On the eighth day since my admission to the hospital, Carlisle informed my parents that he'd succeeded in convincing his brain-surgeon friend to take on my case, pro bono. It was far too unrealistic a scenario to believe, but Carlisle played it perfectly, and my parents didn't really question it. The only thing they would have to pay for, Carlisle said, was my air-fare to Dublin, where the surgeon had set up his practice.
"Dublin?" Charlie repeated. His face fell. I assumed he was thinking about the cost of such a plane ticket, but I was wrong: "I'd better take some time off work, then," he finished.
That was a scary thought. I couldn't have him following me out to the Irish city I wasn't even going to. "Dad," I said, "you can't be serious. You have to stay here. You can't leave your job. I'll be fine. You know, at least I'm travelling, right? And this place looks awesome. The grounds are beautiful. Did you look at the website?"
"Of course I did," he said. "Bells, I can't send you out there all alone—"
"I've been alone before," I said gently. "Alone doesn't scare me." Then, because he still seemed half a step away from boarding a plane, cost be damned, I added in a falsely cheerful tone, "Anyway, I'm bringing my laptop. I'll show you how to set up Skype before I go. It'll just be like I'm living with Mom again. You'll barely even notice I'm gone." Wishful thinking.
"I'll go with her, Charlie," said Renee. "I'll see she gets settled in." I shook my head emphatically, and my parents both looked surprised. Not suspicious, though. Not yet.
"If you guys come with me," I said, swallowing, "I'm gonna feel like...like you're coming to say goodbye."
"Bells—" began my dad.
"Don't do that to me," I said thickly, my eyes flooding. "Don't make me go out there and then turn around and watch you get on a plane and leave. Don't make me do that, please don't make me do that."
"Then I won't leave," said Charlie. "I can stay. I've got some vacation and sick days saved up, Bells—"
"You know you can't do that. Dr. Cullen said we can't possibly know how long this is going to take. You can't cash in every last shred of security just so I don't have to go to another country by myself. What happens if it takes longer than your vacation days? You leave then, and it hurts more? Or you what, lose your job? I want you guys to save up your vacation days and use them to come get me when I'm all better. Okay?"
"No, honey, no, baby," my mother moaned, tucking a strand of my hair behind my ear. But I was firm.
"Promise me," I said. "You have to promise. Don't take me there. Just bring me home when it's time. Don't make this harder on me than it has to be. Please?"
What could they say to such a plea? It was fortunate that this request sounded more or less reasonable, given my independent streak up till now. Oh, what an artful little monster I was turning out to be.
"How soon are you going?" my dad asked.
"Dr. Royard needs to see Bella as soon as possible; the faster he gets to work, the greater his likelihood of success," said Carlisle. "She should be on a plane out there no later than Wednesday." Today was Monday.
"And why is this pro bono, again?" said Charlie. "I have money. Renee has money. Not a lot, but between the two of us..."
"Jeffrey is a very dear friend of mine," said Carlisle. "We were at grad school together; I stood up at his wedding. He has some time to spare and is more than happy to take on this case, knowing it is for someone so dear to my family." The funny part was, there actually was a Dr. Royard, and he really did have a practice in Dublin, and Carlisle really had been best man at his wedding—in 1991. The only part that wasn't real was the part where I was going to be treated by him. "And of course," Carlisle added, "all of the appropriate paperwork will be provided promptly. It is all arranged. All that is required of you is your emotional support—and Bella will no doubt need that in spades."
And who'll support them? I thought. But I didn't say it aloud.
It all seemed so elaborate, but Esme assured me that their family had gone to much greater lengths than this to ensure their safety and secrecy.
My father drove me to SeaTac, Renee trying not to cry too loudly in the back seat. They walked me to the security gate, where Carlisle and Esme were waiting to pretend to escort me to Dublin and get me set up at the hospital where Dr. Royard worked. I was sitting in a wheelchair being pushed by my dad, while my mother clutched my suitcase like it was a life raft. The carry-on in my lap hid my belly, which was really too large at this point to look like anything but a pregnancy. When we were forced to part at security, my mother bent over to encircle me tightly in her arms.
"I want you to call me and we'll set up Skype the minute you get moved in," she whispered, kissing the side of my face. When she pulled away, her own cheeks were damp. She backed away a few steps, to give Charlie and me some privacy, perhaps.
I turned to my dad. He gave me his signature one-armed hug.
