A/N: Before you read, will you promise to stick with me to see how this all shakes out?

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight.

A Guiding Heart

Growing Pains

Chapter 22

"God damn you Jacob Black!" I cursed into the air before picking up a large ceramic blue planter Esme had on the patio and hurling it into the forest with all of my strength. Birds and small animals dispersed through the air and land, disturbed and displaced by my act of defiance. "How many times did you need to interfere with my life!" I yelled more, picking up another planter, growling and hissing.

"Yeah Bella, chuck it if it is going to make you feel better!" Justin stepped back. I took a few deep breaths, settling myself down.

"You have no idea how many times he has ruined my life! Apparently I didn't either! He just . . . Ugh! He makes me so fucking angry!"

"I know, I know. I get it," he said, gesturing like he was waiting for me to throw the planter. In one effortless move, I sent that planter sailing through the air toward the forest.

Justin followed the planter with his eyes - whistling, shook his head, and then gestured back to the seating, guiding me to the chair I had been sitting in. If I could have shed tears at that point, I would have - over everything from my human past to my more recent past. "Jacob Black has messed up my life at every possible turn and he's still wreaking havoc on it. He's been targeting me with the imprinting and now to hear this!" I was speaking a mile a minute.

"Whoa slow down. What are you talking about? What's imprinting?" Sitting next to me, he lightly rubbed my back in a soothing gesture.

How could I explain it to him when I didn't quite know how the hell it was happening myself? But it did happen! I witnessed it….more than once! "He was like ...taking over the body of this guy I was seeing, making him say things to me he didn't want to say. Filling his head with memories that weren't his."

"How could he do that?" Justin asked seeming genuinely perplexed.

"I don't know. Like because he's dead he could just slip into a body and take it over. Didn't you ever see the movie Ghost?"

Justin looked like he was searching his memory. Then he got it! "And this was to torment you, you think?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I think Jacob was just still finding a way to interfere with my love life. Man what a jerk!"

Justin's slow movement of his hand across my back stopped, so did conversation between us for a moment. There was something peculiar to his face. He looked both confused and amused about something. I didn't know if he could even wrap his head around the imprinting subject or not.

"But it's over? With the guy, I mean," Justin probed.

"Yeah," I sighed. "I think so. I don't know. It's still pretty recent of a breakup. I should be listening to a sad song over and over or gorging myself on ice cream," I laughed. "Or blood pops right about now."

"I'm sorry then," he said. "But in a way, just-Bella, I'm not. Only because I don't know if you'd be sitting here with me right now otherwise. And...I'm glad you're here." He paused. His expression changed. "Tell me just-Bella, are you glad you're here...with me?" He looked into my eyes. Did Justin have a gift? If he did, it might be some kind of kindness conveyed in his eyes because when I looked at him, I didn't want to deny him the answer he was looking for.

I smiled at Justin. With a full honest heart, I wanted to tell him that I indeed was glad I was there with him, but Edward still very much remained in my heart, blocking my response as I opened my mouth then hesitated. I think Justin got whatever answer he was looking for, as he straightened up.

"Well I don't know much of why Jacob was targeting him for this imprinting thing, but I do know that the people who lived on the reservation trusted my father's shop. Do you want to hear this?"

I took a few deep breaths, not that I needed the air, just to help calm me down and brace myself for more and to hide the fact that I didn't know the answer about Edward. It's not over for me. Is it really over for him? The note said so, but if I could just talk to him . . . well, what if I could convince him otherwise? Is it over just because one person says it is?

I nodded a yes to Justin, to which he nodded back a questioning yes to confirm again. When I nodded again, he caressed my hand with a light patting and said he was willing to proceed then.

"Jacob had spent time working under my father to learn how to fix cars, the same as me. When he saw you and I together at some point, and I don't know where, he flipped the ever-living fuck out on me. He went ballistic. He made it known to me that he had seen us and wanted you for himself. In his sick head, that son of a bitch had already claimed you as his own, Bella! He threatened to take away the reservation's business from the shop. My dad would have lost out on money that he counted on." Justin looked pensive for a moment while I tried to understand how horrible Jacob had been to him. "I'm trying to . . . it's not that I don't remember some of it, but I might have some of the details out of order," he said, to which I nodded that I understood. He continued to stroke my hand as he thought, and I relished in the feel of his touch and the ease of the comfort it provided me. "He deterred me from pursuing you, but then you and I ran into each other and hung out together more and more, and I don't know, I just really liked you, Bella."

I felt my eyes widen to saucer size to hear him confirm once again that he really had liked me.

"So I didn't actively pursue you, but with us working together, I couldn't stay away from you either. I thought those times we hung out at your house or in the park, we were getting away with it, without Jacob ever knowing. And when I got you to invite me to something . . . I think it was a party of some kind, I thought we were home free. I planned to make my move that night of your party. I had hoped that Jacob's threats were just...empty threats….or that he'd forgotten. But not long before the night of your party, he and his buddies got a hold of me and roughed me up. They held me down and forced me to drink something that made me sick. He told me that if I didn't stay away from you that he'd burn my father's place down and no one would ever question that it had been an accident after someone left a cigarette burning."

