Disclaimer: Twilight is still not ours...Surprise, surprise.
Ava: Hello. There's so much to say. We are so grateful for each and all of you who reviewed and favorited us and alerted us or just read it. We wish that we could put the names of everyone who reviewed on this story down, but the list would be too long. But we can thank everyone who reviewed last chapter: PrettyFlower, Starkissedtulip, Rubikins, iRedeem, Only4Miken, SugerGPup-chan (Hopefully we spelled it right this time), MintCcIceCream, and Gryffindor Gurl2. We would like to specially thank iRedeem (previously known as Terra106) for being with us from the beginning. You gave us the drive to keep going.
So it's the epilogue folks. Please enjoy.
P.S. INFO ON FUTURE FICS FOUND AT THE BOTTOM
Jamie's Point of View
"I missed you so much," I whispered into his ear after I had stopped crying. There was a glow of happiness surrounding us, engulfing us.
"I missed you, too, of course." He laughed joyfully. I rested my forehead on his, and he carried us inside the house.
To our surprise, Billy sat there in his wheel chair, smiling. "Welcome home, son," he said. "Hello Jamie. Good to see you finally found him." He nodded at me.
"Hi Billy."
There was a pregnant pause. I felt slightly embarrassed that Billy had caught us like this.
Finally, Jacob said something, "We're going to my room. We have a lot to talk about." He stared into his father's eyes, conveying something to him.
Billy raised his eyebrows but didn't protest. Jacob walked down his hallway to his room. He laid me gently onto his bed, and situated himself so that he was hovering over me.
"Are you really here?" he asked me softly.
"No," I said sarcastically, "I'm just a figment of your imagination."
He gave a dry laugh and then he leaned in to kiss me, but hesitated and pulled back. His eyes were conflicted. He stood up and began to pace the room. "Jamie I need to tell you something."
What? About imprinting? I opened my mouth to voice my questions, but decided last second to play dumb. "Oh? About what?"
"Well all about the wolf stuff," he replied.
So I listened patiently as he told me an abridged version of the tribal legends. Several times during his tale his eyes flicked over to mine nervously, and when I didn't make a big deal over it he seemed surprised.
After he finished I asked, "So how does it work? Can you…um…transform whenever you want to? Or are you limited to certain time of day?"
He grinned at my word choice. "We can phase whenever we want."
"Anything else?"
"Well, we're extremely fast." I nodded, remembering him blurring before my eyes. "And strong. And we're tall and we all run a fever constantly. That's why we all walk around in nothing but shorts. We're all physically twenty-five years old. And—"
"Wait," I interrupted. "You're eight years older than me?"
"Only physically. I really am eighteen, though."
"Weird."
"Story of my life."
I laughed. "Go on."
"Well when we're in wolf form we can hear each other's thoughts."
"Really?" I asked, my eyes widening. "Like mind-reading?" That was what Nadia must have meant earlier…"That must suck."
He grimaced. "Yeah. No privacy. We all know practically everything about each other. Good…and bad."
I fell back on his bed. "Wow…you've totally ruined my image of evil, people-eating werewolves."
Jake laughed, joining me on the bed. He pulled me so close that our noses were touching. "Good."
He brushed a piece of hair out of my eyes. His eyes were so warm and loving that I felt my throat closing up. Why had I ever left?
Rolling back onto my back, I wrapped my arms around myself. "I missed your laugh," I whispered softly.
After a long moment of silence, I heard Jacob sigh. "There's something else I need to tell you."
My heart beat faster. "What?"
"There's…another thing that happens when you become a werewolf. It's called…imprinting."
My hands were sweaty. Please let him have imprinted on me. Please. "Imprinting?"
"Yeah. It's—"
I couldn't stand waiting anymore. "Jacob. I know what it is. I went to this bonfire party last week and Billy told me all about it. Just, what does it mean for us?" I turned to face him and gestured between us. Something terrible occurred to me. If he hadn't imprinted on me, as was likely, then—then….I swallowed. "What—what if you imprint on someone else Jake?"
"Someone else?" He asked, his forehead furrowing.
"Is it that hard to understand? Someone else!" My voice was edged with hysteria.
He grinned. "Jamie. Have I ever told you that you were an idiot?"
I pushed away from him angrily. "You think it's idiotic to consider that you could fall in love with another girl while I'm still here? God Jacob sometimes you are such an a—"
"No," he interrupted seriously, with only a hint of amusement in his eyes. "But I do think it's incredible that you didn't know from the first time you heard about imprinting that I imprinted on you."
Before I could respond he covered my mouth with his. I had forgotten how amazingly good and right kissing Jacob had felt. A giddy, uncontrollable happiness surged through me. Jacob had imprinted on me!
When I finally pulled away, I was crying. "I'm sorry Jacob. I'm sorry for ever leaving. It was stupid and cruel and childish of me. And I'll regret it for the rest of my life."
Jacob shrugged, grinning. "Good thing you'll have forever to make up for it."
Realization washed over me, and I sighed, snuggling up next to him. "Forever."
Jacob wrapped his arms around me, holding me tight against his chest.
After a few comfortably silent minutes Jacob coughed.
"What?"
He cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Well...is Alex gay?"
I laughed, facing him. "Now who's the idiot?" I asked lightheartedly, before kissing him until we were dizzy.
~Six Months Later~
"Jamie, I am so glad you came!" Emily threw her arms around me, with tears in her eyes.
"Of course I did. I wouldn't miss your baby shower for anything."
"And I'm glad you came, too, Jacob." Jacob smiled at her. I leaned into him.
Although technically men were usually not invited to baby showers, Emily had decided that it was time to break tradition, allowing the whole pack family to come. It was extremely casual. More like one of Emily's dinner parties than a giggling estrogen fest. I was thankful; I'd never been good at doing things like that.
