I am back already?! It's exciting to be writing during school :)
Writing has gotten a lot easier because I got a new phone with slide to type 🤗
Chapter song- Close by Nick Jonas and Tove Lo
WARNING: this chapter gets sad
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Jasper couldn't help the smile quirking his lips as he cheerfully followed the girls through the department store. Mary could hardly be seen from the tall racks of clothing, Rosalie was up in the fray right with her, and Bella hung back with him. It was a little sweet that Rose stuck with them on these trips since she often went on extravagant trips to other countries when she shopped alone.
His sister sorely stuck out among the clientele, although Jasper was sure that he wasn't doing much better. People were staring at him, either horny or curious or fearful, but it hardly touched his mood.
The dance was approaching and his girls were getting ramped up for it. Mary had spent an extra five hours at the school yesterday decorating the gym with one of her committees while Rose had handed her an entire DJ studio stand preloaded with almost every song imaginable. Now, two days before the big event, the girls had the critical mission of finally picking the dresses out.
The only one extremely underwhelmed by the entire process was Bells. She'd been excited when she'd still liked Angela, but Jasper wasn't sure if the girl had even realized that her feelings had changed yet. He himself wasn't sure how the drastic change had occurred, but now his friend radiated depression and boredom.
She was leaning against his arm, face uptilted towards the artificial lights as though they could revive her. Her scent was causing him to drool venom a little bit, but he was so used to the instinctive reaction that he thought nothing of it. "Are you still going to that party?"
Lauren Mallory's after party to the dance, the one that Angela had begged Bella to take her to. Although they weren't openly gay, apparently it wasn't uncommon for same sex friends to go to dances together nowadays. Angela's father had been so thrilled that he wouldn't have to worry about a boy that he was missing the bigger picture.
Bella was starting to get annoyed by the need for secrecy, but once again Jasper knew that she was trying desperately to ignore it.
"Yeah, even though you and Mary aren't invited so I'm not even entirely sure why Ange wants to go so bad."
"Don't sweat it, we don't care. Mary's practically gitty that you are going somewhere without her forcing you to." Jasper did the best to keep his voice neutral even when Mary's beautiful face peeked out of the sea of dresses to smile at him. His undead heart stuttered.
The gesture didn't go unnoticed by Bella and it cheered her up slightly. "You've made her so happy. I never thought I'd see it."
"Wasn't she always happy before, anyway?" He couldn't help but be surprised because in his mind, she was the constant source of happiness and vibrancy that he had become thoroughly addicted to.
"Yeah," She watched her younger sister with eyes that seemed to see more than even Jasper could, "she's always been relatively cheerful, but our world has always just been the two of us. It made her, a natural social butterfly, feel a little stifled. Now she has it all."
They both fell into silence and Jasper couldn't help but to think of a future where they'd keep aging and he'd stay the same. It was a conundrum that Edward, if he hadn't run off somewhere, would be gleeful to remind all of the Cullens.
He resolved to only worry about it once it started effecting Mary. Borrowing trouble hardly seemed worth the heartbreak.
The rest of the week passed in a slow drum towards the dance on Saturday. The only break from the ordinary was when Mary insisted on a 'dress rehearsal' for the two of them since she was still angry that he hadn't let her pick out his tux. It'd been kind of cute to make her angry so he saw no harm in playing dress up for her.
"Come on out Jazz!" She demanded through the crack of his bedroom door. He could hear the impatient clicking of a tiny heel as his little lady paced.
"Calm down, I've been dressing myself longer than you've been alive." He teased as he did up his last button.
"Yeah, in all black for all I can tell." She sighed as he finally opened the door. But when she caught sight of him, her beautiful emerald eyes went huge and her mouth popped open. Her little princess- styled copper dress clashed with her dark, spiky hair and eyes. Her four-inch heels barely brought her to Jasper's shoulder.
He crossed the room to her, stopping about two feet back to give her time to inspect. "Do I pass muster?" He was somewhat worried that he'd fucked up her color-scheme and that's why all he felt from her was shock.
Wordlessly, she nodded with a big blush coming across her face. And then her feelings hit him and he then understood. Before he could open his mouth and smugly brag on his success, she flung herself at him and pressed her lips to his.
Dammit, but he had to find a way to not always have his girl be the one initiating their kisses. It looked pansy as hell even if he did love it.
Smiling against her mouth. "I did good, didn't I?" He murmured.
She broke their kiss for a second to smile wildly up at him. "I might allow you to dress yourself for future events."
He laughed even as they got more swept up into each other.
"What in the world are you thinking about?" Emmett wondered as he shrugged his tux jacket over his massive shoulders. They'd both decided to hang out together before the dance; mainly because Esme and Rose were a thunderstorm of activity around the house and it was beginning to even make Emmett nervous.
"Nothing much."
"Uh huh." Emmett's doubt brushed against Jasper's senses. "Are we picking up the girls?"
"Just Mary." Bella was driving Angela in the pick-up.
They both began the slow trek up from their basement 'man cave' that Esme had relinquished from her decorating. Once they got up the stairs, it wasn't very much of a surprise to see Rosalie typing a million words per minute on her cell phone. "Are we good to go?" She asked without looking up from her task.
Both men nodded meekly even as Esme shoved a camera into Rose's hands. "Get pictures of everything. All of you together, Mary's dress, and Bella's, got it?" The command seemed uncharacteristically threatening with its intensity.
The blonde bombshell saluted their mother figure as they walked out of the door.
It all passed in a blur as they picked up an overly excited Mary, snapped pictures for Charlie, and walked into the gym that now more closely resembled a gorgeous banquet hall.
