A/N: Kind of a longer chapter here, but I just had to get to this part. It is by far probably my favorite scene of the entire Twilight works.
That Monday morning, Daniella didn't go to her classes. She sat in the truck, still overwhelmed with disbelief. When the bell rang and students left their classes, she got out of the car. She stood in the parking lot, waiting as kids rushed around her to leave.
Across the lot, heading for their cars, Jasper could feel her. He stopped, along with his siblings, and he looked over to see her intense gaze locked on him. Her look screamed that they needed to talk. She walked toward them, her eyes meeting his momentarily as she continued past him walking into the dark forest near the school.
Jasper watched her disappear into the lining of the forest. He took a step in her direction to follow after her, but Rosalie stepped in front on him quickly and Emmett grabbed his arm.
"Jasper, don't go." Emmett spoke, his voice thick with warning. However, Alice gently moves Emmett's hand from his arm.
"He's already there." Her soft voice told them as Jasper continued his walk into the forest to meet with Daniella.
~•~
Daniella stood amongst the trees, waiting. Then she head the sounds of his footsteps as Japser appeared behind her. She was scared, but not of him. Dani doesn't turn to face him.
"You...you're impossibly fast. And you're strong," her voice was soft, far from her usual way of acting around other people, "Your skin is pale-white and ice-cold. Your eyes change color...and sometimes you speak as if you're from a completely different time." She decided to turn to face him now. She saw the way he seemed to be fighting between his emotions, but she knew he was hearing every word she said. "You never eat, or drink, or come to school in the sunlight. You had said no to crashing the beach trip with me only after you heard where it was...because of the treaty." The last bit shocked him as he looked up to meet her gaze. He felt the emotions coming from her, but they were not what he was expecting.
Understanding
Confusion
Denial
but also...fright
Jasper hated that he was making her feel like this. He never wanted to scare her. He cared for her more than he thought he should, but as she took a step closer to him he thought that maybe if she wasn't close to him she would have less of a chance of getting hurt because of him. So, he sent out fear. He had to push her away for her own safety.
Dani felt immense amounts of fear as she looked up at the pale boy across from her. She wasn't afraid of him so why was she feeling this? Jasper. She creased her brows at him in question, but continued with the reason she'd brought him to the forest in the first place.
"How old are you?" She asked Jasper.
"Nineteen." Jasper's voice was stern, yet wavering.
"How long have you been nineteen..?" Dani asked her eyes shifting to the forest floor before going right back to Jasper's conflicted gaze. Jasper realizes that he can't hide himself from her anymore. Honesty has always been risky for him and he never believed that it helped when he was honest with anyone, but he has to risk it. For her.
"... A while." Jasper responded. A long silence is presents as Daniella tries to take in the sudden crash of her overwhelming epiphany that everything she was trying to deny, that she thought impossible, was true. She took a breath. As much as she was starting to believe it, it was still just as shocking as if she hadn't guessed.
"I know what you are.." Her eyes wouldn't meet his anymore. He knew it was over. Everything they were starting to have was gone. His sent out emotion of fear was getting to her, he knew it had to have been by now. Nothing mattered now because she knew. And she was afraid of him now. Jasper would blame himself for it though. This was his fault, he knew that.
"Say it," Jasper's cold voice startled Daniella. She didn't expect to ever hear the tone directed toward her, but she understood it. However, the words wouldn't leave her mouth. She couldn't say it to him, "Out loud. Say it." Jasper's voice was powerful. Daniella felt small in his presence, but not in danger. Not even close to it. She wasn't scared of him. She would never be afraid of him.
The sounds in the forest seemed to disappear. The only thing to be heard was the soft breathing and constant beating of only one heart, belonging to Daniella Swan. Then a whisper was heard. The words finally leaving Dani's mouth was enough to change not only her world, but his as well.
"Vampire.."
Jasper and Daniella seem to hover in momentary tension. He was completely exposed to her and her entire reality was utterly destroyed. Then he spoke up.
"You're afraid?" Jasper said. It seemed that he expected the answer to confirm his suspicions, but Daniella thinks that her answer will suprise him.
"No." He seemed angry. As if he wanted her to be afraid of him. But she couldn't. She can't change how she feels. And she feels everything but afraid of him. No matter how much he sends fear into her emotions, she will not be afraid of Jasper.
"Then ask me the most basic question: What do we eat?" Jasper had stepped closer, and Dani was holding her ground looking into his eyes. Honesty shining throughout her brown orbs.
"You won't hurt me, Jazz. You're different." Daniella tried to convince him of her views of him, but Jasper wasn't having any of it.
