we are loving, bleeding, conscious things / [...] and we are living/breathing
Mesita, "Living/Breathing"

10. Epilogue

Jessica was in Cancún. Angela in Kentucky, visiting relatives. Mike was still in Forks, working shifts at Newton Outfitters.

Edward was gone.

The Cullens vanished in a swirl of fog, it seemed. The day I realized this felt like a birthday morning. Like when you turn ten, or thirteen, or eighteen. And it doesn't feel like you're older, or more mature, or responsible all of a sudden. And you're ten, thirteen, and eighteen, at the same time. When Jacob casually mentioned on an unexpectedly sunny morning that the Cullens had left Forks forever, thus rendering the vampire-werewolf treaty needless, I merely blinked in response.

It didn't resonate with me in the way I'd expected. I didn't feel compelled to visit their house, just to check if it was unoccupied.

Perhaps I was simply growing up.

So did Charlie. He and Sue learnt to cope with the burdens each carried. They took care of each other. Healed scars and licked at wounds. It was a delicate situation, but, on the final days of my stay at Forks, I saw it: a steady glow in his eyes and a smile that lit up the whole house.

"Bells," he told me one chilly evening, as we sipped tea on the porch, huddled in sweaters and jackets, "I think your old man is gonna be all right after all."

My eyes travelled across the peaks of the pines in the distance that were illuminated by moonlight and starlight. The cancerous paleness of the moon spilled a silver spotlight onto an invisible spot of the woodland. "Are you sure?" I asked eventually.

"Positive." A beat. "I can't let you waste away here." He peered at me and offered a smile. Upon my confused look, he sighed. "All I wanted to do in my life was to become a police officer."

I arched an eyebrow. "And you did."

"Yes. Yes, I did."

"But you're not happy."

There was a longer pause now. The moments stretched into minutes, and Charlie eyed the oak on our loan thoughtfully, casting an occasional glance at me. "It isn't that . . . nah, it isn't that. I just never got a chance to— to leave. It was eighteen years in Forks, then Seattle for college, then Forks again." There was a hint of sadness in his voice that strained it, as though it was barely contained.

Perhaps now I understood his bitterness for Renée; she'd left, for good.

"Dad," I said, setting my cup on the low table pushed against the wall, beside the door. "Life doesn't end at forty. You can retire, and then . . . life is yours."

Charlie smiled mirthlessly. "You really want this, don't you?"

I felt my lips quirk into a small smile. "Yes. I have it figured out. Travel with Jacob, then community college, then UDub — like you, Dad — and I can write in the meantime, too."

Charlie nodded. "Life is yours," he echoed. He picked up my cup from the table and slipped into the house. I heard the flick of a light switch.

The first stop was Jacksonville: waves crashing into fine sand, sunlight spilling over back lawns. I stood in the driveway of Renée's house — Jacob was waiting in the car — mapping out what I would tell her.

"Are you gonna stay there all day? 'Cause the sun's pretty intense, and the Dodge isn't exactly famed for its AC system."

I spun around and found him leaning against the hood of the truck. The new truck, I reminded myself. It had been quite some time now, since we'd traded the Chevy for the Dodge — the red tetanus express for the blue one — but it still felt a bit strange. Like it wasn't mine yet. "Why don't you join me?"

Jacob grinned and, with a swift leap, he was beside me. "Wanna introduce me to Mom and . . . step-dad?"

"Phil's not here, actually. He's off to Philly for a game."

Jacob snorted with laughter. "Get outta here."

"No, really." I hesitated before the door, my hand hovering inches from the bell. Why was I so nervous? Oh, right. Because I fled from Forks, and drove across the states, and never called.

The bell rang.

Steps echoed.

The door opened.

And I was crushed between my mother's arms. My mother, who was small and slender and shrunk at the sight of a tennis ball hurled her way. My mother, who was always more of a best friend to me than a motherly figure, kissing my hair and whispering into the brown strands.

"Hi, Mom."

"Are you into sports, Jacob? You look like an athlete, if you ask me."

