrapped around mine. "Listen, Jake, let me say this." He eyed the door. "I know I'm not really myself these days. I think I just said the kissing thing to piss you off…I mean, you know I would never ever even think something like that usually. I just feel so…weird. Very, very weird. And whatever it is making me cruel. I think everyone at school is driving me to the brink of insanity." It was mostly true; most of my classmates made my brain go catatonic, but one of them, the one who was the real problem, made it crash into overdrive along with my heart. "So I'm just acting like this selfish nightmare of a human being. It's—I can't explain it."

"Your nose is bleeding." Jacob was emotionless, but he went to the bathroom and grabbed me some toilet paper.

I twisted a few squares before shoving them up each nostril. The white paper tinged with red, and our roles suddenly reversed; now I was Rocky, left standing bloody and broken without my Adrienne. Jacob's hands were folded across his chest. He was gaining inches by the day, his eye level was miles above mine so that he resembled the boy I loved less and less. I felt sick.

The only path out was the one of least resistance, so I sucked in some air through my mouth and said, "I skipped school Tuesday. There was this pop quiz, I wasn't even remotely prepared, and I suddenly wanted a pumpkin, the kind Renee and I used to prop up by the front door on Halloween that always got smashed to smithereens come November. So, one of my classm—one of my friends and I skipped out. I got my pumpkin, and then the next day, I got a detention."

Jacob knew me well enough to know randomness was a trademark of mine. The pumpkin should make perfect sense to him, simply because it would make absolutely no sense for anyone to crave generic Halloween decorations. "Why didn't you just tell me that in the first place? Why all the secrets, Bells?"

Bells. I took this as a good sign; the more abbreviated my name, the less trouble I was in. I deserved an "Isabella" for my heinous kissing comment, but because Jake was a shoe-in for sainthood, he granted me a reprieve.

"I don't know exactly," I hedged. He trusted me, and I was blowing it. "Okay, the truth is, my friend, the one I got the pumpkin with? It's Edward Cullen. We're kind of pals now. I didn't want to tell you because I thought you'd get mad. Or at least uncomfortable because of all that stupid stuff with the tribal elders hating the Cullens. So I kept my mouth shut, and I shouldn't have. But he, his sister, and me—we sit together at lunch. They're very cool, Jake." For good measure, I added, "I'm sorry. I just needed friends. It sucks at school, being alone all the time. I need company."

He snorted. "Company? Is that all he is to you?"

A hysterical, overly loud laugh tore out of my mouth. "Oh, please. You have nothing to worry about, Jake." I stared at him with wide eyes, not understanding why he wasn't getting the obvious. "He and I, we're apples and oranges." A perfect, shiny red apple and a bruised, overly ripe orange. "No worries, I promise you."

I wasn't technically lying to him, but it sure felt like it. But, then again, I had no idea what the truth really was.

He took my hand and led me into the kitchen. He must love me because only true love could explain why he took the bloody tissues out of my nose, tossed them in the trash, and wiped my beat-up face with a wet wash cloth. He kissed my forehead and sternly addressed me. "Don't keep secrets from me, Swan. I mean it."

"You're one to talk." I lightly ran a finger across the puffiness of his black eye.

He jerked his eyes to the ceiling and pinched the bridge of his nose before staring back down at me. "This kid in my class, Paul, and I got into a bit of a scuffle, that's all."

"'A scuffle?'"

"There's some, uh, stuff going on down on the rez, and Paul was talking trash…Things just got out of control."

"Oh, great. What a thorough, specific explanation, Jake. Now I completely understand."

"It's complicated. And stupid." He leaned against the counter, pulling my wrist so I was alongside him. As vague as he was being, at least he was touching me again. "Paul's my age and we've never been exactly friends or anything, or even people that tolerate each other, but now he's up in my face all the time, telling me I need to grow up and quit goofing off with Quil and Embry."

"And that's his business because…?"

