Summary: Emmett disagrees with his family, especially Edward,for leaving a heartbroken Bella behind after her birthday incident, so he decides to return and care for her.

" I wouldn't have left her like you did!"

Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight. Stephanie Myer is the respective owner, I'm just fooling around with the characters.

" I honestly think she's out to get me Bella!"

Bella stared blankly into her small container of Caesar salad during lunch, some of what Jessica was babbling into her going completely out the other. She lifted her head towards her; the other brunette's blue eyes wide in distress.

" Weren't you two just talking yesterday?"

" Only because it was mandatory that we had to discuss the cheer routine for next week's rally performance! Trust me Bella, Lauren Mallory has had it out for me since the day I was declared cheer captain and she had to take the less accredited position as my co- adviser. She is anything but friend-worthy, and I will not let her try to get to me because she's trying to rub everything with Mike in my face!" She exclaimed now, her voice rising above most of the others in the cafeteria.

The room grew quiet, but not after Jessica screamed at them to mind their own business.

" There has to be a perfectly reasonable explanation for why they were making out right? I mean, come on, Mike isn't exactly the hottest guy in school, or the most popular in the slightest! I mean come on Bella! Lauren had been purposely avoiding him since the first grade! He plays World of Warcraft for goodness sake!"

" And yet you still care about him," It had been the one thoughtful response Bella had given out all day. She hated seeing Jessica stressed out like this, even if she was being overly-dramatic. But she had so many other things on her mind at the time, she could hardly believe she had even blurted that out to her. In fact, it was the only time she actually sounded like she cared about Jessica's situation, and not just nodding once in a while to her ranting.

Maybe it was because she could sort of understand what she was going through.

Jessica paused at Bella's response and stared with wide eyes. Her mouth opened to speak, but she closed it just as fast and swallowed. Bella could see her eyes glazing over, and she slowly reached over and placed her hand on hers. Jessica looked down at it and sniffed, but she didn't pull away. Instead, she raked a hand through her hair and sighed. In truth, this was the first time Bella had ever witnessed Jessica so vulnerable.

" I... I can't explain it Bella. I mean Jesus, since when did I started feeling anything remotely romantic for that guy?"

" I think it's always been there, but you're just now starting to realize it. Talk to him about it,"

By now, Jessica had stopped crying and rubbed her eyes with the back of her other hand. Bella pulled her hand away and waited for her to speak.

"It's not that easy, you know. I mean, he probably doesn't even feel the same way about me!" She retorted, her voice breaking.

'You never know unless you've tried right?"

"I guess you're ri-" Jessica stopped short and turned her head a little at the same time Bella did when they heard Mike and the gang approaching. She quickly rubbed her eyes again and inhaled a deep breath before turning to Mike as he called out to her. Bella wore a small smile when they met eyes.

" And Bella. Nice to see you guys talking again. You mind if we sit here?" Mike asked the both of them, but he was clearly waiting for a response from Jessica. Jessica cleared her throat and awkwardly looked down at her tray of untouched food.

" Not at all," Bella said.

"Cool," He said and he smiled, but looked down at Jessica as he sat down next to her, a concerned look in his eyes. Tyler sat beside Mike after he greeted Bella and Angela gave her a short hug before sitting beside her, a large grin on her face.

" It's so nice to see you again Bella! Gosh, it's been ages," Bella always liked Angela. She seemed to be the only girl that didn't seem to judge her, or even pity her as much as the other kids at school did when they found out the Cullens left, well, when they weren't glaring daggers at her for even getting as remotely close to even dating one of them.

"Yeah, we were starting to worry about you girl," Tyler added, with a small laugh.

" Your bodyguard not here today or something?" Mike asked jokingly, all of a sudden, and Bella blinked, totally unprepared for that.

"Mike!" Angela, practically hissed out at him, who cowered a little in his seat.

" Well it was just a question Angela. I mean clearly we're all interested. I wasn't trying to mean about it, but I thought it was strange. I mean, even before they left, you and that guy didn't seem to have any contact with each other at all. Why did he even come back in the first place? What are you guys together or something?" Her rambled, and Tyler glared.

" Dude, just shut up," He snapped, though he also seemed pretty interested in the idea. Angela sat beside Bella, quiet. And when Bella finally looked to her, she noticed she had been staring at her with a worried look in her eyes. Jessica looked to be fuming, and for the first time Bella's ever witnessed, she rose from the table, slamming her hands against it.

" Jessica, what's wr-"

" Goddammit Mike! I'm tired of you worrying about her all the time! I mean Jesus, she doesn't even like you like that! Could you just for once in your life, butt the hell out and let take care of her own damn problems? It's her own business, and you shouldn't even try and question her just because you're being a jealous asshole! When are you going to stop falling for girls that want nothing to do with you!"

The whole cafeteria had gone quiet by now. Jessica hovered over Mike with tears in her eyes. With one last soft glance at Bella, she stormed out of the room. Angela called out to her before apologizing to Bella and running to go after her. Tyler glared at at speechless Mike, before acknowledging Bella, and rushing out of the cafeteria.

Bella looked down at the eerie silence in the air, hearing Mike curse in frustration. After a couple of minutes, chatter started to fill the room again, and Bella rose her head as she heard Mike sigh. He had his hands over his face as he rubbed it, and he looked at Bella between his fingers.

" I'm.. a jerk aren't I?"