Jacob winked at me, his grin wide and warm. "Let's say I enjoy running. My brothers and I do that a lot — a lot of space."

Renée nodded, smiling, too. "I don't know if Bella's told you, but Phil — my husband — is a baseball player."

"Yes, I've heard."

"He's in Philadelphia now. I would go with him, but you called, and. . . ." She snuffled and blinked all too quickly, as though she wanted to prevent the tears from sliding down her face.

It was four days ago.

My suitcase — I was packing a real suitcase, not a small backpack — was nearly filled to the brim with T-shirts and shorts, and sweaters and jeans, and even a swimsuit and a sarong. I'd picked up those in Port Angeles. Charlie had been awkwardly pacing across the store, while I'd been trying on them, not much more comfortable than him.

It was then when Charlie walked into my bedroom, cordless phone in hand and a steady look of determination in his eyes. He pressed the phone into my hand, Renée's number already dialed.

"Hello?"

"Mom?"

"Bells!"

The obligatory pause was not as awkward as I'd expected.

"How are you doing?"

She didn't respond instantly. "All right. Phil's leaving for Philadelphia tomorrow. Big game next in a few days."

"Are you going, too?"

"Well—"

"Because I was thinking of coming over," I blurted out.

"O— Over? Over where?"

"Jacksonville."

"You're coming to Jacksonville?" Her voice was slightly shrill now.

"Is that okay?"

"Oh, honey. Oh, baby, it's more than okay."

Flash-forward to today. Renée was still sitting beside me, blinking vigorously, eyes trained on her wine glass; she took one long sip.

Jacob cleared his throat; I kicked him under the table.

"Mom?" I asked tentatively. Renée placed the glass on the table. A little too brusquely. The crimson liquid undulated in its ceilingless prison, and some of it managed to slip out of the glass altogether, staining the linen tablecloth. Her expression was unreadable. "Mo—"

"I'm all right," my mother replied, her voice threatening to become a whisper.

Jacob winced. He set his fork beside a piece of beef. Leftovers in Jacob Black's plate. I wanted to laugh.

I didn't. I merely looked at my mother, who wiped her chin, even though there were no remnants of the beef or the wine, and pushed her chair back.

"I'd better get something to clean this mess. Otherwise it won't—" Her voice cracked. "—leave."

Hours later, after the sun had hidden in the Atlantic, I left a snoring Jacob in the guest room and tiptoed to Renée's bedroom. She lay on her bed, over the covers, still wearing her cut offs. She appeared to be reading a book, though, upon closer inspection, it turned out her eyes were skimming over the same sentence over and over.

She didn't look up right away.

"I'm sorry, okay?"

Renée closed the book and set it aside; her lips stretched into a smile as she met my gaze. "For what?"

I sat on the foot of the bed, resting my hands on my lap. "You must've been so worried. I'm sorry. I was all right, everything was all right. But I didn't think, I just wasn't thinking—" All the thoughts I hadn't made, all the thoughts I should have made . . . It all came surging into my head, like a giant wave, and there was no way to escape it.

"Sweetie . . . Sweetie, are you crying?"

My throat throbbed with all the words that had desperately been trying to claw their way out for so long — so long that they left scars like half-moons in their wake. So I opened my mouth to finally speak them and found them slowly dissipating in the air, spiraling like acrid smoke; I shook my head instead.

"It's all right, honey. Who am I to tell you how to live your life?"

My mother hugged me for the second time that day, and all I could think was how at home this felt.

The following afternoon, sitting on a Florida beach, our heads leaning into each other, Jacob and I watched the sun dip into the ocean, casting brilliant colors into the canvas of the sky. A violescent and orange and golden painting of inestimable value.

I still didn't know where we stood. It was a comfortable place, though; I could nestle in this vague blur of shelter for as long as I needed. For as long as we both needed.

My hand lingered over my heart, where the hole had thrived for so long. It was healed now. What was left of it was an invisible scar — I could almost feel it through my shirt, over my alive, beating heart. I grinned at the setting sun.

Maybe it was not forever that was awaiting me. But it was now, and now was good.

the end