Disclaimer – I don't own anything Twilight related but this my plot…

Chapter 14: Bella's new normal…

Eight weeks later…

BPOV

Time moved on like it always did. Alex loved our new place, especially the new pool and playground, and started making friends. He loved it so much that I enrolled him in the neighborhood preschool where many of his friends went. The school also had an infants and toddlers section, which I enrolled Ellie in. Alex was a planned change, as Jasper and I were looking into his parents' church, which had a preschool. Charlotte had watched the kids after I returned to work after each of my maternity leaves.

That wasn't an option anymore, so I decided to bite the bullet and enroll Ellie in addition to Alex. Charlotte hadn't watched the kids since this whole thing began, and I was not going to reach out and beg for help. The bill would stretch out my already stretched budget, but I couldn't quit my job. Jennifer combed through my prenup, and there was a clause there saying Jasper would be liable for half of the expenses of the kids' education, including preschool and college if we decided to send them to private school separate from child support. So that was what I was entitled to, and no alimony if we divorced. But I was okay with no alimony part. I liked working; if my mother taught me anything, it was never to depend on a man.

The only thing hindering my work life was my new manager, Maria. Maria had it out for me. She started around the time that I had to go on leave due to the mess in my personal life. I had been back full time for a few weeks, but accommodating was not the word I would use to describe her. She scrutinized my every move. With patients, if I had to leave early or come in late, everything was scrutinized. From what I could tell, I was the only one singled out for this "special attention." Don't get me wrong, she was an asshole to everyone on the staff, but I was the only one she questioned. It was so bad that I was the only one she had filled out a daily report of my tasks.

"Bella, be careful. Maria is on the warpath today," Chris, one of my male colleagues, told me as I dropped my bag in the desk drawer.

"Perfect," I muttered to myself, logging into my computer to retrieve my patient list. Every day, we had to divide the patients who required additional services outside the hospital between us. Ironically, my specialty was mental health - har dee har har.

"Bella," I heard my name being called by the powers that be.

"Here we go," I muttered to Chris, grabbing my list and going to Maria's office.

"Good luck," he replied, shaking his head.

"Good morning," I said as I entered her minimalist office. Maria's office was a homage to the minimalist lifestyle. She despised clutter, believing that mountains of paper were tantamount to laziness, in direct contrast to the loads of paper that defined the nature of healthcare. Which was unfortunate since my desk was covered in mountains of folders of the various client and staff training, we did daily. In addition to said paperwork were framed portraits of Alex and Ellie, a wedding picture of Jasper and me, and a family photo of us at Disneyland. By contrast, Maria's desk just had a computer. Right now - it had a printout of my activities from last week that I sent her last Friday, detailing everything I did.

"Close the door and sit," she said, not even greeting me. Her tone made my stomach churn even more, but I did what she said. "Bella, I was reviewing your schedule last week. You have several hours of unaccounted time."

I raised my eyebrows because she usually said I wasted time. "I'm not sure I understand you; I put everything in from my Outlook."

"Look here, you have at least one hour of unaccounted-for time each day," she said, pointing out the gaps in my schedule.

"Maria, with all due respect, that's not accounting for travel between patients," I reminded her. I often walked all over the place to get the patients, and it could add up to several hours a week.

Maria pursed her lips in an unflattering position. "That's why I told you to account for every minute and task you do, including travel time."

"I see," I repeated, thinking that would have been self-explanatory, but one should never assume I guessed. "I'll make sure to include that in future."

She nodded. "One more thing: You must reduce your meeting times with the patients. Some of these conversations go on for at least an hour."

My teeth started grinding, and I wondered how this woman graduated nursing school. "Sometimes patients and their families require more time."

"You need to be more mindful about managing it," she said, tapping her red nails on the pretentious glass desk she insisted on when she took the job.

Knowing I would lose this fight, I took a deep breath and said, "I'll try to be more mindful."

