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Chapter 76

Parenting Tips


Edward


Why had I promised David that I would pick him up?

I didn't remember when I got out of bed and dressed in the early hours of the morning.

A bad-tempered vampire in the darkness of the night. That would certainly make a good horror movie.

I gave my angel one more kiss on the back neck before quietly leaving the room.

In the hallway, I encountered Jake, who had just come crawling out of the bathroom.

With the lights off, he had tripped over the runner and was currently cursing loudly in his thoughts as he crawled back to his room on all fours.

I smirked.

Happened to him regularly. Bella's genes clearly came through there, if even a wolf could still stumble. After all, his senses were almost as good as mine and I didn't mind the darkness.

"Why don't you turn on a light?" I laughed at him a little.

He said nothing, he thought. As he usually did before his first coffee.

'So that I wake up even more? Forget it!'

He even yawned in his thoughts.

I pushed the door out of his way, watched with amusement as he climbed back into bed as if it were the Mount Everest, and quietly pulled the door shut.

By the time I sat in the car, he was already asleep again.

Strange children I had gotten. They were more likely to put up with getting hurt than to turn on a light. Leah saw it the same way.

I smiled. My mood rose.


At the airport was already amazingly busy for the time - 4:37 a.m. - and I didn't have to wait long for David. Besides his laptop, he only had a backpack with him, which was a carry-on. So, we did not have to wait at baggage claim.

He were only staying until tomorrow afternoon. A good two weeks had passed since his surprise visit. He had an appointment with Mr. Abagnale at the notary today.

We greeted each other politely with a handshake and immediately drove to Saco.

"Emma really wanted to come!" he said with a laugh and thought about it, how she had scolded her father bitterly for flying over without her.

This small angel had really gotten to me.

"How were you able to appease her?" I asked.

His memory didn't look like Emma ever wanted to speak a word to David again.

"She made me promise to let her come next time," he laughed.

They would all be coming here in four weeks, that had been planned for a few days now. Carlisle wanted to see Sonya regularly and that Saturday was the wedding of Peter and Stan. Maybe in four weeks they would even be able to move in already. Jake, Leah, and I had been very busy at the Abagnales. But before that, David would also come here on his own one or two more times.

"So, you're lying to her!" I accused him.

"Sometimes it's nicer to surprise the kids instead of telling them everything in detail in advance," he explained to me.

I nodded, smirking.

That's why I hadn't told anyone that he would be here today. He had called to announce himself, but Bella had been out with Esmé.

On the way, I stopped at the bakery that had just opened. The wife of the baker knew me by now. As well as the daughter, who for a few days 'coincidentally' sat in the store every morning.

"You're early today!" the daughter noted in amazement, smiling at me.

"Good morning. Five? As usual?" their mother asked kindly.

I nodded at the time comment and increased the bun count to seven.

"We have a visitor," I explained good-humoredly. "A friend of my fiancée's is here for the weekend."

The daughter looked offended.

I wished them both a good day and went on my way.

I never tired of referring to Bella as my fiancée, but 'my wife' would suit me even better. I would probably have to step on Alice's toes so that her preparations didn't get out of hand in a time-consuming way.


David immediately sent me to bed.

He wanted to make sure he didn't fall asleep when he sat down and was going to make coffee, pass it out, and make breakfast.

I did what he asked and went upstairs faster than he could see.

It was only twenty minutes to six, so we still had some time and I could snuggle back into bed.

Still, David would atone for having ruined my night. The only hours in which Bella really belonged to me all alone.

I undressed, put on my pajama pants, and carefully climbed back into bed with the comforter.

I could have saved myself the cautiousness.

Bella turned to me and looked at me with her big almond eyes.

"Where have you been?" she muttered.

I controlled my facial features.

"Why aren't you asleep?" I evaded an answer.

"Without you it is just too warm," she complained, snuggling up to me.

But she actually dozed off again and I enjoyed my angel who kept pushing herself on top of me.

Her soft warm skin, her smell, her body pressed against mine, her pulse. Simply everything from her!

Until I heard David at Jake's at six sharp, who nearly fell out of bed in shock.

"Bella," I whispered, spreading soft kisses over her face, which was right in front of mine.

David walked to Leah, who cried out briefly in surprise.

"Darling, wake up!" I continued kissing until Bella stirred and looked at me in love.

There was a knock at the door and Bella tossed her head nervously in that direction.

Usually, we were not disturbed before breakfast.

I smirked already.

"Yes?" she called out.

