Hello, everyone! Just wanted to say that I am still as amazed and grateful as ever for all the reviews, hearts, and follows—even in the midst of the website acting up when it comes to sending notifications. You're the best, thank you!
And huge thanks to CoppertopJ, whose incredible beta skills make every chapter better!
Considering that whether Jacob is a werewolf or not was a frequent query in your reviews, I'd like to clarify that he isn't. With the Cullens absent from town, no other vampires lingered in Forks for long enough to activate the shapeshifting gene. And just one more thing regarding Jacob: in this story, he is one year older than Bella—so currently twenty.
Just a disclaimer—this chapter contains a few dialogue lines from the early chapters of "New Moon". These lines, just like the characters, belong to Stephenie Meyer. I am only playing around in the world she created.
Now, shall we proceed?
Leaving Bella had never been an abrupt decision. The resolution had always been there, at the back of my mind, but I tried fighting against it—stupidly, selfishly—for far longer than I should have.
I knew it the day I watched that damned video of James torturing her—the ultimate proof that even if her heart was still beating, she had stepped too far in my world of darkness, getting to taste its bitter atmosphere in a way that an angel like her never should have. I knew it when I promised her I wouldn't leave. I knew it when I swayed her delicate form on the dance floor, making more promises I couldn't keep. I knew it every day and every night of our only summer spent together. Between kisses, between touches, between late nights, between the flowers in our meadow, my worst fears always lay dormant, ready to dig their claws into the fragile fabric of our relationship.
I had always known we were doomed to end.
But it wasn't until I saw my brother hurling at her at full speed that I realized that it was not enough to know, I also had to act on it. Because the longer I stretched the inevitable, the worse it was going to hurt.
Something inside me broke that night, irreparably so. A proper birthday party was yet another thing on the list of things Bella needed to experience at least once—although, to be fair, it was not necessarily an item on my list, as much as it was on Alice's. In my foolishness, I thought the party would be uncomfortable at worst and boring at best, not even considering the actual nightmare it turned into.
I remembered it all with painful clarity, the details having embedded themselves in my brain for good.
Jasper had long blamed himself, but he and I knew the truth. It was never really his thirst that pushed him beyond the point of no return, but rather the unbearable reflection of my own. When that cursed paper cut through Bella's skin, my instincts took over. I was a pile of needs, every nerve of that pile programmed to crave one single thing only: that delicious drop of blood seeping from the tiny wound on my beloved's finger. I could already imagine the satisfaction of its wet warmth dripping down my tongue, bringing my taste buds to life, making them ache in the search for more, more, more. It would have felt so right. It would have been so wrong.
There was no time to rein in the desire—it had already reached Jasper's sensitive synapses. And he felt it too, in all its formidable intensity. However, he never really had a chance to practice his self-control in the face of such thirst the way that I had. There was no time to process the transition between the moment when I came to my senses and the moment he snapped, unable to make sense of our combined hungers.
Jasper had been fast, but not as fast as me. But in my attempt to save her, I ended up making an even bigger mess. Seeing my Bella bleeding, with shards of glass inundating her wound, made me want to disappear completely, taking all the shards with me, where they could not hurt her.
Even worse, as I was holding my breath, the air was so loaded with the scent of her blood, that I could taste its burning sweetness on the tip of my tongue. There truly was no escape from it. And regrettably, even in the midst of disaster, I wanted to taste it. To taste her and forget about the painful contrast between what my body needed and what my heart wanted.
"Just go, Edward," she told me then. She sounded so caring, as if I was the one who needed to be comforted. Hearing those words coming from her mouth unveiled my worst fear, leaving it bare.
"I can handle it," I promised her—and somehow meant it—while I was becoming one with the fire in my throat.
She didn't let up. "You don't need to be a hero. Carlisle can fix me up without your help. Get some fresh air."
But I didn't let up either. I wanted to stay, I needed to stay. For her. Like a normal boyfriend would. I could hold my breath indefinitely, while my father stitched her up, so that I could keep her hand in mine and assure her that things were going to be all right. My decision was clear. I didn't stutter when I said my next words.
"I'll stay."
"Why are you so masochistic?" she sighed.
