A/N: Okay my dear chillun, only 3 1/2 days since Part One. I hope none of you have turned blue. If so, breathe now. Love ya babies. mama
Shadows Of Love
Chapter Thirteen
It's Now or Never
Part Two
JPOV
When she said 'patience grasshopper' I thought my blood would freeze in my veins. Bella used to say that all the time and I hadn't heard that
phrase in years. Renesmee had a little smile twitching around her lips and I was having a nervous breakdown. I sucked in a deep, resetting
breath, and let it out slowly, though my whole body had acquired a severe case of the shakes.
"Okay, I'm listening."
"Okay, good. Now, I remind you of Bella Swan, a lot, but she's not around anymore. She's departed this earthly plane, yes? Okay, now, Jake,
listen very carefully."
She leaned into me very closely and put her lips right against my ear. I could feel her panting breath, warm and moist. Why was she torturing me?
"Rikki, don't lose that number."
Another deafening silence. This one could cause avalanches.
"What?"
"Rikki, don't lose that number."
"I don't understand, Ren."
I really didn't.
"When Bella was in the Taj with you, right after you guys started rebuilding the motorcycles. She didn't like listening to music because she was still
kind of a zombie, right?"
"Y-yeah, but how would you know that? Where is this going, Honey?"
"Oh, yeah, you used to call her 'honey' too, a lot. But that's not important right now. I like that you call me Honey, I really do. One day, you guys
were in the Taj, and she got up, walked over and snapped off your radio. You said 'Hey, why'd you turn that off? That was a good song.' And she
said she just didn't like music much anymore."
By this point, I simply could not form words. All I could give Ren was a wide-eyed affirmative nod. She couldn't know this. She just couldn't.
"That was the song that was playing when she turned off the radio. Rikki Don't Lose That Number by Steely Dan."
She leaned back to look at me, waiting for...something. I don't know what. Maybe for me to pass out. Maybe for me to scream like an escapee
from the mental ward and run into the woods, never to be heard from again.
"Who told you that story, Ren?"
"Nobody."
"Come on, Ren. That's really not funny. Who told you? How could you know that?"
"That's the question I wanted to hear!"
She nearly gave me a heart attack with her outburst.
"What? How could you know that? The only way is if somebody told you."
"Not quite the ONLY way."
"Ren, Honey, this is silly. Nobody else was there that day but me and Bel... What are you trying to say, Ren?"
"Think about it, Jake. How could I possibly know what song was on the radio when she turned it off?"
"Well, you couldn't. That's just it. There was only the two of us there. And I never told anyone else that story, just that Bells didn't like music."
"Yeah. Sooo?"
"Aaarrgghh! What are you trying to do to me, Ren? What do you want me to say?"
"Do you believe in angels, Jake?"
"What? Ren! C'mon now! What's going on? I don't see what you're getting at!"
"Okay, Jake. How about this? What if, on the day I was born, Bella Swan Cullen didn't actually die, at least not permanently? What if the whole
thing had been a mistake and she wasn't meant to have a baby and she wasn't meant to die?"
And now, the tears began to flow freely again.
"Ren! Don't do this! Don't dredge up all these memories! Not now! Please don't do this, honey!"
She put both hands on my face and smoothed away some of the tears with her fingers. Why was she ripping my heart out all over again? Why now?
"Jake, I'm sorry. I know this is hard. So I'm just gonna say it outright, okay?"
I just nodded and tried to stop my man-card-erasing waterworks.
"Bella didn't die that day. Her body did, but her spirit didn't because it wasn't her time. She wasn't supposed to have married Edward, she wasn't
supposed to have gotten pregnant, and she wasn't supposed to have died giving birth. The baby wasn't supposed to exist."
"But you had to exist, Ren! You're mine! You're my life! You can't say that!"
"Baby, it's okay! Hang on! Stay with me, Jake! Right here! Bella's body was too messed up but her spirit went to an in-between place, not Heaven or
Hell. I talked to Sarah, Jake. I talked to your mother."
"Oh God!"
"Easy, baby! I've got you! She told me that it wasn't my time and that the baby wasn't supposed to be and there wasn't a soul for the baby. So they
put my spirit in my daughter's body. It's me, Jake. It's Bells. I'm here. I'm with you. I've always been with you."
She whispered that last bit really softly and she was holding me close and placing tons of kisses all over my face. If my teenage years had not been
severely interrupted by myths, legends, demons and monsters coming to life, I would have simply fallen over the edge at this point and let the guys
in the white coats come cart me off. I shook my head as if to clear out cobwebs or haze or fog. Ren took it as a refusal to believe. She kissed me again
and nodded her head, holding both my hands in hers, gazing earnestly into my eyes. And as she looked deep into my eyes, and held tightly to my hands,
and smiled 'that' smile that I remembered from so long ago, I knew. I could barely find my own voice.
