Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight, any of the characters in Twilight, or anything related to the books and/or movies. If I did, I would be way too busy- doing dirty things with the Cullen boys- to sit down at my laptop and write this story. The scenes that I did borrow from Stephenie Meyer have been revamped to fit my story.

Learning to Live Again

Chapter Fifteen: My Big Brother, The Superhero

"Sorry that I'm calling you so late, Charlie, but I just wanted to let you know that I'm going to crash at Jasper's house tonight." I paused and listened to my father yell on the other end of the line. Weren't teenagers ever rewarded for honesty anymore? Plus, I was eighteen years old now; I think I was old enough to stay the night with a boy. "Charlie, Jasper and I are just friends. We're both just exhausted and I don't want to make him drive me home this late. I promise that I'll come home as soon as I wake up tomorrow morning. Good night, dad."

I chuckled as I shut my cell phone and placed it on the kitchen counter. I had come in here to tell Charlie I wouldn't be sleeping in my own bed tonight while Jasper was in the living room, calling Alice. There was no way that I wanted to listen to that conversation right now. I took a seat on one of the barstools at the kitchen counter and stared at the dark granite design that my phone was now resting against.

I didn't want to think about the pain that Alice was feeling. I didn't want to stress about having to come clean to Edward when he was finally not avoiding everyone else on the planet. I wanted to prolong telling the entire family that I had developed feelings for Jasper, because I knew that it would divide them. It seems that tearing a family apart was just another of the free services that I had to offer.

I didn't hear the large vampire walk into the room, but his loud voice was unmistakable. "Why are you wallowing, Bells?" Emmett asked from behind me. Without waiting for an answer, he grabbed the barstool and twirled it so I was facing him.

I looked up at him, my hair falling in my face. "Why wouldn't I be, Em? I have a knack for hurting the people that love me. Alice doesn't deserve this. Edward doesn't either, no matter how upset I am with him right now. But you and Rosalie and Carlisle and Esme… you're all going to be affected by it, too. I hate knowing that I'm coming between family. I'm not worth the trouble."

"For the love of God, Bella, you have got to stop taking the blame for everything. There was no way for you to know that you would fall for Jazzy. And Alice will understand that you never meant to hurt her and that you still love her. Edward will definitely lose his mind for awhile, but he'll get over it. With time."

I started shaking my head, about to disagree with Emmett, but he placed his hand over my mouth to stop me.

"And you are worth it. Edward thinks so, Jasper thinks so, and all the rest of us do, too. We all love you, and we all want you to be happy. No matter who it's with." He crouched down to look me directly in the eye and gave me his big, goofy grin. I couldn't stop myself from smiling at him. "There's the smile that I love on my baby sister so much."

"Thank you, Emmett. You always know what I need to hear," I told him as I wrapped my arms around him in a hug.

"Well, I do what I can," he replied with a nervous laugh. I could tell that he was being careful not to hug me back too hard, worried that he would crush me. He probably would have. When he pulled back, he leaned casually against the wall of the kitchen. "You know, you never answered my question earlier." I raised my eyebrow, silently asking what he was referring to. "How did you throw Laurent across the woods, Bells?"

I sighed, not wanting to talk about my power right now. I had bigger things to deal with, and I was still so unsure of what was going on with me. I knew he wouldn't budge on this, though because he crossed his arms over his chest and glared at me. "Okay, fine. A couple days ago, I was sitting on the floor of my bathroom with Jasper. He was trying to keep me calm, but I was so overwhelmed with my emotions. I felt betrayed and hurt and angry with Edward for abandoning me when I needed him. I had been trying so hard to not let what I was feeling take over but I couldn't push my feelings down any longer."

I shrugged before continuing. "They all just exploded out of me and the next thing I knew, Jasper was shielding me from my bathroom mirror breaking in front of us. I had on clue what happened, but I caused the mirror to break. And then Jacob tried to kiss me and I pushed him with my mind and he landed on our kitchen table, breaking it in the process."

"That little bastard tried to kiss you?!" Emmett yelled. "What the hell was he thinking? Your boyfriend just left you! He could've at least waited a month until he tried to make a move in on you."

"Em, you just saw me making out with your other brother," I reminded him. I knew that my expression had changed from confused to even more confused thanks to Emmett's random reaction.

"Yeah, but he's not a dog," he shrugged it off. "And plus, at least with Jazzy, you're keeping it in the family." I gasped but then started laughing when I saw Emmett's eyes sparkle with mischief.

"I'm going to pretend you didn't just say that, joking or not." Emmett just stood there- not worried by my idle threats- and let me continue my story. "Jasper and I were going to eventually ask Carlisle if he knew what was going on with me, but I wanted to wait until I was ready to see all of you again. This afternoon when Laurent showed up, I got the idea that maybe I could try and control my power. I knew that I had been able to throw Jacob across my kitchen, so I figured that if I concentrated hard enough I could throw Laurent off of Jasper to stun him."

Emmett nodded his head and smiled. I knew that he would understand me better than anyone. It sucked to feel helpless all the time. "I'm just so thankful that it worked, but it took so much out of me that I could barely stand after I'd used it a couple of times."

"As glad as I am that you were able to help Jasper today, Bells, you have to be careful with this. You could too easily exhaust yourself or worse. You're right in saying that we need to ask dad about this, though. He may know something more than we could find on our own," he reasoned with me. "Do you think that you're ready now?"

"I don't really have a choice anymore, Em. I just have to deal with everything and try to move on now," I rationalized. "But hey, at least I have a superpower now. I don't have to feel so damn helpless all the time."

"Yeah, that's true. Even if you are still a weak human," he teased. Emmett suddenly had a sad look on his face as he stared down at the wood flooring. I rose from my seat and walked over to him, grabbing his chin and lifting his face to look at me.

"Silly Emmett, don't you know that you have the greatest superpower of all?" I let the shock register on his face before I continued. "You're our protector. You protect us all from evil vampires who want to kill us and from ourselves and from each other. There is no way I could have made it through the last year in this crazy family without you."

"Bella, I really don't bring that much to the table except for sarcasm and pranks," he argued. It was hard to listen to Emmett berate himself; he usually had so much confidence in himself.

"Stop it, Emmett. Stop it right now or I will be forced to throw your ass into the living room where I'm sure Rosalie will slap you across the head for thinking such a thing." He smiled at this. "You're everything to her, and you are so much to the rest of us. You're my big brother. Who else is going to beat up Jasper if he pisses me off?"

"And why would I be pissing you off?" Jasper asked from the doorway. He smiled softly at me, offering whatever reassurance he could muster up after his heart-wrenching conversation with Alice. "You should listen to her, though, Emmett. She's usually right about this type of stuff."

Emmett squeezed my hand before exiting the kitchen, leaving Jasper and I alone to talk. I walked over to the blond vampire who had suddenly wormed his way into my heart and placed my hands on his hips, pulling him closer to me. He unconsciously wrapped his arms around my waist and rested them on the small of my back.

"So…" I started.

"So…?" Jasper teased back, resting his forehead against mine as he looked into my eyes. It was so hard to concentrate with him this close to me, but I knew that there was so much we had to speak about. He started to lean down, ready to kiss me when we heard a loud crash coming from the living room where Emmett and Rosalie were.