"Pretty great, right?" Marry grinned up at him even as music pumped around them. Rose and Emmett slipped off and she was already putting her arms around him.
"Every other dance, remember our deal?" Even as their bodies swayed Jasper knew he'd end up caving. They danced through almost every song without stopping, Jasper only sitting down when a group of girls ambushed Mary to gossip. Just as he cracked back his shoulders in one of his 'tics' he'd developed to look more human, he noticed Bella and Angela standing awkwardly across the room in an isolated corner.
"C'mon Bella, I promised Lauren that we would be there! I know all of this seems strange but it really does seem like she's trying to make it up to you." The taller girl stared down at her girlfriend intensely.
Bella ran a hand down her face as though they'd had the same argument before. "Why does a promise to Lauren mean so much to you?" Her voice was raw.
Angela blushed. "We grew up together. Her family goes to our church, she used to be my friend so I at least owe her a second chance now."
Jasper's eyes narrowed at that and was more than a little surprised at the normally gentle girl's passion. Bella, always so perceptive, didn't seem to notice as she bit her lip indecisively. She threw her hands up. "Alright, Ange, I'll stop fighting this. But I'm only staying for an hour."
"Jazz. Are you eavesdropping?" Mary grinned down at him while she held out a hand. A slow dance was on and she obviously hadn't let him off the hook yet.
"Maybe." He forgot all about what he just witnessed as he appreciated her copper earrings that went with her dress. It looked great with her short hair and somehow made her even prettier.
He didn't let her go until the music stopped.
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Charlie Swan's heart stopped when he heard the address of the call. "The Mallory's place?" He pulled a 180 in his police cruiser, desperate to get into the right direction.
"Yes, Chief. Reported assault on an underage girl, ambulances on the way. No description of perp or the condition of victim."
Bella said that she was going to that party.
Ignoring the impossible nightmare because that's the only way he'd be able to function, Charlie drove and forced himself into a professional frame of mind. His training was the best way to respond for everyone involved. Whether or not that was his little girl...
He yanked himself out of that thought again as he arrived at the Mallory residence. His men were working on securing the scene of the crime, which was apparently a little off in the backyard where a scattering of a few trees were. He didn't remember walking there or barking out orders, but he did. It looked as though the Mallorys had made an outdoor area with a fire pit, a great feature for a party like this.
The paramedics were loading up the victim and at first all he could see was shoulder-length, curly hair. The right color, but wrong length... Charlie's panic lessened.
It can't be Bella, her hair is so much longer than that! Even as he felt the punch of visceral joy that his daughter was okay, the yellow medical stretcher pitched on the uneven ground, giving him a view of the victim's pale face.
Chief Charlie Swan fell to his knees.
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Dr. Carlisle Cullen smoothed a gentle hand over Bella's skin, regretting the bruised flesh and the tube shoved down her throat, forcing the girl to breath. It had taken hours to stabilize her to this extent, and they were waiting on the brain scans that held all the weight to the family waiting. Dread gathered in the pit of his stomach at the unthinkable.
That this happened in Forks of all places and to one of the Swan girls, it seemed impossible. He'd asked his staff to give him some time with the girl before he spoke to Mary and Charlie. But the extra time wasn't to prepare himself for the worst, it was to investigate.
He hadn't spent centuries honing his medical skills for nothing. He scanned the patient's body for anything that could be useful for a police report or his family, anything distinguishable or telling.
Her skin was mottled with bruises from blunt trauma. It was impossible to tell where one blow originated and another began. The color of the bruises were completely even, which implied the perfectly distributed force more akin to a machine than that of a human.
Her face was completely untouched, save a traumatic blow to the back of her head.
That hadn't bled, but had undoubtably caused a brain bleed to complement the internal bleeding already caused by a pierced lung from a broken rib.
Since it had mostly been Bella's torso and not her face that had taken the trauma, Carlisle's eyes widened. There hadn't been even a speck of blood on the girl. Her attacker hadn't gone after her face because the nose, mouth, head were more likely to bleed externally from punches.
Humans almost always attacked the face unless extremely detached from the situation. But the impossibly even, mechanical abuse with a lack of blood?
Carlisle gave the girl one last look before exiting the room quickly. He remained with his back to the door, unwilling to chance leaving her entirely, and flipped open his phone. "Jasper, get to the hospital and don't let Mary out of your sight."
"... The blood, Carlisle." His son's voice, both so angry and anguished and ashamed, rang out to him. "I won't be able to handle that much blood."
The doctor cursed himself as he realized that his son was undoubtedly right. Jasper had improved in impressive bounds over the past few months, but was still nowhere close to being able to handle the amount of blood in an emergency room. "Send Rosalie and Esme down, I need you to investigate the crime scene without being caught. It's vamps, take Emmett with you and be careful." Even as he snapped the phone closed, the pacifist in Carlisle shuddered at the potential bloodshed that his son would cause.
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I sat beside Charlie with his hand crushed in my own. Each breath I took came with an image and I could hardly stare at my own high heels without skittering into a vision. Always the same one with Bella's bloodied eyes and pleading words as I disappeared into the void.
But juxtaposed on top of that vision was another, another of a grey, grey day where Rene, Charlie, and I put my beloved sister in the ground forever.
Faced with this, sobs wracked my body and Dad dragged me close and hugged me tight to him. "She'll be all right, it's okay..."
I just cried harder. Even as I resolved to save Bells no matter the cost.
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What ya think? ☹️
Sorry for the cliffhanger but it's got me pretty worried too...
Disclaimer: if my sister or mom read this they'd laugh their asses off because they're medical professionals, so sorry if the hospital scene was super bad lol
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I'm also working on another project I'll be posting soon!
-rednight73