"B-Bells? Is it you? Oh, God! Is it really you? How is this possible?"
"It's me, Jake. It's really me. I wasn't allowed to tell you to start with. I had to wait till I was a grown-up and, honestly, I wanted to wait till you loved
Renesmee, too. So you would love both of us, sort of."
She cast her eyes downward and looked thoroughly abashed as she barely murmured her next words.
"I wanted to hedge my bet. I couldn't bear losing you again."
The rest of my ability to speak tried to leave me. I began to sob all over again and I enveloped her in my arms and held her as close as I could.
"Oh my God, Bells, I've missed you so bad. I nearly died when I realized I'd lost you for good. I've never felt so alone in my whole life. Why couldn't
you tell me? Didn't you know how I was suffering? How we all were suffering? Couldn't you see? Bells, I needed you so much."
She held me tightly and stroked my hair and my shoulders. She was crying too and trying to find her voice to apologize and tell me that everything would
be alright now. Finally we were both able to calm down and quiet our emotions. It was as if we were afraid to let each other go. I couldn't bear to lose
physical contact with her. All I could do was hold her hands in my own and stare into her beautiful brown eyes. A light was beginning to come on in the
back of my mind. Could I get a grip on what Ren was telling me? On what Bella was telling me? If this was possible, and why the hell not (?) and she was
really being on the level with me, then I'd fallen in love with my best friend...again. And she had been waiting for me for five years. Oh God, I had so many
questions for her. Sniffling, I began to chuckle with just a note of hysteria in it.
"You asked me to wait for you."
She looked at me questioningly and that little crease formed between her eyebrows even as she pursed her lips and made that dimple in her left cheek show up.
"Way back, when you were, oh I don't know, maybe 4 or 5 months old, you told me that you were growing up fast and you asked me if I would wait for you."
The smile faded from her lips and she looked at me sadly. I wrapped my arms around her again and pulled her close, flush against my body, to try to warm her
and stop the shivers that were skittering across her shoulders. She looked down for a minute, drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and looked back up till our
eyes locked.
"That was the night Edward killed himself and tried to kill me too."
I started to apologize for bringing her back to such a painful memory, but she pressed her fingers against my lips to stop me.
"No, it's okay, Jake. It's in the past. I've dealt with the loss and moved on and do you know why? Because of you. Because I knew you really would wait for
me and I would have your love and friendship to make me strong. And I am strong, Jake. You've made me strong with your love and your devotion and loyalty
and your steadfast faith that we would be together and we'd be okay. I want to tell you how sorry I am for hurting you so deeply."
"You don't have to apologize for anything, Ren, uh, Bells. Oh geez, what do I call you now?"
She smiled up at me warmly and reached her hand up to stroke her cool fingers across my brow.
"Whatever you want to call me is fine. You can stick with 'Honey' if you want. I always liked that anyway. It might simplify things at first."
"Well, Honey, you don't have to say you're sorry..."
"But I really do, Jake. But I won't beat the dead horse. Let me say it and we'll move on. I'm sorry for all the pain I caused you and I'm sorry for breaking
your heart. I have no excuse, only reasons. I was young, foolish, and stupid; the list goes on and on. Okay, that's done, I promise. The main thing is that
I was lucky. Lucky to have known you and have you in my life and lucky to have been given a second chance to right some of the wrongs I did. I don't
know that I was so deserving but I embraced the opportunity to fix some stuff. That's one reason I've spent so much time with Charlie. I've tried to ease
his pain of losing me. I can never erase it, but I can love him now and try to help him be a little happier maybe. But you, Jake, my Jacob, you mean everything
to me. You always have but I was too blind to see it. You were always enough for me. You were always more than good enough. I didn't understand how
much you loved me and how much I truly loved you, until it was too late. But it wasn't too late, do you see? Please don't think I'm crazy. Please tell me
you believe me."
I felt like I was floating and I was numb. I was trying to wrap my mind around everything Re_, Bella was telling me. Could this possibly be true? If it was I
would have to say that I was the luckiest bastard that ever walked the face of the earth. There was no way I was going to waste this chance. Even if she's
just pulling my leg, I didn't care. This girl, this woman, loved me, made me happy, was my soul mate. I felt my heart swelling to more than its full proportion.
I hugged my girl close to me, placing sweet kisses on her forehead, her cheeks, and her eyelids. Then I found her lips and I attempted to answer her requests.
I didn't think she was crazy and I believed her with all my heart. I could feel it in her kiss. This was Bella in my arms. My soul and my heart and my wolf all
settled down and were completely at peace, for the first time in a very long time, much too long. I put every ounce of love and passion I felt into that kiss. I
knew that this woman would be with me till the end of our days and she would love me with all she had, as I would love her.
"Bella. My Bells. I believe you. Thank you for coming back for me. I don't know how you did it, but I'm so happy you did. And I love you, with everything
that I am. Forever."