“You know, we can’t do this anymore once Charlie is back home,” I said as Jacob and I snuggled into my bed that night.  We had fallen into a routine since Charlie had been away.

Jacob would take his turns running patrols through the woods and then tiptoe into my room to join me.  Or, like tonight, he would wrap himself around me, putting us both into a peaceful slumber.

There had been no sign of Victoria since prom night.  Jared knew that he had injured her, although not bad enough to cause real damage.  The pack presumed she was hiding away somewhere, nursing her wounds.  But, we all figured she was planning her next round of aggression.  We all knew she would come back; we just didn’t know when.  She not only had the score to settle over the murder of James, the pack had now killed two of her other partners in crime.

“You said that Edward used to sneak in your window and spend the night in here all the time,” Jacob said as he pulled just the sheet around us, his heat assuring we wouldn’t need any more cover.

He was clad in his usual cut off shorts.  I was in one of his T-shirts and a pair of old gym shorts.  It had only taken me one night to learn that my sweat pants just got too hot when I slept next to my werewolf.

“Yeah he did, but you are forgetting one important thing,” I said before giving him a chaste kiss on the cheek.

“That he was a worthless bloodsucker not worthy of your time and attention?”

“Jake!  You are such a smart ass,” I said reaching back to swat him.  “I was talking about the fact that Edward did not sleep and YOU snore like a freight train.”

“Oh, that!”  Jacob leaned in close to my ear and snorted.

“Yes that,” I said giggling and squirming to get away at which I utterly failed.  A failure that was welcome, Jacob’s strong arms holding me firmly in place.  “I would venture to guess that Charlie would catch us within the first hour.”

“Charlie likes me,” he said confidently, as if that would excuse the fact that he was sleeping in the same bed as his teenage daughter.

“Let’s keep it that way.”

“Next year, when you’re in Seattle…”

“We’ll be able to do this every weekend,” I said finishing the thought for him.  And what a good thought it was!

###

A note from author Larisa Dawn:

Thank you to all that have read and enjoyed Phases of the Moon.  I have enjoyed reading many of your comments throughout this process.

I, of course, have the next chapter of Bella and Jacob’s lives together mapped out in my head.  If any of you are interested in reading my rendition of what comes next, let me know.  If I get enough people interested in knowing where things go from here, I will continue the story. It’s up to you whether or not I write those additional Twilight Saga, Team Jacob fan fiction books. If that’s what you want, please let me know by posting a comment.

(Unfortunately, those more-evil-than-Victoria spammers prevent your comments from appearing immediately, but I’ll see that valid comments get posted as soon as possible — and I’ll post my replies when appropriate. Thank you.)

Sirens!  I heard sirens.  Had Jacob gone for help instead of chasing Victoria?  Maybe a local resident had seen the light from the fire and alerted the authorities.  Whatever the reason, I was grateful for the sound.

I leaned my back against the trunk of the tree keeping my arms draped across Charlie.  Emily was already on the road, she could direct them to us.  Now that I took the time to notice, I was amazed at how far the heat of the massive fire projected.  I estimated that we were a good fifty yards away from where the car had settled.  I could feel waves of warmth much like feeling wisps of a cool breeze on an Arizona summer day, only the opposite sensation.

I missed Renee, a realization that I found very odd.  I was positively sure that she would not have been any help whatsoever in my current set of circumstances, but I missed her just the same.  I guess I had a substantial portion of respect for her right now.  I had always ridiculed many of the decisions that she had made over the course of my life, but recent events had forced me to realize, decisions weren’t always easy to make.  They were easy to second guess after the fact.  This flying by the seat of my pants wasn’t exactly graceful.

I squeezed Charlie’s shoulder.  “Help is on the way dad,” I assured him, not knowing if he could hear me or not.

“Thanks, Bells,” he muttered, “I’m a lot warmer now.”

Although his statement didn’t make total sense, the sound of his voice made the tears flow again.  “Are you hurting anywhere, dad?”

But, he was silent again.

I rubbed Charlie’s arm and listened as the sirens grew painfully loud and then stopped.  I heard voices moving toward us.

The face that came into view first was not one that I expected to see.  But it was the russet face that I wanted to see the most.  “Jacob!” I gasped.  “How did you get back here?”  I would have rushed into his arms, but he was kneeling beside me, warming me, before I had even shifted my arm away from Charlie.

“The rest of the guys had her chased into Canada.  Sam and I decided to go for help and stay close in case she circled b…”

“Who is injured?” an energetic paramedic asked.  “Are you hurt miss?”

“No, I’m fine,” I croaked out past my sob-marred throat.  “My dad needs help.”

“Chief Swan, can you hear me?” asked the second responder on the scene.  He was an older Indian man who looked like he could have been Billy’s twin brother.  “Bella, has he been talking to you?” he asked as he knelt down on the opposite side of Charlie, taking in the not-so-healthy look of him.

I started to cry again.  I knew that it was not a productive thing to be doing but emotions were not always practical.

Jacob leaned away from me.  He placed his large hands on my shoulders.  “Pull it together Bells,” he commanded, “Charlie needs us.”

I was beginning to wonder if a person could actually get whiplash from mood swings.  As quickly as they had started, the tears stopped.  Jacob was right.  My meltdown would have to wait a little longer.

“He was knocked out when we got to him.  When he did come around, he almost acted like he was drunk.”  I was trying to remember anything that would be helpful for them to diagnose his condition.  “Oh,” I added, he would hardly put any weight on his right leg when Emily and I helped him out of the car

“What exactly happened, Miss Swan?” asked a third voice from behind me.  A police officer had joined the rescue crowd.

Oh boy! I thought.  I had no idea how I was going to answer that one.  Sam and Emily were just coming into view.    I watched the older paramedic slowly slide a neck brace onto Charlie, being careful not to move him in the process.  I found that rather ironic considering how Emily and I had yanked him from the car.  I took a deep breath and rapidly put my thoughts in order.

“We weren’t far behind him on the road.”  I said a silent prayer that no one would ask who “we” were, because I wasn’t quite sure how I was going to explain Sam’s sudden appearance.  “We knew that we had to help him.”

The paramedics had slid a flat back board alongside Charlie.  “We’re gonna get him to the hospital,” the younger man said in the direction of the police officer, “you can sort out the rest of the details there.  Can you help us get him moved?”

The officer looked put out, but he quickly accepted that the paramedic had a valid point.  They rolled Charlie to the side in order to maneuver the board under him.  They enlisted the help of Jacob and Sam to brace the awkward looking leg during the move.

“Ow,” Charlie moaned.  The movement must have jarred him awake again.  He opened his eyes and took in the scene around him.  “Did you guys see the deer?”

Jacob and I looked at each other, neither of us sure if speaking or silence would be most helpful.

“Did you hit a deer Chief?” the officer asked.

“It just darted right out there,” he said and then closed his eyes again.  “I bet the wolves got it,” he muttered.  “Weren’t the wolves loud, Bells?  It was like they were right next to us.”

“Yeah, dad,” I agreed. “They were pretty impressive.”

This time when I chanced a glance at Jacob, it was not me he was looking at.  He and Sam were locked in a mental conversation that I did not have to be a part of the wolf pack to understand.  The paramedics positioned themselves at the head and the foot of the board that Charlie was lying on.  The police officer and Jacob fell into place on the sides to help disperse the load.  Emily and I walked arm in arm as the group returned to the road where the ambulance was parked, safely away from the blaze, of course.  Sam drifted off into the trees and I knew that somewhere in the woods, a deer would soon be sacrificed to create the scene.  By daylight, it would be appropriately disemboweled and found at a believable location to corroborate the deer and wolf remarks.  Charlie couldn’t have created a better alibi if he had tried.  I sure as shootin’ knew I couldn’t have.

We put our story together on the way to the hospital.  The Rabbit was drivable, but Jacob was going to have to put some serious hours into it if he wanted it to look decent again.  Sam joined us as we were walking into the lobby so slyly that I barely even noticed.  My reputation of klutziness assured that no one would raise an inquiry when I reported that I lit the signal flare to be able to see in the trunk, but then dropped it as I stepped away.  We had stopped at the reservation to pick up Sam and Emily to join us at home for a late night movie and pizza.  It sounded like such a nice arrangement; I had to keep reminding myself that we hadn’t really planned it.  I sincerely wished that we had.  It would have been much more fun than the way we spent the remainder of the night.

Charlie had to have a craniotomy to relieve pressure from bleeding in his head.  I paced, I fretted, I accidentally drew blood from Jacob’s hand two different times with my fingernails.  He kept reminding me that he healed quickly when I apologized.  Fortunately, there were not many people in the surgery waiting area of the hospital at that hour on a Saturday night, but the few that happened to pass through confirmed my suspicions of what we must look like.

Charlie was kept in a drug-induced coma.  It was like watching a shadow of him breathing only when the whir of the machine prompted.  I fully understood what my parents, and Edward for that matter, must have gone through last year while I recovered from James attempt on my life.  I didn’t remember anything between when I passed out at the ballet studio and awoke days later in the hospital, but they did.  Edward had told me a few times that it was the most agonizing time he had spent on this earth, waiting to see if I would come back to him.  Renee had gushed about how I had added at least six wrinkles to her forehead during that time.  Charlie.  Charlie had not said a word; I had read it in his eyes and in the way he hugged me every time since then.

Two days later, Jacob and I were in the surgery waiting room again while an orthopedic surgeon plated the broken bones in Charlie’s leg.  At least we were more appropriately dressed.  The head injury must have deadened the pain in his leg.  I had repeated the story to the doctor about the walk from the police cruiser to the shelter of the tree the night of the accident.  “Winced,” the doctor had choked out, “he shouldn’t have even been able to walk.”

The weeks that followed were a blur of school and hospital visits and doctor updates and people from all over Forks stopping by to wish the Chief well.  Jacob was with me through so much of it that I probably should have worried that he was shirking other duties.  I was just so grateful to have him there that I willfully ignored my guilt over monopolizing his time.

At least the scenario had provided me with a believable excuse as to why I left the prom when I did.  I think Angela suspected something was amiss; she must have read the full report in the newspaper and deduced that the times didn’t quite match up, a fact that went completely over Mike’s spiky blond head.   She never voiced her doubts.  The Forks Daily Standard printed nearly as many retractions as articles, so times not matching didn’t really raise a huge amount of suspicion.  I suspected that was her reasoning; I never asked.  I didn’t want to bring it up.

I relied on my experience from my post-Edward zombie days to carry me through my studies.  And, when Lauren lashed out at me, I found that I just didn’t care.  I had more important things to worry about than what that insignificant little witch thought of me.  I do believe I shocked our entire lunch table on the last day of school when I actually told her that out loud.

“Here, here!” Ben said emphatically, raising his cardboard container of chocolate milk in the air in a toast.

As if the surprise of mild-mannered Ben being the one to second my motion of an attack on Lauren, what followed gave me a much needed moment of comic relief.  Our entire table raised milk cartons, Gatorade bottles, soda cans, even a Styrofoam cup of coffee, whatever was in front of them at the time.  Although it did not produce a dignified “clink”, it gave an effect that pleased me.  Lauren stood up and dramatically stomped out of the cafeteria.

“I can’t believe you just said that,” Jessica gasped.

I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me or Ben, so I shrugged my shoulders and returned my gaze to my to-do list for the evening.  The vindictive side of me wished I would have thought to do that months ago.

“So Bella,” Mike asked after the chatter over Lauren’s departure had died down, “you seriously aren’t doing anything for graduation.”

“I’m showing up,” I clarified, “that’s all I really think is necessary.”

“You and Jacob are welcome to come by my party, its right after graduation,” Jessica said.

“I appreciate that Jes, but we’re going to go up to the hospital and have supper with Charlie.  He feels terrible that he can’t be there, especially since Renee can’t make it.”

“Whoa,” Mike snorted, “when did this happen?  Bella, you’re Mom isn’t coming either.”

“My step-father broke his leg.  She is staying with him,” I said matter-of-factly.  I missed Renee horribly, but given Charlie’s current circumstances, I could understand her need to stay behind with Phil.

I didn’t want to hurt the feelings of any of my friends, because I truly did appreciate each of them, but the only person I really cared about being at my graduation would be there.  Jacob would be by my side, just like always, tomorrow.

***

“I can’t stand this anymore,” Charlie grumbled near the end of his fifth week in the hospital, or captivity as he referred to it.  He dramatically pushed his tray table away.  I really couldn’t say that I blamed him; I had had my fill of hospital food during the few days I spent in the one in Phoenix after the James incident last spring.  “I want to go home.”

Charlie had been through the gamut of hospital units.  He started in ICU in the initial days after the accident.  He then went to a step-down unit once the pressure inside his head had gone down enough to get him off of the ventilator.  Now he was on a rehabilitation unit building strength in his leg and dealing with the bouts of dizziness that had plagued him since the accident.

“Ask and you shall receive,” the cheerful neurosurgeon said, waltzing into the room at the perfect moment.

Dr. Moony could always bring a smile to Charlie’s face.  The man was so cheerful it was infectious, that coupled with the fact that he had literally saved Charlie’s life softened him a bit.  But the smile that spread across my father’s face today was not one I had seen in a while.  “Are you serious?” he gasped.

“Absolutely,” Dr. Moony insisted.  “You are doing great.  You’ll have to take it easy for a while, but it sure seems like you’ll be in capable hands.”  The doctor patted me on the head like a puppy.  Coming from anyone else, I might have felt offended, but it was hard to feel anything derogatory toward Dr. Moony.  “The dizziness is getting better every day, but you won’t be able to stay by yourself.”