"That's the thing, it's not. I keep telling him that, but then he says I'm worthless to the tribe. I mean, I'm freaking sixteen. What is his deal?"

I was more confused than Jake was. Who was this Paul, and why was he stalking my boyfriend?

"Anyway," he sighed, "he and Sam Uley are, like, in love with each other or something. They're together all the time, and I get more of the same 'be more responsible' lectures from Sam, only he's a lot less in my face about it than Paul. Yesterday, I ran into them when Quil and I were looking for parts for this bitchin' engine we're building. Paul mouths off about me being unworthy—what of, I have no idea—and then he starts badmouthing my friends, so I decked him."

Jake lifted his fist and peeled off the bandage I'd been too angry to notice earlier. Underneath the white gauze were a series of scrapes and bruises that made his face look flawless.

Jake sheepishly muttered, "I guess his face is a bit harder than what I expected."

"Jacob Black! Holy crow, go to the hospital! What's wrong with you?" Finally, the Adrienne in me made an appearance. All I wanted to do was hold him and tell him I'd fix it all, this Paul kid's bad attitude and all the cuts and bruises, in a single second.

"I already saw the doctor down on the rez, and he says nothing's broken. I should be icing it more, though, but whatever." He shrugged. "So, Paul hits me back immediately and then…it gets kind of weird. I mean, he looked like he wasn't putting all his strength into it, so I wasn't all that worried, but then his fist hits my eye, I completely black out, and when I come to, Sam's across the parking lot, looking at Paul like he wants to rip his face off. Lover's quarrel or something, I don't know."

"Well, this will make the Halloween party tomorrow a bit more interesting." I was nervous as to Jake's reaction; going to this party together meant we were Jake and Bella again and not the screaming hotheads we'd been upstairs in my bedroom.

He nodded but didn't wrap his arm around my shoulders like he normally would have done. "You're not dressing up are you?"

Relief reached my brain but not the pit of my stomach, something was still off but at least he wasn't leaving me. "Jake, you know me better than that."

He granted me a half-hearted smile.

I touched his cheek and turned away so I could do what I should've done days ago. Tripping my way up the stairs, I returned seconds later with the pumpkin cradled in my arms. I carried it to its rightful place on the front porch, telling myself Renee would be proud I kept the tradition alive. When I walked inside, Jake and I sat down at the kitchen table, spending the remainder of our Friday night slumped over our homework, staring at equations that made no sense.

X X X

Halloween fell on a Monday, but the tribe was celebrating on Saturday. When we arrived at First Beach, the sand was speckled with various age groups, half the crowd in costumes huddled under umbrellas, the others bundled up in raincoats. I grabbed Jake's good hand and headed off to a bale of hay near the fire that struggled to burn under the light mist.

We chatted about safe topics, steering away from pumpkins and purplish welts. For over an hour, we practically enjoyed ourselves.

And then Sam Uley showed up.

A sullen boy-man I could only assume was Jake's newfound nemesis Paul flanked Sam's side. I hadn't seen Sam in nearly two months, not since the night he'd acquired and then relinquished missing-person status, but I still couldn't get over how huge he was. I'd heard of guys in their twenties getting growth spurts, but Sam belonged in the circus. He'd been almost six-foot-four before, but now he had to be closing in on seven feet.

Paul wasn't much smaller. I couldn't believe Jake had the nerve to punch him square in the jaw; the fact that Paul's face didn't show any evidence of their brawl told me he wasn't someone you wanted to cross.

In studying Sam's massive frame, I failed to notice Leah cowering behind him. Had it not been for her close proximity to Sam, it would've taken me awhile to realize it was her. Her once silky mane of black hair was matted and pulled into a ratty ponytail. The smile that normally played on her mouth had died, a hopeless grimace in its place. The real difference, though, was her interaction with Sam. Once joined at the hip, lovingly touching each other to the point that it made everyone else around them uncomfortable, the Sam and Leah we had once known were no more. Leah now clung to Sam's arm like a starving, lost puppy, taking strides too large for her petite legs in order to keep up with his unyielding pace. As for Sam, his eyes darted everywhere but her. He had an air of superiority to him that I'd never noticed before. Older members of the tribe nodded at him reverently, and he nodded back like a king bestowing a greeting upon his royal subjects.

