A Floating Life
Disclaimer: all characters and copyright belong to SM.
Delusion
"I can't believe this!" Bella cried, both of her hands cradling her swollen belly. "Why didn't you tell me, Jacob? Why?"
Jacob concentrated on a spot above her head, his expression indifferent. He wasn't deliberately masking his emotions; he was using it as a valid form of defense to protect himself. Doing so was the key to his survival. The emotional abuse Bella had unwittingly inflicted on him because of their toxic relationship had rendered him numb. During his lowest moments, when the pain became overwhelming, he came close to hating her, then realized that hate was just another warped version of love itself. Hate tells that once there was love and that love is still possible.
When the imprint had first happened after he locked eyes with her in the meadow, he had been filled with joy, stupidly thinking that this was the answer to all his prayers. She was his, the wolf inside claiming her for his own. He had made the decision straight away to keep it to himself. Not even his brothers were aware, he had quickly concealed his thoughts, instead concentrating his mind on tracking the dread-locked leech and tearing him apart.
Jacob didn't know if it was the Alpha blood running through his veins, but he had always been able to hide his true thoughts, even from Sam. He sometimes wondered if Uley suspected there was something mysterious about his attachment to Bella. He knew that the others couldn't understand his co-dependency, or his obsession with Bella's safety. They saw nothing remarkable about her. In their eyes she was just a slightly awkward human girl, pretty, but nothing special.
"Jacob, you can't ignore me forever!" Bella insisted, breaking him out of his thoughts. "Why didn't you tell me? Does Edward know?"
Jacob reluctantly lowered his gaze and finally made eye contact. He was reminded of the early days of their friendship when they used to laugh so much, at times him stopping and waiting for the usual torrent of giggles to be released from Bella. Even during her darkest moments, he had always managed to coax a laugh or a smile out of her. But of everything they ever did, it was looking in to her eyes that he loved the most. That's all that they had ever needed to connect, just eyes, no words.
Bella bit her lip, not hard enough to draw blood, but enough to leave an impression in the soft skin. Her breathing softened, the pensive look melting into a smile as soft as the morning light. Her body squirmed just a little as her muscles relaxed.
"I know why you didn't tell me." She admitted. "You wanted me to choose you without any outside influence." She sighed softly. "I don't know whether to curse you or kiss you for deciding that."
"A kiss would be better." Jacob quipped, slowly returning her smile, though it didn't quite reach his eyes.
"Oh, Jake, this is all such a mess."
Jacob nodded his agreement, lowering his gaze again.
Another soft sigh escaped Bella's parted lips as she stared at him. "What are we going to do?"
"I have no idea."
There was another beat of silence, broken only by the jagged rhythm of Bella's sluggish heartbeat.
"Did you know that Esme jumped off a cliff? When she was human, I mean."
Jacob jerked his head upwards, meeting her eyes again, wondering what the hell that had to do with their current situation. "So?"
"So, she was close enough to dead that they didn't even bother taking her to the emergency room – they took her right round to the morgue. Her heart was still beating, though, when Carlisle found her…"
That's what she meant before, about keeping her heart beating. Jacob stared at her, sickened.
"You're not planning on surviving this human." He stated dully.
"No. I'm not stupid." Bella met his stare with a determined jut of her chin. "I guess you probably have an opinion on that point, though."
"Emergency vampirization." Jacob mumbled.
"It worked for Esme. And Emmet, and Rosalie, and even Edward. None of them were in such great shape. Carlisle only changed them because it was that or death. He doesn't end lives, he saves them."
"Oh, well, that makes it alright then!" Jacob sneered. "The good vampire doctor – out there selflessly saving the lives of the dying and turning them into bloodsucking monsters instead!"
Bella sucked in a pained breath, her complexion turning even more ghostly white. "I can't believe you just said that." She whispered. "After everything Carlisle did after the newborn battle to make you well."
Jacob felt a slight twinge of guilt about Carlisle. It was true, the coven leader had gone out of his way to make sure his bones had healed correctly so that there would be no lingering aftereffects. Still, it wasn't enough to make him apologize. He was tired of doing that.
His heartbreak was like grief that came in waves, grueling, stealing appetite and sleep alike. It was a shard in his guts that never left, though over time the edges had dulled. It felt like death just the same as bereavement and in quiet moments it choked the breath from his body and short circuited his mind. That's what listening to Bella's plan felt like, the way she was discussing her own death so casually as if it didn't matter, but it did matter, as it meant his death, too.
"I never expected this, though." Bella murmured sadly, breaking through the maelstrom of his thoughts. She gazed into his tormented eyes, those eyes which showed the hue of every tree in the forest from the early light to the sunset, made all the richer by the liquid moisture shining in them. "Now this affects you, too."
"Listen to me, Bells. Don't do it this way." Jacob hated that he was reduced to begging. He needed her to stay alive. He took a deep breath. "Don't wait until its too late, Bella. Not that way. Live. Okay? Just live. Don't do this to me. Don't do it to him." His voice got harder, louder. "You know what he's going to do when you die. You've seen it before. You want him to go back to those Italian killers?"
Bella cringed on the sofa as she recoiled away from his onslaught of words. He left out the part about what it would do to him.
Struggling to make his voice softer, he asked. "Remember when I got mangled up by the newborns? What did you tell me?"
Jacob waited, but Bella refused to answer. She pressed her lips together hard until they were a bloodless stain on her face.