Charlie looked as though someone had just deflated his birthday balloon.  “Bells has a job.  She’s saving up to go to college in the fall,” Charlie stated, although I could tell it pained him to do it, “I’ll be on my own during the evening.  You still think it will be okay, doc?”

“I can see if Sue can look in on you on her days off, Jacob is mainly working in the morning at the garage, and I’m sure Billy wouldn’t mind coming over to watch some baseball games [on the big screen(?)],” I said quickly.  Jacob and I had already started networking with Charlie’s friends to plan for his return home.

“See,” Dr. Moony said confidently, “I knew you were in capable hands.  I’ve already talked to your therapist and the other doctors on your case.  We’ll get it all set for tomorrow.”  And with that, he strolled back out of the room.

Charlie reached for the tray he had only minutes before pushed away, his appetite suddenly returned.  But three bites into his vegetable lasagna, his meal was interrupted again.

“Knock, knock,” said the officer that had taken our report the night of the accident.  I had since learned that his name was Kirby.

“Hey buddy,” Charlie cheerfully boomed, his attitude over the recent good news seemingly seeping from every pore.  “Were you able to get it finished up for me?”

Kirby looked at me nervously, like he wasn’t sure he wanted to be near me.  I immediately began to wonder if he had dug around and found some way to discount our account of the accident.  Most of the evidence had been burned up with the cruiser, but I stilled worried that something would have remained.  Up until now, I hadn’t gotten the impression that any further investigation was even being ordered.  Charlie’s excellent set up of the story hadn’t given them any reason.

Get a hold of yourself! I mentally ordered.  I took a deep breath and decided to reign in my panic attack until I heard what Kirby had to say.

“It’s okay,” Charlie chimed in. “Just go ahead and give it to her now.”

I allowed myself a full exhale.  Charlie seemed to be fully aware of why Kirby had come by, and I didn’t think he could remain so happy if he thought that his daughter were about to be arrested for arson.

Kirby handed me a plain black shopping bag with red handles.  I held it gingerly, still not sure what to make of the entire scene.

“Given my current… situation,” Charlie scanned his eyes around the room to emphasize his meaning, “I was not able to get you a graduation present.  I made a few phone calls and got most of this arranged, but Kirby here had to pick it up and make sure all of the papers were turned in for me.”

I felt my unwarranted anxiety slowly seeping through my tired feet from my shift at Newton’s into the hard tile floor.

“Open it up, Bells,” he said, nodding toward the bag.

I looked into the bag and tears immediately filled my eyes.  “Dad,” was all I could manage to choke out.

“If you don’t like that model, the sales lady told me you can exchange it within three days with no penalties,” Kirby said, not understanding the tears at all.

I pulled out a pale blue cell phone.  I turned it back and forth in my hand, cradling it.  It was the kind that had the number keys on the front and flipped open to reveal a full qwerty keyboard.  I absolutely loved it, but I was confused by what else I saw in the bag.  At the bottom of the bag lay two more of the same model of phone, only in black.

“Why three?” I asked.

“One is for me,” Charlie said snatching the bag from my hand playfully.  He removed one of the sleek black objects from the bag.  “And as hard as it is for me to face this, I am certain that I am not the man you will be most anxious to hear from when you’re up in Seattle.  The other is for Jacob.”  He cleared his throat and looked out the window.  “You and Jake will both be making a lot of trips back and forth.  The accident made me realize…  I take it for granted that I always have a radio in my car, but the two of you don’t.”

The tears were dripping off of my cheeks now.  Charlie’s thoughtfulness never ceased to amaze me: from the purchase of my truck before I ever moved to Forks, to the chains on my tires he installed before the sun was even up when the weather got bad, to the way he cared for me after Edward left.  Despite my age when I moved in with him, my father took his guardianship of me very seriously.  Now he was doing the best he could to make sure that would continue.

“These phones have awesome cameras on them, Bella,” Kirby pointed out.  The attempt to soften the atmosphere was obvious but appreciated.  It made me realize that he wasn’t as oblivious to emotions as I thought he was.  Being male, he just generally chose to avoid them.

“That’s why I picked them,” Charlie chimed in.  “We can send all of the pictures or text messages we want to each other.”

I had to chuckle a little as an image flashed in my head of Charlie sending me pictures of the fish that he caught on his Saturday trips.  As corny as it sounded, even to me, I looked forward to getting them.

“And, I checked with Renee, Bells, she and Phil have the same network, so you can call or send messages to them too,” Charlie went on.

I opened my new toy and snapped a picture.  I wanted to remember this day.

“Bells, get in the car,” Jacob said as he ran through Emily’s kitchen.  “Emily, Sam is still running.  One of us will let you know as soon as we can when he’ll be home.”  Jacob had a hold on my wrist and was dragging me toward the front door.

“What’s the rush?” I stammered out in shock.

“Charlie headed home.  We’ve got to get to your house.”

I managed to wrench my arms onto the doorframe to stop his momentum.  For a fleeting moment, the look in his eye made me think he may throw me over his shoulder and carry me out kicking and screaming.  “Jacob, you’re being rude.  I think Charlie will understand if I’m a little late.”

Jacob grabbed my face with both hands.  “Bella, we lost them.  We divided up to search.  Charlie is on his way home and there is no one with him until we catch up.”

The gravity of what he told me nearly dropped me to my knees, but I couldn’t allow that.  “I’ve been here for hours,” I said as calmly as I could manage, forbidding the shock to sink to deeply into my thoughts, “Emily should come with us in case they follow my scent here.”

Understanding flashed quickly in Jacob’s eyes.  “She’s right.  Emily, get in the car,” Jacob said bluntly and taking advantage of the fact that I had loosened my grip on the doorway, continued his path with me in tow.

A light rain had begun falling while I was with Emily.  Moistened gravel flew as Jacob floored the gas pedal and sped toward the main road.

“What happened?” asked Emily from the back seat.

I glanced back in her direction.  Her face was an almost frightening mask of forced calmness, but I caught the reflective glint of the tears on her cheeks.  I could relate to how hard it was to keep the “game face” on when someone was watching, then how quickly the tears could flow when you thought no one would see.

“I’m sure Sam has told you that the female is a real crafty wench.  Sam nearly had her – his teeth were inches from her shoulder and she dodged at the last minute.”  Jacob slammed his palm on the steering wheel in frustration with such force that it bent.

I grabbed his hand with both of mine and massaged.  I lifted it to my lips to gently kiss the tension away.  We rode in silence.  I knew that Jacob’s mind was with his pack.  I wanted to ask if he was hoping that they dispatched her while he was away, or if he was hoping they would wait and let him in on the action.  After a time, I felt his fingers relax and caress my cheek.  No matter where his mind wanders, I whole-heartedly believe that his heart is always with me.

“There he is,” Jacob said as we spotted the cruiser in front of us about 100 yards.  He sped up to tail him a little closer.

“Um, guys,” Emily spoke from her seat, “what are we going to tell Charlie about why I’m along?”

I was completely tapped out of adult answers.  I debated for a moment what the repercussions would be if I just told him the truth.  Fortunately, I stopped myself before I said it out loud.  “Got anything, Jacob?” I finally managed to ask.  The police cruiser was now in plain sight; I could see Charlie’s outline in the driver’s seat.  I felt his hand tense again so I re-started my ministrations.

“Wasn’t Sam supposed to help his cousin…”

“Charlie!”  My scream bounced off the windows, reverberating through the car.

We watched the wild redhead jump out of the trees onto the road in front of us and push the cruiser off the opposite side of the road lifting the tires completely off of the pavement.  Victoria crouched in the middle of our lane holding her hands out in front of her awaiting the oncoming rabbit.  The sneer on her face was confidant.

Emily and my screams blended together, creating a constant racket.  Jacob slammed on the breaks and the car fishtailed out of control.  Victoria took a step to the side.  I originally thought she intended to displace Jacob’s car as she had Charlie’s cruiser.  With her new position, it appeared as though she meant to yank me out as the car skidded past her.  I was fairly certain that I would not survive the extraction, let alone anything she had planned once she had me removed from the vehicle.  The car hit a wet stretch of pavement and made a sudden lurch to the left sending it off the road and into the brush.

“I love you Bella,” Jacob declared as he wrenched his door open, knocking down a sapling in the process.  Two steps into his sprint toward the evil vampire, he phased into his full impressive wolf form.

“I love you,” I shouted after him, praying that it was not the last time either one of us would hear it said.

I sat frozen in my seat watching Jacob and Victoria slowly pace as they sized each other up, Jacob carefully keeping himself between Victoria and me.  My heart sank as, moments later, the situation deteriorated.  A pale blur appeared from the trees on the north side of the road; Victoria’s accomplice had rejoined her.  He was a blond man who was in his mid-twenties when he had been turned.  He looked to be less than six feet tall and on the stocky side.  He had nothing on the girth of Emmet, but he was wider than Edward.  They positioned themselves about ten feet apart.  They sauntered toward my Jacob with evil smiles on their faces.  The wolf in front of me bared his teeth and growled, splitting his gaze evenly between his two pursuers.

I watched in horror as the two inched closer.  He was confident in his abilities, downright cocky at times, but he was now outnumbered.  My only consolation was that if they overpowered him, I wouldn’t have long to suffer from my broken heart.  There would be nothing left to stop Victoria from carrying out whatever tortures she had for me.

“Emily, go,” I stated coolly.  “If they get through Jacob, you won’t want to be anywhere near me.”

“Bella,” Emily said meekly.

“We can’t fight them.”

“I know,” she agreed.  “Let’s get out of here.”

“We can’t outrun them either.  Maybe they’ll be satisfied with…”

Five more blurs came into view.  Jacob and his brothers now formed a circle around the two vampires.  I allowed my heart a sigh of relief.  I wouldn’t do a victory dance until the fight was over, but I knew the odds were now more in favor of the wolves.

“Now, Bella,” Emily said firmly.  “Let’s get Charlie and get out of here.”

“Charlie,” I gasped and pulled my eyes away from the scene on the road a few yards away.

Emily had already scurried past the up-rooted tree outside of the car.  I quickly joined her and we raced toward the police cruiser not daring to look back at the road.

Thankfully, being an officer of the law, made Charlie very conscious of all safety regulations.  He was wearing his seatbelt.  The airbag had deployed from the steering wheel, but the sudden stop of the sideways motion that Victoria had created had caused his head to star the side window.  “Bella,” he groaned as he began to come around when Emily and I started moving him.

“Dad,” I choked out, “I’m here Dad.  Let’s get you out of this car.”  I had read in a magazine that despite what you saw in movies, it was very unlikely that a car would catch on fire after an accident.  But I didn’t feel like taking any chances.

“Emily?”  Through bleary eyes he looked toward her as the two of us began to remove him from the driver’s seat.  The car was tilted at an awkward angle.  The driver’s side had settled against a ditch which meant we would have to get him out the far door.  Emily had climbed into the backseat to help him along.  I was in the passenger seat pulling his arm around my shoulders.  We inched him slowly across the seat.  He tugged and pulled until finally we were standing on the uneven ground with Charlie between us.

“Emily, what are you doing here?” he asked more plainly; he was becoming more lucid.

“Let’s get you over there, beyond those trees,” I said firmly, giving Emily a pleading glance then motioning back toward the stand-off still taking place on the road.  On the plus side, the vampires seemed to have their full concentration on the pack, so they were not paying any noticeable attention to me.

“Yes, Chief Swan.  I think we need to move away from the cruiser.  I’m pretty sure I smelled gasoline when we were getting you out.”

Charlie was now attempting to move although leaning heavily on Emily and me and wincing with each step on his right leg.  Fortunately, he was not a large man.

We settled under a large evergreen tree that shielded us from the majority of the rain that continued to fall.  He shivered in the cold night air and with every shudder, he whimpered.   He was trying to be stoic, but I could tell he was in a lot of pain.  The three of us huddled together to conserve heat.  We listened to the threatening growls of the wolves not far away.  I was thankful that I had put Jacob’s dress shirt on before the accident, and I was equally as thankful that Charlie hadn’t noticed that I was wearing it.  The blow to his head must have really messed with his perception.  I silently hoped we could get him help soon.  I didn’t know anything about how to take care of someone with a head injury.

“Bells,” Charlie choked out between clenched teeth, “did you try the radio before we headed over here?  I don’t remember hearing you.”

“Ya dad,” I lied, “it wasn’t working.”  All of this deceit was becoming exhausting.  It made me think of Jacob and his pack.  They had to be so careful every day not to let anyone know what they were really doing when they would phase into a wolf to run patrols through the woods.  It must get taxing.

“I think there are a couple of blankets in the trunk.  Could you get ‘em while we’re waiting for help to come?”  He looked half-heartedly between Emily and me.  “Jacob went for help, then?”

“Yes dad.”  This time it wasn’t totally a lie.  Jacob was trying to help us more than Charlie would ever know.  “Emily, stay with him, okay?  I’ll get the blankets.”

“Be careful, Bella,” Emily said cautiously.

I made my way back to the cruiser, stopping at the edge of the trees to see how the fight was progressing.  The wolves seemed to be circling the vampires, backing them toward each other.  As if they had been waiting all of this time for their audience to return, the action started.  Victoria lunged toward a wolf to her left, I believe it was Sam.  Through the misty rain and moon light, it was really hard to tell.  If it was Sam, I couldn’t help but think that Victoria had chosen poorly.  Sam was one of the better fighters.  Victoria had been eluding the pack for months, and any of them that had fought her so far touted her craftiness.  The choice did not seem like her.  I thought maybe she was trying to shield her accomplice who didn’t appear to be as able to defend himself.  The move had positioned her in somewhat of a protective stance in front of him.

