A/N: I originally wrote this scene for another unpublished story (that may never be completed). However, I liked this moment too much to let it languish alone on my hard drive. Here's a little moment of pre-phase friendship and confusing feelings.
Charlie and Billy were glued to the hockey game, and Jake insisted it would go into overtime; how he knew was anyone's guess, but I wouldn't be making one. We'd been sitting at the kitchen table trying to do homework, but neither of us could get into it. It was Friday night, and we were the two lamest teenagers in Forks. I tapped my eraser against the page as the equations in front of me faded into a mess of lines and numbers.
Jacob elbowed me and held his finger up to his lips when I opened my mouth to complain. He shifted in his chair and glanced down at his lap, then back at me. I glared at him, wondering what he was trying to show me, but he just looked down again and nodded a couple of times. Was he trying to make me look at his – no! He couldn't be. My eyes grew wide, and my mouth popped open.
He looked confused, then horrified, and shook his head vigorously.
"No! Jesus!" he hissed and made a drinking motion.
"You're thirsty?" I asked.
Huffing, he rolled his eyes and started to stand up. He looked frustrated, but with a hint of a smile.
"Why are you being so weird, Jake?" I whispered.
He grabbed my arm gently and pulled me up, nodding toward the back door.
Fresh air would be pretty nice, but it was still cold out, and I chewed on my lip as I tried to decide if I would follow him. He swiped Charlie's hunting jacket off the hook and held it out; that would keep me warm. As I shrugged it on, he took two Cokes from the fridge, and then we headed out to the back steps. I was about to sit down, but he shook his head and pulled me around the side of the house.
"What the heck? I want to sit," I complained.
He had a mischievous grin, though, and pulled something from the pocket of his jeans. It was a small glass bottle, oddly flat and curved, about two-thirds full of a brownish liquid. I smacked his arm, and I was shocked by how hard it was under the sleeve of his hoodie. He had a growth spurt and had been filling out for a while, but that was new.
"Jake!" I hissed. "My dad's inside!"
"Inside for the next hour and a half at least," he chuckled. He opened the bottle and tipped it toward me. "Ladies first."
I stared at it for a moment, and I didn't hear Ed– his voice, exactly, but I knew what he'd say: Bella, don't! You could end up in a coma – don't be so stupid! Well, whatever. I wouldn't end up in a coma, but even if I did, it wouldn't be worse than anything else. It might be a relief, even. Would I dream of him in a coma? Maybe in some hazy, unconscious world, I could live the life we never got to have.
Grabbing the bottle from Jake's outstretched hand, I took a sip and almost spat it back out. The sickly-sweet liquid burned my throat, but my mouth was almost numb; it was so spicy, like cinnamon, maybe? I screwed my eyes shut, trying to force myself to swallow, and felt him take the bottle from my hand. Then I heard the pop and hiss of a Coke can.
"Bells," Jake was laughing but trying not to, "here. Take a sip of this, fast."
I opened my eyes so I could see the can and scowled at him as I took it and drank. Finally, my mouth felt normal again, and the cola and cinnamon mixed together tasted sort of pleasant. I watched him take a swig and drink it down straight with barely a reaction.
"Showoff," I pouted, nudging him in his side with my elbow. He answered with a smirk. "What is that?"
"Fireball. Embry swiped it from his mom and sold it to me for five bucks. What, uh, what do you think?"
His confident expression had cracks around the edges; I saw it in the slight waver of his lips and the quick flash of his eyes as he watched me. He rubbed the back of his neck and smiled again. If he could fake it, maybe I could, too. I snatched the bottle back and took another sip – bigger this time. Now that I knew what to expect, it went down more easily. Too easily. Jake's eyes bugged out, and he reached out to grab it back.
"Whoa, slow down!" He sounded concerned. "You're gonna pickle your liver."