"Good, you do that, you'll be just fine, Bella," Maria said with a condescending tone and smile like she was doing me a giant ass favor with this ridiculously stupid lecture. "One more thing, how close are you to finishing your graduate degree?"

"My master's in social work?" I asked, "I'm a few classes from finishing. I was going to finish a year from spring."

"Well, I need you to finish it sooner," she said dismissively.

"Maria, my job only requires a bachelor's degree," I replied, confused.

"I'm changing the job description. Unless you have a nursing degree, which in your case you don't, you're going to require a master's degree," she explained.

"Maria, I respect what the nurses do in this department, but they don't have knowledge that I have mental health placement," I retorted, which was the wrong thing to say by the way her eyes narrowed.

"Bella, you're just a social worker," she replied condescendingly, "You don't have clinical knowledge."

I pursed my lips because I knew this was a losing battle. Case management was a delicate balance between nursing, social work, and finance. The social work and finance teams and other non-clinical personnel were often asked to get additional education, which seemed irrelevant to our roles. Either way, with all I had going on right now, taking on additional commitments was just too much.

"Maria, can I at least have an extension?" I asked, "I'm unsure if I can join, as classes have already been in session for two weeks."

"I need you to show some commitment," she said, "As long as you pass, the hospital will reimburse you for the courses."

"Okay," I replied, knowing I was losing another battle. "May I return to my desk so I can call my program and get started on my patients?"

"Of course," she replied in a saccharine voice, "Remember to watch that time with your patients. And another thing, Bella, watch outside distractions. You need to be mindful about the time you come in."

"I'm sorry, I'm not following you. Are you saying that there is an issue with my attendance?" I replied in disbelief.

"Your attendance has been spotty since July."

"I was on family leave," I retorted, wondering how the six days I took outside of maternity leave for a family emergency constituted an attendance issue."

"You were late twice last week, and you left early once," Maria replied serenely.

"Everyone else in this department has been late or left early all summer, and I've covered for all of them. We all cover each other," I reminded her.

"Yes, well, you need every minute you can to catch up on your work, don't you?" she said sweetly.

"Evidently," I replied, keeping my voice as professional as possible. I cursed both her and Janice, our old department head, who got fired for refusing to use email.

"Well, I have a meeting. You should return to your desk," Maria told me bluntly. She got up and grabbed a notebook from her purse.

I nodded, followed her out of the office, and resisted the adolescent urge to slam her door as hard as I could. I hated that woman with the passion of a thousand suns.

However, that didn't stop me from slamming my folders on my desk as hard as I could.

"Bad meeting?" Chris said sympathetically.

"She thinks I'm giving everyone my workload, have attendance issues, and am too slow," I replied curtly, "I also have to finish my master's degree."

"Oh," Nettie, my other neighbor, an RN around my age, told me. "Wait, why do you need to get a master's degree? Your job only requires a bachelor's?"

"Search me, she said they're making it a job requirement for the non-clinical team members," I explained.

"Bella, you're the only social worker," Chris said, raising his eyebrows in disbelief, "That's ridiculous. You're also the only one with any experience in mental health placement."

"All valid points that I told her," I replied, opening an email message to my grad school advisor to see if I could still attend this semester and wondering how I would manage to arrange for babysitting.

"You should go to HR," Chris told me.

"Why that's going to piss Maria off more," Nettie said, "You can do this, Bella, and Maria isn't long for this world."

"Why do you say that?" I asked, remembering her connection to Aro Volutri, our CEO. "She looks really chummy with Aro. Rumor has it he groomed her for management."

"Yeah, I'm sure she groomed something alright," Chris snickered.

"Chris, she's our boss," I said warningly, not liking the tone he was taking.

"Yeah, well, you need to wise up, Bella; she's our boss who decided to switch the game up on you," he pointed, "Be careful and document this shit."