What I saw next actually turned my stomach.  Victoria had not chosen Sam in an attempt to protect her partner; she had chosen Sam to sacrifice him.  Her movement wasn’t truly a lunge but the prelude to a leap.  She launched herself over Sam once he had set himself toward her, effectively assuring that Sam’s teeth would sink directly into the slower vampire.  In the next instant, the craftiness that the wolves had spoken of came into full view.  Not only had she pitted Sam onto her partner, the next closest wolf was Jacob.  Victoria took off into the woods.  Jared leaped at her, knocking her off course momentarily, but she quickly regained her equilibrium and, in a red streak, disappeared into the night with the rest of the pack in hot pursuit.  But the fiercest two werewolves of the Quilute pack remained on the pavement ripping the blond to pieces.

I remembered something Edward had told me once, “I’m not always the worst thing out there,” he had said.  It was in the early days of our relationship when he was admitting how much he craved my blood.  At this moment, I truly believed I had just bared witness to the worst.  Not only was she willing to murder me to exact her revenge for her slain lover, she was willing to forfeit one of her own kind to accomplish her goal.  If she hadn’t been after me, I may have actually admired her tenacity.

Something else Edward had told me popped into my head.  To destroy a vampire one had to rip them apart and burn the pieces.  “Burn the pieces,” I said out loud.  I looked up at the gently falling rain and then over at the police cruiser.  I knew what I had to do.  Sam or Jacob would have to phase to human form and somehow build a fire which would take precious time away that they could be pursuing Victoria.

I ran to the trunk and grabbed the blankets.  I frantically searched for something combustible.  It didn’t take me long, signal flares.  I had seen Charlie light them in the past.

I circled the car, sniffing for the gasoline Emily had spoken of.  I realized that she may have said it simply to get Charlie to leave the cruiser willingly which I hoped was not the case.  I spotted a puddle under the rear portion of the car and in the moonlight I thought I could see the tell-tale rainbow formation of gasoline floating on the surface.

I didn’t take time to think about what I was doing, so I didn’t have time to tell myself how wrong what I was doing actually was.  I pulled the top off the flare and tossed it under the car then turned to sprint toward the wolves.

I guess I could consider myself lucky that I was successfully able to start the fire so quickly, but it was hard to count it as luck when I was knocked to the pavement by the blast behind me.  I chanced a look at my dress as I tried to scramble back to my feet.   It was now covered with mud and several snags from various stones and branches that I had encountered.  The modest slit on the left side that had reached just above my knee at the beginning of the evening, now extended to just below my panties.  I sincerely hoped that Jessica would never see the dress again under any circumstances; she may be reluctant to show any kindness to me in the future.

I sprinted into the fray just as the two wolves had the vampire completely dismembered.  “Go after her,” I yelled to them, “I’ll burn the pieces.”

Sam disappeared in a blur in the direction that the rest the pack had taken.  Jacob’s large brown eyes searched me.  I could see the internal war that was waging in his head.

“Go after her,” I assured him.  “I’ll be okay.”  I willed myself not to think about what I was truly doing.  I bent down and picked up the lower portion of the former vampire’s leg.  I ran as close to the fire as I could stand and hurled it into the flames then returned for another piece.

“I can do this Jake.  Just get her.”

And with that, he must have been convinced.  I watched him sprint away.  I felt utterly alone as I took a moment to survey the damage in the flickering fire light.  I shook myself out of my reverie.  I picked up piece after piece, wearing a path with my footsteps back and forth to the fire.

I wasn’t certain how thorough I needed to be, so after all of the obvious chunks were incinerated, I continued.  At this point, I figured the dress couldn’t get any worse, so I crawled on my hands and knees looking for bits of clothing or tissue.  I found one clump of matted fire-engine red hair, but no other evidence of damage to Victoria.

“How is he?” I asked as Emily and I tucked a blanket around Charlie.  He appeared to be unconscious again.

“I really think he needs help,” Emily stated with concern in her voice.  “He was talking and then all of a sudden he just laid his head back.  He mumbled something about having fish for supper.”

I scooted as close to him as I could get under the boughs of the tree.  I threw my arms around him, ignoring the perimeter of space we usually gave each other.  “Oh please, hang on Charlie, hang on Charlie, hang on Charlie.”

As I rocked back and forth, the events of the evening began crashing into me.  The tears started to flow and I couldn’t make them stop.  “Hang on, Charlie…” I continued to mutter.  I knew that Jacob was out doing what he needed to do, but I was beginning to regret sending him away.  I had no idea how I could get help for Charlie now.

“Emily,” I asked through my sobs, “how far do you suppose it is to town?”  I could kick myself for not trying the radio before I went for the flare.  I knew that time was of the essence for getting the fire started, but I couldn’t help but think that I hadn’t taken the big picture into consideration.  I hadn’t even stopped to regard how I would help Charlie.  Just when I thought I had the knack for adult thinking, I did something like this and realized that I was still eighteen.

I don’t know what I would have said to the officer at the station on the radio anyway.  “Hey Bart, could you send help.  Charlie is hurt.  Just look for the flames shooting into the sky, because I’m about to set fire to the cruiser.  Oh, and be careful, there is a bloodthirsty leech on a warpath here!”

“I imagine it’s about 5 or 6 miles.”

“Do you think anyone will see the fire?”  I was grasping at a straw.  My next option would be to try and make it to town to send someone which is what I knew that I would need to do.  I was gathering my strength.

“I don’t know,” she whispered.  “I’m going to go and try the rabbit.  It’s banged up, but it may start.”

That thought had never even occurred to me.  It was so obvious.  “Thank you,” I managed to croak out.

Emily scooted toward the edge of the shelter of the tree.  She turned back to me and despite the darkness, the fear showed clearly in her eyes.  “Do you think they are gone?”

“I know one of them is,” I said dryly.

“I don’t suppose you’ll tell me it’s the red-head?”

“I wish.”  I realized as soon as I said it, that I had never wished for someone’s demise before.  I knew that there should be a considerable portion of my psyche that should feel guilty about that, but I couldn’t find it.  Maybe that portion would surface at some point in the future, but it was dormant right now.

I listened beyond the steady drum and drip of the rain around me.  I didn’t hear any howling.  I was at least relatively certain that Emily would be safe.  If the wolves were far enough away that we couldn’t hear them anymore, Victoria probably was too.

Then another sound grabbed my attention. At first I thought that my ears were deceiving me.  I couldn’t be hearing what I was hearing.

I took a deep breath, willing myself to be mature even though that was the last thing I wanted to be.  I wanted to grab hold of Jacob and run away with him, far away from Victoria and all of the havoc that she wreaked.  But I knew that Jacob had to go after her.  If he didn’t, he would never forgive himself – or me for that matter.  I could be a grown up.  How had Mike put it, “If she’s tearing into me, she’s leaving someone else alone.”  He was talking about a far less ferocious female, but the concept was the same.  I was quite certain that I had better protectors than nearly anyone else Victoria would be attacking.  “What’s the plan?” I asked, keeping my voice even and looking directly into Jacob’s eyes.  I shifted the gaze to Embry to acknowledge to the two of them that I was serious.

“Most of the guys took off up the river after her,” Jacob said, looking over my head.  “Paul stayed home to keep watch over the reservation.”  He still wouldn’t meet my eyes.  I could tell he was holding back.

“And?” I prompted.

There was a pregnant pause.  Neither wolf wanted me to hear what was next.  I looked back and forth between them.  Embry looked only at the ground, but finally, my Jacob looked at me.  “She has a male with her, one that the pack doesn’t recognize.”

I took a step forward and snaked my arms around him.  He kissed the top of my head and pulled me close.

“Bella,” he said firmly.  “I want you to go back to La Push.  Charlie is there watching the game with Billy.  Embry and Paul will stay close by in wolf form, so we can keep in contact.”

“What are we going to tell Charlie?” I asked as calmly as I could.

Jacob and Embry stared at me like I had just sprouted antennae.

“What? I asked, a little put out.  “Don’t you think he’ll wonder why I show up on the reservation this early and just decide to sit down and watch the game with him?”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Jacob quietly admitted.

I was better at this maturity thing than I gave myself credit for.  I recalled the night of my first encounter with Victoria and her coven.  I had been the one to think of a somewhat rational plan to keep Charlie in the dark about what was actually happening.  I concentrated hard and willed myself to do it again.  Moments later, I had it.  “Is Emily home?  I can hang out with her.  That way Charlie won’t have to know anything.”  Leah would have been my first choice, but she and her mother had gone to visit Harry’s sister for the weekend.

“I’ll make sure to get word to Billy to keep Charlie there,” Embry offered.

“Do you want to make up a quick story to tell any of your friends?” Jacob asked looking at me seriously.  “You know, to keep them from assuming where you might have taken off to.”

I thought about that for a moment.  What could I really tell Angela?  “Hey, I gotta go, there’s a crazed vampire headed for me.”  No, I wouldn’t do that.  I could tell them there was a family emergency, but then a realization sunk in.  My true friends would accept an explanation later, and they would believe me.  People like Lauren may think that I took off early to do less than noble things with Jacob and/or his friend, but people like Lauren would probably think that no matter what I said was going on.  I decided that I really didn’t care what Lauren or her type thought.  I knew why I was leaving.  In a month I would graduate and possibly never see some of these people again.  What they thought of my prom night activities wouldn’t matter to me then, so I wasn’t going to let it matter to me now.

“I’ll make something up to tell Angela and Mike tomorrow.  I don’t care what conclusions the rest of them come to,” I said confidently, and I marched toward the door.

It was a quiet ride inside the rabbit as we sped toward LaPush.  Embry had opted to run back so he could check in with the rest of the pack while en route.  I laid my head against Jacob’s warm shoulder and traced tiny circles on his arm with my fingertips.

Embry opened my door for me when we pulled into the drive in front of Sam and Emily’s house.  “I already let Emily know you were coming.  She’s throwing a snack together.”

“She didn’t hav…”

“Of course she didn’t,” Embry cut in, “but that’s Emily.”

“Besides,” Jacob added in his cocky, self-assured voice, “we’ll all be hungry when we finish the bloodsuckers off.”  He flipped the back of my hair teasingly.

“Be careful,” I stated firmly, not buying into the playful attitude Jacob was trying to portray.  I knew that it was his way of reassuring me, and I suspected it was a sort of self pep talk too.  No, I didn’t buy into it, but that did not mean I didn’t appreciate it.  “I love you.”  I wrapped my arms around his neck and relished the feel of him holding me tight.

“I’ll be back sooner than you can even miss me,” he assured me, brushing a kiss across my lips.

“Too late!” I said as playfully as I could manage.

I watched as Jacob removed his shirt and tie and placed it neatly in the passenger seat of the rabbit.  He then made quite the display of shaking his rear-end toward me as he stepped out of the dress pants.  I had to chuckle, despite the lump swelling so large in my throat it was threatening to inhibit respiration.  I blew him a kiss as he disappeared into the trees.

“Come on in Bella,” Emily called to me when I finally tapped on the door.  I stayed on the porch long enough to get my breathing under control; after all, Emily was living this too.  The crazed vampire was here as a vendetta against me, but I tried to see it from the pack’s point of view.  I brought her close enough for them to take out.  I just prayed they would take her and her new friend out without any harm befalling themselves.

“Wow!” Emily gawked.  “You look absolutely gorgeous.”

“Thank you so much for taking it in for me,” I replied taking a step toward the porch light so she could see the full effect of what she had helped to create.

“Why don’t you come in the kitchen and tell me all about the dance.”  She linked her arm around my elbow and guided me in the direction she wanted.  “Then I can tell you about the disaster that was my senior prom.”

Emily placed some of her wonderful homemade corn chips on the table and three different kinds of dips.  “What would you like to drink?” she asked in the overly cheerful voice that I knew was trying to mask the fear she was feeling.

“Rootbeer sounds really good if you have one,” I blurted out.  “I’ve been craving one of those for days.”

“It just so happens that I do have some,” she said pulling two from the fridge.

I found myself relaxing as I regaled the night’s earlier events which truly surprised me.  We munched on chips and slurped our sweet drinks and talked.  Emily’s own prom fiasco involved red punch spilled down the front of her pale yellow dress, a broken toe from a rambunctious round of fast dancing, and a date that left with her best friend’s date.

“The last I heard, he’s a dancer in Vegas ,” she said shrugging her shoulders, “goes by the name Rhonda.”

I tried to keep my mature face on.  It worked until I caught the grin on Emily’s face.  I cracked up.  And once I started it, we both ended up with a full round of the giggles.  I was very thankful that I had not just taken a drink.  I did not know from experience, but I did not imagine rootbeer snorted into the nasal cavity would feel too pleasant.

“He was a good dancer,” she commented when she could get her breath which only started another onslaught of sniggering.

“Were you upset?” I asked on a more serious note.

“Yes,” she nodded.  “At the time, I shed a lot of tears over Robert.  I was so certain that he and I would be together forever.  He wrote me a letter a couple of months after graduation and apologized the best he could.”  She stared for a moment at the bubbles rising up in her soda.  “How can you really apologize for something like that.  He said he did love me, but…”

“But …”  We both took a slow swig of soda.  I realized that no matter how someone tried, there really was no graceful way to finish that sentence.

Emily broke the silence, “Leah always said that he was a little different.”

“Leah didn’t like him?”