I leaned back against the house while he had another drink. It should be nice that he's looking out for me, and it was good of him, but Jacob's wasn't the concern I wanted. I knew it wasn't fair, but it was the truth. So many times, I had been annoyed and fought back when he was just worried about me, but now that he was gone, the hole he'd left wasn't worth the freedom I now had.
My face started to feel warm, and I needed to sit, so I did. The grass was damp, but Charlie's jacket was big enough to offer some protection. It wasn't long before Jacob was on the ground beside me with his arm over my shoulder. When I dropped my head onto him and closed my eyes, it felt like leaning into the sun.
We chatted a little about school, and he told me about some of Quil's recent antics, one of which managed to land them both in detention. I watched him from the corner of my eye as he talked and laughed, though all I could really see was his Adam's apple bobbing up and down like a buoy on the water. He would take a drink, pass me the bottle, talk more, laugh more, and eventually, we ended up just sitting. The air was cool and damp, but it wasn't too windy, and there was just enough light between the moon and the bulb outside the shed that it wasn't scary. Jacob was warm and easy to curl up against, even when there were no more stories to tell.
I shifted when my leg started to fall asleep and found myself staring at the spot where Edward had led me into the trees that day. It felt like it had been years without him, even though his words cut as sharply as ever. I don't want you to come with me. You're not good for me. What was I good for?
"What are you thinking about there, Swan?" Jacob asked, his voice low, thick, and just a bit slurred. At some point, he must have started rubbing his thumb back and forth on my shoulder because now I was keenly aware of it.
"Nothing," I lied. My words felt thicker than they should have, too.
"Bullshit. There's always something swimming around that brain. Looks like it's bugging you."
Something in his tone seemed to pull the words from me against my will.
"You know, everyone thinks he left me in the woods." I laughed, but it was darker than I meant it. "He didn't, you know? I chased him."
I could feel Jake's eyes on me, but I didn't look back.
"Bells, I–" He sounded so sad. This time, I turned my face to see him – he looked sad, too.
"He's fast. He's really fast. I couldn't catch up. I mean, what did I think would happen?" I found myself laughing bitterly again, and my voice became mocking. "'Oh, Bella, good job! You caught me; I'm not leaving you now.'?"
Jacob wasn't laughing with me; he was looking at me with a frown, his forehead all bunched up, and big puppy dog eyes. Well, I didn't want his stupid pity.
"So, it was me who got lost because I was stupid and thought he cared. I thought they all cared about me. But I was just a distraction; I wasn't even important enough to say goodbye to."
The arm draped over my shoulder moved, squeezing me in tighter as Jake took a deep, ragged breath. Our faces were uncomfortably close, and I looked back down at the ground and picked at my shoe.
"They're fucking stupid, not you." I felt his head drop on top of mine. "You're so smart and funny and caring. If they didn't see that in you, they aren't worth shit."
He didn't know how perfect they were or how insignificant I really was compared to them, with my human weakness and stupidity. Leaving me was like returning a defective product; it wasn't anything personal. I just made their lives harder and didn't work the way I was supposed to. I sniffled as my eyes burned with new tears.
"They're not stupid. They were right. He was so perfect, and I'm just – I'm nothing."
I felt Jake's head moving against mine, ruffling my hair around. If I didn't know better, I would have thought he kissed the top of my head. His next words were muffled.
"It drives me crazy they made you think that, Bells. You're so important; you're important to me and Charlie and my dad. For real. You're crazy smart; you make me laugh more than anyone, and you're fucking so beautiful." He gulped, and so did I.
"You're biased," I croaked.
"I am." His words were oddly clear.
We sat like that again for a while, and I was surprised at how comfortable I was despite the chill that was still in the air and the dampness seeping into my clothes. My breathing evened out, and I felt my whole body relax. I knew I was important to Jacob, for some reason, but even he could only list three people I mattered to – and one of them was my father. If I disappeared tomorrow, there would be stories around town for decades about the old police chief's quiet daughter who came for a year and was never heard from again, but they wouldn't remember me. What was there to remember anyway? Getting close to them when nobody else had was the only thing of note I had really accomplished. My grades were good, I wasn't mean, and I was reasonably attractive, but that's not much for fleshing out a character. Maybe in death, I would be a mystery, at least.
