Chapter Sixteen Part One

Bella

I couldn't believe that Jared had been in a car wreck. But I knew it was the truth, I could feel the pain in my body. I knew it in my heart.

I curled in on myself, not talking to anyone as the tears rolled down my cheeks. Jared would be the fourth person I have lost because of a car accident.

That pain was enough to kill me, but I knew if he was dead, I wouldn't be far behind him. Of course I only knew this from my brother telling me.

"Jacob, what if he isn't ok?" I sobbed out on my brother's shoulder. This was the first time I had ever shown weakness around anyone since the wreck. I wasn't proud of it, it was a sign feelings were coming back into my body, and I really didn't know if I was ready for them.


"He's not severely hurt, we know that." He said it like it was the easiest thing in the world to say.


"And how the hell would you know that?" I snapped.


Jake sighed and looked at me with sad eyes, the tears in his eyes threatening to spill over. "Bella, if Jared was severely hurt or killed, you would feel it. You two share the same pain, the same feelings. When you are away from the person who imprinted, you won't feel complete. You'll fill like part of you is missing, and if you think about it, it's the truth. If Jared died, you would feel it, you would feel your body slowly shut down. It's part of the imprint."

I cried as I remembered that day that was a week ago. I missed Jared more then I would like to admit. My soul could feel that he wasn't by me, around me, touching me, loving me.

I stayed curled up in my bed the whole time. Only eating when forced, and only leaving the bed to run towards the bathroom to throw up what little bit of food I was forced to eat.

Everyone kept telling me everything was alright; Jared is fine and will come back. My response to them was to shut the fuck up and leave me alone.

Nothing was alright, nor would it be. Jared was hurt; only God knows where, and I couldn't do anything but feel helpless.

Even worse yet, it felt like my whole life was a lie. I felt like since I was giving some sort of love to Jared, everything James and I had was nothing but lies. It felt like I was cheating on him, like I betrayed him. I know he isn't here, physically, but mentally he was.

Every time I closed my eyes, I would see a happy Jared, with a family and me sitting on the front porch. Then it would shift to a sad and heartbroken James. The tears in his eyes, his body slumped in defeat, I would always end up opening my eyes, just to get away from the image. Needless to say, I wasn't sleeping very well.

"Bella, how are you feeling?" I heard Billy by my door.

"Why do you care?" I snapped.

He sighed and rolled himself into my room. I quickly sat up and backed into the corner. I wanted as far away from him as possible.

"Bella, I need to tell you something." I rolled my eyes, not in the mood for this shit.

"Why would I care? You left! You left me and mom like garbage on the side of the fucking road!" I screamed. I watched as he shook his head.

"No Bella. Your mother took you away, she left, not me. I wanted to keep you. I didn't want you to leave. You see, I fell in love with Renee when we were younger. We were young and crazy, and passionate. I planned on marrying her. We found out she was pregnant with you, and pushed the wedding back until you were born. Then after that, Renee said the time wasn't right, she wanted you to be older, and we should spend as much time with you when you were young as possible."

"I, of course, listened to her. It wasn't until the day that I came home to see her packing her small car with both of your stuff. She had met another guy, and was running off with you."

"You could have stopped her, or fought for me!"

"I tried. Your mother was always good at getting what she wanted and when she wanted it. She knew that I was a werewolf, and that she couldn't tell anyone. She told me that if I fought for you, or ever tried to find you again, she would expose me and the tribe. I knew she would do it, so I painfully moved on."

I sat there thinking of everything. I knew my mother was good at getting what she wanted, but could she really be this horrible? Enough to keep a father from his child?

I knew the answer, yes. She kept me from knowing that Phil wasn't my real father, only adopted one.

Billy turned and wheeled out of my room when I didn't say anything. I sat there shocked.

I felt my body start to tremble, and I was sweeting horribly. My body was screaming at me to just walk, move around and stretch.

I stood up and groaned as my body was mixed with pain and pleasure. It felt good to have all my bones crack, but then again, it hurt like a bitch.

I slid my window open, and slowly crawled out. The fresh misty air felt great on my overheated body.

I started my way towards the beach, just walking. I cleared my mind and just let my feet do my thinking.

As my feet hit the sand, they worked their way east towards the trees. I knew it wasn't a good idea, but did so anyway.

My mind wondered to what it would feel like to be with Jared. Could I really let go and move on? Act like James never existed and move on with my life?

I knew I would never forget James, but moving on made me feel like he didn't exist. I had lived with this pain for so long, I was ready to just let it out.

My feet started to get tired and I looked around me for the first time. There were trees everywhere, but I expected that being in the middle of a damn forest.

There were a couple of flowers, and I could hear the birds in the distance squawking. I turned around and groaned; I was lost.

I let out a loud scream from being frustrated. It felt so good, I threw in another scream. I screamed at the top of my lungs.

"Why me? What the fuck did I ever do to you?"

Salt water fell into my mouth, making me realize that I was crying. My legs gave out, making me fall to the ground. I didn't know if my knees gave out from not eating very much causing lack of energy, or lack of energy from walking around for hours and getting lost.

I let out another scream, this time I wasn't for sure what it was for, but it felt good.

My scream was cut short when I saw the grass move. I looked around, but there was no wind. My attention was brought to a spot when I heard a twig snap.

"Wh…who's there?"