Another Life
Disclaimer: all characters and copyright belong to SM.
Thoughts
Bella hadn't realized they were already back at Jacob's house until he walked through the front door. A light rain had started to fall. Droplets coated his hair and skin.
"You can stay here." Jacob said as he dumped Bella on the short couch. "I mean it-right here. I'll get your clothes."
"My clothes?" Bella said faintly. She didn't recall leaving a spare set at his house. She let her eyes adjust to the dark room while Jacob banged around in his bedroom. The cramped front room seemed so empty without Billy, almost desolate. She wondered where he was.
Jacob was back in seconds. He threw a pair of skinny black jeans, a black hoodie, and white t-shirt at her. "I'll, er, step outside so you can change." He muttered, before quickly disappearing again.
Bella sat up, still feeling disorientated and confused. The light rain had turned into a downpour outside, the rain pellets drummed loudly on the roof. Picking up the clothes that Jacob had thrown to her, Bella finally happened to glance down at herself, her chocolate brown eyes nearly bugging out of her head as she took in what she was wearing-or to be more precise-what she wasn't.
She had never seen so much of her pale skin on display all at once. The sight was shocking. Goose pimples broke out on her skin as she examined the skimpy red bathing costume she was wearing. It left little to the imagination. Tight fitting, the back was cut so low it barely covered her butt. The front wasn't much better.
Bella felt the heat rise in her face, the red flush running all the way to her collarbone. She had never felt so mortified in her life, even more so when she realized that Jacob had seen her exposed like this. It was beyond mortifying. She didn't own a costume like this. Where it had come from, or even why she was wearing something so revealing, was disturbing.
This had to be a dream. It had to.
She was still in the water. Drowning. This was all a hallucination. Brought on by oxygen deprivation.
Still, hallucination or not, she wanted to cover up. Peeling the offending costume off her body, Bella hurriedly pulled on the underwear she found scrunched in the middle of the clothing bundle Jacob had thrown to her. The skinny jeans followed, then lastly, the white t-shirt and hoodie.
That was better. Bella felt more like herself now.
"I'm done!" She called out to Jacob.
Jacob strolled nonchalantly back into the room. He dipped down, picking up the offending red swimming costume and holding it out in front of him. "I'll throw this in the wash."
"What?" Bella spluttered. "No!"
"Why not?" Jacob said, confused. "I've got to put the laundry on anyway. This isn't going to make much difference."
"Just bin it." Bella huffed in annoyance. It wasn't like she was ever going to wear the darn thing again anyway.
Jacob's eyebrows rose almost up to his hairline. "Why? It's a present from your mom. You were road testing it today. You said you liked it." A small grin lit up his face. "I like it."
"I bet you do." Bella muttered.
It figured that Renee was behind the costume choice. It was certainly something that Bella would not have bought for herself. The fact that she had worn the thing in the first place, and in front of Jacob, too, was the most surprising aspect of the whole thing.
"You're acting weird, Bells." Jacob looked at her curiously. "First at the beach. Now here. What's going on in that head of yours?"
"Nothing!" Bella snapped. "I'm just tired that's all."
"Whatever." Jacob retorted. He sauntered out of the room, screwing the swimming costume up in his fist as he headed for the laundry.
Bella slumped back onto the tiny couch, feeling a smidgeon of guilt. She shouldn't be taking her anger out on him. It wasn't his fault. It was all hers. She was the one who had jumped off the cliff and was now…. now what?
"Jake?" She called out again. "Come back here. I'm really sorry I'm being such a grouch."
Jacob reappeared; his face more relaxed now that she had apologized for her outburst. "That's okay, honey."
"Its not okay, Jake. You're too forgiving. I shouldn't be taking my shitty mood out on you." Bella apologized again. "Sit with me."
Jacob sat on the floor next to Bella, his back against the couch. He leaned his head on the cushion next to hers and yawned. "I feel kinda tired…." He admitted.
"Go to sleep if you want. I know how much you need it. You can't keep going on the way you are."
"Huh?" Jacob blinked, looking bewildered by that statement. He didn't call her out on it, though. Instead, he closed his eyes. "I guess I could rest for a minute. All that unaccustomed exercise can really take it out of a guy, you know." He joked.
