The relationship between the two sisters only continued to strain as time passed. And as the weeks bled into one another, no matter what Veronica tried she felt as though she only continued to hit a brick wall when it came to her older sister. The two sisters seemed completely unable to gel with one another. Their raging differences only became more and more evident and the lack of ability to relate to one another only continued to make it worse. And Veronica was slowly coming to terms that she would most likely only have to live with her sister for another complete year, until the older girl finished high school and headed off to college. A year which was going to be incredibly difficult but a year nevertheless. Bella had become unable to grow any form of relationship with a person who was not Edward Cullen. And for a while Veronica, and her father, had assumed that it was only like this because the two teenagers were in the throws of a new relationship. Yet as time continued to pass this was once again another thing which was proven otherwise. And it was not like Veronica knew her sister incredibly well, ever really, before she met Edward and therefore could not tell if the older girl had truly lost herself to this relationship. But she felt as though Bella had lost herself, even the little bit that Veronica did know. The pair remained inseparable even now as Veronica heard the scrawny boy climb his way into the attic bedroom, that Bella had eventually won when Veronica had enough of the constant arguments regarding the room, late at night when he assumed that everyone else was asleep. Edward was not very careful about climbing through the window of the topmost room often kicking panels of the house by accident on his way up.
And as Edward stayed at the forefront of the older sister's mind, the little boy slipped further and further to the back. Matthew continued to be left behind in his birth mother's life having to focus more and more on those around him to step in and support him. Charlie had continued to support the baby as though he was his grandfather, a incredibly involved grandfather but that was all. That was all Charlie provided as he continued on with the naive thought that one day Bella would have an epiphany and return to her son's life ready to be the mother she should have been from the beginning. Veronica could no longer just play an overly supportive aunt. The rose coloured lenses had been ripped from her face the more and more she argued with her older sister. When Bella had last blown up at them both blaming Charlie for her not being involved in Matthew's life, Veronica had lost any hope that her older sister would ever want anything to do with her birth son. And therefore, Matthew seemed to no longer have any parental figure. She blamed it on her own Hero Complex, but Veronica found herself stepping out of the aunt role and into the mother role. Wanting Matthew to have one parent who loved him unconditionally just like she had. Because she had learnt that she did not need both parents not when she had her dad, and therefore, in the back of her mind she gathered that at least if Matthew had her then he too could lead a decent life.
She was willing to fool herself as much as it took in order to get through whatever life threw at them from now on. Fool herself into thinking that she was ready to step up into this role. That she was able to care for a baby when she knew little to nothing about caring for one, when she could barely care for herself. But she had come to the horrible realisation that if she didn't do it, nobody else seemed bothered. Her dad tried but it wasn't enough. Her dad struggled to look after Matthew whilst he was still trying to do something about Bella, of which he still remained incredibly unable to do anything about. And continued to run around and around in circles. Renee hadn't contacted much since Bella and Matthew had moved to Forks a few months prior, so she would not be someone who would be able to lend a hand. And that left Veronica.
With Bella preoccupied with Edward and the entire Cullen family, Veronica had to start outsourcing her support. She found herself incapable of turning to her older sister for help, even when it did not involve Matthew. Bella was no help for even the small things, whether it be helping her pick an outfit for an important event or help out with school work when it was difficult. And with her dad caught up with the increased dangerous animal activity in the area, increased overall case load at work and attempting to get legal documents sorted for Matthew, she could not ask for his help either. And therefore, Veronica turned to the one other place she often found solace in. The Reservation just 10 minutes down the road housed a community which had been very welcoming to her for many years now. And therefore, upon mentioning she had been struggling with a few areas of school, they had been able to provide her with not one but two people who would be able to tutor her. Something that she had been unable to find at her own school, that her friends on the Softball team had been unable to offer. Leah Clearwater was the first person to have offered help by being a tutor. She was a few years older than Veronica at 19, and doing an English course via distant learning at one of the Seattle colleges, and therefore had been more than happy to help the girl out with her high school class work. Leah had used it as a distraction from her crumbling relationship and social life and Veronica had been happy for both the help and the gossip. Feathers had been ruffled when the other tutor came forward, Emily Young was someone that Veronica did not know well personally, but she knew well through rumours. Emily had only recently moved to the Reservation about 9 months prior but she had an eventful 9 months, having found herself a boyfriend been attacked by a bear and survived and having brought herself a rather nice little two bed cabin house. And with her two new tutor's Veronica finally found herself actually passing most classes.