"Why a cigarette?"

"To implicate me I think," he said, coming to kneel in front of me and pleading. "Bella I couldn't let him do that to my dad, not … not after everything he had done for me. I had to make you think I had moved on with that other girl so you'd have a reason to keep your distance. I was caught between a Goddamn rock and a hard place. I didn't have any other choice. Can you understand that?"

"No, yeah, I don't blame you," I looked at him. "It just sucks, you know. You were. . . well you were like the king of mixed signals, and I was pretty hurt." Too many emotions flashed through me as I recounted the details I had relayed to Esme recently about the party and memories of what happened at the pizzeria. "But. . . why didn't you tell me?"

He caressed my hand lightly with just his fingertips sending chills through me. "I guess I just didn't think I could at the time. Or maybe I tried. What a fucked up situation, huh? And now I can't even kick his sorry ass. Man you don't know how much I was looking forward to doing that." He paused briefly, his eyes roaming my face then stopping to search my eyes. "But just Bella, look around…." Justin took the time to look around the outside furnishings of the cottage. "We're free of Jacob Black. We don't have to worry now." He lightly tapped my hoop earring, making it sway as he smiled at me.

With the movement of the earring, I thought of Edward and what he told me on the Ferris wheel: No matter what happens, I want you to always remember this moment.

It hurts too much right now to remember it, Edward, because you're not here. You left. Did he know he would be leaving when he said those words to me?

My knees quivered. Justin held my hand. His presence mixed with this new information made me feel nervous all over again. His scent was also driving me a little crazy. His scent was like cedar wood chips with that same hint of citrus Edward always had. I sat quietly trying to make sense of out of everything that had happened until I needed to break the silence and change the air around me. "Umm, I'm going to get a cigarette. Do you want one?" I asked standing up while he moved to the patio couch.

"You smoke?" he asked with a tone to his voice that exactly matched how he asked me once before and I giggled to myself from inside the cottage as I was reaching into my purse.

"Why is that funny?" he asked from outside. "And yes, I'll partake. Thanks for offering."

I grabbed my SSA lighter and brought it outside with the pack of cigarettes and a small glass bowl to use as an ashtray that I found in the kitchen.

"It's just . . . I sort of remembered when you first saw me smoking at the park. It's like you couldn't believe it." I laughed.

"You do? I'm not sure if I remember but I probably thought you were too good to get yourself addicted to anything. You had too many ambitions, just Bella. And you were good-hearted. You were way too good for me, then that's for sure, too."

"No. No I wasn't. Why would you even say that?"

"Because you …. You had your life figured out. You were different than most of the girls I knew at that time."

He took a cigarette from the pack and I held out the lighter to him. I didn't know what to think about what he was saying. Yes I knew even back then what I wanted to be in life, but things don't always go as planned. They certainly hadn't for me. After he lit his cigarette, he tapped a beat on his leg with the lighter, until I finally threw him a glance, motioning to it with my eyes.

"What?" he asked after inhaling his cigarette. He held the lighter up and read it. "You don't like my skills?"

"You don't remember the lighters either?"

"I'm not sure I do," he admitted.

I laughed. "It's just as well."

"Tell me," he said.

"No," I replied, smoking my cigarette.

"Tell me," he begged.

"Nope," I said flashing him a coy smile. I was enjoying this.

"Well it has something to do with the Ski and Skies Adventureland so I'm guessing it has something to do with me. Was it a time when I acted like an ass to you?"

"No. In fact, you . . . you were really sweet to me to the point that my friend convinced me you were hitting on me. One minute we were spending time together, and the next minute you were telling me to go away to college and forget about you. That's why I was always so confused about us."

"So you admit, there was an us," he grinned. With his next inhale, he blew smoke directly into my face. I shook my head at him and his juvenile antics, then his eyes widened. "At the pizza place?" he said, like the memory had just overwhelmingly come back to him. "That's where I told you to go away to college. I said it in front of Jacob because I wanted you to get away from him. I knew as long as you stayed in town, he was going to pursue you or hassle anyone else who was interested in you. I couldn't give you a reason to stick around here because it meant giving him more opportunity."

I thought back to that day in the pizzeria and Justin telling me, "You know what you need to do Bella? Just go off to college, become a fancy doctor and forget about me."

"Oh my God...you were trying to protect me from him, weren't you?" I said, my voice full of anguish.

"Yeah...lousy damn job I did of it," he muttered. "Considering . . ."

"You had no idea what he really was, or became. None of us did." I was overtaken by how much sense he was making out of those days. He was giving me horrible reasons for everything that happened, but at least now I knew. All the unanswered questions finally made sense.

"Hey! I have an idea!" Justin said brightly. "Let's you and me go to the park, walk around, maybe ride some rides! Maybe we can figure out some more memories there together. There has to be some better memories to dig up between us."

"Justin, I'm not sure if that's such a good idea . . ."