Jake slowly shifted to sit up straight again and pulled me in even closer, side to side. I heard the glug of his next drink and shook my head no when he offered me another sip. I didn't know what being drunk felt like, but I wasn't feeling entirely myself, and I didn't like where my mind had been wandering. I might not have what I needed to be whole, but there were a couple of people still willing to put up with me no matter how broken I was.
"Thanks for tolerating me, Jake. I know I suck lately. You're a pretty awesome friend." I looked up at him and smiled, but he had a strange look on his face. He shook his head and sighed.
"See? That shit, Bells. That's the shit I don't get!" His voice was getting louder, and I cringed. His eyes softened when they met mine, and his voice lowered again. "You weren't like this before. Sometimes I see you again when we're just fucking around fixing things, or you're getting all stubborn about doing something yourself and shit, but then you think about Cullen, and you get all meek and sad and depressed."
I scoffed. That was an understatement, if there ever was one.
"No, for real!" He was heated again. "You're fucking amazing, and you don't even see it, and that's bullshit. You're talking like, that, like, just because some douchebag fucked up and didn't see your worth, nobody does. Not everybody's a fucking blind idiot."
Jake's breaths were coming hard, and I felt his body stiffen. His eyes were closed, and without thinking, I reached out and placed my palm against his cheek. Immediately, his features relaxed, and he leaned into my hand. My goal accomplished, I started to pull it away, but he grabbed it and opened his eyes. They were soft and sad, like before, but with something else I couldn't quite place. I couldn't keep staring – I felt too exposed – so I lowered my gaze.
"Do you even know how much I love you?" It sounded like his voice was about to break, and it shattered my heart all over again. My chest seized – I did know, and I knew just how hopeless and misguided it was.
"I think we've had too much to drink," I choked out, willing it to be true, for that to be the only reason for this confession. He didn't answer. When I moved to pull my hand back, he let me, but when I tried to stand, he pulled me into a tight, awkward hug. One arm was bent strangely, and it was hard to wrap my other around him, but I knew he needed this. He'd held me together so many times when the weight of losing my love and my whole future was so heavy I thought I would split apart, and now he needed the favor returned.
"I do, you know," he mumbled into my shoulder. "I love you so much, and you're my best friend, and even if it's only that forever, it's OK. I'll still love you the most of anyone."
He said it again, and I hated that I couldn't say it back. Of course, I loved him. I loved him more than anyone else, too, honestly – anyone still here, at least – just not in the way he meant. Not in the way he needed. There was no way to get it right, either, so I froze and just hoped that something would happen to end this moment. Nothing did. It didn't take him long to notice, and he let go of me and scooted away so we were no longer touching; he hit the house with the back of his head.
Watching the pain on his face as he tried to hide it ripped a second hole in my body. My arms wrapped themselves around my middle, and I took a deep breath.
"I fucked up, Bells. I'm sorry."
"You didn't fu – you didn't mess up." I couldn't raise my voice much higher than a whisper. "I'm the one who should be sorry. Maybe if I was better, or I wasn't so broken, or–"
"Just stop," he cut me off. "Stop saying that. 'Cause then all I want to do is make you feel better, but I can't. I know I'm not the one you want; I get it. But I still care, and I don't let people shit-talk my friends – even themselves."
He still wasn't looking at me. Despite everything puberty had done to him recently, he looked so young right now, and my chest felt so heavy with the knowledge that I'd just hurt him. I was like some jerk who kicked a puppy across the room when all it wanted was a cuddle.
Our friendship would survive this – it had to – but sitting there, both of us hurting and a new space between us, I wasn't sure just how.