"You told me to be good and listen to Carlisle." Jacob carried on regardless. Fuck her feelings. He was done with being sensitive. The leech had spent so long tiptoeing around her feelings, for all the good it had done him, he wasn't about to do the same. He would spare her nothing. Its not like he had anything to lose – oh, yeah, just his life! "And what did I do? I listened to the vampire. For you."
"You listened because it was the right thing to do." Bella retorted stubbornly.
"Okay – pick another reason."
Bella took a deep breath. "Its not the right thing now." Her gaze softened and touched her big round stomach and she whispered under her breath. "I won't kill him."
Jacob's hands began to shake despite his best efforts. "Oh, I hadn't heard the news. A bouncing baby boy, huh? Shoulda brought some balloons. We can celebrate the gender reveal of your killer!"
Bella's pale cheeks turned pink with anger. She was enraged by his sickening comment. "What a wicked thing to say!" She snapped.
Jacob didn't care, he was enjoying the color in her face, marveling at how it transformed her complexion from almost deathly to something resembling the beautiful, human girl she used to be. The sight of it twisted the knife in his stomach – a serrated knife, rusty and ragged.
For he knew he was going to lose this. Again.
"I don't know he's a boy." Bella admitted after a moment, her expression turning sheepish. "The ultrasound wouldn't work. The membrane around the baby is too hard – like their skin. So, he's a little mystery. But I always see a boy in my head."
"Its not some pretty baby in there, Bella." Jacob reminded her sarcastically. She may be delusional enough to believe that the demon implanted in her womb was some fragile, delicate little neonate, but he knew better.
"We'll see." Bella countered. Almost smug.
"You won't." Jacob snarled. "And neither will I."
Bella flinched again at the reminder of what her decision was costing him. This time she was the one begging. "You're very pessimistic, Jacob. There is definitely a chance that I might walk away from this. Remember that old saying: where there's life, there's hope."
Jacob couldn't answer. He looked down and breathed deep and slow, trying to get a grip on his fury.
"Jake." Bella murmured soothingly, and she patted his hair, and stroked his cheek. "It's going to be okay. Shh. Its okay."
Jacob didn't look up. "No, it will not be okay."
Bella wiped something wet from his cheek. He hadn't even realized he was crying, damn it, he felt so defeated.
"Hush, now, it will all work out." She murmured again. "I can feel it, Jacob."
"What's the deal, Bella?" Jacob stared at the pale carpet in despair. His bare feet were dirty, leaving smudges. He knew it was petty and pointless but he was glad that he was making something so perfect, imperfect. "I thought the whole point was that you wanted your vampire more than anything. And now you're just giving him up? That doesn't make any sense. Since when were you so desperate to be a mom? If you wanted that so much, why did you marry a vampire and not me?"
The last words flew out of his mouth before he had a chance to stop them. He cursed inside his head at his stupidity, regretting them, knowing that he had just revealed a forbidden fantasy he had always had of Bella, that someday she would – he shook his head to rid himself of the treacherous thought before its completion.
Bella sucked in her lower lip, her brown eyes glistening as a lone tear made its way down her sallow cheek. She knew exactly what he was thinking, she didn't need an insight into his mind to know that.
"Oh, Jacob." She said in a broken whisper. "You don't know how many times I wish I could have split myself in two – to give you both what you want, what you need." She hung her head, her lank hair falling about her face. She caressed the curve of her growing belly with gentle fingers. "I would have considered it once, Jacob." She admitted. "If Edward had never come back…I think our relationship would have naturally progressed that way. When we kissed on the mountain…I had a vision of you, of two little black-haired children running away into the distance."
Jacob's head shot up, he gulped in great gasps of air, trying to contain his fraught emotions and put them back into the fortress he had built inside his head. Did she have no idea what she was doing to him, saying something like that? Did she get a kick out of torturing him?
Bella continued to talk, seemingly unaware of his struggles. "I didn't really care about having a baby, Jacob. I didn't even think about it. It's not even about having a baby. It's…. well…this baby."
"It's a killer, Bella. Look at yourself!"
"He's not. Its me. I'm just weak and human. But I can rough this out, Jake, I can – "
"Aww shut up, Bella! This isn't just about you anymore. This includes me, too. You can spout this crap to your bloodsucker, but you're not fooling me. You're not going to make it…and you're willing to kill me right along with you. I am the one who is fucking keeping you alive as well as that thing leeching the life out of you."
Bella glared at him, infuriated. "I do not know that. I'm worried about it, sure. But we don't know anything for certain. I know you think it's our connection – the imprint – that is the reason I've survived this long, but that is only guesswork. Maybe, just maybe, I am more resilient than you are all giving me credit for."
"Stop with the bullshit!" Jacob said through gritted teeth.
Bella gasped and clutched at her stomach. Jacob's fury vanished like a light switch being turned off.
"I'm fine." She panted. "Its nothing."
But Jacob didn't hear her, her hands had pulled her sweatshirt to the side, and he stared, horrified, at the skin it exposed. Her stomach looked like it was stained with big blotches of purple-black ink.
Bella saw his stare and grimaced. "He's strong, that's all." She said defensively.
The ink spots were bruises. The thing was beating her up from the inside.
Jacob almost gagged, but the imprint pull compelled him to comfort her. Reaching out, he lay a gentle hand on the curve of her belly, just as another convulsion shook her. The warmth from his touch immediately soothed the pain, causing her whole body to relax in blessed relief. She fell back against the sofa cushions, her eyes widening in disbelief as the bruises on her skin slowly began to fade.
A/N-thanks for reading!