“She liked him, everyone liked him.  She just always sensed there was something odd about him,” she said.  “I cried on her shoulder half the night.  She drove up to see me right away.”  Emily shook her head at the memory.  I had a feeling it was no longer Robert she was thinking about missing.

Emily smiled.  “I apologized for her having to listen to me every time I reached for another tissue.  She just kept the Kleenex box in her hand and assured me that it made up for all the times she had come to me when she and Sam got into a fight.”

Her last comment caught my attention.  “How often did she require your services for that?”

“Leah and Sam had more than their fair share of disagreements.”  She paused, obviously mulling over how to word her next phrase.  “They are both wonderful people, but together, it always seemed like they brought out the worst in each other.  Does that make any sense?”

“Not really,” I admitted.

“Well,” she let out a long sigh, “how can I explain?”  She swirled a crisp chip in some creamy dip then chewed it slowly.  “Okay, you know how Leah can be very dry.  She doesn’t mince words.  She just says what she needs to say and leaves it at that.  Well, Sam would bait her.  If someone would ask her a question, and he didn’t think she had answered well enough.  He would start throwing questions at her to clarify, and he didn’t always do it politely.  And Sam tends to be kind of bossy.  Leah would stand back and let him take control of a situation, even if it was deciding where to go for dinner.   And then once he did take charge, she would say things like ‘Oh, what would we do without Sam to lead us!’ or ‘Let’s all bow down to King Sam.’”

“I see what you mean about their personalities, but I never saw them together, so it’s hard for me to picture them acting like that.”

“Exactly!” she replied.  “When they were together, it’s like they were the worst forms of themselves.  I mean, we all have good days and bad days; good moods and bad moods.  But this was almost constantly.”

“Did they realize it?”  I couldn’t help but think that being in a relationship like Emily described would be exhausting.  It would be a constant struggle.

“I think Leah did, but she loved him.  They could be very sweet to each other at times, and she told me that their make-up sex was always extraordinary.  As often as they fought, that was probably the only kind they ever had.”

My entire face turned red at the mention of that aspect of their relationship.

“Sorry,” Emily said after noticing my response.  “You and Jacob have never…”

I shook my head vehemently and stuffed a large chip and wad of dip in my mouth.

Emily grabbed my hand.  “Bella, I can see you are not comfortable talking about this, but if you ever do need to talk to anyone about it, feel free to come and see me.  If you need someone to ask about birth control or just in general, don’t hesitate.”

I think the red color extended all the way down to my navel, but as embarrassing as it was, I was thankful for her offer.  I had always been close to Renee, but I didn’t think I would ask her anything like this.  “Thank you,” I mumbled.  I attempted a smile, but I didn’t figure it was very convincing.

We sat in silence for a few minutes.  I began to play over in my mind the conversation Jacob and I had shared on the dance floor.  “Emily,” I blurted out, “were you attracted to Sam while he was still with Leah?”  As soon as I had said it, I regretted it.  Emily had just offered to be a surrogate mother for me, so to speak, and here I was asking a very inappropriate question.  I blushed again almost as much as before.  “I shouldn’t have said that.  You don’t have to answer that if you don’t want.”

“No, it’s alright,” she assured me.  “I would be lying if I told you no.  But, I can say that I never did anything about it until…”

“You imprinted,” I finished for her.

“I see Jacob told you that part.”

I nodded.

“Leah and I were always close.  We grew up playing with dolls together and getting muddy by the creek near my parent’s house.  As we got older, we started to branch out and have our own lives, but we could still come together and be like old times.  She started dating Sam when we were juniors in high school.  I didn’t actually meet him until her graduation.  He and I sat and talked for over an hour about American History, of all things.”  Emily chuckled and pushed a strand of hair back away from her face.  “The evening ended when Sam and Leah got into a huge fight over, I can’t even remember what.  I went home and cried.”

“Why?”  I thought I probably knew the answer.

“I couldn’t believe this guy that I had hit it off with so easily was the same one that Leah had been talking about for a year and a half.  I vacillated between being ashamed of myself for even thinking about my cousin’s boyfriend in that way and being angry with Leah for fighting with him so much.  I couldn’t help but feel like I would be better for him.”

“It sounds like you are,” I had to admit.  “You know the more I think about it, every time I have heard Leah tell me something about Sam, it always starts with ‘this one time we had a huge fight about…’  I guess I didn’t really consider how odd that was until now.”  I wondered what Leah thought about when she saw other couples who weren’t always at each other’s throats, if she thought it was strange.  “Do you think she and Sam would have stayed together if you two hadn’t imprinted?”

“We’ll never know.”  She shrugged her shoulders, but then continued.  “I think they would have stayed together just because they are both very loyal people.  They would have probably gotten married eventually, but I don’t know how happy they would have been or how long it would have lasted.  But then again, do any of us really know that?”

“I suppose not.”

Emily had definitely given me a lot to ponder when I had some free time.  A story that Leah had told me suddenly popped into my head.  It was about a long weekend that she and Emily’s families had taken to a family reunion at a state park.  I recalled that although the tale itself was full of the fun they had had while there, I couldn’t help but notice the tone of underlying sadness to Leah’s voice as she told it.  I debated about saying what was at the back of my mind, but ultimately decided to go ahead.  “If it makes you feel any better, I think Leah misses you too.”

“Sometimes I wish that Sam had been someone else, anyone other than Leah’s boyfriend.”  Guilt clouded her attractive features, making the scar more noticeable.  “But, then he wouldn’t be my Sam, I suppose,” she said, the sweet smile creeping back to the forefront as it always did when she thought of her love.

“What was it like when you imprinted?” I asked.

The sweet smile was replaced with a full face grin.  “I can’t even describe what I felt like at that moment.  It was like there was not room in my head for thoughts of anyone but him.  We couldn’t take our eyes off of each other.  Before we even realized what we were doing, we were kissing.”  Emily blushed a little at the memory, but she had nothing on me.  “Thankfully, Leah had run to the store to grab a loaf of bread.  I went for a walk on the beach while Sam broke up with her.  He came and found me a couple of hours later, and we’ve pretty much been inseparable since, unless he’s working or running with the pack.”

“I’m sorry I am putting him in danger like this,” I said, my eyes stinging.  The rush of fear and anxiety hit me like a truck.  I knew that all of them were in danger, not just my Jacob, but it was my Jacob that I was worried about the most.  Seeing Emily sitting here in front of me longing to have her Sam back in the kitchen with her made me feel guilty for being so selfish.  But, I suppose, Emily probably felt the same way as me.

“Bella, this is not your fault,” she stated firmly, grabbing my hand again.  “Sam has accepted what he is and why.  Just as I am sure Jacob has.  They only want to protect those that they love from the vampires.”

“I just worry about them so much,” I said in a whisper.

Emily scooted her chair up next to mine and draped her arm across my shoulders.  “Me too.”

The tension pressing on my mind was becoming nearly unbearable, it must have been doing the same to Emily because soon she leaped to her feet.

“Let’s get this sauce simmering for some enchiladas.  I want them to have a good meal when they can,” she said moving to the stove and turning the burner back on.  “I figured this was something I could have ready and they could throw them together when they get a chance to eat.  Could you dice those tomatoes in my crisper drawer for me Bella?”

I did as she requested, finding that the task did succeed in distracting my mind somewhat.  I read about a study that was done onetime on whether misery really does love company.  It was found that it does, but in general, the miserable person prefers the company of someone in a similar situation.  So basically, misery loves miserable company, so to speak.  I had never really understood those findings until tonight.

“Bella,” Angela cooed as I approached the table where she and Ben were perched at the prom, “you look gorgeous!”

“So do you.  That color looks great on you.”  I was proud of myself for the amount of girl talk that had escaped my lips.  It had never been my forte, compliments being the absolute worst.  Yet, here I was, in a gown at my senior prom giving and receiving compliments freely, and thoroughly enjoying myself, surprisingly enough.

Jacob looked positively handsome.  I noticed several female heads snap in his direction when we walked in.  I suppose I should be jealous, but I just couldn’t bring myself to be angry with them.  My jaw had dropped at the sight of him in his dark gray pants, pale pink dress shirt and tie.  And furthermore, from the way that his hand never left the small of my back, I knew that I didn’t have anything to worry about.

Jacob and I joined them and the four of us watched the throng of people gyrating to the music pumping through the sound system.  Jacob had convinced me to dance for one fast song and then, thankfully, he was content to mingle.  I figured talking was better for my health than dancing in my dress shoes; that is, as long as I was not talking to Lauren.

“Where did you two go for dinner?” Ben asked Jacob.

Jacob’s mouth twitched a little at the edge.  “We went to that new Mexican place in Port Angeles,” he said, rubbing his hand across my back.

I watched as the two boys, or young men, whatever one chose to call them, discussed the meals they had consumed prior to arriving at the dance.  I had told Jacob it was not necessary for us to go anywhere for supper, but he had insisted that we get the full prom experience.  At the back of my mind, I had wondered if he was trying to one-up Edward.  For obvious reasons, a meal had not precluded my previous year’s prom.  That may have been a part of it, but now, listening to them talk, I realized what was probably the bigger motive.  Jacob didn’t really know any of the guys that he would be hanging out with tonight.  He was not a shy boy and generally didn’t have trouble talking to anyone, but a good full meal would give him an easy conversation piece.  He and Ben were in guy heaven right now.

A ballad came on and couples from all around the room meandered to the dance floor.  I reached up and placed my hands on Jacob’s massive shoulders, and he pulled me close to him.

“So, are you glad we came?” he asked with a smirk.

“Yes,” I said matter-of-factly.  “I am really enjoying myself.”  I let out a contented sigh.  “I also have the added entertainment of watching several girls drool over you.”

“Who?” Jacob quickly jerked his head from side to side looking around the room.  “Are they pretty?”

I stomped on his foot.  I had actually stepped on his feet three times already, which he had politely ignored, but this time, I did it with force.

“I was just curious,” he joked pulling me closer.  “I’ve already got the prettiest girl who for some reason is madly in love with me.  I just want you to realize that what a catch you have in me, so you don’t feel the need to go dance with some other guy.”

I tilted my head back to look up at him and shook my head.  “Nice cover there,” I said, rolling my eyes.  We held each other close, enjoying the sensation.  “Hey, I have a question for you,” I blurted out.

“Shoot,” he said, leaning in to kiss my forehead.

“What is the deal with Sam and Emily?”  It had been in the back of my mind ever since Harry died.  “You told me it was a wolf thing.  What wolf thing?”

Jacob took in a deep breath.  “There is a rare process called imprinting,” he began.  “It’s kind of like a really potent love at first sight.”  His hand swept across my back and pulled me closer to him, as if needing to feel me near.  “It happens the first time a wolf sees the girl.  It’s like a force that just pulls them together.”

“Does the girl get a choice?” I asked, a little appalled at how barbaric the whole thing sounded.

“I don’t know if you really call it a choice,” Jacob said shifting his left hand to caress the exposed skin of my shoulder.  “An imprint is mutual, it’s felt by both of them.”

“But weren’t Emily and Leah friends?” I asked still trying to get a grasp on the idea.  “Sam must have seen her before.”

“He had seen her when he was still just a man,” Jacob clarified.  “The first time he saw her after he was officially a werewolf is when the imprint happened.”

We danced in silence for a few moments, swaying in sync, as the information Jacob had given me sank in.  One song ended and the next began before I found the nerve to speak again.  “How often does it happen?”

“Of our group, only Sam and Jared.”

“So it is possible,” I almost couldn’t bring myself to complete my sentence, “for you to…”

“Imprint with someone else?” Jacob finished my statement in question form.  “Yes.”  The single word sounded as though it caused him pain to say.

I laid my head against his chest and ran my fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck.  I took a deep breath and looked up into his eyes.  “Jacob,” I began, “if there is one thing that I have learned in the last year it’s that if something is meant to be, it will find a way to be.  I love you.  You love me, and that is all we have to hold on to right now.”  I ran my hand across cheek, and brushed his full lips with my thumb.

“I just don’t think I could live with myself if I did that to you,” he said, his voice cracking with sorrow.  “It eats Sam alive at times, what he did to Leah.”

I snuggled back into Jacob’s massive chest and basked in his warmth.  He ran his fingers softly over my shoulder.  The song shifted again, and we continued.  After a few bars of the new song, I heard Jacob chuckle.

“What?” I asked, looking up at the grin that had found its way onto Jacob’s face.

“Do you recognize the song?” he asked leaning down to kiss my forehead.

“Should I?”

“Well, I have more reason to remember this particular song than you.  It’s the only one I was able to dance to at your last prom.”

I stood stock still for a moment, listening carefully to the ballad seeping from the speakers.  I too smiled as recognition hit.  “This is the song we danced to.”

“You catch on quick!” Jacob teased.  “I don’t know what I enjoyed more; dancing close to you or the look on Edward’s face.”  A rueful look gleamed in his eyes from the memory, but it wasn’t there for long.

“May I cut in?” Mike Newton asked, extending his hand in anticipation of mine.

The look on Jacob’s face was absolutely priceless.  “Of course,” he finally managed to choke out, stepping back so I could move to dance with Mike.  “It must be something about this song.”

“No,” Mike said with a grin.  “Your friend over there said he needed to speak with you.”  He nodded toward the entrance to the gym where Embry stood with his arms crossed over his broad chest.  “I told him I would get you.  I figured delivering the message bought me at least one dance,” he said doing his best to torment Jacob.

“Go see what Embry wants,” I told Jacob.  I took Mike’s right hand in my left and placed my right hand on his shoulder being sure to keep at least a foot and a half in between us.  “Mike was one of my first friend’s in Forks.  I think I owe him a dance.”