And with that, she owned me. There had always been a certain dichotomy at the basis of our relationship. My masochism, juxtaposed with her recklessness. My tortured restraint, combined with her sensual provocations. My thirst, her lust, our lust, mixed up in such a way that we never found a healthy balance for any of it. Instead, we always took one step forward and three steps back. It was going to be like this as long as I allowed myself to burden her with my presence and force something that was never going to work properly.
I looked at her once more, taking in the disastrous state she was in, understanding that it was my own doing, and deciding that she would never have to endure the dangers of my world again.
When I stepped into her bedroom that night, I knew it was going to be the last time I was doing it. It was nothing but a selfish gift for myself, one that I certainly did not deserve.
I felt the pressure of the incoming separation hanging in the air, heavy like a lead blanket, ready to crush us under its momentous weight. I could not focus on my own music coming out of Bella's CD player in waves—my gift to her felt so insignificant all of a sudden—as I was too busy assimilating every detail of our last night together. Her warmth rolling out of the blanket, only to be stifled by my coldness, her heart beating so erratically that it made me scared, the scent of her making me shamefully hungry, the angry wind knocking at the window, as if to encourage me to leave my only safe haven behind.
As the music kept rolling, I felt more and more inclined to step over my usual rules and give in to my more human instincts. The temptation was higher than it had ever been, amplified perhaps by the dark knowledge that it was my last chance. I yearned to spend hours just trailing kisses all over Bella's body, using my mouth and tongue to make a thorough map of every single inch of her skin, leaving no area unattended. I wanted to feel the tremble of her flesh under my kisses. To hear her encouraging gasps. To say yes when she said more. How many times had she asked me to let go, to forget about limits for a while? Too many times, enough to make me question everything. Would it have been terribly wrong to listen to her, at long last? Perhaps.
Although my blooming desperation was making up a million excuses per minute, just to get me to understand that it could also be so, so very right.
"What are you thinking about?" Bella's whisper almost startled me. I felt caught, as if she had seen right through my perverse longings. It took me a little longer to find the strength to answer.
"I was thinking about right and wrong, actually."
I prayed that she would not demand a more detailed explanation. I didn't know how to offer her one without crumbling.
"Remember how I decided that I wanted you to not ignore my birthday?" she added. The question brought me some kind of relief, but I also didn't know where she was going with it.
"Yes."
"Well, I was thinking, since it's still my birthday, that I'd like you to kiss me again."
The words tumbled out of her so quickly, that it became obvious that she must have rehearsed them in her mind a few times before saying them out loud. The idea was so endearing, but also so very crushing at the same time. How was I ever supposed to do what was right, when everything I ever wanted lay in her fluttering heartbeat?
"You're greedy tonight," I observed. But then again, so was I, although for entirely different—and wrong—reasons.
"Yes, I am—but please, don't do anything you don't want to do."
I laughed at the irony of it all. If I were to listen to her—and to my less noble intentions—I never would have left that bedroom. And I would have gladly met my end in it, as long as I was by her side.
"Heaven forbid that I should do anything I don't want to do."
She seemed to want to add something, but I didn't let her. My needs came to the surface with ferocious vengeance, and I became their prisoner without putting up a fight. I pulled Bella's face towards mine and found her lips easily. I tried to be gentle—God, I swear I tried—but as soon as I heard her moaning into our kiss, I was lost. My defenses fell, leaving me a pile of raw, sensitive nerves. My mouth opened to take in as much as I could, as roughly as I could, and my hand twisted into her hair to bring her closer still, where I wanted her to be.
Bella reacted in lovingly predictable ways. Her hands tangled in my hair, pulling with what I knew was their full force, her back arched, her knees parted ever so slightly, in an invitation that was almost impossible to refuse. I usually stopped at this point, aware that my self-control could only handle so much, but simply thinking about parting from her made me groan in agony. The sound must have triggered something inside her because she groaned in return, and I found myself pressing against her further, careful not to let my erection graze her—Lord knew how she would have reacted then.
My hand descended eagerly from her hair, caressing her clavicle and shoulder in passing, stopping right underneath the soft mound of her breasts. I could feel the promising softness yielding under the hard knuckle of my index finger, Bella's rapid pulse bringing my palm to life, but I didn't dare to go further, despite how every cell inside my body was begging me to.