The door opened slowly, a cup settled on the dresser, and David appeared in the doorway, grinning.

"Good morning, Bella!" he said, as if it was the most normal thing in the world that he would be standing right now, right here.

"David!" Bella jumped out of bed and straight into his arms.

Their lips touch lovingly in greeting.

I had become accustomed to that and it disturbed me just as little as it did Sonya. That's just how the two of them were.

I sat up a bit and leaned against the headboard of the bed.

"What are you doing here? Why didn't you say anything? How did you get here anyway? At this time of day? Do you even know what time it is?" my angel asked frantically and without taking a breath.

"Easy there, Little one. Edward picked me up at the airport. He's known since the day before yesterday that I was coming today," David explained.

Evilly, Bella turned to me and put her hands on her hips.

I considered who looked cuter in this pose. Bella or Emma? I could not decide.

"You scoundrel!" she accused me angrily.

She huffily took her coffee from the dresser, sat down in front of me, and leaned against me.

So she wasn't quite that evil after all.

David leaned against the dresser and told why he was here while Bella drank her coffee. He also talked about his family. Sonya was doing fantastic, except for the small matter of morning sickness. The boys were looking forward to the new city, and Emma was so excited about the upcoming move that she had already packed all her toys three times. They seemed to be more important to her than her clothes.

David disappeared after the kids asked him if he wanted to go jogging with them. This time he had thought of sports pants, he proudly announced.

Bella turned to me.

"You'll pay for this!" she threatened.

"How?" I asked amiable, pulling her even closer to me in my arms.

"I'm locking you out tonight!" she said snottily.

"But then you'll not sleeping either. It's too warm!"

"I'm going to take a shower without you!"

"Then who's going to wash your back?"

"I've been able to do it long enough without you!"

"But it's more fun with me!" I countered beguilingly, driving my fingertips up her back under her pajamas.

She trembled and I pulled her sweet lips towards me. Before she lay completely will-less in my arms, I took the cup from her and put it aside. Gradually I opened the buttons of her top and tenderly stroked the exposed skin. Her sensual mouth wandered over my neck.

Actually, I had only wanted to tease Bella a little so that she would forget my punishment, but this woman drove me crazy. Everything around us sank into nothingness. All my senses were fixed only on Bella.

Her playful hands, her loving lips, her sparkling eyes, her erratic circulation, the exciting aroma of her feminine body ... It went by way too fast, as it usually did, and I would never get enough of it. Never tire of her. I belonged her, with all that I was!


The game in the afternoon was interesting.

Everyone had told me how good Leah and Becky were, but I had assumed they were all exaggerating. I guess they had understated it. The only downer was that I basically wasn't allowed to touch Bella in public. As if by chance, our hands lay side by side on the bench, caressing each other under the protection of the people standing around us, all of whom knew.

Over and over we stood up, cheered for our girls, reacted angrily to the opponents, and I worried about Becky in the further course.

She became inattentive, which was no wonder. The opponents were out to get her, after they had no success with Leah using this strategy. The ball hit her roughly on the temple.

I concentrated on Becky even before she hit the floor and pulled my angel into my arms.

I had to hold on to her so I didn't do anything rash. Like running vampirically fast to her.

But Carlisle was already on the move with Jake through the hallways.

Becky had lost consciousness for a moment but was already coming to. In her head it went haywire.

She wondered where she was and why. Mental confusion. Quite understandable after such a violent ball to the head. It wasn't until she saw Jake that her thoughts were clear again.

But Bella's closeness and the attentiveness to Becky let me become inattentive. I didn't notice that the school principal had just entered the bleachers, and that too from the door right next to us.

One could not miss us from this entrance.

I followed suspiciously the conversation, which took place afterwards exactly under the seats and could not avoid to wanting stand by my angel nevertheless.

I would have gone down to her earlier if Carlisle hadn't already arrived at Bella's, but other thoughts had distracted me in the short term.

Of course, I knew how much Jake and Becky were in love with each other. Even if one couldn't listen to their thoughts like I could or feel their emotions like Jasper did, it was hard to miss.

Becky was still sitting on the cot they had used to carry her off the playing field and Jake was kneeling right next to her.

They just looked at each other without exchanging a word. But in their thoughts they were almost talking to each other. Jake tried to talk her out of continuing to play and considered how she would respond. And he was exactly right. Almost word for word. Becky, on the other hand, silently presented her arguments in response to the reproaches Jake probably wanted to make to her.