Billy's sofa was right next to the radiator. Bella felt toasty warm now. She took in a few deep breaths, testing her lungs to see if they worked. They didn't ache, despite all the seawater she must have inhaled. Seeing Jacob so sleepy, made her feel the same way herself. She wondered vaguely whether it was wrong to sleep…or was she getting drowning mixed up with concussions…?
Jacob snored softly, and the sound of it was like a soothing lullaby. Bella fell asleep quickly.
For the first time in a long time, her dream was just a normal dream. Just a blurred wandering through old memories-blinding bright visions of the Pheonix sun, her mother's face, a ramshackle treehouse, a faded quilt, a wall of mirrors, Edward's face…. she forgot each of them as soon as the picture changed.
Maybe these were the flashbacks she had been waiting for. She was dying now. This was it. Her life was over. She was relieved, in a way, that her imagination had conjured up Jacob, so that his was the last face she would see before blackness set in. Her delusional brain knew what she wanted even within the fog of her misery…the comfort only her best friend could provide.
I'm sorry, Jacob, she thought in her head.
Bella was floating, as if on air. Her head rocked back, her eyes still tightly closed, as another picture emerged. It was meaningless-just a set on a stage. A balcony at night, a painted moon hanging in the sky. Bella watched the girl in her nightdress lean on the railing and talk to herself.
Meaningless…but when she slowly struggled back to consciousness, Juliet was on her mind.
Bella opened her eyes to find she was still in the same place. There was no cliff. No seawater filling her lungs. No cold. No fear. No anxiety. Jacob was still asleep; he'd slumped to the floor and his breathing was deep and even. The house was darker than before, it was black outside the window. Bella felt stiff, but she was warm and dry.
She felt thirsty, but was feeling too relaxed to move and get a drink. Her body just wanted to lie there, limp forever. Whatever this delusion was, it was perfect. No angst. No gaping hole in her chest. Dying was a lot easier than she expected.
While she lay there in peaceful silence, Bella thought about Juliet some more. She wondered what would have happened if Romeo had left her, not just because he was banished, but because he had lost interest, just like Edward had in her? What if Rosaline had given him the time of day, and he'd changed his mind? What if, instead of marrying Juliet, he'd just disappeared?
Bella thought she knew how Juliet would feel.
Or did she?
Of course, Romeo wasn't a vampire. He was human, fallible. Just like Juliet.
But still, the circumstances may be different, but would the result be the same?
Bella thought that Juliet couldn't go back to her old life, not really. She wouldn't ever have moved on. She was sure of that. Even if she had lived to be old and grey, every time she closed her eyes, it would have been Romeo's face she saw behind her lids. She would have accepted that, eventually.
Would Juliet have married Paris in the end, just to please her parents, to keep the peace. No, probably not, Bella decided dreamily, but then, the story didn't say much about Paris. He was just a stick figure-a placeholder, a threat, a deadline to force Juliet's hand.
What if there had been more to Paris?
What if Paris had been Juliet's friend? Her very best friend? What if he was the only one she could confide in about the whole devastating thing with Romeo? The one person who understood her and made her feel halfway human again? What if he was patient and kind? What if he took care of her? What if Juliet knew she couldn't survive without him? What if he really loved her, and wanted her to be happy?
And…. what if she loved Paris in return? Not like Romeo. Nothing like that, of course. But enough that she wanted him to be happy, too?
Bella knew that the comparison to her own situation was tentative at best. The questions, the solutions, the resolutions of her true feelings toward her best friend and her faithless lover were moot at this point. She had no future now. Any contemplation on the subject was ridiculous. She didn't even know why she was entertaining it.
While her spirit soared, her body floated lifelessly on the grey ocean. Soon, this, this fantasy, this delusion, whatever it was, would end. And all that would be left was what could have been…
Jacob's slow, deep breathing was the only sound in the room-like a lullaby hummed to a child, like the whisper of a rocking chair, like the ticking of an old clock when you had nowhere you needed to go…it was the sound of comfort.
If Romeo was really gone, never coming back, would it have mattered whether Juliet had taken Paris up on his offer? Maybe she should have tried to settle into the leftover scraps of life that were left behind. Maybe that would have been as close to happiness as she could get.
Well, it was too late now, Bella guessed she would never know. She would just have to add it to her long, long list of regrets.