After that meeting with Maria, I spent the rest of my day seeing patients and their families and then calling the nursing homes. My advisor returned my message and suggested I take the human behavior class to get started, and she would help arrange a schedule to be finished by the summer. I also went through my list a little faster, so maybe there was something to what Maria said, or perhaps because we were a bit light in the patient census today. It was a little distracting today - we had two people come in for opioid abuse. Maybe it was due to what I was going through with Jasper, but I felt it today.

Per Nettie's suggestion, I emailed Marie outlining my plan. Still, I also took Chris' suggestion and decided to meet with HR to get an idea of why my job description was changing.

I was at my desk typing up the notes and thinking that my day would have a better ending when my cell phone and email blew up. My inbox announced an email from Maria, giving her displeasure at my education plan and a list of new duties she was expecting keep things spicy, the call ID on my cell phone announced the name of Jasper's rehab facility.

My first thought was: Oh no, he bolted or OD'd. In retrospect, if he had done that, I could have forgiven him. But this, this was so much worse.

"Hello, Bella Whitlock," I announced, my heart hammering, and I prayed that Jasper was okay.

"Mrs. Whitlock, this is Devon Williams," a deep voice answered, "we met during family day."

I pulled up with an image of a tall African American with dreds, listening patiently as Jasper and I fought.

"Yes, I remember," I told him, "Is Jasper okay?"

"Yes, he is fine and he's sitting here with me right now. Mrs. Whitlock, I'm sorry but you need to come up and pick him up," Devon explained.

"What?" I cried. "Why is he leaving the program? If he's giving up, he can find his own way back to Berry."

"No, I'm sorry, Mrs. Whitlock; Jasper is no longer welcome here; he violated the rules."

"Oh my God, he did test for Oxy?" That was the first thought in my mind, the one thing that would undoubtedly get him kicked out. The other thing that would get him kicked out never crossed my mind.

"No, and I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this, but he was found in a compromising position with another patient here. And you know, patients are forbidden to have sexual relationships." Devon answered in a calm voice, too calm, the kind you were when you knew something was about to explode on you. I knew that type of calm well - I used it with my psych patients.

"I. See." I spat out, "Can he reach his parents?"

"We tried, but we cannot get hold of his parents. Mrs. Whitlock, Bella, you're the next of kin; you signed him in here, and there are rules in this facility, one being that if you violate them, there are financial penalties. If you come up now, we'll wave them," he explained firmly.

Another financial hit in addition to the amount of money I spent on this place. I didn't have ten grand to spare if I refused to get him.

"I understand," I replied, ready to strangle Jasper. "I'll be up there in a couple of hours. Tell him to have his bag ready."

Jasper Peter Whitlock was a dead man.

AN: For the record I work as non-clinical employee in a hospital, and I have nothing but the highest respect for my clinical colleagues.

Yes, Maria is going to give Bella a hard time moving forward. Maria is based on a former manager of mine. And yes, a manager can change the job education requirements. My former manager did that to me. I had to earn certifications during the pandemic. Not a lot of fun trying to do while fighting a deadly pathogen. The same person also who gave me grief about nonexistence timecard problems but I digress.

But on to Jasper, as a lot you suspected, he slipped but not the way Bella predicted and why would she? She never had reason to suspect him of adultery. So he's now done the triple AAAs = Addiction, Abuse, Adultery.

And why is Bella not letting him find his own way back? He broke a cardinal rule – you can't have sex in these places. Most rehabs have rules against patients engaging in sexual behaviors with other patients or staff. In fact you want to get fired in a hospital or rehab – hook up with a patient or family member. The patients are supposed to focus on their sobriety which Jasper hasn't and has now found a distraction. Bella is next of kin and at least in my story she's liable to make sure he leaves safety or they're for violating the contract they both signed.

I'm almost done with my next chapter and hope to post it by tomorrow or this weekend. I'm warning you now there is going to be a graphic lemon of the sour variety. So if that's not your thing, which I get it – it wasn't fun to write, scroll down a page or so.

Again thank you very much for your reviews and kind words!