Carlisle, on the other hand, had given up discussing. He wasn't really noticed by the two anyway, but was reassured for the time being from a medical point of view and left again after making it unmistakably clear to Becky that he would examine her in detail after the match.

"What's happening down there right now?" David asked me, not trusting that silence.

"They are discussing," I replied simply.

Becky's father joined them nervously and deeply concerned, which ended their cosy togetherness.

Becky literally jumped up from the stretcher while Jake put a hand in her back.

Becky and Henry snapped at each other.

A seemingly regular occurrence between father and daughter, as their thoughts told me. In the midst of the bickering, Becky turned back to Jake, took his face in her hands, and became as cool as a cucumber.

"Show them!" whispered Jake, still spurring her on, and kissed her.

Back on the playing field, she high-fived Leah and the game continued.

I shook my head a bit in disbelief and then hurried to Bella.

But this fight against the principal was quickly over.

Cathlyn's way of thinking was interesting in this regard.

She did not accept our love, did not believe our feelings were real. She assumed that in reality we both had other reasons for this relationship. A relationship of convenience. She did not believe that we would really get married. She was therefore very disappointed in Bella and had assessed her good friend differently. In the future, she didn't want to deal with a person who seemed to be slipping into a mid-life crisis, and she didn't want to speak to Bella again until she came to her senses. Nevertheless, she thought her boss, Mr. Taylor, was going too far and defended us to him. She then explained her opinion as honestly as she could grasp the words.

She was sincere, I gave her credit for that.

I held my angel in my arms until she had temporarily come to terms with the loss of her friend.

"It's all right, Edward. I didn't really expect anything else," she smiled at me more forcedly.

"But you were hoping for a different reaction!" I gently stated.

She nodded.

I hugged her tightly to me and kissed her hair.

I was sorry that she lost her friend because of me. Maybe Cathlyn would change her view of the things when she realized how sincere our love was.

We went back to the bleachers, forgot about this unpleasant incident, and watched the rest of the game.

However, we placed David between us. As a spacer between Bella and me.

He chuckled in amusement at the term.

With something so affectionate would never have been titled.

He sat on the front edge of the bench so Bella and I could look at each other, or even touch, without having to laboriously look past him.

I thought that was really nice of him, because that was exactly his reason for doing it.


The rest of the day was spent leisurely.

The kids were with the team and their group of friends celebrating the victory and David, Bella, and I were sitting with my family in our living room in - my - small house.

David had not yet noticed that I could play the piano and demanded an extensive concert. He was impressed and asked why there was no piano in Bella's house.

Neither of us had a real answer. It would probably be a little too cramped for a grand piano, but a place could certainly be found for a simple upright.

Bella fell asleep in my arms on the sofa after everyone but David had left. I pulled a blanket from the backrest and spread it over my angel.

"Shall I put her to bed?" asked David, grinning mischievously, remembering the evening of our first meeting.

"Are you attached to your life?" I asked back tonelessly.

He was not serious, of course.

He found my little house very cozy.

A wonderful retreat.

It had been almost three weeks since Bella and I had agreed to spend the weekends here together.

It just had not worked out so far correctly. Among other things, David had been in our way the weekend before last.

He truly and with all sincerity apologized for it.

We talked for quite a while until David's eyes also slowly closed.

I put my angel to bed while David made himself comfortable in my guest room.

I wrote the children another text message that both beds were occupied here. On weekends it was never clear who slept in which bed.

Bella's nightly monologue was interesting.

She dreamily instructed me to move some furniture to make room for my large concert grand piano. Who already had to come into the kitchen? she pronounced against my concerns.


The next morning, Bella was busy with Alice.

They did not drive to Portland - as originally intended - but spread out in Alice's studio.

I was quite curious what the two were doing there alone, but on the other hand I didn't want to ruin the surprise for myself.

So, I drove back to Saco with David.

We had promised Mr. Abagnale to help this morning.

Even before I drove into our driveway, I heard the very quiet thoughts of the twins and of Brandon and Jenny.

"They were celebrating pretty hard!" I declared.

"Must have been a rough night after that close win!" noted David based on that comment.

I nodded.

I considered how I should react to this appropriately. Since I accused myself of always being too lenient, perhaps I should finally show a little more severity.

"How are things going between you and the kids?" David then asked a bit more seriously. "I mean, are they Bella's kids or do you also have something to say educationally?" he smirked afterwards.

"You missed something last weekend ... I am their father!" I said not without pride.

"Then act like one!" David gave me to understand and got out.