"See what I mean about the weirdness?" Jake muttered to me under his breath.

I couldn't take my eyes off of the bizarre trio of Sam, Leah, and Paul as they strode across the beach. "Most definitely."

Jacob took extra measures to avoid them, but the devastation all over Leah's face made me want to comfort her. We'd never really been friends, but seeing as how no one was even glancing in her direction, I felt compelled to go to her.

Kissing Jake on the cheek, I nodded to where Leah sat alone by the fire and whispered, "Be right back."

Jake grabbed my arm. "You don't want to do that, trust me. There's a reason nobody's getting within ten feet of her."

"She's hurting, I can tell she—"

Releasing my arm, he exhaled loudly. "Fine, it's your funeral."

Tentatively, I wove around partygoers to reach her side. "Hey, Leah." I kept my voice steady and soft.

She didn't even turn her head in my direction. With malice I didn't think her weary, despondent body was capable of, she hissed, "I don't want to talk about it."

"Huh?" She hadn't even given me time to wipe the cautious smile from my face.

Finally shifting her stare, Leah appraised me like a snake about to strike. "You want to know about Sam. Well, I don't know a goddamn thing, so leave me the hell alone."

"No, Leah, it's not—"

"It's none of your business. Get out of my face."

Wordlessly, I briskly moved back to Jake.

His face was bathed in "I told you so."

"How long has that being going on?" I was still in shock.

"Oh, you mean the bitch-on-wheels routine? Awhile."

I shot him a look. "Don't call her that."

"Sorry," he grumbled. "But she's not exactly a ball of fun these days. She's like that with everyone, don't take it personally."

"Because of Sam?"

"Probably. Trouble in paradise, I guess. Maybe she's jealous about Paul…"

I wished Leah and I had been friends; relationship problems seemed contagious these days, and I longed to reach out to someone who had a solid head on their shoulders, even if I couldn't tell them the whole truth.

Jake was still talking, but I was so used to the guilt that now took up permanent residence in the pit of my stomach that no new wave of remorse hit when I realized I'd been ignoring him.

"…Seth told me it's like hiring a bunch of babysitters for her, to keep her from going completely bonkers."

"Uh, what was that, Jake?"

"I was just saying that the Clearwaters have been inviting people, family and people on the rez, to spend time with Leah, like a playdate. I think Sue and Harry are pretty freaked that she's going to go off the deep end or something." Somewhere, Jake had gotten his hands on a hot dog and was gulping it down without pause, as if Leah's mental stability was light-hearted cannon fodder.

As if on cue, a girl with satiny copper skin and long, straight, crow-black hair took up watch over Leah, gently leaning over her and embracing Leah's rigid frame. The two could have been sisters; the stranger resembled how Leah had once looked, a lifetime ago when she and Sam swallowed each other whole as if they were starving. Leah didn't lift her arms to return the hug, but her face relaxed minutely, telling me that maybe the Clearwaters were onto something.

"See?" Jake nudged me. "Tonight's sitter has arrived."

I half-listened to the conversation around me, Jake oblivious to my silence as he chatted enthusiastically with Embry about the many ways in which Paul was a "walking douche bag." Mostly, I watched Leah.

I knew the reason behind my fascination with the shell of a girl across the campfire. She was me. Without Jake. She was empty, as I would be if the center of my universe no longer revolved around me. Slowly, I would become her. I could feel it, and the pain stabbing my insides might not be just a possibility…something was telling me it could very well be inevitable.