But the bliss didn't last long. Through the ever-rising heat between us, Bella's heart had started to pump her blood so violently that I could taste its melody. I could hear every ripple and every wave humming a sonata of their own.
It was the perfect sound.
It was an invitation to sin.
It was an invitation to feast.
It was the wake-up call I needed. Unwillingly, I pulled away.
"Sorry," I managed to say, not one bit surprised to realize that I was just as breathless as she seemed to be. My head was still spinning with scenarios of more heat, more Bella. "That was out of line."
"I don't mind."
She seemed so enthusiastic in her fervour, and turning her down was the last thing I wanted. Alas, it was what I had to do, for her sake. Thirst still played on my tongue, basking in the growing pool of venom, asking for just one bite.
"Try to sleep, Bella."
"No, I want you to kiss me again."
Those words alone were torture of the highest order.
"You're overestimating my self-control."
But she kept going, stubborn little thing that she was. "Which is tempting you more, my blood or my body?"
Considering the way the carnal lust overlapped with the bloodlust in such an evil way that I could no longer tell them apart, the answer was simple. "It's a tie. Now, why don't you stop pushing your luck and go to sleep?"
"Fine," she agreed in the end.
She fell asleep faster than expected, leaving me alone with my thoughts. She fumbled a lot in her sleep that night, unlike right now, as I was hopelessly staring at her peaceful figure from the tree. Jacob had joined her too, and he was holding her as they dreamed together—a picture as simple as it was envy-inducing. It was by no means nice or ethical, but I wanted it to be me who was holding her now, instead of him. She looked so soft, so perfectly undisturbed, and it was exactly what I always wanted for her.
But as the hours flowed by in muddy waves, there was no escaping the memory of her rejecting him. I had been trying to find an explanation for the way she freaked out, but to no avail. The further I dug for clarification, the less sense it made. The Bella of my past craved intimacy with wild rapacity. Like an animal who could never have enough of a perfect meal, she always sought my kisses, my touches, and my body, even when my monstrous nature caused our closeness to come to a halt far sooner than either of us wanted. Especially then. So what could possibly get her to be so against the idea of physical closeness now? Was it something terrible I didn't know about? Or perhaps something milder, easily treatable with proper medical care, like a hormone imbalance?
Not that it was my business anymore. Still, the unknown was eating me alive.
Jacob was the first to wake up, frowning at the grey light of the morning. The rain had stopped at some point, but the clouds were still scattered everywhere, effectively covering the sun. He went straight to the bathroom and I felt misplaced joy upon seeing Bella once again alone in the bed she once shared with me. It almost felt as if I could bust in through the window and wake her up. But then Jacob's mind became annoyingly loud, as it flipped through fleeting images of Bella and several artificially-enhanced women he stumbled upon during his internet searches. Luckily for me, the unwanted mental noise that accompanied his jerking off ended after three minutes, the house falling silent after that.
Half an hour later, it was Bella's turn to wake up. Her eyes opened lazily, fighting against the last remains of sleep, and she checked the time on her phone, sighing as if something offended her. Her hair looked mostly like a haystack, but I enjoyed the view. It reminded me of another life, when she woke up in my arms and her first worry was not fixing her hair or getting something to eat, but kissing me until she ran out of air and I ran out of control. I moved my eyes away once I realized she wanted to change her clothes—as tempting as the spectacle surely was, I didn't want to risk a single glance, since Bella couldn't—and surely wouldn't—consent to be seen like that by me, out of all people. It was bad enough that I was essentially stalking her at this point; I didn't want to add voyeurism to my list of sins as well.
Jacob barged into the room soon after, and I dared to look back inside at long last. She no longer had the camisole and sweatpants on, but a black T-shirt and blue jeans—simple, mundane clothes, yet they still couldn't hide her deliriously perfect shape. Every curve called for attention, every line was a work of art. My view got obstructed when he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her towards him for a kiss.
I instantly had to look away.
"Good morning, gorgeous," he muttered.
"Hi, Jake." More wet sounds of lips moving together. Her heart started beating faster. I felt my insides churning in repulse.
"How was your sleep?"
