Surprisingly things seemed to settle into a sense of normalcy once I had been able to talk to Alice and to Jacob. Alice seemed to understand my need to let Edward go in order to move forward with Jacob while still retaining my humanity. Even she could see that Jacob treated me far better than Edward ever had plus she even admitted that she liked Jacob once she got past her natural aversion to the Quileute wolves.
Alice remained at my house for the rest of the week before she returned to Denali with the promise that she would keep in touch with me through emails and phone calls. Thankfully those came at least twice a week and I could tell right away that she had quickly accepted Jacob into my life, often joking with him through the phone when he was at my house during her calls.
I still missed her and the rest of the Cullens whom I was able to talk to on the phone from time to time, at least I talked to everyone but Edward and Rosalie. Still, Alice did say they would try to come see me during graduation if they could and maybe even try to stay a bit over the summer.
Jacob was still a little reluctant to accept Alice and the rest of the Cullens as a part of my life, but he had seemed more relaxed once Alice had returned to Denali. I had made it clear to him that the Cullens were still like family to me and as long as they were willing to keep in touch with me, I would do so.
He knew he had to accept my decision and did his best to keep his complaining to a minimum. Alice was the first of my two supernatural best friends to seem friendlier, but it didn’t take long after that for Jacob to finally admit that Alice seemed like a good friend to me.
I knew it mostly had to do with the fact that Alice never brought up Edward in any conversations. Plus she had once let it slip during a time when Jacob was listening, that she thought Jacob had to be the best thing to happen to me when I’d told her about yet another potentially dangerous mishap that Jacob had saved me from. After that he would ask how she was doing or trade friendly barbs with her when she called to talk to me.
After Alice had left, Jacob and I had another talk where I had finally told him the truth about everything that had happened in my life after Edward had left me. I told him how his leaving had made me feel and how long it had taken me to snap out of my zombie-like existence. I told him how I had discovered that I could hear Edward’s voice anytime I put myself in some sort of danger and how that had led me to using Jacob to further my delusions.
I had expected him to look at me like I was psycho at that point, but he had simply sat there and urged me to go on. So I told him how I had felt when I thought I had lost him too and I told him about the holes in my chest that had appeared, the holes that both he and Edward had been catalysts for.
His face changed at that point, but all it showed was his remorse for unintentionally hurting me at the time when it seemed I needed him the most. I tried to tell him that I didn’t blame him for leaving me because I now knew why he had done what he had. Besides, I refused to let him ever be responsible for my feelings the way I had let Edward be. He needed to understand that he couldn’t always be responsible for the way I felt about things, that he couldn’t and I didn’t want him to always save me. I had to learn to deal with things myself.
I was glad that he seemed to quietly accept what I said as I went on to tell him how my feelings had been changing and when I had noticed that they had been doing so. I told him how his image had begun to replace Edward’s in my mind, but I made it clear that I knew it wasn’t a delusion. Jacob was real to me, not an illusion I had formed in my mind to escape what I had once believed to be a dismal reality.
I now knew my reality was anything but dismal.
I let Jacob know that while he had helped me to see that my life was worth living, I had to do that living myself. I had to get my head out of the clouds and live in the now. I had to put myself back together again and then I could focus on making those I cared about as happy as I was beginning to feel.
I could tell he was proud of me for telling him everything that had been going through my mind. It showed in the shine of his eyes and in the way he had hugged me when I finished my confession.
“Thanks Bells, for telling me everything. I’m glad you did. Now I get how you feel…but I still want you to know that I’m here for you whenever you need me, okay honey?”
I nodded against his chest, content to be held by him for that moment. I was sure that this time we were both on the same page, we both knew that we could tell each other anything, no matter how embarrassing or dark it was. Our conversations with each other could still be taken as if we were the best of friends, even though we were clearly becoming something more.
Once we had gotten the heavier topics out of the way, we had soon moved on to other things, like figuring out how to tell our dads that we were now dating each other and calling each other boyfriend and girlfriend in public. Jacob was of the mind to just go and say it to them point blank, certain that both of them had always been rooting for the two of us. I didn’t think Billy would be a problem, but I was still a little leery as to how my dad was going to take it.
In the end, I was right…Billy had taken it better than Charlie had, probably because of Charlie’s memories of the Edward fiasco. Still, both of them had accepted it and immediately set ground rules. We weren’t allowed to have closed doors in our homes when we were together and if our grades started to suffer, we wouldn’t be allowed to spend time together. Charlie insisted that I not neglect any of my other friends like I had when I had dated Edward and I still had a curfew on school nights.
The curfew really didn’t bother me since Jacob had patrols and homework that he had to do and I had my own homework and soul-searching to attend to also. I knew Jacob’s patrolling duties were necessary since Victoria was still out there somewhere, gunning for me. That fact did worry me, but I knew the wolves had things covered.
I would catch a glimpse of one or two of them in the woods out of my window when I was supposed to be studying.
Their presence comforted me and let me know that Jacob was out there somewhere too and that he was okay. I was the most relaxed though, when I caught sight of the russet wolf patrolling the woods around my house. That let me know that Jacob was within earshot and safe like me.
Strangely, I always seemed to feel the safest when he was the wolf nearest me or when Jacob himself was at my side. Maybe it had to do with my burgeoning feelings for him or maybe I had begun to trust that he and the rest of the Quileute wolves could take care of any vampire menace that came around.
Whatever the reason, I had begun to relax and was able to get back to being a simple teenager again. School had become fun for me again and I had begun to get closer to Angela and Ben, as well as remaining friends with Eric and Tyler. Mike was distant at first when he found out that Jacob was now my boyfriend, but even he couldn’t seem to stop being my friend.
The only ones not happy with my presence were Jessica and Lauren. Jessica still couldn’t forgive me for my weird depression as she called it and Lauren, who seemed to hate me for breathing and for the amount of attention Tyler had always paid to me, just egged her on.
I didn’t let the two of them bother me though, I was happy with the friends I had as well as the life I was now living. My senior year was coming to a close. I was healthy, happy and surrounded by those I cared about. From where I stood, I could tell that I had a future I was now looking forward too.
A future that allowed me to….live.
THE END
No comments:
Post a Comment