"You think you know me? At all?" Jasper was glaring at Daniella, and her stance on the subject never wavered. Suddenly, he grabs her hand and pulls her with him going further into the woods.
"Where are we going Jasper?" Dani's voice was calm, but she was nervous. She didn't want to upset him more than she already had, but she figured it was worth the risk.
"Up the mountain and out of the cloud bank. You need to see what I really am. Why I never go out in the sunlight.." Jasper's voice was urgent.
"No! The sun, it'll hurt you, right?" She didn't want him to do this. Not if it means that he will be harmed.
"That is a myth, you want the truth, Daniella," He pulled her, but she continues to stumble along behind him. Then he was suddenly beside her, "Are you afraid?" He asked her once again.
"No." Her answer wasn't going to change. It was set. She knew that, no matter what, he would not hurt her.
"Then let me take you to a place where no one can come to help you. A place where I can do whatever I've wanted to do from the moment I saw you in that cafeteria to now." Jasper's voice was stern and cold, but Dani knew it was a mask. He was nothing but good.
"I am not afraid." Dani stated, taking a step closer to him. Her voice forceful as she tried to get him to understand. There was a pause, the wind blowing the leaves of the trees above them as well as Daniella's hair back from her face and neck.
"You should be." Jasper said, his emotionless voice not as suprising as she wished it would have been.
Jasper grabbed her quickly and tossed her onto his back, not giving her much time to process anything at her humanly speed.
"Hold on." He still cared for her. She wasn't going to be harmed while he was present. Daniella's grip tightens around him as he ran. The trees passed by them quickly and Dani's eyes couldn't keep up. She was amazed by the brown-eyed man's abilities. Dani couldn't get a good grip on reality for a moment, so before she knew it they were at the top of the mountain and she was back on her own two feet.
Dani's balance fails her as she falls to the ground. She was dizzy, and the adrenaline, the fear still rushing through her body made her hands shake and her heart to speed up. She looked around, aware that Jasper had disappeared.
"Jazz?" She muttered, her voice was quiet, she couldn't get herself to raise it yet.
Still in shock from recent events, Daniella stumbles up and holds onto a tree as she walks a little further into the meadow in front of her. As she takes a look around she comes to find Jasper standing, shirt open, in the shadows of the trees as he watched her cautiously. She goes to move toward him, but he's quick to raise a hand to stop her. Dani waited as he took a deep breath and stepped into the rays of the sun's light.
"This is the reason why we do not show ourselves in the sunlight.." As Jasper spoke, his skin began to reflect the light of the sun. It was as if diamonds had been stuck to his skin permanently. Jasper took the few steps that were left to stand in front of Daniella. "This is what I am." He finished, seeming to expect her to be disgusted by him...but she wasn't.
"You're perfect.." Dani says in awe. When Jasper realizes that Dani isn't disgusted by him and that she's reaching out to touch him, he steps back into the shadows of the trees.
"Perfect? I am a killer, Dani. This is the skin of a killer." He said, trying to get her to understand what he was. Daniella was upset that Jasper thought of himself so badly.
"I do not believe that." Daniella was angry, but she couldn't be angry with him.
"Because what you believe is the lie. The camouflage. I am the world's most dangerous predator, because everything about me invites you in," Jasper took steps away, but Dani followed him, "my voice, my face, even the way I smell..As if I needed any of that."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Dani asked. She was upset by his words and she couldn't tell if he meant them or not now.
"Are you afraid?" He asked her once again. In a moment of anger Daniella's answer changed.
"Yes." She said as she glared at the man in front of her.
"Good." Jasper seemed to think he had done what he was wanting to from the start, push her away. But she wasn't giving up that easily.
"No, I'm not afraid of you. The only reason I am afraid is because you are making me, Jasper." Daniella's voice was stern as she spoke to him.
Suddenly he was behind her, then infront of her. She gasped as she saw him by a tree a couple feet away. He was angry and so fast that she never saw him move he would only appear in the places around her.
"As if you could out run me." He yelled from the tree. Then he was right next to her, "As if you could fight me off.." His voice was softer, but as he ripped off a part of the tree's limbs and threw it against another tree farther away from them, she realized it was a predatorial tone. However, Daniella didn't even flinch. She held her stance on how she felt. Dani was unwavering.
"I am made to to kill." Jasper spoke looking into Daniella's eyes.
"I don't care." Dani says, full forced dismissal toward his statement in her tone.
"I have killed before." Jasper replied, trying, once again, to push her away for her own safety.
"Doesn't matter." Daniella shook her head slightly, never taking her eyes away from his.
