6
Bella looked from Edward to the picture of the beautiful young girl with long caramel colored hair and bright hazel eyes. If she graduated from high school five years ago, that meant Carlisle had been paying her rent since she graduated, but why? Why hadn't he told her that he had a half-sister out there? Why hadn't he told her that he was paying her rent? Of course he hadn't told her a lot of things, had he? Like how he was unhappy with her, how she had apparently complained too much, bitched too much, how he would rather work sixty, seventy, eighty hours a week than be home with her. Bella had always thought they had a good marriage, but now, now she wasn't so sure anything about her marriage to Carlisle was true or real.
"Izzy."
At the sound of Edward's voice, she inhaled a sharp breath before handing the picture back to him. "What do you mean she's your half-sister?"
Edward frowned and took the picture back. "Guess dear old dad wasn't much of a one family man as he was a two family man. Turns out he had had a side piece over in St. Cloud for the better part of a decade before he up left them, too. The woman he had been having an affair with had a daughter with him. Her name is Esme. She's twenty three years old and a first year medical student at the University of Minnesota. I've never met her."
"How'd you get her picture if you never met her?"
He grabbed the back of his neck before he explained, saying, "After Mom died, he bailed. Left town in the middle of the night, leaving me to take care of all their shit. I was rifling through his desk, trying to figure out what to do with the house and the business, when I found a stack of letters between him and Esme's mother. Love letters," he added with a bit of disdain. "The way he talked about her, about their daughter. Well, it didn't take much to figure out which family he preferred, Iz. No wonder he was such a bastard to us."
Bella snorted, knowing first hand that there was no love lost between Edward and his parents. There hadn't been between them and Carlisle, either. Their mother was raging alcoholic, who spent the majority of their lives making sure neither Carlisle nor Edward forgot what a burden they had been to her. After all, if she hadn't gotten knocked up at the age of seventeen, she wouldn't have been forced to marry their father, stuck with an abusive asshole who made sure his wife and two sons knew they were nothing more than in his way.
She drank herself to death six years ago, but neither she nor Carlisle came back for the funeral. As far as Carlisle was concerned, she had died the day they left for New York. And their father? Well, when he was home, he was too busy using his clenched fist to keep his family in line to give two shits about any of them. Watching Edward follow in their mother's footsteps, seeing the way he turned violent when they tried to help him, well it had been hard to understand why Carlisle chose to cut Edward out of their lives.
"Do you think Carlisle met her?"
"I don't know."
"Probably not." Bella walked over and sat at the bar. She picked up another fry, but didn't eat it. "He'd been paying her rent, though. For five years. Why wouldn't he tell me, Edward?"
"I don't know." He paused before adding, "I tried to talk to him, you know?"
Bella looked up at Edward. "When?"
"About a year after you left. I went to New York, wanted to make amends. Thought maybe he'd give a chance, but he said he had to protect you, said he'd heard my bullshit promises time and time and time again, and he was just done. Just done. Caught him one day when he was heading to the academy. The way he look at me, Izzy, I never let myself forget the way he looked at me that day. And when I find myself wanting to use again, wanting to drink this entire bar," he said, waving his hand toward the bottles of liquor. "I think about the way he looked at me that day, and I go to a meeting, call my sponsor, anyone who will distract me away from the urge to disappoint him again. I never wanted to see that look on his face again, Izzy."
Bella dropped her fry and placed her hands on her knees. "It wasn't easy for him to cut you out. You know that, right?"
"Seemed pretty easy to me." Edward picked up his burger and unwrapped it. "You should eat your burger. You're too fucking skinny and the baby needs the calories."
Bella rolled her eyes, but picked up the burger and pulled out the toothpick. She unwrapped it, almost smiling when she saw the chili bacon cheeseburger with pepper jack cheese and jalapeños.
"What? Did you think I forgot how you like your JT's burgers?"
"Kind of."
Edward scoffed. "I may have been a junkie, Izzy, but I didn't forget anything about you."