"Pleasant enough. Did you have breakfast yet?"
"I was just finished with it."
They soon left the bedroom, and I heard their steps descending on the stairs. I started getting antsy as I heard several familiar sounds, alerting me that she was preparing a bowl of cereal for herself. Jacob was not really paying attention, his mind was somewhere else, on some bike he had to fix soon. After a while, his attention shifted back to Bella, and he was the first to talk.
"So, Embry invited us over to his place today. Any thoughts on this?"
"Oh… today? I don't know…"
"Full disclosure: his folks got him a new PlayStation and he probably just wants to brag about it."
She giggled, and the melodic sound awakened butterflies in me that I forgot I had. "Like you don't love it, Jake!"
"You know I do. But I promise not to get distracted if you join us."
"You said this when Harry got him that VR thingy from Europe."
"That was the exception."
They started laughing together, and my butterflies died. There was no use for them being alive anyway. Their reason for existing was clearly a pipe dream, withering right in front of their dead wings.
"Well, don't worry about it," Bella said. "I'm not joining you today."
"No, come on!"
"It's fine, really. I've got to do some stuff around the house anyway. You have your fun with Embry."
"But I told him we're going together, Bells."
"He'll cope, I'm sure."
"You can make an effort though." There was a sudden edge to his voice, one that had not been there before. And I didn't like it one bit.
"I'm just not in the mood today, no need to get cranky again."
"She always does this. Never in the mood my ass. I hate this. It's getting too much."
He didn't voice his thoughts out loud, but he let his attitude do the talking for him. He left the kitchen, and I heard her calling his name, with a voice that sounded defeated. But I didn't hear her getting up. She just sighed and continued eating her breakfast. I didn't know what to make of it. It made me feel uneasy—how he left her there alone, how he dismissed her, how she accepted it all.
Maybe my mind was blowing things out of proportion—it wouldn't have been the first time. People went through phases and mood shifts, it was the blessing and the curse of being a living, breathing creature with a conscience. Trying to find a hidden meaning behind their actions was not only intrusive, but useless as well.
This was their life, not mine. I was nothing but a miserable trespasser.
Bella lingered in the kitchen long after the sounds of her cleaning her plate stopped. I had no clue what she was doing, as she had become frustratingly quiet all of a sudden. Meanwhile, Jacob was in his own bubble. He was texting the friend he mentioned, Embry, back and forth, complaining about having to drive to the reservation alone. Apparently, Embry had managed to smuggle a few beers from his father and they were planning to drink them later on. Jacob had counted on Bella being there, so that she could be the designated driver.
My distress started to dissipate when I heard her moving again. She found Jacob in the living room, still texting. It wasn't until I heard lips moving against rough skin that I realized what was happening. She was comforting him.
"Please, don't stay mad at me, Jake."
He said nothing, even if deep inside his ego was pleased.
"I will make it up to you. I'm just a little bit under the weather today. It wouldn't be fun to be around me with how I'm feeling anyway."
Jacob huffed, but I could see the decisions forming in his mind in real time, when he grabbed her and pulled her in his lap, obviously unable to resist her.
"So what is it?" he hummed. "Bad period incoming?"
"No, it just ended three days ago. I thought I told you that."
"It's difficult to keep track sometimes. Haven't your periods been all over the place lately?"
"A little bit, yes."
"Must be those hormones going crazy, honey."
And with that, they made up. No further questions, no complications. But for one reason or another, I still felt tension plaguing the air—and I knew it was not just my own bias at play this time around; otherwise, he would have been more focused on her eager kisses, and less on pondering about the ways she could make it up to him in the future.
He didn't stay much longer after that. He left, leaving Bella all alone in the empty house. It was the best temptation. The worst temptation. I still had enough strength to not obsess over her scent, mostly because the thick walls of the house were doing a great job at keeping it contained. Its trail was soft, barely scraping my throat. I didn't know what to do with myself, now that I knew she was all by herself. The more reasonable part of me reminded me that I had to leave—as soon as possible, ideally now. Hadn't my mission been accomplished, after all? I only came to Forks to see her once more, before she made the leap and got married. Overstaying my welcome was beside the point. Furthermore, how long could I hide in this damned tree?
