Revenant j. hale

Chapter 40

"Are you okay Bells? Is the baby okay?" 

Right as we walked into the living room I could feel the tension, along with hearing some snarls at my previous question. Jasper cautiously wrapped an arm around my waist, pulling me further away from my destination. 

"Jas, I'm okay. It's just Bella." I rubbed his arm and looked at him sweetly. Reluctantly he ended up letting me go.

"I'm okay, the baby is-" Edward interrupted before Bella could finish.

"Don't lie and say that everything's fine. That thing is killing you from the inside out." His words slashed through the air, and Bella's face visibly deflated at his harshness. 

"Edward I'm going to do this. I want to have this baby."

The anger that floated in the air made me almost dizzy, and instantly worry about how Jasper must be feeling as well. Looking at the girl in next to me, she was no longer the same as before she had left. The usual "pregnancy glow" other women got did not appear on her face. Instead Bella's face had hollowed out tremendously, and left dark circles under her sunken eyes. 

She turned to look at me, "Everyone thinks the baby is dangerous and that I should let Carlisle remove it."

"Not everyone," Rosalie's voice chimed behind me with a smile. 

I looked at Jasper to see him looking away, not meeting my gaze, so I looked back at Bella. "This is just so different, it's special and new. They just don't know what to do. If you want to keep the baby I respect your decision." Bella smiled brightly at me as the others in the room began arguing. 

"We can't let her keep it." 

"It will kill her"

"It's a monster."

Over and over their voices got louder, trying to talk over one another as Bella moved around anxiously, and Jasper stood quietly most likely trying to defuse the situation. I finally cleared my throat and spoke up, "God guys, I know you're all super old and stuff but it's the 21st century. Bella can do whatever she wants with her body." In return, Edward let out a very dramatic groan and left angrily. 

Hours later I stood in the kitchen decorating a pizza with Emmett. He was troubled, I knew that much. Bumping him with my shoulder I smiled. Nothing. 

"Em, what's wrong?" He stopped for a moment.

"We can't talk here, everyone will hear," Emmett mumbled. Telling Esme we'll be back in time for the pizza to be done, we left. 

Emmett took me to a small stream, out of the hearing range of everyone at the house. 

"Are you gonna die?" He asked quietly. 

"What?" I was almost gonna laugh, but I saw his serious and sad looking face. 

"Don't lie. Something's been up with you and you haven't said anything. Why don't you want one of us to turn you? I thought you loved us like family."

His voice was trembling despite not being able to cry. I had never seen big burly Emmett look so sad before. "And Bella's being all headstrong about this baby. I don't wanna lose two sisters at the same time."

"Em, you aren't gonna lose me. Or Bells. She's strong." I looked down. "I haven't wanted to turn yet because this is hard for me. I've had to live this way, with this pain," I gulped, "for so long. I know Alice could see the future before as a human, then when she was turned she had it more amplified." 

I stopped, unhappy with the thought. "If I turn and it's still there, or worse, I don't know if I could handle it." Emmett looked back at me with more understanding, grabbing my hand I hadn't realized was rubbing at my scars before we went back to the house.

Back at the house Esme had already set out the cooked pizza, leaving some on a plate for Bella who wasn't at all interested. Jasper came and wrapped his arms around my waist, kissing the top of my head before leaning his onto my shoulder. 

"Hey Jas? Does Jake know?"

"Yeah, he found out earlier before Paul called. Why?" 

I stopped chewing. Rushing to find my phone I saw it. All the missing messages from Paul and some from Jared as well. 

"Oh shit."