"I wish this coulda happened to me instead of you," he said, his voice shaking. "This should never have happened to you."
That was when it hit me: this could actually be the last time I ever saw my father face-to-face. I could be dead in a month. I could be a newborn vampire, totally stripped of my humanity, unable to think of anything but the lust for blood. Anything could happen. This could be the only goodbye we ever got, and I couldn't begin to think of how to say it. How could I explain to him how sorry I was that we'd had so small a percentage of my life to spend as father and daughter? How glad I was that at least I'd gotten to know him a little better before it was too late? How could I tell him I didn't blame him for the way everything had turned out? Because I knew he would blame himself. Yet another trait I took from him.
"Dad," I said, hugging him back fiercely. My eyes flooded and my voice shook. Masen shifted in my belly, pushing and pressing and making himself known, making himself loved. This was all for him. This and so much more I would do for him.
But it still hurt.
"I'm glad I came here," I said at last, gritting my teeth to keep from bawling. "I wouldn't trade these last two years for...for anything."
"No offense, kiddo," said Charlie, "but I can think of one thing I'd trade 'em for."
Carlisle and Esme walked toward us, both carrying small suitcases. They smiled at me. Carlisle shook my father's hand, then hugged Renee. Esme gave them both a hug and promised she would stay as long as needed to get me settled in and comfortable. Then Charlie kissed the part in my hair, and handed my bag to Carlisle, and stood as still as a statue while I went through the security gate. I turned one last time to wave. Renee was holding one hand stiffly up, the other wrapped around the front of her like she was trying to hold her organs in. Her mouth kept flickering between encouraging smiles and wobbly grimaces, and her eyes were fixed on mine. But Charlie wasn't looking at me anymore. His face was buried in his hands, and even from here I could see his shoulders shaking.
Carlisle and Esme drove me to their house. Esme sat in the back seat with me, her arm around my shoulders while I cried.
"Oh darling," she crooned, smoothing my hair with gentle fingers. "I'm so sorry it hurts. I know, darling, I know…"
I had mostly managed to stop crying by the time we reached the glass mansion. Edward was standing in the driveway, waiting for us. I stumbled into his arms and breathed deeply. My eyes hurt. My head hurt. My heart hurt. Even though I knew there had been no other choice, I still felt like I'd just done an unforgivable thing.
But Edward had done unforgivable things, too. All of the Cullens had, at one time or another. I was in good company.
Esme had emptied out the large dining room and the small parlor which was connected to it by French doors. She had installed heavier, sound-muffling doors, helping to separate these two rooms from the rest of the house. I had no idea where the dining table and all the chairs had gone, because the two rooms now formed a suite which was to be my living quarters for the next who-knew-how-long. In the smaller of the two rooms was a bed made of sleek, satiny walnut and covered in snowy linen sheets. Looking closely, I saw a little swan embroidered in white-on-white on each pillowcase.
The dining room had become a sort of personal living room for me, with a large desk where I could set up my laptop and the books I'd brought with me. There were comfy chairs and thick carpets on every inch of floor. Not a single piece of furniture in either room had a sharp corner on it. Half in jest, I checked the wall outlets for baby-covers.
"This looks great," I said appreciatively. Esme had outdone herself. I could see that every effort was being made to ensure that I was comfortable, safe, and not too bored. Anyway, I had already been practically living here since my Junior year; this wasn't so different, when you got down to brass tacks.
In the days that followed, I received the best of care, as promised. Carlisle checked on me twice a day, and there was always someone close enough to catch me if I fell over my own feet like I always did. Other than that, though, it felt like a normal visit, albeit one that never ended.
A few times, I talked to Esme and the others about Victoria. Edward had told his mom my theory, but she still wanted to hear it from me. I hoped that Esme would see some obvious flaw in my theory, some reason Victoria wouldn't think Bree worth hurting. I didn't really give this hope much weight, though, which was just as well since Esme agreed with me anyway.
"We found few traces of Victoria's scent around Seattle, which squares with my belief that she has resorted to finding victims from further afield. We located the dropoff point, though obviously no one was there. We didn't find any clues. I don't suppose it's surprising that Victoria would be such a savant at hiding her tracks."
"Did she...um, did she punish us? For going out there?" I couldn't think of another way to say it.
A fleeting expression of anger crossed Esme's face. "Yes," she said tersely. "However, in deference to your condition and the need to keep you completely calm, it would be best if we didn't discuss it just now."
"Oh."