As I was asking myself these questions, I heard Bella going on about her day, doing exactly what she told her fiancé she would do. She vacuumed the house, mopped the floors, loaded the washing machine, and started it. Throughout all this, she whistled a tune that sounded half off-key, half charming, and I could not help but smile. This was yet another thing I missed about her. Once she grew a little more comfortable in our relationship, she no longer shied away from humming in my presence. And even if she was not a professional, my ears still preferred her sound over that of a skilled soprano. This thought alone made me want to bottle her little whistling song up and carry it with me everywhere, once I inevitably left again.
I had no idea where an entire hour had gone. It felt as if time itself was playing tricks on me. I expected her to need some rest after finishing her chores. But her heart was suddenly beating faster, signaling that she was far from needing a break. Craving to know what it was that got her pulse to quicken, the frustration of her unreadable mind resurfaced, making me feel weak and incapacitated. The fact that I could not even see what she was doing was adding to my aggravated state.
But then, taking me completely by surprise, the back door of the house opened and closed, and the wind carried Bella's intoxicating fragrance right into my nostrils, no warning beforehand. And goddamn, how spoiled I had been by those thick walls of the house. Without them acting as a fortress, her scent was a maddening storm, one that worked to get me to succumb to my lowest needs. I needed its lush sweetness to coat my tongue more than anything.
Powerless, I held my breath and waited. Bella was out of my field of vision, so all I had was the noise of damp grass yielding under her footsteps as she stepped forward. She didn't stop, she kept going in a direction completely opposite of where I was. As her steps got further and further away, I realized I knew precisely where she was heading. I stood by completely motionless, until I could no longer hear anything other than the duet of her breath and pulse.
She was not far away. But going by the faint echo of her heartbeat, there were trees surrounding her now from every angle.
My body instantly craved to get closer to where she was. Just to see.
One last time—for real this time.
Ever so carefully, I left my spot on the branch, once I made sure there was no one within seeing distance from me to spot my misdeed. I crossed the backyard in between two blinks of an eye, heading towards the east side, where Bella's trail led me and the forest began. I made a point to be as silent as possible so as not to arouse any fears or suspicions in her. I could not risk being seen—not now, that I was so close to finding enough peace to flee again.
I found a new temporary home behind the thick base of an old hemlock tree, twenty feet away from the tantalizing call of her blood. I was still holding my breath, but my tongue could taste the forbidden honey lacing the air. Gathering enough strength, I dared to look in front of me, painfully aware of where I was.
Bella was closer than ever now, and this time there was no real layer of separation between us: no walls, no windows, nothing. Just me and her and the most divine anticipation. She sat on the trunk of a fallen alder, her eyes closed, and every atom in my body started to sizzle upon realizing how easy it would have been to step forward, kneel in front of her, and beg her for one single embrace. It was so easy to imagine myself doing that—dangerously so. I tightened my hands into fists, warring with myself to remain calm and not ruin everything in the wake of my selfish desires.
Held in place by the thinnest willpower, I observed her. She seemed peaceful, even if she was not even ten feet away from the place where she last saw me. I was not foolish enough to think that she remembered the exact spot, of course, but for me, it was impossible to forget. It was the place where all happiness went to die. Being here again hurt in a way I had not expected. Because if I looked to the right, I could see the ghost of us still lingering there, still saying goodbye. And if I looked to the left, I could see the sounds of Bella shouting my name materializing, coming to life, and taking nightmarish shapes, ready to attack me.
And worst of all, I heard all my lies, trapped in the very sap of the trees that had been our unwilling witnesses.
I don't want you to come with me.
You're not good for me.
I won't come back.
So much for my resolve.
As Bella's heartbeat returned to a normal pace, I felt my pain slowly turning into panic. Liquid, black, ugly panic, its source neverending. I closed my eyes, inhaling again, if only to distract myself from the sudden, overwhelming emotions. Her smell hit me like a freight train, mouth-watering to the extreme, and I realized I had made a mistake. Because now I wasn't just a raw pile of anxiety, I was also a starving animal.
