We were in the living room when Jake came ithrough the front door. He stayed by the entrance.
"She's all right, Jake." I spoke.
"Or, the same, You should say." Edward said.
Edward was on the couch, he didn't even look up to speak. Esme was by his side, her arm wrapped tight around his shoulders.
"Hello, Jacob," she spoke. "I'm so glad you came back."
"Me, too," Alice and I said at the same time.
Alice came prancing down the stairs and went to Jake.
"Uh, hey," Jake said. "Where's Bella?"
"Bathroom," Alice told him. "Mostly fluid diet, you know. Plus, the whole pregnancy thing does that to you, I hear."
"Ah."
"Oh, wonderful," Rose grumbled behind Jake. "I knew I smelled something nasty."
Bella's face lit up when she saw Jake.
"Jacob," she breathed. "You came."
"Hi, Bells."
Esme and Edward both got up so Bella could sit. Rose carefully laid Bella out on the couch.
"Are you cold?" I asked her when I noticed she was shrunken.
"I'm fine."
"Bella, you know what Carlisle told you," Rose said. "Don't downplay anything. It doesn't help us take care of either of you."
"Okay, I'm a little cold. Edward, can you hand me that blanket?"
Jake rolled his eyes. "Isn't that sort of the point of me being here?"
"You just walked in," Bella said. "After running all day, I'd bet. Put your feet up for a minute. I'll probably warm up again in no time."
He ignored her and went to sit on the floor next to the couch.
"Thanks, Jake,"
"Yeah," he said.
Edward sat on the arm of the couch by Bella's feet.
"Rosalie, why don't you get Jacob something from the kitchen?" Alice spoke, she was now sat beside me on the other couch.
"Thanks, anyway, Alice, but I don't think I'd want to eat something Blondie's spit in. I'd bet my system wouldn't take too kindly to venom." Jake said.
"Rosalie would never embarrass Esme by displaying such a lack of hospitality." Alice said.
"Of course not," Rose said in a sugar-sweet voice.
Rose went to the kitchen.
"You'd tell me if she poisoned it, right?" Jake asked me.
"Yes," I promised.
After a few seconds Rose came back holding a bowl and handed it to Jake.
"Enjoy, mongrel,"
"Thanks, Blondie."
She snorted.
"Hey, do you know what you call a blonde with a brain? A golden retriever."
I faced Jake, I was also a blonde.
"I've heard that one, too," she said.
"I'll keep trying," Jake said.
He was finishing eating when Bella started touching his hair.
"Time for a haircut, huh?"
''You're getting a little shaggy," I said. "Maybe..."
"Let me guess, someone around here used to cut hair in a salon in Paris?"
Bella chuckled. "Probably."
"No thanks," he said. "I'm good for a few more weeks."
Everyone was silent for few minutes.
"So... um... what's the, er, date? You know, the due date for the little monster." Jake spoke.
Bella smacked the back of his head.
"I'm serious," he told her. "I want to know how long I'm gonna have to be here."
"I don't know," she murmured. "Not exactly. Obviously, we're not going with the nine-month model here, and we can't get an ultrasound, so Carlisle is guesstimating from how big I am. Normal people are supposed to be about forty centimeters here. When the baby is fully grown. One centimeter for every week. I was thirty this morning, and I've been gaining about two centimeters a day, sometimes more..."
Two weeks to a day. Bella wouldn't last more then four days.
"You okay?" she asked him.
He nodded.
"It's going to be okay,"
"Right," he muttered.
"I didn't think you would come. Seth and Violet said you would, and so did Edward, but I didn't believe them."
"Why not?" he asked gruffly.
"You're not happy here. But you came anyway."
"You wanted me here."
Everyone was quiet for another minute.
"Thank you for coming," Bella whispered.
"Can I ask you something?" Jake spoke.
"Of course."
"Why do you want me here? Seth could keep you warm, and he's probably easier to be around, happy little punk. But when I walk in the door, you smile like I'm your favorite person in the world."
"You're one of them."
Jake rolled his eyes. He didn't want to hear this answer.
"You've always been a part of my family."
"That's a crap answer."
"What's a good one?"
"How about, 'Jacob, I get a kick out of your pain."
She flinched.
"You'd like that better?'' she whispered.
"It's easier, at least. I could wrap my head around it. I could deal with it."
Bella was exhausted. Soon later she was asleep.
"She's exhausted," I spoke. "It's been a long day. A hard day. I think she would have gone to sleep earlier, but she was waiting for you."
Jake looked at me.
"Seth said it broke another of her ribs."
"Yes. It's making it hard for her to breathe." I said.
"Great."
It was slient again.
"Four days?" Jake spoke.
"Approximately." I answered.
"Then what?"
"From what little research we've been able to do, it would appear the creatures use their own teeth to escape the womb," I whispered.
"Research?"
"That's why you haven't seen Jasper and Emmett around. That's what Carlisle is doing now. Trying to decipher ancient stories and myths, as much as we can with what we have to work with here, looking for anything that might help us predict the creature's behavior."
Edward read his mind.
"Then is this thing not the first of its kind? Maybe. It's all very sketchy. The myths could easily be the products of fear and imagination. Though... your myths are true, are they not? Perhaps these are, too. They do seem to be localized, linked..." Edward said.
"How did you find...?" Jake asked.
"There was a woman we encountered in South America. She'd been raised in the traditions of her people. She'd heard warnings about such creatures, old stories that had been passed down."
"What were the warnings?" Jake whispered.
"That the creature must be killed immediately. Before it could gain too much strength." I answered for Edward.
"Of course, their legends say the same of us. That we must be destroyed. That we are soulless murderers." Edward said.
"What did their stories say about the... mothers?"
Rose answered.
"Of course there were no survivors," she said. "Giving birth in the middle of a disease-infested swamp with a medicine man smearing sloth spit across your face to drive out the evil spirits was never the safest method. Even the normal births went badly half the time. None of them had what this baby has—caregivers with an idea of what the baby needs, who try to meet those needs. A doctor with a totally unique knowledge of vampire nature. A plan in place to deliver the baby as safely as possible. Venom that will repair anything that goes wrong. The baby will be fine. And those other mothers would probably have survived if they'd had that—if they even existed in the first place. Something I am not convinced of."
The baby will be fine. This sentence made me feel disappointed in Rose. Without wanting to, in front of us, she revealed who her priority and her concern were.
Edward moved like he was about to attack Rosalie for what she said. She turned her back to Edward and Jake in the chair she was sat.
"Allow me," Jake thought.
Silently, he got up and lifted the bowl off the floor. Then he threw it into the back of Rose's head.
Bella twitched but didn't wake up.
"Dumb blonde," Jake muttered.
Rosalie turned her had slowly, and her eyes were blazing. It looked like a scene from The Exorcist.
"You. Got. Food. In. My. Hair."
Jake pulled away from Bella so he wouldn't wake her up. He laughed so hard that tears ran down his face. Alice and I also started to laugh.
For a second I asked myself why Rose didn't attack Jake. Then I noticed Bella had woken up.
"What's so funny?" she murmured.
"I got food in her hair," Jake told her.
"I'm not going to forget this, dog," Rose hissed.
"S'not so hard to erase a blonde's memory. Just blow in her ear." he said.
"Get some new jokes," she snapped.
"C'mon, Jake. Leave Rose alone." Bella spoke.
Everyone was quiet for a few minutes. Bella was stroking her belly.
"You know, he reminds me of you, Jake," she said.
"Do not compare me to that thing,"
"I just meant your growth spurt," she said. "You shot right up. I could watch you getting taller by the minute. He's like that, too. Growing so fast."