"Anyway, it seems that there is no longer time for us to hide in the shadows. We are adopting a policy of constant harassment. We won't give Victoria a moment's rest, nor a single hour of peace during which to search for victims. In fact, that's what Rosalie and Emmett are doing now, as well as the Denalis. We really have no hope of catching her now, especially if we couldn't catch her before; but at least she can't settle down in a hidey hole with a cache of murder victims lined up in neat little rows, as she's done thus far. If Victoria hadn't increased the murder load so rapidly, we might still be cowering, looking for an angle. She has, perhaps rashly, forced our hand."
"Why do you think she wants to turn Bree?" I asked. "Do you think she, like, cares about her?"
"She might," Esme admitted with a shrug. "Bree's life bears certain notable similarities to Victoria's own. But I think that there is a much more powerful motive. I was confused, at first, by the freedom with which Victoria allowed Bree to socialize with you. Naturally, I considered the possibility that Bree is merely a very good actress, but one of the first things we did was confirm her backstory. In light of that fact, Victoria's failure to prevent Bree from conversing with you as much as you both wish seemed uncharacteristically risky. But then, if preventing fraternization were truly her goal, why not simply hire someone more experienced, someone who would know not to fraternize, someone who knows all her plans and agrees with her agenda? Indeed, why not simply send you a letter via post? She must feel convinced that Bree can give you no information that might hurt her. She is presumably keeping the details of her operation under wraps. You say that Bree is under the impression that we are in business with Victoria, correct?"
I nodded.
"She could have told Bree all sorts of lies about us, about you. Or indeed she could have told her a version of the truth but cast herself as victim. That would no doubt have put Bree on her guard, or even instilled dislike and distrust in us. But she shows no sign of this; you said that Bree's rejections of your invitations to spend time together were because your father is a cop, and not because she didn't want to or wasn't allowed. I can only conclude that Victoria has wanted all along for Bree to think of us not as enemies but as partners in some way. She may even have hoped that you would try to befriend Bree, or would at least feel sorry for her and like her. Want to help her. Trust in her innocence, knowing she is likely to be caught in crossfire and totally ignorant of her fate."
"Which is exactly what happened," I said. I felt a bitter twinge at the thought that I'd done exactly what it seemed Victoria wanted. I'd fallen for Bree hook, line and sinker. Esme must have guessed some of what I was feeling, because she pressed my hand and said,
"What else could you do? If you were the sort of person who wouldn't feel sympathy for Bree, you wouldn't be the Bella Swan we've all come to love. And anyway, all of this is probably moot."
"Why's that?"
"Well, let's add up what we know. Victoria chose for her messenger a girl who was sweet and charming and who looks like you, and she has done nothing to prevent you two from talking with some freedom—all indicators that she wants you to like Bree. She has told Bree nothing of her true machinations so that Bree will maintain her innocence. Bree only meets you alone, when none of our people are around. Over time, you have grown accustomed to this. You no longer fear her, specifically, instead considering her merely another of Victoria's pawns, a victim like yourself. And the signs all point to an eventual plan to turn Bree. It is possible that Victoria's only aim is to gain herself a little sister and begin rebuilding her life, but that is unlikely now that she's lost her mate. No, my belief is that Victoria intends to use Bree as a weapon against you."
"Against me?" I gasped, my heart speeding up until Masen started to squirm. I took several deep breaths and tried to calm myself.
"The flaw in her plan," said Esme with a modest smile, "is that you have just been sent to a hospital in Dublin to be treated for an illness that everyone, including your own family, believes to be totally real. As soon as Edward gave me your message, it became obvious what we must do. Carlisle has already begun planting paper trails. You were so kind as to mention to Bree that you may be sent away, and a side-effect of Victoria's brilliant plan to get you to like Bree is that she's more likely to believe that some of what you say to her is truth. As far as Victoria knows or will know for some time, you are currently on another continent."
"Will she really fall for that?" I asked anxiously. "She's clever."
"Oh, not permanently," said Esme regretfully. "I don't expect her to think that you're actually sick. But I do expect her to believe you have been moved to a safe place, far away. Carlisle has far more resources and allies at his disposal than she does, and it will take her a while to follow his trail of paperwork to its end. That will take time, especially with the two families hounding her every step. And the paper trail is a good one, with all sorts of cul de sacs and dead ends. Carlisle is taking pains to create clues that Victoria won't be able to quite ignore. Eventually, the only way for her to verify that you are indeed in Dublin will be to travel there herself."