I laughed in spite of myself, knowing that Mike was enjoying the look on Jacob’s face just as much as Jacob had enjoyed Edward’s last year.

“Are you having a good time?” Mike asked, trying to cover the fact of that enjoyment.

“Yes I am,” I told him honestly.  “I’m glad Lauren suggested I come.”

We laughed simultaneously at the reason for my presence here tonight.

“You sure do know how to irritate her,” Mike mused.

“You have a lot of room to talk,” I said, punching him in the shoulder.

“Yeah, but I do that on purpose,” he readily admitted.  “You seem to have an inborn gift of irritating Lauren.  It just comes naturally.”

“I wish I knew what I ever did to her to make her hate me.”  I shook my head trying to figure it out.

“Oh, I don’t think you did anything,” he said still wearing a playful smile.  “Lauren is an equal opportunity bitch.  You don’t have to earn her wrath; she gives it freely.”

There was a part of me that felt some relief at Mike’s nonchalant admission of her hostility toward me.  I had always tried to tell myself that her anger was her problem, but there was a part of me that couldn’t help but wonder what I had done wrong.  Mike’s attitude was validation that Lauren was just plain mean.

He shrugged his shoulders.  “When she tears into me, I just remind myself that she’s leaving someone else alone.”

“That’s a healthy attitude.”  I suddenly felt very thankful that Mike had chosen to take a liking to me.  And more importantly, that he chose to continue his gallantry even when I did not return his attentions.  “Thank you for being such a good friend, Mike.”

“You’re easy to be friends with, Bella” he said, and I appreciated him all the more.

A fast hip-hop style song blared throughout the gym signaling the end of the slow dancing.  “Thanks for the dance,” I said.

I made my way to the doorway where Jacob and Embry were still deep in conversation.  The closer I got to them the more I knew that my carefree prom night was over.  I mentally kicked myself for not figuring this out immediately.  Why else would Embry show up and need to speak with Jacob.  I squared my shoulders and braced myself for the news.

They both stopped talking when I reached Jacob’s side.  He put his arm around my waist and said the words I dreaded hearing.  “She’s back.”

Leah’s uncle’s building was absolutely huge.  Charlie estimated that there was probably room for three or four apartments, but the place was definitely a mess.  Jacob and Charlie took measurements in several of the rooms.  Sue scribbled down the numbers they would spout off on the rough diagrams she had drawn while Leah and I accessed the old cupboards in the space that would be our kitchen.  I thought they looked like they would make excellent kindling for the next First Beach bonfire, but Leah seemed to think that, with a little sanding and a fresh coat of stain, they would be gorgeous.

We had eaten lunch at a cozy little deli a few doors down from the bookstore.  I was glad Charlie was along because he took the upper hand with the discussion of rent, not that he got any further than I would have.  Leah’s uncle Jeffery stood his ground in the insistence that he would not accept payment.  He did say that he would like us to clean out the entire area above the bookstore eventually.  Not just the space we needed for our apartment.  He then could renovate as he was able.

We even were able to make a stop at a mall to shop for shoes for the prom now one week away.  I let my mind wander to Jacob and I felt a smile spread across my face.  He hadn’t hardly said two words on the trip back home.  As a matter of fact, he hadn’t hardly spoken all day.  I thought back to when he, Sue, and Leah had picked Charlie and me up that morning.  Jacob had jumped out of the middle van seat to give me a bone crushing hug and shake hands with Charlie.  I chatted with Leah most of the way to Seattle about the classes we planned to take.  Jacob had held my hand and traced little circles on my skin, but he looked out the window for most of the drive.

When I thought back further, I couldn’t really recall Jacob saying much of anything since our dinner on Monday.  I realized that I had been so excited about my college acceptance that I hadn’t paid attention to how Jacob had responded.  He had congratulated me as I recalled, but his eyes were troubled.

I began to wonder if Jacob was jealous.  He really hadn’t ever struck me as the jealous type, except where Mike Newton was concerned, but the difference in our ages was a sore spot at times.  Maybe he thought that I would be so caught up in school and city life in Seattle that I would forget about him.  I knew that wasn’t possible, but I would have to make extra sure that he knew that too.

I glanced at my alarm clock – 4:28am.  I let out a long sigh.  I decided I may as well resign myself to the fact that I was not going to get any more sleep tonight.  I tried to think of anything that would clue me into what Jake’s problem could be.  I mentally kicked myself for being so caught up in all of my own enthusiasm that I had ignored his mood entirely.

The bookstore was at the edge of town with the outer rim of a state park reaching right up to the lot.  Jacob had taken a walk out into the woods while Leah and I went through the top floor, the rooms that would be tackled last.  I had asked him if the woods would be a good place for wolf sightings, and he had chuckled and kissed me on the forehead.  But he really hadn’t said anything about it.

Suddenly I felt my body grow cold.  I knew exactly what was going through Jacob’s mind.  I had seen the same abrupt change in behavior one other time – just before Edward had decided to leave.

The more I thought about Jacob’s actions over the past few days, the more similarities I drew.  He had a troubled look on his face nearly constantly.  He didn’t talk.  He only showed displays of affection when they would be expected.  The hug that I had enjoyed so much before we departed in the morning had been out of obligation alone.  I wrapped my arms around my torso and felt my breathing quicken.  I looked at the clock on my bedside stand, 4:42am.  Tears began to slide down my temples and onto my pillow.  I wiped them away with my sleeve only to have them replace before my arm made contact with the mattress.

I sat up and scooted so I could lean against my headboard.  I pulled my knees up to my torso and hugged them, rocking gently back and forth, trying to hold myself together.  How could I have not noticed this earlier?  A part of me, the darkest part, seemed content to tell me over and over again that I should have seen it coming as soon as it started.  My relationship with Jacob was too good to be true.  Throw a college acceptance on top of that…  I didn’t deserve that much happiness the voice of self-doubt told me louder and louder the longer I fretted.

I decided I had to go speak with Jacob.  I had to know.  I would not sit back and allow myself to be blind-sided again.  I may not be able to stop him from leaving just as I hadn’t been able to stop Edward, but I would at least confront him.  I would try to take the upper hand.

I pulled off my shirt and threw it into the hamper in the corner.  I rummaged through my drawer for a sweatshirt with only the glow of my dim reading light and then tiptoed back to the bathroom to brush my teeth and pull my hair into a ponytail. I quietly made my way to the kitchen and left a note for Charlie.  I wasn’t exactly sure why I was being so stealthy, once I started my truck in the driveway Charlie would wake right up.  I guess I just didn’t want to have to speak with him before I left.

The closer I got to La Push the more I felt the old hole in my chest start to fester at the edges.  My truck rumbled to a halt in front of the tiny house on the reservation.  I took in a deep breath and felt a single tear trickle down my cheek followed by another.  I sat in the cab for a few moments.  I almost started up the truck again and went back home.  But, I decided that I had to know.  If I could ever hope to deal with this again, I had to know the truth.  I opened the door and slid down out of the driver’s seat.

Jacob appeared in the doorway clad in his usual cut-off shorts.  More tears escaped my eyes as I took in the beauty of him, and the fact that he may not still be mine.  He yawned and did his best to smooth his mussed hair as he strode to meet me in the yard.

When Jacob got close enough to see the expression on my face, he closed the remainder of the distance between us in two strides.  He scooped me into his massive arms.  “What’s wrong, Bells?  What happened?”

I felt marginally better that he seemed to be so concerned, but it wasn’t enough to stop the flood gates of tears that ensued.  I buried my face in his hair and breathed in his woodsy scent.

“Come on, Bells,” Jacob said releasing me from his hug, but leaving his arm around my shoulders.  “Let’s go for a walk.”  I used the time we spent in transit to First Beach to get my emotions in check.  By the time we sat down on our driftwood bench, I was fairly certain I would be able to say what I needed to say.

“Bella, you’re scaring me,” Jacob said cupping my face in his hand.  “Please tell me what’s wrong.”

I took a deep breath.  “I want to ask you the same question?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, you have been acting funny ever since I got my acceptance to Bell State.  If you don’t want to have a long distance relationship, I guess I’ll understand.”  The tears started to flow again.  I stood and took a couple of steps before turning and facing him again.  “Jake,” I looked directly into his concerned eyes, “just before Edward left, he quit talking to me about things and he started acting…”  I wasn’t able to finish the rest of my string of rapidly spoken worries, because I was pulled forcefully to Jacob’s immense chest.

“Oh Bella,” Jacob said as he stroked my hair.

I pushed back away from him.  “I have to know Jake,” I said, tilting my head back to look up into his eyes.  “Are you tired of me?”

Jacob firmly gripped my shoulders.  His expression went from concern to borderline anger.  “Bella, I am not him,” he said bluntly.  “I love you more than life itself, and I have no intention of letting you go.”

I gasped at the raw honesty of his statement.

He eased his grip on my shoulders.  “Bella, have you stopped to consider how the pack is going to protect you when you are all the way in Seattle?  Have you forgotten that there is still a deranged red-headed bloodsucker hell bent on seeing you dead?”  His arms fell to his sides, and he turned his gaze out over the water.  “I don’t think I could go on living if anything happened to you.”

“Oh,” was all I could manage to say.

“I am happy for you that you were accepted to school,” he went on, “and the apartment above the bookstore is a great opportunity.  I just can’t stand the thought of you being there with no protection.”

“Jacob, I can’t not live my life because of her,” I said shaking my head.  “She may come back tomorrow.  She may not come back for five years.  She may never come back.  I can’t just sit here and expect you guys to run patrols through the woods forever. “

“I do have an idea.”

“Oh?”

“That building is huge,” Jacob began.  “Charlie even said that there is probably room for three or four decent size apartments.” Jacob took a deep breath.  I could tell he had something big to say: something that I probably was not going to like.  “I spoke with Sam about this already, and we think that Paul should move there with you.”

He said the last sentence so fast it took me a moment to separate the words in my mind.  I was quite certain he could read, by the expression on my face, the moment I figured out what he meant.  “Absolutely not!”

“Why not Bells?” he asked me with a pleading look in his eyes.  “It makes sense.  I could come up on the weekends, but Quil, Embry, and I have to finish high school.  Jared has Kim, so unless they would both go, that won’t work.  And for obvious reasons, Sam going wouldn’t be a wise choice.”

I shook my head so hard my hair almost whipped him in the face.  “I am sure Paul is not going to be thrilled about that arrangement.”

“Well,” Jacob said averting his gaze, clearly trying to avoid that part of the subject, “he’ll do what Sam tells him.”

I was getting angry now.  “Oh, that will be pleasant!”  I went back to the driftwood and plopped back into my seat.  “Jacob, I can’t have someone forced to move away from his home to keep watch over me.  If she gets me, she gets me.  There’s not…”

Jacob dropped to his knees right in front of me.  He looked more angry than I could ever remember seeing him.  “How would you like it if I adopted that attitude?”

I sucked in a deep breath.  “I can’t even think about that,” I stammered.

“I can’t either,” Jacob said bluntly.  “I want to have the chance to spend my life with you.  And do you honestly think that if Victoria kills you that she will all of a sudden turn away from her evil ways and start following a vegetarian diet like the Cullen’s?  Because I don’t think so!  If she kills you, she’ll gloat for as long as she can and then she’ll be off to another town to murder again.  She’ll kill someone else’s Bella or some other girl’s Jacob.”  He sighed and held both of my hands tightly in his.  “Bella, you know that I did not want to be a werewolf, but I am.  And the reason I am what I am is to protect people from vampires like Victoria.  You are the one that I want to protect the most, but you are not the only one.  We can stop her.”

I let out a sigh feeling thoroughly put in my place.  “I guess it’s no different than soldiers being sent away to war to protect our freedom and safety here at home,” I said putting my thoughts in order.

Jacob stood to his full height then pulled me to my feet as well.  “Exactly,” he said, seeming relieved that I was beginning to see his point.  “I am not naïve enough to think that our little pack can rid the world of nasty bloodsuckers, but we can do our best to protect this corner of Washington.  You are in this corner of Washington.  Let us do what we were made to do and protect you.”

I put my hands on my hips.  “Well, I guess I’ll have someone to snuggle up to on those cold Seattle nights!”

“Why Bella,” Jacob said with a smirk, “I am proud of you.  You’re turning out to be quite the smartass!”  He planted a playful pat on my rear to emphasize his point.

“I have an excellent mentor,” I groaned.

“Did you let Jacob see the dress?” Jessica asked me Monday at lunch.  I had chosen a hot pink floor-length gown with silver rhinestone designs across the bodice that extended down the skirt.  It had been Jessica’s oldest sister Grace’s dress for the girl’s choice dance her junior year.

“No.  I just let him know the color,” I told her.  “Thanks again Jessica, I really appreciate it.”  I was dying to ask her what made her suddenly change her attitude toward me, but I didn’t.  Maybe she had decided that Lauren was nasty enough to me, she didn’t need to add to the insult.  I just figured that I would enjoy the bit of friendliness.  If more followed, I would take it in stride.  But if she returned to the anti-Bella posture that she and Lauren had shared, I was prepared for that also.  Maybe Jessica had determined that we only had a little over a month left together, so she would try to play nice for that bit of time.

“I told you, my mom was going to get rid of them.”  Jessica shrugged.

“Did you let Jason see your dress?” I asked.  Jessica had told me while we were looking through the closet in her sister’s old bedroom that she was going with a boy from Port Angeles named Jason Metz.  They had been going out for a couple of months.

“Actually yes.  We were out together when I found it, so he saw it then,” she said.