She looked down at her burger before she heard herself asking, "Did Ro tell you I was pregnant?"
He laughed, swallowing the bite he had been chewing. "She didn't have to. You were at Dr. Black's office. Wasn't hard to put two and two together, Izzy."
Bella nodded and took a small bite of her burger before placing it back on the bar. "I don't know how to do this without him, Edward."
"Were you trying to get pregnant?"
With a frown, she nodded. "For almost four years now. After the first year came and went without success, I had all kind tests ran just to find out that I was fine. There was no medical reason why I wasn't getting pregnant. So, Carlisle got tested. And his tests came back fine. We were both fertile and healthy but month after month I found myself staring at negative pregnancy tests. I cut back my hours with the company, costing me more than one starring role. Maybe my failures was why he didn't want at home with me anymore," she added as a second thought. "And then he died before I could tell him that we were finally going to have a baby."
Bella stood up and walked across the bar, stopping in front of the juke box. The music selection hadn't changed in the last ten years. She dug a quarter out of her pocket and plopped it into the juke box before pressing the option for F and then four. She closed her eyes as Need You Now by Lady Antebellum started to play and she heard herself start singing along with it.
"Picture perfect memories scattered all around the floor. Reaching for the phone. Cause I can't fight it anymore. And I wonder if I ever cross your mind. For me, it happens all the time."
She closed her eyes, remembering the way he would hold her when this song started to play, when he'd press his lips against of her neck and whispered, "And I don't know how I can do without. I just need you now. I just need you now."
But when she heard the sound of one of the bar stools scrapping across the floor, she stopped singing and opened her eyes, looking back to find Edward tossing their uneaten food into a large trash can.
"I was going to finish my burger," she said, causing him to scoff. "I was!"
"It was cold, and you don't like to eat cold burgers."
Bella sighed, knowing he was right, but before she could . . . she wasn't sure, defend herself? The door to the bar opened and when they both looked over, she felt herself tense when a tall, bulky man with the standard army mandated haircut walked inside. His bright blue eyes flickering from Edward to Bella, and he smiled, and a dimple sank into his left cheek.
His hand lifted to the back of his neck before he said, "Holy shit, Izzy! I thought Ro was blowing smoke my ass when she told she'd seen you a couple weeks ago. Thought for sure it was one of those pregnancy brain things she's told me about."
"Hey, Emmett," she sniffled. "I'm sorry I didn't come to your Welcome Home party. I just . . ."
"No worries." He looked from her to Edward, who was doing a great job of keeping himself busy. "Am I interrupting?"
"No," Bella said before Edward could say otherwise. "I was just leaving, actually."
"You don't have to leave," Edward replied, hurrying around the bar and over to her, but when she put her hands up in front of her, he stopped a few feet from her. "Please, don't . . . I still have questions."
"I . . . I'm sorry," she whispered, shaking her head. "I just . . . I can't right now. I'm sorry."
Bella hurried past him and then Emmett, who grabbed her hand on the way by, giving her a sad smile, before she tugged her hand out of his and hurried out to her car. She couldn't keep her tears from falling as she climbed into her car, and shoved her eyes into the ignition. Just as she cranked it on, the doors to the bar opened and Edward stepped out. She gave him a small, pathetic wave before she shifted into drive and pulled away from the Oasis and Edward, with more questions than answers.
—RtW—
When she turned into the driveway, she groaned when she saw Alice sitting on the front porch with Jasper while Cassie and Millie were roller skating up and down the front walk. She parked, but didn't get out of the car. She had had a long afternoon, and while she loved her family, her head was starting to ache and all she wanted was to go upstairs to her bedroom and lock herself in her memories — again.
But when Alice whispered to Jasper and then stood up and started walking toward her car, Bella knew there was no way of escaping them. Alice walked around to the passenger side and opened the door, climbing in before she could lock the door.
"I need to run to the store. Will you drive me?"
"You could drive yourself?"
"I don't have my car, and you know I don't like driving his big ole truck. I can barely reach the pedals."