"When is it due again?" I asked, while we made our way to the living room. I reached for Jacob's hand. I always felt uncomfortable in this room; so much had happened here.
"March second," Sam said proudly, appearing behind us. He looked so happy.
I placed our gift on the coffee table before sitting next to Jacob on the couch. "Are we the first people here?"
"Yes, Kim said something—" The door bell rang, interrupting Emily. "Come in!" she yelled. "Don't know why they decided to ring the door bell for the first time today," she muttered under her breath. I smiled.
Brady and Collin's booming laughs filled the house. "Hey Emily! Hey Sam!" Brady greeted.
Collin, ever the comedian, bowed when he saw Sam. "Greetings, leader. I bring my respect."
"What is he talking about? I thought Jacob was the leader," a small, curious voice asked eagerly. It was ten-year-old Caleb, Brady's brother. He had caught Brady phasing last week and ever since then had worshipped the pack.
Caleb had been referring to the fact that, for the last three weeks, Jacob had been Alpha.
A month before, I had been surprised to discover that Jacob was descended from tribe chiefs—or Alpha wolves, depending on how you looked at it. So when Sam had decided to give up his wolf form to grow old with twenty-five year old Emily and to allow himself time with his new baby, Jacob had taken over. He was great at it. Even with all the extra responsibilities, Jacob still managed to put aside time for us without my asking.
"He is," Brady grinned down at his brother. "Sam was our leader, but he quit phasing last month."
"Why would he do that?"
"Because I love Emily," Sam answered, kissing Emily lightly on the lips.
Caleb frowned, but didn't respond. I knew what he was thinking, though: I wouldn't give up being a werewolf for a stupid girl. I smiled.
The door opened again. "Aunt Emily! Aunt Emily! Aunt Emily!" Claire squealed, jumping up and down, pulling Quil in. "Guess what? Guess what? Guess what?" She was five now and attending Kindergarten at the local tribal elementary school. Quil was handling it better than he thought he would. School made Claire happy, so he was.
"What?" Emily asked, pulling Claire in for a hug.
"Gabby's turning eight on Saturday and I get to go! It's a slumber party!" Gabby was Claire's older sister. They got on really well as far as siblings went.
"Really?" Emily asked.
"Yes." Claire pouted. "Quil can't come, though."
Kristen, who had entered a few moments after her daughter and future son-in-law, grimaced, changing the subject quickly.
I looked over at Jacob; he was deep in thought, uncharacteristically quiet. I wondered what was going on in his head. Maybe he thought I was still mad at him; earlier that day I had discovered that he had visited me at night over the summer, and I had gotten, well, a little angry. After calming down and thinking about it though, I realized that it was probably the only reason I was still sane. It was strange that, even though we were technically soul mates, we were still getting into arguments just like any other normal couple. Something about this comforted me. It made our relationship feel more real to me, less forced.
Soon everyone had arrived, and we were betting money on the gender and the due date of the baby. Whoever won received all the money in the hat. The pack, of course, loved this, and put ridiculous sums of money into the hat presented to them.
Instead of joining in, Jacob was watching Sam and Emily. They were sitting on a love seat in the corner. Emily was on Sam's lap, smiling happily. There really was a glow around Emily. I felt a pang of jealousy. I glanced at Jacob, finally understanding his silence.
"I don't want a kid, do you?" I asked seemingly out of the blue.
Jacob's eyes flashed to mine. For a brief second, he looked extremely disappointed. "You don't?"
"Nah, too much work," I replied.
"Oh," he said hesitantly, putting on a brave face. "Well, if that's what you want."
I laughed. "I'm just kidding. You should have seen your face."
"Not funny." He smiled anyway.
I leaned against him. "I love you."
"I love you, too."
Ava: So that's it. The last chapter we will ever write from Jamie's POV for probably forever. (Not to say that you'll never see her again. ;] ) I'm sure some of you were relieved that we didn't add in another twist. Truthfully that would be far too exhausting.
We want to apologize for our terrible update rate. Making time to write with another person is extremely difficult. Especially for two highschoolers who like to be busy for some strange reason. (Is anyone else like that? Do any of you hate being idle when you're not busy, but hate being busy when you are? Or is that just me?) Not to say that it hasn't been completely great working with each other. It has been, and having another person writing makes sure that the story is balanced and doesn't get too out of hand. We never run out of good ideas either.
FUTURE FICS: God, I'm sick of looking at bold writing... I'm sorry to say that there will not be a sequel to The Rising Sun. It would be almost cruel to continue the story, because it would ruin what we already have. However, I (I'm not sure if Aubrey wants to join in on this one. Like I said, it's difficult for both of us to find time to write together. She will definitely help edit, though. Aubrey is the master at that stuff.), have been researching and writing another imprinting story. I'm about sixty pages in and I will promise you now, that the main character is nothing like Jamie. So for all of you who hated Jamie, which is a lot of you, shouldn't have to worry. Of course, for those of you who love Jamie (Anyone?), Jamie will be found in the story. This has been in my mind almost as long as The Rising Sun, and I am super excited about it. As it is in third person and is proving to be much longer, I am finding it a nice challenge. It's a CollinxOC and SethxOC story. When I post the first chapter (after school has started probably), I'll let you know via this story and add in a teaser. Also, I want a betareader, so if anyone knows a good one please tell.
By the way: We are planning on changing our name to something shorter like: Ava and Aubrey, or AvaAndAubrey, or Ava Abney and Aubrey Ambler, etc. So watch out for that.
We love you guys!!!!!!
PLEASE REVIEW!!! We would really appreciate it if you would review today as it is the last chapter. Please. Just tell us what you thought. Even if you hated it.