"I wanted to kill you." Jasper admitted, his voice faltering just enough for Dani to catch it, "I've never wanted a human's blood so much in my entire existence....I'm dangerous for you, Daniella." He said, looking away from her recapturing gaze.
What Daniella says next not only suprised him, but it suprised her as well, "I trust you." She spoke, her head barely making sense of much at the moment. The words that left her lips caught her off guard. She hasn't trusted anyone since she was young, so how did she get to this point with Jasper?
"Don't." Jasper struggled with his words. They didn't match with what he was feeling and lying to Daniella, well, that might be harder for him to do than resisting the temptation of the crimson liquid flowing through her veins at every waking moment.
"I trust you, Jazz. Okay? I'm right here." Daniella sounded desperate. As if she was begging him not to leave her. She thought she sounded ridiculous. She barely even knew, the...man?, the man standing in front of her. Dani was attached and she knew it was bad now. She couldn't let him push her away, ever.
Daniella takes Jasper's hand into her own. Her warmth drawing Jasper in more and more. She was drawn to him and the closer they became, the less Jasper felt he was in control of himself. One minute he was there, then he was gone. Dani looked over to find Jasper across the little meadow trying to catch his breath, more like gaining his control back.
"Jasper?" She asked, taking a cautious step in his direction.
"You..you took me by suprise." Jasper admitted as he collected himself and took the last few steps toward Daniella. "I do not know how to... to do this." He said, seeming to finally accept that he would not be capable of pushing her away from him.
Daniella understood that it was going to take time for him to be around her comfortably. So she let him initiate the conversation and interactions between them.
"My family and I, we are...different from others of our kind. We're not travellers. We have our permanent home, here in Forks." Jasper started, informing Dani more about himself and Daniella was all for talking about Jasper and his family. Jasper's hand reached out and lightly took hers into his own two bigger hands as his eyebrows furrowed together at the warmth coming from the brunette in front of him. He shook his head, but continued, "But you..your scent, it is like a drug for me. You are like my own personal brand of heroin." He finished their gaze never faltering from each other's eyes.
A realization crossed Dani's mind at that moment, "I...I thought you hated me the first day." She spoke, shifting a piece of hair to lay behind her ear insecurely. Her eyes leaving his for a moment until he began to respond.
"I did." A sigh left him, then he continued, "For making me desire you so badly. I am still unsure if I will be able to control myself with you." Jasper's emotionless exterior was completely gone when it was just Daniella and him. He showed her himself, and when he realized that he had done it without even knowing, it seemed to clear his mind of any doubts he had left.
"I know you can, Jazz." She whispered softly to him. They were closer to each other than they had even been before. Jasper was utterly vulnerable as he searched Daniella's face for any sign of doubt, but it never appeared.
"I wish I was able to understand what it is that you see in me that is so good. You look at me with those honey, brown eyes..." Jasper was frustrated with the situation because he wasn't able to understand the emotions coming from her. "I cannot read your emotions. Tell me how you're feeling..."
"I'm scared." Daniella admitted. The words sent a shock through Jasper as he sank gracefully to the ground below them. He was devastated at the thought of her being frightened by him, but he could not blame her for it. "Good." The bitterness of his tone eligible for anyone to decipher.
Dani sat down in front of Jasper in the grass, "No, not of you. I'm scared...you'll disappear. That somehow, I'll lose you.." Daniella finally admitted to something she was trying to figure out this entire time.
Jasper was amazed by the brunette. He had waited, what seemed like forever, to feel for someone the way he felt for Daniella.
"You cannot imagine how long I have waited for you.."Jasper whispered as if someone or something could ruin the moment at anytime. They shared a small smile and Jasper reached toward her neck before pausing, "Be still."
Daniella stills her movements, watching as he shows an immense amount of control with her. His hand resting on her throat, so exposed and vulnerable. The rush of adrenaline flowing through them was overwhelming, knowing that if he lost control, for even a second, her life would be changed forever or she wouldn't have a life at all anymore. However, Daniella didn't dare move an inch. Jasper slowly glided his hand up to her cheek, then down to her chest laying just above where her heart sits in her chest, he felt the steady beating of her heart. Causing a foriegn feeling to arise within himself.
"And so the lion fell in love with the lamb.." Jasper mumbled.
"What a stupid lamb." Daniella muttered her reply.
"What a sick, masochistic lion." Jasper said, a small smirk covering his expression. They both fell into effortless laughter as they stayed close to each other.
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A/N: I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter it was one of my personal favorites to write. I have a few other favorites that'll be pointed out along the way as well. Stay tuned and comment what your favorite scene is of the Twilight Saga (I'm curious).
- xoxo Jaye