"You can take my car," Bella suggested, but when she looked back at the house and saw the way Jasper was staring at them, she shook her head and said, "Never mind. Let's just go."
Alice reached behind her and pulled her seatbelt on, so Bella shifted into reverse and eased out of the driveway and headed to the supermarket. Alice didn't speak as she drove. Instead, she hummed along to the radio, bobbing her head. She hadn't gotten to know her sister-in-law the way she had wanted to. Bella and Carlisle left town right after Jasper met Alice, and it was hard for them to make the trip to New York, especially after the girls were born.
Bella parked in front of the market, and waited for Alice to go inside, but she just sat there.
"You said you needed to come here."
"I don't like going in by myself."
"Why not?"
Alice laughed. "Because they look at me like I am only Jasper Swan's wife, and not Alice. He's kind of big deal around here, Izzy."
She smiled and nodded. "Yeah, he always has been. Made it very difficult to be his little sister, too. Teachers would look at me and say, 'Your brother didn't have any problems with the quadratic formula. Why are you?' Like just because Jay is a mathematical genius I should be one, too. Mind you he can't do a pirouette for three solid minutes, can he? No, no, he can't."
"Be funny to watch him try, though, wouldn't it?"
Bella smiled, but didn't reply.
"He's worried about you. They are both worried about you."
She nodded and looked out the window.
"I told them to tell you. About Charlie's stent," Alice added, and when Bella looked at her, she said, "But you know how stubborn the Swan men are."
"I wish they had told me, Alice, but they're right: I probably wouldn't have come back. I would have used whatever show I was in at the time, or Carlisle and his schedule as my excuse, but he have left the decision up to me. He would have said they're my family and I needed to be here, but the choice would have been mine, and I would have said I wasn't coming back, Alice." Bella blinked back her tears. "Guess the Swan men aren't the only stubborn Swans, are they?"
"Well, seeing how Cassie and Millie are pretty damn stubborn, too, I would guess not."
Bella lobbed her head to the side, looking at Alice. "I don't know how to . . . how to breathe without him, Alice. He is . . . was everything to me, and he's gone and I . . . I'm having a baby and . . ."
"And you're scared. Sweetie, it's only natural to be scared. Nobody blames you for being a little bitchy right now."
Bella laughed through her tears. "Yeah?"
"Of course not, but they're going to smother you a little, because they've missed you. We've all missed you, but they've really missed you. Just try not to get too mad at him when he gets to be overbearing. He only does it because he loves you, Izzy."
"I'll try. That's all I can promise, Alice."
"I'll take it. Now, I really do need to go in, and I don't want to go alone. Will you go with me?"
Bella nodded. "Sure, Al. I'll protect you."
By the time they made it back to the house, the trunk of Bella's car was filled with more food than they should have needed for a simple family dinner. Charlie was sitting on the front porch with Jasper when she pulled back into the driveway. While Jasper, Cassie, Millie, and Alice grabbed all of the food and hurried into the house, Bella leaned against the side of the car and crossed her legs at the ankles and folded her arms in front of her while Charlie sat on the porch.
Once Jasper, Alice, and the girls were inside, he stood up and walked over to her, leaning against the car next to her, bumping her with his shoulder. Unable to keep her tears from falling, she turned and leaned her head against her shoulder, letting her tears drip onto his sleeve.
"I'm sorry, Dad. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry," she sobbed, and he shifted so that he was holding her against him, one hand on the back of her head and the other rubbing her back like he used to when she was little.
"Shh, Izzy, it's okay."
"It's not okay," she cried. "It's not okay, Dad. I don't . . . I miss him so much. So, so much. Why? Why did he leave me?"
"I don't know, honey. I just don't know."
Charlie kissed the top of her head, holding her and letting her cry. Just letting her cry. There was a lot they needed to talk about, a lot she needed to apologize for, but first, most importantly, she was going to have to figure out how in the world she was going to raise a baby on her own.
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