Her other support came in the shape of her overly charming best friend. Jacob Black was never far away when Veronica was visiting, or when she just needed a little bit of help. She knew not how he managed to do so, but often before she even admitted to herself that she needed someone he was there, ready to do whatever was needed. Whether it be to give her a little while respite from Matthew just so she could get something done, to being the emotional support when things were just not going right. Whatever it was, Jacob was there. Always ready to listen, always ready to fight when she just couldn't. He knew herself to be blessed to have him, knowing that they put equal amounts into the relationship. Or at least she hoped they did. Therefore, when she called him once again in a state of unknown emotion, she was no longer surprised that even without thinking she had reached out to him.
This time however, was slightly different to the times beforehand when she had reached out for the boy's help. This time it did not feel like some silly little thing she was asking for help for. This time felt a lot bigger. As she recalled the words her older sister had spat to her, to her father and most importantly to Matthew she waited for an outside opinion. To make her feel as though she was not going insane. That her conclusions were irrational. And as the familiar sound of his truck backfiring pulled up onto the front porch and the door unlocked with the key copy no-one was sure how he obtained Veronica had never been happier to see a familiar face. She had spent the 10 minutes it had taken him to travel the distance between their houses, pacing around the kitchen baby attached to her hip muttering nonsense as to not scare the little man. Matthew, remained oblivious to what was going on around him, considering it was rather late in the evening, and not far off the time he would usually be fast asleep he was hopefully under the impression that he was just been helped to go to sleep.
Jacob was quick to survey his surroundings as he entered the kitchen where the three remaining inhabitants of the house were. He had got only minimal information from Veronica when she had called him, enough to know that Bella had run off somewhere after having spoken in a much ruder manner than ever before hand. Something that had been enough to not only shock but upset Veronica. Jake was able to take a good look at Charlie Swan as he first entered the house. Charlie out of all of them seemed the worst off. With a beer bottle in his hand, and two discarded empty ones on the kitchen table just a few inches to the left of him. His gun sat only feet away on the table and Jacob had to wonder exactly what had gone down.
"Hey buttercup, lemme take Matty." Jacob spoke as calmly as he could as he reached out for the infant. The pair quickly swapping possession of the child with an efficiency which could only have been gained after practice after practice over a long period of time. He held the infant just off his hip tightly as to ensure the boy did not slip from his grasp. Matthew was quick to cuddle in, a behaviour which would have usually made Jacob coo in response, but considering the situation at present did not really state this to be appropriate he chose to do otherwise.
"Hey little man how's it going?" He spoke to the infant before bouncing him slightly.
"Do you want to talk about what happened?" He turned his attention back to his best friend keeping the soft and calm tone as to not seem as though he was forcing her to respond. But he knew he needed to get some form of answer from her as he could not help if he did not know what was wrong or had happened in the first place.
"Bella's left forks." Was Veronica's short and very blunt response it was almost as if she was trying to still make sense of the situation.
"What do you mean Bella has left forks?" Jacob tried to run it through his head as well not understanding how the other slightly older teen could just up and leave. Well he supposed he did slightly considering she could drive and did have a truck of her own. But he didn't understand considering how much she had thrown into her current relationship how she could just leave unless something horrible had happened and she needed out.
"Something sudden must of happened. She came in and immediately started packing her belongings. Going on and on about how she needed to get out of here. Something must have happened between her and Edward, I'm worried about her safety if I'm being honest." Veronica mumbled the last part as she chose what to say next. "Her and dad started fighting about her leaving, he wanted her to sleep on it and in the morning he would help her get out drive her to wherever Renee is at the moment. But she turned on him again saying something about not wanting to be stuck here like our mom was. Dad asked about Matthew and god she said some horrible horrible things about him." Veronica didn't want to repeat what Bella had said about Matthew, amongst denouncing him as her son, something Veronica was not surprised about, the other things Bella had said were much, much worse.
"What's got you so upset Buttercup, I thought her words were just starting to not effect you anymore." Jacob remained gentle as he probed for just a little bit more information.
"I'm not sure really. Maybe it was the way she spoke about Matthew, I'm used to her denouncing him as her son, but the words she chose I don't even want to repeat them." Veronica looked Jacob in the eyes and he knew from the look he was receiving that it was not worth asking again, and he didn't particularly want to hear those words.
"Okay, that's fine. And so what if she is only his birth mother. He doesn't need her in his life acting as his mother. He's got so many around him who step up and into that place that it's irrelevant." Jacob reshuffled his hold on Matthew before moving to pull Veronica into him as well.
"Both of you will never be alone, I promise you that." Jacob tagged on as the trio remained embraced for just a little longer. Before he turned to the only real adult in the room. "Get in here Charlie can't leave you all left out alone." And the group hug became four.
*EDITED JANURARY 2023*