I forced my eyes open and looked at her again. At her tranquil face and the voluptuous way the shadows were slithering around her like snakes. Instead of calming me, the picture worsened my state. Because along with the thirst, another hunger reared its head, reacting with pure avidity upon seeing Bella. Her parted lips, her taut neck, her slowly moving chest—everything she had, worked against me.
Craving to taste, to grab, to bite, my fingertips sunk into my palms until it started to hurt. I didn't trust myself to move further than that.
As if to tease my demons, Bella sighed and stretched, making the air move in waves that carried her perfume straight to me. She frowned ever so slightly, but she didn't leave her spot on the fallen tree. I ached to know what it was that got her to frown. Was it a bad memory? Was it something mundane, or was it something deeper? Was it the harrowing aura of what this place meant, the one that was tormenting me as well? No, certainly not the latter. She had done her mourning when it came to me. She was engaged. She had no reason to look back on what once was. Enough time had passed for her wounds to have closed with minimal scarring.
Bella moved again, this time shifting until her wrists were visible. And I saw it. The bite mark adorning her right wrist, covering the blue lattice of veins underneath. The damned sign that proved she had seen the very worst of my Underworld and survived, against all odds. It was doomed to be forever etched into her skin, as a reminder that I had failed her worse than anyone in her life ever could.
My eyes stung, but I ignored them. There was already enough pain to focus on without them bothering me with their pathetic inability to shed tears.
I was still trapped in this limbo of watching her and burning to move, when she opened her eyes at long last, looking around. She rose up, wobbling a little on her feet, and started to walk again, seemingly without direction. I remained where I was, struggling to understand what her plan was. She just moved in a zigzag pattern, her eyes darting from the ground to the sky, again and again and again.
Several minutes passed like this, and I was getting more and more confused. A hummingbird started a wistful tune in the distance, and almost on command, Bella's eyes went on a mission of searching upwards. It was already too late when I saw the deceivingly hidden roots of a tree peeking from underneath the grass layer. One more step and her feet ran right into them, disrupting her already precarious balance.
It took everything I had to remain where I was when I saw her falling. All of my instincts screamed at me to catch her. She landed with a thud, and her loud groan sent freshly sharpened blades through me.
It's just a fall, it's just a fall, it's just a fall, I kept chanting to myself, in a desperate effort to convince myself to stay put, so that she could get up and continue whatever it was that she was doing. But then she started wailing, and my concentration gave way, replaced by terror in its most primal form.
I wanted to do something. But I couldn't. Even more than that, I shouldn't.
She searched inside the pockets of her jeans, cursing under her breath about her missing phone, and propped her palms on the ground. She pushed herself on them and tried to get up. Once. Then twice. Then she gave up, cursing once more, and reaching to touch the ankle that was causing her trouble. She winced, and it was getting too much for me to see her like this.
Goddamn, I had to do something already. My mind urged me to not waste more time, tempting me with thoughts of just because I shouldn't, doesn't mean that I couldn't. I tried resisting it, analyzing my options. I could go inside the house, and text Jacob from her phone, but there would be no sane explanation after that. Or… I could leave her here, until he returned and realized she was missing. He would know where to look, he knew her well enough at this point.
But how long was it going to take for him to return? An hour? Two? Three? More? An awful lot of things could happen until then. The rain could start, soaking her and adding unnecessary distress to the table. Or a wild animal could stop by, sensing the promise of a wounded creature and taking advantage of it. Or a venomous spider could spot her before she could spot it. Or… she could worsen her injury, without even meaning to, in her attempt to get up from the ground.
Try as I might, I was running out of excuses for myself. What I was about to do clashed with every selfless, rational musing I had ever had. It went against everything I believed in. It was wrong in more ways than one. It was also the only sane thing I was capable of doing, given the circumstances, so I prayed to whatever god was listening to me for forgiveness in advance.
Bracing for the worst, I stepped out of the shadows.
Uh-oh, interesting times incoming :)!
Do you think Edward is making a mistake by breaking the promise he once made to Bella about never intruding into her life again? How do you think she'll react when she sees him again?
I'd love to know your thoughts on this chapter! And if you'd like an early preview on what's coming next, you're welcome to join my Facebook group: Twilight fanfics: NightBloomingPeony & friends corner.
Until next Sunday, stay safe and happy!