"So what's to stop her doing just that?" I asked.
"Well," said Esme, "among my husband's friends are dozens of nomads who have agreed to keep their eyes peeled for Victoria. Not to catch or kill her, since that would probably not be possible in any case; merely to keep her from reaching any certain conclusions about where you are located. And there is something even better. Ireland is the home of a small but important coven of vampires. Not animal-drinkers, alas, but they share some important moral beliefs with our family. They are close friends of Carlisle's and mine. Their leader is a woman named Siobhan, and although she does not believe herself to be unusually gifted, Carlisle and I have suspected for some time that she has a certain subtle gift that enables her to quietly influence future events. Her daughter, Maggie, also has a gift; she cannot be lied to. They have heard our story and agreed to become our allies. Although Siobhan does not strongly believe in her own powers, she has agreed to do what she can to help us keep Victoria occupied and powerless until we can come up with a more substantial plan. And she has determined to envision a future in which Bree is kept safe from harm. Victoria won't get close enough to Dublin to confirm your presence or absence there for some time. If she is kept in limbo about your whereabouts, persistently harassed by our nomadic friends so that she can not hunker down and plot, caught in the web of Siobhan's subtle gift, then we may have enough time to do a little plotting of our own to put an end to this. "
I sat there with my mouth hanging open, just staring at Esme. She had followed every possible course of action that Victoria might take, had narrowed down the probabilities, planted false leads, manipulated circumstances. Turned shit into gold. Was it Esme who had first come up with the idea of sending me to Ireland instead of somewhere else? Carlisle must have connections everywhere; until now it hadn't entered my mind that there might be any motivation for me to go there, specifically, besides the simple fact of its distance my parents. Now I found out that the location of the clinic was its own layer of protection, yet another buffer against Victoria's machinations. Esme was now smiling openly. But still gently.
Gently, gently. She did all things gently.
"Esme," I said in awe, "I want to kiss you on the mouth."
"Thank you, Bella. Mind you, she'll come up with something else eventually. Something worse, I've no doubt. But she will not find us an easy foe. Not after we've had time to plan."
On the day Carlisle declared me to be about six and a half months along, we received our first phone call from Alice. Since everyone but me could hear the conversation from a room away, Edward handed me the phone immediately.
"Hi, Alice," I said.
"Bella!" she bubbled. "How's the bod? I miss you, honey!"
"I miss you too," I said. The sound of her voice was like a well-loved song; I could just imagine what a ray of sunlight she must have been, coming so unexpectedly into the Cullens' lives. Even now, her absence was felt. Without Alice, everything felt just a little darker, a little colder.
"Bell, we have great news. We found Zafrina, finally, and it looks like our hunch was correct! There's at least one half-vampire she knows, although she thinks he has sisters. His name is Nahuel. Zafrina says he's totally normal and cool and not a freak at all. We're headed for Santiago now, because apparently that's where he usually lives, but they didn't have a very precise address. Also, you would not even believe the sun down here, or I don't know, maybe you would. I swear we can only travel between the hours of midnight and fifteen past midnight."
"Did Zafrina know anything about...about the birth?"
"Well…" Alice hesitated. "She, um. Well."
"Alice," I said warningly. "Out with it."
"Apparently Nahuel's mom didn't make it," she said in a rush. "But Zafrina doesn't know the whole story. Besides, Nahuel is like two hundred years old. Three out of every two women died in childbirth back then, so don't be freaked out just yet."
"I'm not freaked out," I said. It was true. I actually wasn't. This felt like the first good news in a long, long while. It was possible for Masen to be born. If nothing else went right, at least I knew that one thing was possible. My son would breathe air.
"I have to run," said Alice. "I just had a vision. Using my visions to track a random person I've never met is tedious in the extreme. Bella, if you end up with a power, I sincerely hope it is the power to never ever have to see the future."
"Thank you, Alice," I said.
"Welcome," she said airily. "Hi, everyone who's listening! Love you, Bell. See you all soon!"
"Love you too, Alice," I said.
The Cullens were all watching me nervously, like they thought I might explode.
"I'm not freaking out," I said. I felt a little bubble of laughter rise up my throat and let it out before it could burst. "If Nahuel can survive being a freak of nature, so can Masen. Everything on top of that is just icing."