"Well..Mike-"

"I'm really sorry Bella," He confessed, and he sighed again. " I guess I was curious, and I'm sorry for trying to pry into your business. But that's it, I swear, because I care about you Bella. I know... I know you don't like me in that sense and I get that now.. I-I just didn't think she would react like that.. And Tyler and Angela... they're going to be avoiding me forever.."

" Not if you explain to them.. to her,"

" Why would she scream like that though? You don't think..." He trailed off, and his eyes widened as he started to put the pieces together. He cursed again and dropped his head to the table, muttering.

" I am such an asshole.. All this time, and I never knew.."

" She saw you with Lauren,"

His head lifted up at that. " Whoa wait, what? You've got to be kidding me." Bella shook her head.

" Jesus, she forced herself on me! I pushed her away as soon as I could! She talked about letting me...you know.. if I did her Biology paper for her, but I refused. I mean sure I liked her back in elementary, but things have changed now. I care about Jessica, Bella. So much. I didn't think she'd think twice of being anything more than friends with me," He explained, breathlessly, and raked a hand through his short dirty blonde hair in frustration.

" She needs... to hear that from you Mike,"

"I know, you're right. I'm sorry I caused all this mess. And.. thank you, for listening,"

Bella nodded. He rose from the table and grabbed his backpack. But before he left he stared into her eyes, and they softened.

" If you are.. you know, involved with that other Cullen, I would be careful. Edward left you, and look where that got you the last few months. If it's one thing I know about those Cullens now, it's that, they don't mind leaving when they want to. They're have like, empty souls, you know?"

Bella swallowed at just how true that last bit was, but couldn't help but feel a pang of guilt at his explanation. Her face flushed at the idea.

Involved with Emmett? It was crazy to even consider.

Never once had she ever thought about the bulky vampire that way. And with everything that was going on, on top of that.

She still had feelings for Edward for goodness sake!

She couldn't possibly be falling for Emmett too, could she?

She awkwardly waved as he left, and once again she was left alone.

ooOoo

Bella shut the front door to her house, sighing as she dropped her eyes in her jacket pocket. The house seemed to be empty, which meant Charlie was at work and wouldn't be back until later, which also meant she would have to cook dinner for herself tonight. She entered the kitchen and towards the refrigerator to get a bottled water and peeled off a sticky note from the front.

Eating out tonight.

Be back later so don't wait up.

Be safe Bells.

- Charlie

She crumpled up the sticky note and dropped it into the garbage can before trudging up the stairs to her bedroom. She figured she would at least take a nap first before starting on dinner, which would probably just be a turkey sandwich or frozen dinner since she didn't feel like cooking and washing pots afterward.

The door to her bedroom creaked as she opened it. She set her backpack down and looked towards her bed tiredly.

And that's when she saw him.

" Welcome home Bella," He replied with a cheeky grin, his large hands folded into his lap.

"Emmett... what... are you doing here? I thought you-" She paused, watching him as he rose from her bed.

" I didn't mean to disappear like that, even if it was for a day, but I promise you I will never do that again," He replied, as if he were worried she would lash out at him. He did look sorry. His eye brows furrowed as he waited for a response, and he took a couple of steps forward.

" Where did you go?"

"Hunting." He replied, and Bella released a breath she didn't realize she had been holding.

Maybe it was because she realized he hadn't been trying to leave her for good. He had told her in the beginning he wasn't going anywhere and now he was back.

She had been overreacting the two days he had been gone, and she felt pretty foolish.

" O-Oh," She stammered, her face flushing as she nervously raked a hand through her hair. By now, he had already closed the large amount of space between them and placed his hands on either of her shoulders. A shudder ran through her at his touch, and she blushed even more at the reaction as he earnestly looked into her eyes.

" I'm sorry if I worried you. It was urgent, but I know it would have been better to at least tell you first,"

"Vampires have needs too. You don't have to apologize to me,"

He seemed to want to protest at that, but he let it go, and to Bella's relief, he smiled a little instead.

"Okay, good. But there's something you should know first,"

Bella nodded.

" I went hunting with Rosalie," The color completely drained from Bella's already plain face.

" R-Rosalie? She's here?" He nodded, but gave her an earnest smile afterwards.

"Yeah, and she wants to see you,"

Author's Note: OMG guys it's been forever! So, Senior year is kicking my ass! But guess what? Tomorrow is the last day of Finals before Winter Break, so you know what that means!

MORE UPDATES!

Oh yeah, and guess who got accepted into San Francisco State University? This girl!

I'm so stoked that I got in, but I might not be able to go due to the tuition and living expenses and such, BLAH!

Anyways, I've been pretty busy so I haven't really had time to contribute to any of my stories, as you can see, but I would love to give a shout out to all my reviewers: twilightlover4evr, jessa76, natashar, Jazzyprentiss42, HeatherLove88, an anonymous reviewer, Lissa, InuNekoLexi, JojoLutz, Floridagirl13, and mydirt09 for reviewing!

And thank you for all the alerts! 107 followers and 67 favs? You guys are the best! :)

But I seriously need yall's help! I need some ideas to get this story moving a little faster, and to get my creative juices flowing!

It would be such a big help! I don't want to make this story a major let down in any way so I need make every chapter appealing!

Welp, other than that, you know what to do!

And thank you for being so patient! It's great to be back!

Review! :)