She closed her eyes and drifted again, letting her mind wander from the stupid play she didn't want to think about anymore. She thought about reality instead-about jumping off that stupid cliff and what a brainless mistake that had been. So many people were going to get hurt. She had people who loved her. Jacob being one of them. His pain had always been her pain. And now she was going to cause him the worst kind. He was going to grieve for her, probably blame himself for suggesting the stupid cliff dive in the first place.
How would she be able to tell him it wasn't his fault? Would she be able to communicate with him from the other side now she was dead? Vampires and werewolves were real, so why not ghosts?
And it wasn't just the cliff, either, but the motorcycles and the whole irresponsible Evel Knievel bit. What would her death do to Charlie? He would be as grief stricken as Jacob. Who would comfort her father in his lonely house? Her mother? No, Renee was too selfish to comfort anyone. She had Phil. But Charlie, he had been lonesome all his life. He had his friends to lean on-like Billy and Harry. But their time would probably be taken up comforting Jacob.
Oh, what a terrible mess she had made. Oh, she really was the most selfish creature imaginable. It wasn't as if she really had intended to kill herself when she had jumped off the cliff. Drowning had been an unfortunate side effect of her reckless actions. All in an insane attempt to hear Edward's voice…. Edward…. oh, Edward….
Bella waited for the hole in her chest to rip wide open as soon as she thought of his name, but surprisingly, for the first time in a long time, the wound stayed closed. The stitches, the stitches that Jacob himself had sown around her heart, remained firmly in place. She pondered what this meant for a moment, before realizing once again, that none of that mattered. She had foolishly thrown her one and only chance away at exploring an alternative future with Jacob. What was happening now was merely her subconscious trying to soften the blow.
Images from her ill-considered afternoon stunt rolled through her head even as she tried to fight them…the feel of the air as she fell, the blackness of the water, the thrashing of the current…Edward's face. Jacob's warm hands caressing her face….
Caressing her face?
Bella opened her eyes to find Jacob looking down at her in concern. One hand was cradling the side of her head, the warmth from his palm on her skin soothing. He opened his mouth to say something, when he was interrupted by the sound of a car squelching through the mud on the road outside. It stopped in front of the house. Then there was the noise of doors opening and closing.
Jacob sighed and took his hand away from Bella's face, leaving her lamenting the loss of his warm touch.
"Dad's back early." He remarked, failing to disguise the irritation in his tone.
Head whirling with the knowledge that her brain was still firmly determined to anchor her in this strange alternate reality, Bella thought about sitting up, and then decided against that idea.
The door opened and the light flicked on. Bella blinked, momentarily blind. Jacob jumped to his feet.
"Sorry, son." Billy grunted. "Did we wake you?"
Bella's eyes slowly focused on the older man's face, and then, her mouth fell open in astonishment.
"Billy, you're walking!" She cried.
Billy looked at her oddly, glancing quickly to the side at his son, the expression on his face clearly questioning her sanity. Jacob shrugged in response.
Sam Uley was right behind Billy. He paused, noting the tension in the room. "Everything okay?" He asked.
"Everything's fine." Billy clarified. "I think Bella is just having a moment."
"Another one?" Sam questioned; his remark clearly indicative that this wasn't the first time something like this had happened.
Jacob scowled. "Its not her fault. And it's been happening less and less lately."
Billy's expression turned sad. "Its okay, son. Why don't I go and put the kettle on?" He headed to the kitchen, patting Jacob on the shoulder in sympathy as he passed.
Bella stared at them all in confusion, trying to sort through their cryptic conversation for clues as to what was going on. What did Jake mean it had been happening less and less lately?
"Its okay, Bella, honey." Jacob became aware of her distress and knelt in front of her. He put his hand back on her face and Bella instantly felt calmer.
Bella swallowed hard. "Thanks, Jake." She murmured.
Jacob gave her a sympathetic look. "I'll drive you home." He offered. "I just need a quick word with Sam before we go. Wait here for me."
"Okay." Bella agreed faintly.
Jacob smiled again, but it didn't quite reach his eyes. He caressed her cheek briefly before taking his hand away, then straightened up again, before reluctantly joining Sam and Billy in the kitchen.
A/N-thanks for reading!