“I’ve seen Angela’s dress,” Ben said in between bites of macaroni and cheese.  “I haven’t seen it on her, but I bet she will look radiant.”

Angela had been excused for the afternoon to attend a program at her twin brother’s pre-school.  She wasn’t even there to hear the compliment.

“Did you find anyone to do the alterations for you?” Jessica asked.

“No not yet.  Charlie told me to ask my friend Leah from La Push,” I told her.  “I’ll give her a call tonight.”  Grace must be about my height, but judging by the fit of the dress, she was ten to fifteen pounds heavier.  Or at least she had been when she wore that dress.

“Mike, what color is Amanda wearing?” I asked, making conversation.

“Color?” he asked, in typical guy fashion which set off a round of eye rolling.

People came and went at our table throughout the remainder of the lunch period, all talking about prom.  I tried to remember what lunch time conversations had been during the previous weeks, and I couldn’t really think of anything specific.  Maybe I was noticing the whole prom topic more now that I had plans to go.  I had made a point to check out many of the colorful posters announcing the dance strewn about the school corridors since Jessica had pointed out to me over the weekend that I had previously ignored them.  Some of my peers had obviously put a lot of time and effort into designing them, the least I could do was notice.

The remainder of the day passed in the usual blur.  It seemed that once I realized school was winding down, it started winding faster and faster.  I wonder if Einstein developed his theory of relativity during his last weeks of high school.

I was surprised to see a visitor waiting by my truck when I walked out of school.  “Leah, what are you doing here?” I asked as I approached.  I noticed that she wasn’t leaning against it; she was literally bouncing back and forth in front of it.

She held up a large manila envelope.  “I got in!” she screeched.

“Leah, that’s great.”  I hugged her tightly before I remembered that she wasn’t really the hugging type which was alright, because neither was I.  The excitement of the moment must have made her forget that aspect of her personality, because she hugged me back rather firmly.

“I hope you’re not mad,” she said taking a step back, “but I stopped at your house and got your mail.”

I crossed my arms and raised my left eyebrow.  “That’s a federal offence you know,” I said trying my best to keep a straight face, but failing miserably.

“I stopped at the station and asked Chief Swan if I could so…nah,” she said sticking her tongue out at me.  She thrust an envelope exactly like hers at me.

I felt my book bag slide off of my shoulder, and I did nothing to stop it.  I stared at the envelope that may or may not hold the key to my future.  I slowly took it from her hands.

“It’s thick like mine,” Leah said, “I bet you got in too.  Oh, would you open it already!”

With one swift movement, I tore the flap off.  I pulled the letter out and began to read it out loud…

Dear Ms. Swan,

We are pleased to inform you that your application was more than satisfactory and we would like to extend…

I didn’t get any further.

“You got in!” Leah screamed.  She grabbed me in a tight squeeze that made the one I had given her seem mild.

“I got in,” I echoed.

“Let’s celebrate,” Leah said picking up my bag off the ground and throwing it over her shoulder.  She began leading me toward her car, a gray Focus, parked a few spaces from my truck.  “I have to be at work in an hour, so it has to be quick.  What do you want?”

I climbed in the passenger door.  She put the key in the ignition, and looked over at me.

“Ice Cream,” we said in unison.

The gorgeous weather from the weekend was still hanging on.  She drove to a little, seasonal place that had just reopened a couple of weeks before.   I read over the remainder of my letter en route.  “I got a small scholarship too,” I said genuinely shocked.

“How much?”

“Five hundred dollars a semester.”

“That’s better than nothing,” Leah pointed out.

“I suppose,” I said.  It was better than nothing, but as I looked down over the list of tuition and other expenses, it didn’t seem like it would even make a dent.

“Just think of how many hours you would have to work at Newton’s to earn that much.”

“Excellent point, my friend.”  After that, it didn’t seem so small.

I looked over the outdoor menu at the ice cream shop trying to decide exactly what would taste appropriate to celebrate collegiate acceptance.  I opted for a root beer float.  Leah chose a banana split.

“Did you get any scholarship money?” I asked between chilly slurps of sweetness.

“American Indian,” she simply stated, pointing to herself dramatically.  “Everything’s covered – even books.”

“Oh, so unfair,” I teased.

“Hey, are you off this Saturday?”

“I’m pretty sure, why?”

“I already called and talked to my uncle,” she said in her fast, excited voice that was so unlike the usual abrasive Leah.  “He said he would love to have us come and see the place.  My mom said she’d come along.  I thought maybe Charlie would want to come and Jake too.”

“I can ask,” I said just as elated, but then I remembered the no rent offer.  “But we will have to negotiate some sort of payment.  It wouldn’t be fair for me to live there for free.”

Leah rolled her eyes.  “Is it fair that I get my entire education paid for because I live on the right side of the reservation line and you have to work for yours?”

I was speechless.  I had never thought of it like that.  Leah pulled back up behind my truck at school.  The entire trip had only taken us about twenty-five minutes.   The hardware wasn’t too far away so I knew Leah was not in that big of a hurry.  I decided to ask my question.  “Do you know anyone that can do alterations?  My friend Jessica gave me her sister’s old dress for prom, but it needs taken in.”

Leah sighed.  I suddenly felt guilty for asking.  She looked like I had just stolen the cherry off of the top of her banana split.  “Emily is a great seamstress,” she said soberly.  “I’m sure if you ask her she will alter it for you.”  Just as suddenly as it had left, the smile returned to her face.  “Now get out!  I’ve got to go earn some grocery money.”  She gave me a look that let me know there were no hard feelings.

“I’ll talk to Charlie and Jake about Saturday, and I’ll give you a call later tonight.”  I slung my bag over my shoulder and held my float in my hand as I climbed out of her low car.

“I get off at nine,” she said taking another bite of banana before she would have to set it down to drive again.  “Call me after that.”

I stood there at the rear of my truck watching her taillights disappear.  It was no wonder Leah and I got along so well.  Not only had she lost Sam, like I had lost Edward, but he had taken Emily with him just as Edward had taken Alice.  I hoped there would come a day that Leah and Emily could be friends again; although, I was not naive enough to think that they could be as close as before.  There are some things that a person just can’t get past, and I honestly believed that would be one of them.

I climbed in my truck but did not start it right away.  A smile slowly crept across my face as the gravity of the Bell State acceptance sank in.  I slurped and smiled and smiled and slurped.  I thought about the rest of my evening.  I was dying to run to La Push and tell Jacob or to the station to tell Charlie, but I couldn’t decide which one to tell first.

I started my truck and backed out of my space into the empty lot.  Jake and I had already made plans for him to join Charlie and me for supper tonight.  I pulled onto the road and headed for the grocery store.  They could both wait and find out together.

I stopped at the bank and withdrew enough from my savings to buy four steaks.  I knew I had potatoes at home from my last trip to the store.  I bought some lettuce, grape tomatoes, carrots, cucumbers, and mushrooms for a salad.

I set to work when I got home.  Thankfully, I had gotten my homework done during some free time at the end of my physics class.  I scrubbed four potatoes, wrapped them in foil and put them in the oven.  I had learned from Emily to always double the amount of food for a werewolf at your table.  I mixed some marinade and let the steaks soak.  I washed the lettuce and other vegetables and tossed the salad together.  I searched the cupboard for croutons and gave a little growl when I realized we didn’t have any left, but before I could get too upset, I found some sunflower seeds.  I sprinkled those on top instead.

I figured Jacob would arrive first.  I knew Charlie wouldn’t say anything about Leah coming to the station in case the news was not good.  He wouldn’t want to make me say something in front of Jacob.

When I heard the rabbit pull up to the house, I threw the steaks under the broiler.  I heard the front door open.

“Bells,” Jacob yelled.

I tried to rein in my excitement.  “In the kitchen,” I called to him.

Faster than humanly possible, I was wrapped in warm arms.  Jacob lifted me onto the counter so our height differences weren’t an issue, not that we ever let that stop us anyway.  I squeezed Jacob’s shoulders and tilted my head back losing myself in our embrace.  I nipped at his ear and giggled as he shuddered against me.  I traced kisses down his neck to his jaw line.

“I’ve missed you,” Jacob said holding my face in his hands and tilting my head to look at him.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”  Jacob pressed his mouth to mine again with renewed fervor.

We pulled apart when we heard the cruiser pull into the drive.  My audience awaits, I thought.


“Yeeeeaaaahhh,” I yelled on my way down.  It was the only voice I heard: just my own sounds of exhilaration.  The air screamed past my ears.  The ocean seemed to be speeding toward me, and I thought I may have left my stomach somewhere back up on the ledge.  But my mind was my own and I was free to enjoy the journey.  I couldn’t help but think that if I would have never moved to Forks, I would have never felt the greatest experiences of my life.  I had ridden a motor cycle.  I had jumped off a cliff.  I had met my first love.

I felt the cool water close over my head as my body torpedoed downward.  I kicked and swam for the surface.  I opened my eyes and looked up to see the sun shining through the short distance of water that I still had to cover.  My lungs were starting to ache.  I gave one last thrust with my arms and broke the surface.  “Wahoooo!” I screamed because at that moment I realized the best thing that had happened to me since moving to Forks.

I quickly swam to the sandbar where Jacob stood laughing at my reaction to the jump.  I threw my arms around him.  “I love you Jacob Black.”  I was not ashamed or embarrassed that I had said it.  Sometimes the truth just demands to be heard.

He pulled me tightly to him and looked into my eyes.  “I love you too, Isabella Swan.”

Jacob’s feet were firmly planted on the sand below the surface.  I wrapped my legs around his middle and kissed him, allowing my declaration to him to show through the physical connection we shared.  I gripped his muscular shoulders and I relished the blazing vice-like clamp his arms made around my ribs.  Every sensation of what Jacob and I shared felt completely right, like we were created for each other. Like everything else we had done in our lives up until this point had just been preparing us for this.

“I’ve wanted to hear you say that for so long,” he said almost in a whisper.  “I’ve loved you since the first time we rode our bikes together, but I knew you weren’t ready.”

I felt a wave of guilt as I thought about all of the grief I had caused him.  I pressed tighter against him.  “I’m sorry…”

“Don’t be sorry, Bells,” he interrupted pulling me back to look at me.  “This is just like our first kiss,” he said with his familiar smirk, “worth the wait.”

I laid my head on his shoulder and buried my nose in the crook of his neck breathing in his woodsy scent.  I entwined my fingers in his sea-soaked hair; he had let it grow out a little since the initial cut.  Jacob gently rubbed the back of my neck.  I let out a contented sigh and opened my eyes to take in the beauty of the calm waters surrounding us.  I caught sight of something red floating out in the distance.  I thought back to the day Harry Clearwater died; the day of my edict to myself to give up my hallucinations.  It seemed to be further out today than it had been then.  If it was a buoy I wondered why it was moved.  I would have to ask Jacob about it sometime but not now.  This moment was too perfect to worry about drifting buoys.  We held each other until I started to shiver from the chilly water despite Jacob’s intense body heat wrapped around me.

Jacob waded, carrying me until I could touch the bottom, and then we walked hand in hand.

“Can we go again?” I asked as we waded toward the shore.

“If you’ll tell me you love me again.”

“I’ll tell you that any time you want to hear it.”

“Okay, now,” he said playfully.

“I love you.”

“And now.”

“I love you, I love you, I love you!” I said in a sing-song voice.   I looked at Jacob to see the beautiful smile that I called the smile of My Jacob.  His face looked as relaxed as it had the night, which seemed so long ago now, that we had gone to the movie theater with Mike Newton.  It was our last time together before he became a werewolf.   I had wondered for a long time if he would ever smile that uninhibitedly again.  I imagine Jacob had probably wondered the same thing about me at times, if I would ever truly experience joy again after Edward had left me.   I was beholden to the phenomenon that had returned the beam to both of our features.

I noticed a group of people had congregated on First Beach since we had left there.  “Bella,” I heard a familiar female voice call.  “Bella, come join us.”

I waved to Angela and the group of my friends from Forks High School.

“Cliff diving later?” Jacob asked, steering us toward the crowd.

“Do you mind?”

“Of course not,” he said snaking his arm around my waist. “We can do that any time.”

Jacob pulled me closer to him as we approached the crowd.  I figured out why when Mike stepped forward.  “You remember Jacob, right Mike?” I asked motioning between the two of them.

“Yeah, the sophomore,” Mike said the last word with unnecessary emphasis, but extended his hand to Jacob at the same time.

Jacob gripped his hand with enough force to make Mike’s eyes squint with pain.  “I remember you,” Jake said.  “You’re the one who puked your guts out during the zombie movie.”

“I had the flu,” Mike said through gritted teeth.

“Un-huh.”  Jake finally let go of Mike’s hand and he slinked back into the crowd.

Angela approached us next and grabbed me in a hug.  “I tried to call you to let you know we were all coming over to the beach today, but no one was home.”

“I worked this morning, and Charlie is probably fishing somewhere,” I said hugging her back in earnest.  “He can’t stay inside when the weather is lousy.  I’m sure he’s out enjoying this today.  Do you remember my friend Jacob?” I asked motioning toward him.  “I think the two of you met one day at the grocery store.”

Angela reached to shake Jacob’s hand followed by Ben who had joined us by that time.  “It’s nice to meet you Jacob,” Ben said puffing his chest out as far as his little body would allow.  “I’m Angela’s boyfriend.”