I got huger by the day. I passed what Carlisle was considering the seven month mark, and I couldn't even hobble around on my own anymore; Carlisle insisted that I be confined to my bed, a couch, or a wheelchair—which I wasn't even allowed to roll around by myself. A week later, it was to be bed rest exclusively.
I tried not to be too annoyed at this. I was an independent person by nature, and it grated on me to have to call Edward over every time I needed to go to the bathroom. Even that would only get worse; Carlisle was saying that in another week I would require a bedpan, because the bed rest would need to be unbroken, even for bathroom breaks. There was only so much my body could take.
There were other difficulties, as well. My father must have told Harry about my sudden illness and departure for Dublin, and this instantly raised the suspicions of the pack. Luckily, since I was Skyping with my dad every day as I got "settled in" at the hospital overseas, the wolves knew I hadn't yet been changed, the treaty had not yet been broken. But of course, it would be. All this subterfuge can only have looked like a final settling of my affairs.
Carlisle and Esme began holding long, drawn-out phone calls with Harry and Old Quil. I never heard what they said, but Edward summarized for me: apparently, Carlisle had explained the Volturi to the tribe, convincing them that outing the Cullens would be worse for them than for us. The elders had agreed to restructure the treaty: they would never breathe a word of what they knew about the vampires, but the minute I was turned, we would have to leave—and never come back. And they would make absolutely sure we held to it.
This was an incredibly distressing thought, now that I'd become so ridiculously attached to Forks. But as I entered my eighth month of pregnancy (and the dreaded bedpan, and one-hundred-percent bedrest), something wonderful happened: Alice and Jasper returned.
They didn't tell anyone they were coming back, just showed up one day out of the blue. ("Classic Alice," Edward had said fondly.)
"I suppose you didn't have any visions about...what's going on up here?" said Carlisle tentatively, after everyone had hugged everyone else several times over.
Alice shook her head. "I had to focus on finding Nahuel with like, one million percent of my brain. Why? What have you guys been up to?"
We all looked at each other uncomfortably. Finally Edward summed it up.
"Victoria has been scheming to kill an unknown number of us, almost certainly including Bella, and has murdered half the population of Seattle in the process. She's being kept busy in Ireland with some false leads at the moment, and we probably have a while before she catches up with us, but eventually she'll come up with some new and horrible way to express her grief at James' passing. Meanwhile, the wolves have got wind of Bella's impending transformation and will view such an act as the breaking of our contract. We have to leave Forks as soon as she's turned, which will probably be as soon as Masen is born."
"Masen?" said Jasper, looking at me.
"Oh," said Edward as an afterthought, "and we named the baby."
"Shucks," Alice said, "I guess if you've named him I have to like him. Drat you all." She was smiling, and despite the uncertainty hanging over my head I felt happy.
As described in the books, the bond between Bella and Renee is a confusing one. Bella claims to be very close to her mother, yet she shows an astonishing inability to perceive how much her transformation/death will affect Renee. I also didn't see much evidence in the books that Bella really enjoyed spending time with her mother, but that might have been because Bella didn't regularly show signs of enjoying anything (except, obviously, face-touching with Edward). Renee doesn't actually show up all that much in the books, despite being Bella's "best friend", and there were no scenes between them that really convinced me of the degree of closeness that Bella always insisted they shared. She rarely spoke of her mom with affection or admiration, although she did seem to look down her nose at Renee's shortcomings, like her flightiness and irresponsibility. I don't see a problem with that per se, but I do see a problem calling them best friends when they act like so much less. To paraphrase the ever-insightful Alaislana, it feels disingenuous and undermines Bella's (already crumbly) reliability as a narrator.
My Bella loves her mom, but she has also come to understand that there are significant limitations on how much she can rely on Renee to be emotionally supportive. She moved to Forks because she wanted distance from her mother and because she felt that there was no reason for them to live together anymore after Renee had found Phil. Bella felt that she could be content anywhere (even in Forks), but that Renee could not be happy without Phil. I like the idea that Bella had a closer relationship by default with Renee than with Charlie, but that when they were no longer spending time together she had the freedom to realize that her mother had failed her in some ways, requiring Bella to essentially assume the role of mother. This doesn't mean she no longer loves Renee, it merely means that she is growing up and learning to see her mom as a flawed human being (something we all go through eventually). And it gave her the opportunity to be her dad's little girl for a short time, while she still had the chance. And Renee's shortcomings as a mother would enable Bella to appreciate Esme's maternal guidance all the more.