"Oh come on, just Bella! It'll be fun! Remember the time we ditched your date to ride on the rides? Whoa, where did that memory come from?"

"He wasn't my date," I replied, knowing exactly what night Justin was referring to.

"Yes he was," he insisted.

"No, Mark was just a guy that worked with me. He was a good buddy that had gone to my school."

"Then why did I like to steal you away from him?" He flashed his bad-boy smile-the one with the hint of 90210's Brandon and Dylan.

We both laughed. We had what seemed like hours of laughing as we shared anything in between tiny flashes and long stories of memories. They rippled between us like waves in the ocean pushing and pulling and sometimes crashing hard on the shore. With each memory shared and after the explanation of Jacob, I sunk further and further into a comfort and closeness with him that I had never known before - neither as a human nor as a vampire.

Why did I feel caught like I was doing something wrong when Alice returned? Justin and I were thumb wrestling, but Alice's sneer made me lose my concentration, letting him win when she announced herself as being back.

Alice was swift yet precise with her hair cutting. It was a modern version of Justin's 90s' look. She styled it perfectly for him with a little hair gel, before sending him in to shave. The Justin I knew was an unexpected new addition to my new life and a distraction from Edward.

While Justin was shaving, Alice scribbled across a piece of paper.

"What are you doing?"

I don't know, I wrote in return.

What about Edward? She wrote quickly.

I shrugged. In some ways, every moment I shared with Edward was 1000 times harder than just sitting on the couch existing with Justin. Not that I didn't think it was worth it. I didn't know what I was doing with Edward, but I questioned it constantly. Now with Justin, because he was a vampire, I didn't have to question so much.

"Do you know how I've been struggling with being this now? Remember the night we talked about it recently?" I gestured with my hand up and down toward myself, referring to being a vampire. Alice nodded in understanding. "He," I nodded toward the hallway hesitating, ". . . he's somehow making it all okay. Everything else around me is chaos out there. For the first time, I feel like I don't have to forget the past in order to embrace who I am now. This, Alice,...finding Justin this way….this is what you saw for me in your vision. This is my life coming full circle."

Alice crumpled up the piece of paper and stuck it in her pocket.

"Will Kate be coming back to the cottage?" I asked Alice.

"No, she and Garrett made their own plans and then she was heading back to Denali."

With that information, I immediately pulled out my phone and called Esme, asking for permission to allow Justin to use the cottage. She questioned me about why he was a vampire but I told her I'd have to talk to her more another time. She agreed but expressed how much she wanted the cottage to remain intact. Oops, so I had a couple of planters I had to replace!

Once I was off the phone, Alice dragged me outside, immediately mouthing the words to me to avoid Justin overhearing us.

"So then….what are you doing?" she mouthed, showing her frustration by putting her hands in the air.

"I don't know!" I mouthed, putting my hands up in the air too. Then with a shrug I mouthed, "How did this even happen?"

"But what about Edward?" she mouthed.

I could only shake my head slowly. How could I have ever expected him to understand a relationship with me? A fling maybe, had we even gotten that far, but long term? No. There would always have been the difference that existed between us. Two different species. Two different worlds.

"What about his …" Alice placed her hand over her chest. "And all that stuff about how you made him feel better?"

Her words sent pangs through me. What about it? How many times had Edward told me he felt better around me? I know the effect I had on his heart.

"Alice, it's killing me every minute not knowing if he's okay, but he's the one who left. He made the decision to leave without talking to me about it. How can I help him if he doesn't want to be part of my life any more? I can't force him."

"Well try to reach out to him somehow!" Alice said sternly. "Do you want me to send Jasper to Chicago still?"

I hesitated. The truth was, I wanted Jasper here to help Justin if need be. "No, I don't want to make him travel for me," I lied.

"Okay listen, I have a friend who lives out that way, her name is Charlotte. She owes me a favor. What if I ask her to track him down, just to see how he's doing?"

I agreed. "That sounds good, Alice. That way I can stay here."

"But you're in a bubble here, Bella," Alice reminded me. "Don't let it get so big that when it pops, it explodes in your face!"

"How do I look?" Justin appeared to us in the leather jacket Alice had brought - clean shaven, shorter hair, and eyes aglow, less red now, the amber flecks settling in like small champagne-colored sparkling diamonds. I froze knowing that if I had had a working heart, it would have stopped. He was breathtakingly Justin! The Justin of my memories. The Justin who had broken my heart. The Justin who I had loved both near and from afar for far too long. The Justin I had never forgotten.

He was Justin, and unlike Edward, he was here.

~AGH~

A/N:

Torn between his family and a girl he liked, Justin became one of Jacob's victims too. And he's hot. I know, I know - he's not Edward. LOL I don't expect to get any reviews saying "Team Justin" but still, Justin is a weakness for Bella, and he's giving her something that no one else could-resolution about what happened actually happened between them. If she can get resolution about Justin, maybe someday very soon, she'll be able to get resolution about Edward. It's just a matter of who will provide resolution-will it be Edward himself or someone else? It all goes down in the next couple of chapters!