"Good morning!" I said in a hard and loud voice, arms crossed unyieldingly in front of my chest - whereby everyone winced a little - suppressing a chuckle, which I managed far better than David.

Over the sofa spread four tired teenagers with headaches and dry-mouth.

"Shh ...!" came from Jenny.

"That sure looks like a night of drinking to me!" David stated matter-of-factly, but loudly.

"Not so loud!" muttered Jake, holding his head.

A heartbreaking face that almost made my sternness cave in.

"Well then, tell me! How much did you drink?" I prompted the four of them.

"Or should we say 'chugged' instead?" also asked David.

"It wasn't really that much," Brandon tried to mumble reasonably clearly.

Leah looked at me challengingly and she remembered last evening.

Bran was right. It really wasn't much, provided Leah's thoughts were complete. It was just jumbled and not the shallowest alcohol for teenagers. Starting with sparkling wine to celebrate the victory, the boys had treated themselves to one or two glasses of whiskey each and the girls to some colorful cocktail. They then washed it down with beer. And as far as I could tell from everyone's memories, they were still doing very well and didn't feel overly drunk by the time they fell asleep. Jake and Leah had even made their usual rounds as wolves and Jenny and Brandon had put clean sheets on the bed in the guest room. It was not getting too late eather. What should I do already now?

I went to my children, squatted behind the sofa, and put a hand on each of their foreheads. They leaned against it gratefully and looked at me apologetically.

"So, where's Becky?" I asked quietly, trying to spare my kids' heads a bit.

Jake once again didn't speak, but thought.

He had brought her home when curfew was approaching, since her father was not willing to let his daughter spend the whole weekends away overnight. The party hadn't been far from her house and the rest of the group had then split up into two cabs.

At least no one had the idea to drive a car, however they were quite sure that they could still do it.

'Don't be TOO peaceful. Even if they just overestimated themselves, it was too much! They should realize that!' David indicated to me with a smirk.

I nodded barely noticeably and rose.

He was absolutely right.

"Since you're all old enough to party, you're also old enough to live with the consequences ..." I began, and the four of them looked against me a little anxiously.

Jenny and Bran were about to discreetly say farewell from the living room, but David got in their way.

"If you can drink, you can also get up and run!" I stated and got a collective groan in response. "So, get out into the fresh air with you! All of you!", I ordered and the teenagers moved with difficulty.

It was fun to watch them struggle to execute.

David ran straight upstairs and changed his clothes.

He would accompany the children so they would not stray from the path.

While preparing a more utilitarian than delicious breakfast, I first called Cathlyn and then Jenny's father.

He didn't know me yet, but had already heard about me from Jenny and Bran. However, the two had only said quite noncommittally that I was a bit younger. They had wisely concealed the fact that I went to school together with the children. Even Cathlyn agreed with my way of punishing the children, even if she rejected me as Bella's mate. They had both expected that the kids would over do it after yesterday's victory.


About an hour and a half later, six of us stood in Mr. Abagnale's house.

David and I watched smugly as the four of them moved all sorts of things to the side of the road, packed boxes, and carried them around the house.

I roamed around the big house with David while the kids continued to work.

He was already planning through the individual rooms. Since he didn't live here, he would hire an interior designer to do the renovation work, and I advised him to go with Esmé, of course.

I called her, she came immediately and began making the first sketches.

With the Abagnales they discussed a more exact time schedule, because with the help of Jake, Leah, and me everything went much faster than they had originally thought.

Most of the rooms were already mostly empty. They had donated a lot to charity, sold some, and simply disposed of some. What would really be taken to California was quite manageable and almost completely packed.

I went back to the kids in the attic after the thoughts became quieter and quieter and now completely become silent.

There really was still most of the decluttering to be done here, and they had dug out an old sofa where all four of them had fallen asleep kind of tangled up in and on top of each other.

I took a photo with my cell phone for proof before whistling loudly once.

All four tumbled off the cushion, startled.

It was already afternoon and the children had probably been punished enough.

For David it was already time to drive to the airport again.

Leah and Jake were then going to run to Rose and Em's house while I took Bran and Jenny home on the way to Portland.


"They both seem to really accept you," David considered.

"They have almost from the beginning, although evolutionarily I was supposed to be their enemy. After they got over the murderousness towards me, it became very cozy within a short time," I remarked.