The sound of metal clinking awoke me from my despair. Yards across the beach, Sam had inadvertently walked into the grill where Quil had been flipping burgers. Charcoal, ground beef, and utensils lay scattered at his feet, and Sam's mask of quiet, confident authority had slipped. Now, as he gaped at something in front of him, he looked like he'd been hit by a truck…and that he enjoyed the paralyzing aftershock that followed the crash.

Without paying any attention to the string of profanity spilling from Quil's mouth, Sam made his way to where Leah and her friend warmed themselves by the fire. Instead of reaching out to Leah in her fresh state of bewilderment, he bent down next to the girl at her side and gingerly took her hand in his, never saying a single word. She stared back for a moment before turning to Leah and then back to Sam. Protectively grabbing Leah's limp arm, the girl gave one cold, confused look at Sam before dragging his girlfriend off into the night.

"Drama!" Embry whispered quietly in a sing-song voice.

When Jake shook with laughter, I elbowed him as hard as I could in the ribs. "What is wrong with you? How could you think this is funny?!"

"What?" he asked, the humor still very much alive in his eyes.

"God, you are such a teenage boy."

"Uh, yeah? And this bothers you?" He was teasing, not getting it.

"Just—nevermind." I was so angry with him, but all he was really doing was acting his age. I was such a nervous train wreck that I took every bit of my anger and anxiety out on him. Still…whatever just happened wasn't funny, not one bit; really, it was just heartbreaking. How Jake couldn't see that, how he could laugh about Leah's obvious pain didn't sit right with me.

Before I could block it out, my brain began to make the hideous suggestion. Edward would never— My hands physically flew up to my temples, as if enough pressure would stop my selfish, unjustified insanity.

As my hands squeezed my head to the point that my eyes were about to pop out of their sockets, I figured it out, the truth about what was haunting me. I'd cast myself as Leah before, but now I saw it more clearly. I was Sam, crushing the person who loved me, pushing them away from me so I could pursue a stranger who had no inclination of ever wanting me, who didn't even know me at all.

I kept the tears in until after Jake dropped me off. I dropped my brave front when the Rabbit sped cluelessly down the street.

Marching to the porch, I picked up the pumpkin and thrust it onto the sidewalk. It broke into dozens of jagged pieces, scattered amongst the clumps of orange pulp that were beginning to seep into the concrete.

Bitterly, I acknowledged that at least that part of the tradition would live on, even if it happened by my own hand instead some unruly neighborhood teenagers.

That night, I wouldn't let myself wail and sob like I wanted to; instead, I laid still in my bed like a plank of wood. I didn't deserve the release crying would bring.

Aside from telling me I was a pathetic excuse for a human being, the pain told me something far, far worse.

I had this thing for Edward Cullen, this sick, superficial thing. Yet, I didn't really know him, and he certainly had no idea who I really was. He didn't know my earliest memory was of my neighbor's beagle getting hit by a car. He didn't have any idea which ice cream I preferred or which CD currently spun in my stereo. He didn't know that every single year when some snot-nosed kid would smash my pumpkin on Halloween, I'd ball up my little fists, run to my bedroom, and sob, regardless of whether I was five or eleven. He couldn't possibly see what made me hurt and what made me happy.

But Jake knew most of those things. He was the only person who truly knew me. So I had to make it work. I had to fix this because history told me I only had one soul mate. The past I shared with Jake told me lightening wouldn't strike twice. I was being such an idiot, craving Edward like he could somehow make me whole.

Eventually, I drifted to sleep, slightly comforted by the fact that Jake was who I really wanted, deep down.

I tried to be content telling myself all I need to know I learned in the past, where Jacob was the only person to fill the void inside me.

I never considered that the future may have something to teach me.

At least, not until the next morning, when I stumbled onto the front porch to discover the pumpkin I'd decimated the night before had been replaced with a perfect, uncrushed doppelganger.

I could have spun the lies to myself, convincing my heart that it was Charlie or Jake who went pumpkin shopping in the middle of the night.

But I knew it was him.

Just like I knew I was in love with him.