I finished introducing Jacob around to the rest of my school cafeteria crowd.  I noticed Lauren couldn’t take her eyes off of him.  I quashed the urge to rip her short spiky hair from her scalp.  I had never been a particularly jealous person, but this was Lauren.  What Jacob did next was better than any amount of hair ripping I could have done.  He bent down and brushed a kiss on my lips.  I got the feeling it was more in an attempt to show the males in the crowd I was taken, but for my benefit, it got the point across to Lauren as well.  Her ears turned bright red and she stormed over to help Tyler and a couple of the guys from the baseball team setting up a volleyball net.

I borrowed some suntan lotion from Angela and Jacob helped me cover my back and shoulders.  I noticed that Mike and Lauren watched the whole process intently from their positions by the court.  By the time we were done, the net was up and people were dividing into teams.  Anyone who had ever seen me in gym class, which included most of the group, didn’t protest when I offered to be the scorekeeper.

After a couple of matches, the crowd had grown as kids from the reservation joined in.  Quil, Embry, Seth, Jared and Kim were among them along with a few others I didn’t know yet.  I looked around for Leah, but quickly remembered that she was working a long shift.  I sighed and leaned back on my elbows.

I was surprised by how much most of my peers got into the game.  The action got pretty intense.  There were a few kids who I could tell were losing interest, obviously not as ultra-competitive as the rest of them.  The teams were evenly matched, each taking two games.  After the tie breaker, and a shameless round of gloating from the winning side, I was joined by most of the females.  They had decided to let the guys play a round on their own.  I wasn’t sure if unleashing that much testosterone in one small space was such a good idea, but I figured it should be fun to watch.

Mike was serving first.  He jumped a fast one right at Jacob’s face.  Fortunately, Jake was fast enough to deflect it, but it went way out of bounds.  Mike’s team scored.

“So are you and Ben going to the prom?” Jessica asked Angela.

“Of course!  My dress is about the color of Bella’s bathing suit,” Angela told us.

“That’s a good color on you,” I said, remembering the blouse she wore to the spring choir concert.

“Are you going, Bella?” Angela asked.

“No.”  I shook my head.  “Dancing and I don’t get along well.”

“Oh come on, Bella,” Lauren said in her sugary sweet voice that she reserved for when she was being particularly vengeful.  “Edward got you to go last year, and you had a good time.”  She said his name with extra emphasis, obviously hoping that I would crumble into a heap at the mere mention of him.

I thought about what she said for a moment.  I nodded my head.  “You’re right, Lauren.  I did have a good time.”  I turned toward the court and yelled, “Hey, Jake.  Do you want to go to my prom with me?”

He glanced over at me and smiled.  “You lead, I’ll follow Babe.”  The ball sailed toward him; the opposite team was attempting to take advantage of his distraction.  The others didn’t know of Jacob’s superhuman reflexes.  He not only returned the ball, but returned it with enough force at Mike’s head to knock him over.  If Mike hadn’t started it, I would have told Jacob to play nice.

“Is he a boyfriend or a puppy?” Lauren sneered.

I figured her intentions had been to get me out of the way to ask Jacob herself.  I looked directly into her vindictive eyes and just couldn’t help myself.  I burst out laughing.  If she only knew what kind of a puppy dog my Jacob was…  “That’s a good one,” I finally managed to croak out between continued giggles.

“When is prom anyway?” I asked looking away from Lauren, so I wouldn’t be hit with another wave of laughter.

“It’s two weeks from today,” Jessica said.  “Haven’t you seen the signs hanging up all over the school?”  She rolled her eyes to highlight my lack of attentiveness.

“Do you want to go shopping for a dress?” Angela asked.

“Oh!”  I hadn’t thought about that part.  I really didn’t want to spend a lot of money.  If I was going to afford to start college in the fall, I really needed to make every effort to save.  “I may just wear the one from last year.”

Every set of female eyes landed on me and stuck there as though I was a magnetic force.  “You can’t wear the same dress,” Jessica gasped.  “Why don’t you come over tomorrow afternoon and you can look through the ones that I have.  I have two older sisters.”  Jessica shrugged.  “My mom says any dresses that are left in the house after I graduate; she’s going to give to the Salvation Army.”

“Thank you, Jessica,” I said sincerely surprised at her offer.  “What time would be good?”

“Um, two o’clock.”

“Do you think the puppy will tag along, or will you leave him chained in the yard?” Lauren asked, her voice now dripping with venom.

I really don’t know what effect she was going for with her continued mistreatment of me, but I don’t think it was working in her favor.  I glanced around the crowd and noticed that every single person was looking at the ground, or at the game, or at the woods.  No one was looking directly at her or at me for that matter.  Lauren was not recruiting any followers with her “Let’s abuse Bella” campaign.  I could plainly see it.  I decided to just wait to see if she would figure it out.

When the afternoon turned into early evening, everyone decided to meet for supper at a little restaurant in town.  As Jacob and I walked back to his place to get my truck, I began to wonder if he really wanted to go to the prom.  I hadn’t asked him in a very conventional way.

“Jake, if you don’t want to go, I’ll understand,” I said slowing my pace down a little.  “I sort of put you on the spot back there.”

Jacob stopped abruptly and spun me to face him.  “Bella, we spend all of our time together.  We kiss – a lot.”  He allowed the smirk to creep back across his features as he added, “And I know that I enjoy it – a lot.  And I would venture to say that I am not the only one.”

Oh boy!  Jacob leaned forward and claimed my lips until I felt like every nerve in my body was dangerously close to a high voltage wire.

“Am I?” he asked.

“I enjoy it,” I admitted, “a lot.”

“And today, we declared our love for each other,” he continued.  “I would like to consider you my girlfriend.”

“I think that sounds acceptable,” I said, wondering where he was going with this.  I loved this boy dearly, but he had a way of getting me to agree to things before I even realized where the questions were leading.  “Can I consider you my boyfriend?” I asked tentatively.

“Nothing would make me happier,” he lobbed his arm back over my shoulders and we proceeded toward his house.  “And as my girlfriend, I would expect that if I had something important going on, it would be safe for me to assume that you would come with me if at all possible.  As your boyfriend, you can expect the same from me.  Prom is pretty important, so even if I had plans for that day, I would do everything in my power to change them.”

“So you really don’t mind going?”  I squeezed my arm tighter around his waist.  He was right.  I would do anything he asked.  I was so relieved to know that he was willing to do the same for me.  If I really thought about it though, there never should have been any doubt in my mind.

“At least I don’t have to crash it this year!”

Jacob rode home with me.  It was his turn to run the circuit through the woods around my house and back to La Push searching for a fresh scent of Victoria.  I hoped she would just forget about me, but I knew that would probably not happen.  The threat of her coming back was always just behind my consciousness.

The house was dark when we pulled up, leaving Jacob free to walk me to the door.  We wouldn’t want to have to try to come up with an excuse for Charlie as to why he rode back from La Push with me or how he planned to get home.  “Be careful,” I said softly into Jacob’s neck as I hugged him tightly at the door.

“Bells,” he said taking my face in both of his hands and looking into my eyes.  “Paul is already in wolf form back at La Push.  If I smell anything, he will know and the rest of them will come running before the bloodsucker even realizes we’re here.”

“You’re so confident Jake, but I’ve seen how deadly they can be.  I just worry about you and your friends risking your lives to protect me.”

“I’ve told you that becoming a werewolf didn’t exactly thrill me, but I am a werewolf.  I’ve accepted that.  And I am a werewolf for one reason and that is to protect people from leeches.  We’ll protect you,” he insisted and then leaned in to kiss me to punctuate his declaration.

I allowed myself to get swallowed up in the passion of our embrace.  Our kisses were becoming more and more intimate.  I had always had to be so timid when I kissed Edward.  With Jacob, I was free to explore.  My tongue explored his mouth.  My hands explored the ripples of his muscular back and chest.  Jacob did his fair share of exploring as well.  His hands caressed my back.  His lips traced a hot line from my ear to my collar bone.  I gasped and clutched at his shoulders.

“Did you like that?” he whispered, the look on his face revealing that he knew full well that I did.

“Um hmm,” I purred and lay my head against his massive chest.

“Hey Bells,” Jacob said abruptly after a few moments of silence.  “The weather is supposed to be great tomorrow.  Why don’t you bring a bathing suit with you, and we can finally go cliff diving.”

I was hit with a sudden wave of panic.  “Um, I don’t kn…”

“You’re not going to chicken out are you?” he asked tilting my chin upward so we could see eye to eye.  “What happened to the brave girl who attacked me by the fire tonight?”

“I don’t think that can be considered an attack considering your over-exuberant participation.”

“Come on, you know you’ll like it,” he pleaded.  “It will be just like riding the bikes.  Only you shouldn’t have to make any trips to the ER.”  He smiled his broad, Jacob smile.

“Cliff diving it is then,” I said reaching up on my tip toes to kiss him again.  “I work until noon.  I’ll be over afterward.”

“It’s a date.”  Jacob took a step back and removed his shirt.

“Um…What’s with the strip tease?”

“I forgot to leave my shirt at home,” he said rolling his eyes at me.  “Do you mind hanging on to this for me.  I can put my shorts on the strap on my ankle.”

I looked down at the black cord around his left lower leg.  “I wondered why you were wearing that.”  I took the shirt from him and held it to my face, breathing in his scent from it.  It made me smile.  “I’ll miss you,” I called to him in a whisper as he strolled toward the woods.

Faster than should have been possible, I was back in his arms.  We shared one last kiss.  He sat me back down gently.  I leaned forward and made a little circle with my tongue on his bare chest and then placed a soft kiss over the spot.  He shuddered and closed his eyes.  “See ya tomorrow, Bells,” he said in his low husky voice, and then he ran into the woods.

I quietly went into the house.  I could hear Charlie snoring as soon as I walked into the kitchen.  I sniffed Jacob’s shirt again and got the same goofy smile across my face.  I was becoming such a sap.

I got ready for bed quickly and climbed under the covers.  It was well past midnight and I had to work at 9:00 am.  My head hit the pillow and I began to relax, then the panic hit.  I was going cliff diving.  I thought back to my original reason for wanting to go, but I had since sworn off my hallucinations.  I had quit them cold turkey, and I had been successful.  I didn’t want to have one now, or did I?  I had been so happy over the past two weeks; I hadn’t taken much time to think of Edward at all.  Several of the times I had thought about him, it was out of frustration.  I was angry that he had left me to deal with the not-so-nice vampires on my own.  If he was going to leave me, the least he could have done was let the others of his kind know that we were no longer an item.  I really don’t know how I had expected him to accomplish this.  I highly doubted there were any Web sites devoted to such proclamations, and Victoria and Laurent didn’t seem like the type that would check their voice mail too often.  But still, I was irritated just the same.

I made myself think about him now.  I thought about how he used to climb in my bedroom window and lie next to me while I slept.  Those times together had been the most intimate we shared.  And now, I chuckled a little to myself as a thought occurred to me: Jacob and my last study session lying on our stomachs on the living room floor: our hips touching, our feet intertwined.  Yes, doing my Calculus homework last night had been more intimate than all of the times Edward had shared my bed.

I got up and walked over to my desk chair where I had deposited Jacob’s shirt when I came in.  I picked it up and sniffed it again.  I removed my own threadbare T-shirt, put Jake’s on in its place, and crawled back in bed.  I wasn’t sure if I would be able to get to sleep with the silly grin on my face that the smell of the shirt put there, but I was going to enjoy myself while I tried.  I took another deep breath, appreciating the tingles that the scent induced.  I was going cliff diving with my Jacob, because it was something fun that we wanted to do together.  I was not going for the purpose of hearing Edward’s voice.  I decided that I really didn’t care if I heard him or not, and I drifted off to sleep, silly grin and all.

Jacob was right.  By the time my shift at Newton’s was over, it was nearly eighty degrees.  I changed into my lilac tankini bathing suit and put a pair of denim shorts and a purple tank top over it.  My apprehension returned when I rounded the last corner to La Push, but this time, it was the actual jump that had me worried.  Until recently, when I had started seeking my hallucinations, I had never been into anything more extreme than going to the pool for the afternoon without sunblock.  Maybe Jacob will forget, I thought, but as I pulled into his drive less than a minute later, I saw he was sitting on his front step with a towel over his shoulder.  He most definitely had not forgotten.

“You can do this Bella,” I whispered and then opened my door.

I was greeted by my favorite warm set of arms wrapped around me seemingly before my feet hit the ground outside of my truck.  We kissed as though we hadn’t seen each other in days rather than hours, but that’s how it usually was with us.  Once we had started kissing, it was like we always wanted more.

“Are you ready?” he finally asked breaking his lips away from mine.

“As ready as I’m gonna get.”

We chatted about my shift at Newton’s and his patrols on our way to First Beach.  We left our towels and clothes there, so they would be where we needed them after we jumped.  I was a little self conscious about Jacob seeing me in only my bathing suit, they are not conducive to hiding flaws.  I nervously pulled the top down so it completely covered my mid drift and adjusted the bottoms.  I glanced over at Jacob’s perfectly sculpted torso and felt a sudden urge to put my clothes back on and just jump in those.  I blushed bright red when I noticed that not only had Jacob noticed that I was checking him out, again, but Jake was doing a little checking out of his own.  I turned to face him and stood with my arms held out to the sides as if to display the suit.  Jacob made a horizontal circular motion with his finger.  I spun around to let him get the 360 view.

He slowly stepped to me, stopping just inches away.  “You look beautiful.”

The look on his face let me know the sincerity in his statement.  I felt more beautiful in that moment than I ever had before in my life.  I reached up and put my arms around his neck.  He lifted me off the ground and we shared yet another kiss.  I wondered if someday I would get tired of kissing Jacob so much.  I hoped not.