"Yeah, sure. That's what I saw when I was there last time. But that's not what I mean ... They take you as the one whose orders they have to follow as well as Bella's. I'm surprised at that. Simply because they got to know you as a classmate and you are theoretically their age. Even in front of their friends earlier, they didn't say a word about how you don't really have anything to say to them."

I told him in more detail what had happened last weekend.

That the two of them had defended me with their lives when they themselves realized who I could be for them. How it felt for them, but also for me. Their father.

I had spoken to Carlisle about it. He had turned me at the age of seventeen and it was said that vampires stopped developing physically and emotionally with the transformation. Character qualities and traits became more pronounced. For example, Esmé's kindness or Jasper's sensitivity to the feelings of others, Alice's 'hyperactivity'. That the transformation into a vampire was the last change one underwent. Unless he met his soul mate. That was me twenty years ago when I met Bella and I had changed again. Apart from my angel, there was nothing more important to me from then on. But to feel just as intensely for Jake and Leah now did not correspond to the typical nature of a seventeen-year-old, no matter what time he actually came from. I wanted to join the army. The thought of having my own family was far from my mind. So, there was no reason for me to take love for children, who were not even my own, into this life.

"Maybe it's because as a human being - even if you were only seventeen - you were already capable of these feelings. You once mentioned how close your relationship with your mother was ..."

I nodded affirmatively.

"... She certainly prepared you - at the age and time you were born - for a family of your own. With that, she probably taught you values that instinctively shaped you. It's just that other things seemed more important to you that time. If you had met Bella at that time, you probably wouldn't have given a thought to wanting to play soldier. If you had survived the flu as a human being, had married and had children of your own ... perhaps you would then - emotionally viewed - be in the same situation as you are today. Unconditional love for your family! I want to say that it was already there. In you. You just missed it as a human being to be able to really use these feelings and never thought about something like that before Bella and the twins," David considered.

"Carlisle has the same suspicion," I smiled.

So, whatever the reason, it didn't matter. I loved my family. All three of them! Even more absolute than the family with whom I had shared my life for over a century. If Bella wanted to remain a human being - and I was unexceptionally in favor of that - she would stay in this tranquil town and in her pretty house, while my family moved on in a few years. I didn't have to think about which family I would follow. I would miss Carlisle, Esmé, and my siblings, of course, but without Bella and the twins there was no life for me anymore.

"Jake and Leah are something special ... You probably wouldn't have it so easy with other kids," David meant after a brief moment of silence.

I nodded.

I was well aware of that. When I looked at other teenagers at school, I doubted very much that any of them would have accepted me into the family so trustingly.

We had reached the airport, but still had some time before his plane would take off. Therefore, we sat down in an airport lounge, where David enjoyed another coffee.

"Then let's talk father to father. There are not only the beautiful sides that one can experience with his children," he began.

David had all my attention.

We talked for some time about the joy of having a family, but also about what could become less joyful in the process.

The problems and fears of the children, which one perhaps could not understand oneself, because as a grown person one saw no problem. Still, one had to help them somehow. A quarrel among friends over a toy excavator and this spat meant eternal enmity. He admitted with a smirk that I was probably less confronted with such cases.

"... But there's still health concerns. Brawls, drugs, bad company, rivalries, trouble at school, and the like. And just too much alcohol and possibly resulting in stupid decisions ... You would have liked to send them to bed earlier, wouldn't you?" David smirked at last.

"Yes. I felt sorry for them," I admitted. That's probably how I would have done it, aware that it would have been wrong from an educational point of view.

"No matter how much one loves their children, one can understand their actions, and may not have been better oneself at that age ... You must never forget that if you don't let them realize the effects of their actions, they will never learn anything from them and will do it again and again," David clarified and I had no choice but to agree with him. "Next year, they're both going to college. So, whoever they're together with by the summer, the likelihood of them going to the same college with them is not very high. Then you'll have to deal with broken hearts ... And it occurs to me that I haven't talked to Leah about Ben at all," he stated guiltily in the middle of the conversation and slapped a hand against his face.

"I did, already, the last time you were here. And in this respect, I have a small advantage. I can see behind her words and actions, and recognize her thoughts ... Leah was only mourning the happy times, but not Ben himself. He hurt her too much for that," I said.

"I certainly wouldn't have recognized that," he admitted after a moment's consideration.

His flight was called, he drank up quickly, grabbed his stuff and we headed to the gate.

"Take good care of my little family," he said farewell.

"And you give Emma a kiss for me," I requested as we parted.

We shook hands.

It was a much friendlier feeling than it had been yesterday morning.


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