Jacob led the way up the path to the lower cliff.  I listened to the sound of the waves gently caressing the shoreline.  The sun felt wondrous on my shoulders, and I was proud of the fact that I did not fall down once on our ascent.  I was grateful that I had thought to bring an old pair of tennis shoes, because I didn’t think I would have been so pleased with the hike if I had been barefoot.  It didn’t seem to bother Jacob.  I guess that must be another wolf thing.

We soon reached the cliff.  Jacob took my hand and we slowly walked toward the edge.  We stopped with our toes hanging just beyond the rim.  I looked at him and saw the confidence in his face.  I knew that I would be safe.   “I’m going to go first, so I’ll be in the water already if you have trouble.  I’ll swim over that way.”  Jacob pointed off to the left.  “There is a sandbar that reaches out that way, and we’ll be able to walk the rest of the way in.”  He dropped my hand and took a few steps back.  “See ya in the water,” he said and then he took a running leap off of the edge doing a flip and a half before gracefully entering the water head first.

“Show off,” I muttered under my breath when he resurfaced.

I took five steps back just to be sure I would clear the cliff on the way down.

I took a deep breath in and blew it out slowly.

My heart raced with anticipation.

I thought of Jacob waiting for me in the ocean below.

I sprinted forward.

As if on cue, to break the mood, my stomach growled.  I started to giggle, and Jacob soon followed.

“Do you suppose there are any hotdogs left?” I asked with a sigh.

“Let’s go find out.”  Our lips brushed together one last time before we stood to rejoin the crowd.

“What were you and Leah talking about anyway?” Jacob asked as we walked arm in arm back to the bonfire.

I filled him in on the entire conversation including our promise to apply to Bell State as soon as possible.

When we returned, most of the older crowd had dispersed.  Sam and Quil were leaning back against one of the logs and it appeared that Emily had fallen asleep against Sam’s chest.  He stroked her hair gently as he spoke with the younger werewolf.  Leah was pouring a glass of soda.  Seth and Paul were talking with a couple of girls from the reservation that I did not know.

“Where’s Jared?” I asked Jacob.

He handed me a roasting stick and a hot dog, again his held three.  “Sam has us taking turns running a circuit around the area to check for a fresh trail,” he said.  We moved closer to the fire to allow our snacks to heat.

“Do you have to take a turn?” I asked, hoping that he didn’t.

“Quil offered to go for me earlier,” Jacob said smiling at me.  “Would you miss me if I had to leave?”

“I’m sure I could find something to do,” I said with a sigh, feeling my cheeks blush.  “Maybe Paul would offer to keep me warm,” I added to his playful banter.

“Oh, now that’s just cruel.”

I laughed out loud.  “Yes, I’ve been told that us girls are like that.”

“Where the heck were you two?” Embry asked loudly placing a large warm arm around each of our shoulders.  “I really don’t think it takes two people quite that long to walk one old man back to his house.”  He looked back and forth between us, waiting for a response.

I blushed darker red.  Thankfully the firelight flicker masked it for me.  I concentrated on cooking my hotdog, making sure not to turn my gaze from it.

“It did seem like you were gone for an awfully long time,” Quil added from his seat near Sam, clearly interested in this conversation now.

“I was just explaining to Bella the Quiluet legend of how intelligence is distributed among the young males of the tribe,” Jacob began in his I’m-lying-through-my-teeth voice.  “You see what I meant, Bella?  It’s quite obvious that these two were sent to me, so that I could guide them.  Being that I was the only one deemed worthy of possessing more than three brain cells.”

I was able to grab the roasting stick out of Jacob’s hand before Embry had pulled him back from the fire, and once joined by Quil, the two of them were doing their best to wrestle my Jacob to the ground.  Jacob was holding his own.  Soon Seth joined in the fray.  I wasn’t really sure whose side he was trying to join, if either, or if he just wanted in on the action.  I watched the match while also keeping my eyes on the franks until they were split and juicy.

“Jake, food’s ready,” I said as I slid the hotdogs into buns.

Three other sets of hands reached the warm food before Jacob’s.  “Cook your own,” he complained, but the sandwiches were all half eaten before he could even get the words out.

“I’ll share mine,” I said holding it out to him.

He took a small bite.  “You eat it,” he said placing three more on the roasting stick and returning to the fire.  “I don’t want to be responsible for your stomach growling again.”

“Do you want something to drink?” I asked.

“Whatever you’re having is fine with me.”

I poured us a glass of Pepsi and returned to the spot by the fire where we had sat during the stories.  Jacob soon joined me with his fresh supply of food.  Jared returned and the boys regaled the tale of the fight he had missed, adding lots of embellishments for dramatic effect.  Jacob and I sipped from our glass of Pepsi.  He shifted so I could sit in front of him, with his legs on either side of me, much the way Sam and Emily were seated.  I leaned against him, enjoying the heat of him wrapped around me.  Soon everyone was sitting on the ground, around the fire: some in pairs, some alone.  Everyone talked and laughed and shared anecdotes about each other.  Jacob periodically rubbed one of my arms, or stroked my shoulder, or placed soft kisses in my hair.

Two weeks later, Jacob and I found ourselves in almost the same setting.  We were gathered around the same fire pit, with most of the same people.  We were not celebrating a new brother to the wolf pack, so the legends were not retold.  Most of the elders only came by at the beginning and then quickly retreated to their homes leaving the younger crowd to enjoy their time on the beach.  Jake and his pack were keeping a close eye on Seth Clearwater, but so far, he was still just a very large human boy with a higher than normal temperature.

Jacob and my routines had not changed drastically.  We still rode our bikes.  We still took walks on First Beach.  I worked my shifts at Newton’s, and Jacob took his turn running rounds as a wolf.  We still studied together, but we sprawled a little closer on the floor of my living room.  The main difference in our practices was that we peppered all of our activities with kisses: long kisses, short kisses, deep kisses, quick smooch kisses.

Charlie had walked into the kitchen and witnessed a short kiss when Jacob had come to dinner earlier in the week.  Being Charlie, he didn’t say anything at the time.  But before I went up to bed that night, he asked, “Is there something you want to tell me about you and Jake, Bells?”

By his tone of voice, I knew a simple “No” would not suffice.  I settled with “We are more than friends now.”

Charlie had just nodded his head.  I noticed he was trying to suppress a smile without success.  “Goodnight Bells,” he had said.  I had gone up to get ready for bed.  By the time I was done brushing my teeth, I heard him on the phone with Billy.

I handed Jacob three hotdog buns.  I had stopped at Forks’ one convenience store after my shift at Newton’s and bought a bottle of ketchup; I squirted some on my sandwich and took a bite.  Leah did the same.

“Have you heard from Bell State?” Leah asked.

“No,” I replied.  “You?”

“Not yet, but I’ve heard that they are still admitting students.”  She tried to make her tone of voice sound nonchalant, but I could tell by the way her forehead wrinkled when she said it that the news came as a great relief to her.

“That’s good,” I said.  “Do you think we should apply to any other schools?  I mean, I know your Uncle’s free apartment is only available there, but we could look into some other places,” I suggested.  I had thought a lot about our plans in the past two weeks.  And the more I thought about them, the more excited I got.  It was like I had put my life on hold to mourn the loss of Edward; now that I was over that, I was ready to make up for lost time.  I didn’t want to let the admissions practices of a single school determine the course of my future.

Leah stared out over the moon-brightened waves, pondering my question.  I had learned that it was not her style to answer a question without thinking it through completely.  Sometimes, for whatever reasons she came up with in that mind of hers, she would just stare at you and deliberately not answer.  But then she would come back an hour later and offer another viewpoint.

About a week ago, I had asked her if she planned to get a job in Seattle or if she was just going to try and work at the hardware store over breaks and on weekends.  She had called me at home three days later and blurted out “I figured out that if I spend my money wisely, which I always do, I should be able to live off of my savings for at least two years.  I’m going to see how much time my classes really take before I look for a job.”  Then she hung up the phone.  That particular incident still made me chuckle each time I thought about it.

“Let’s give it one more week,” she finally said.  We nodded in agreement.

I took a second bite of my sandwich and went to stand by Jacob who had already eaten all of his food.  A huge hand at the small of my back caught me by surprise.  He pulled me close to him and proceeded to lick the corner of my mouth and across my lips filling me with familiar tingles.  “You missed a little ketchup,” he said with a smirk.

I blushed several shades of red as cat calls came at us from every direction.

“Thank you, Jacob!” I squeezed as much sarcasm as humanly possible into his name.

“Anytime!”  He leaned down and kissed my forehead.

I decided that two could play at this game.  I threw my arms around his neck and crushed my lips to his.  I let my hotdog fall to the sand, and I tangled my hands in his windblown black hair.  Jacob wrapped his arms around my waist and picked me up off the ground.  We briefly allowed the kiss to take on a rhythm of its own before we broke apart. I could tell my cheeks were still bright crimson.  Jacob’s face had a look of pure satisfaction.  I finally let my gaze wander; the looks on the faces of those around us were priceless.

“Well, well, well!” Sam said at last.  “What have the two of you been up to?”

I stepped back to the picnic table to get another hotdog and let Jacob deal with the questions from his pack.  I smiled a contented smile knowing that our secret was out; although, it had been fun sneaking around.

Leah soon made her way over.  She stood next to me silently while I held the roasting stick over the fire.  “I knew it,” she finally said just above a whisper.  I chanced a glance in her direction to try and gauge what she meant.  She flashed me a smile and playfully punched my arm.  I took that as a sign of approval.

Aside from the initial looks of shock on the faces of the group, no one seemed overly surprised by our public display of affection.  I knew that Jacob’s feelings for me had been evident since before he became a werewolf.  Since the pack could read his mind, all of his brothers would have already known of his intentions.  To the best of my knowledge, no one, not even the one mind-reader I had met in my life, could read my mind.  And until recently, I don’t know that it would have done any good if someone did.  I myself just realized exactly how I felt about him, or just admitted it, at least.

Jacob soon sat next to me on the bench of the picnic table.  “I’m impressed, Bells!” he said throwing his arm around me.

“With what?”

“I didn’t think you had it in you,” he said playfully squeezing my shoulder. “You have the makings of a smartass after all.”

“You couldn’t settle for just telling everyone about us?” I asked, knowing full well that that wasn’t my Jacob’s style.

“Where would be the fun in that?”  He stood and pulled me to my feet.  “Come on, there’s someone I want you to meet.”

I allowed myself to be pulled around the outer perimeter of the fire pit.  The crowd looked a little larger than the one two weeks ago.  Seth Clearwater was talking with a young red-head who looked like she was maybe fourteen or fifteen.  “How old is Seth?” I whispered to Jake.  He looked like a full grown man, but then again, so did Jacob.  I had to remind myself from time-to-time that he was only sixteen.

“He just turned fifteen.  Why?”

“Just curious,” I said.  That would explain why the object of his affections looked to be so young.  He was that young.  “Not all of you like older women, I guess.”  I nodded toward the youngsters near the fire.

He glanced toward Seth.  “Seth has liked her since he was about 8,” Jake said shaking his head.  “And I thought we determined that I was older after you spotted me the ten years for fixing the bikes.”

“I think licking ketchup off of my face takes you back a couple years,” I said, blushing again, or still; I wasn’t sure if it had fully faded yet.

“You didn’t seem to mind,” he reminded me with a leer.  “But since you’re so stuck on chronological age, I want you to meet Kim.  She’s almost a year older than Jared.”

“Who?”

Jacob stopped in front of Jared and a rather plain looking Indian girl.  “Bella, this is Kim.”

I extended my hand in greeting to the girl who looked to be around twenty.   “Nice to meet you,” I said politely.

“Jared tells me that you are a good friend of Jacob’s,” she said warmly.

“We are very close,” I said quietly.  I wished there were some way to keep my cheeks from blushing.

“I gathered that by the lip action display you put on a minute ago,” she said with a smirk, gesturing toward where Jake and I had been standing.

I clamped my mouth shut.  I figured anything I said at this point would just add fuel to the fire.  I noticed Jacob didn’t seem to mind the extra attention we were receiving.  He was practically preening.

We stood and talked with the couple for quite some time.  After a while, I became aware of the fact that Jared and Kim were always touching in some way.  He wasn’t groping her or doing anything that was in any way inappropriate; it was like they just couldn’t stand NOT to have physical contact.  If one of them shifted, they would make sure to readjust themselves so it was possible for his hand to rest on her back, or her hand to clutch his arm.

Kim was telling us about a project she was working on for her favorite instructor at the community college where she studied in Port Angeles.  By all rights, it should have been painfully boring to listen to; it was computer graphics.  But to hear her tell it, it was absolutely fascinating.  Her enthusiasm for her work was infectious.  I found myself asking questions and allowing my mind’s eye to see the project as a living force.  The look on Jared’s face for this woman that he obviously loved as he too was engrossed in her story, was a mixture of pride, admiration, adoration, and a little lust from time to time.  I quickly realized that to Jared, this was not a plain looking, average girl.  This was the center of his universe.

I leaned a little closer to Jacob, enjoying the warmth that his closeness provided, and appreciating the fact that I could be like Jared.  I was probably never going to be like Kim.  I took pride in my work and enjoyed a job well done, but I didn’t ever picture myself bringing it to life like she could.  But, my Jacob could do that.  He could entertain a crowd for hours talking about car parts.  And I was certain, that no matter how interesting it may be to others listening, I would always be his biggest fan.  I ran my fingers up his forearm and let them settle in the crook of his elbow.