"Thunder Cake" - Fic Exchange Story
After much agonizing, bloodletting, and hair-pulling, this story is complete. I have to say that "Thunder Cake" has been the most challenging piece I've ever written, and honestly, I still don't think I got it completely right. Depsite of all that (because of all that), I've grown incredibly attached to it, and I have to thank runningsissors for giving me such intriguing prompts to work with. And thank you, soul_beguiled , for organizing this amazing event. I can't wait to see the stories that get turned out.
Title: Thunder Cake
Author: Majesta Moniet
Rating: T (underage drinking)
Warnings: This story was cut-out by Matisse, reconstructed by Picasso, and wept over by Majesta Moniet. That being said, don't expect a work of art. Collaborations are always messy. (And they ate all of the cake.)
Summary: But the memory of a too-tall cliff, an ethereal boy’s voice, and an insistent pounding between her shoulder blades is proof that hearts don’t really break; sometimes you just leave them somewhere you shouldn’t.
Written for: runningsissors
Prompts: 1) Plastic Cups 2) Thunder 3) Playing more confident than one really feels
What they didn’t want to see: 1) childhood/future-set fics 2) cliches 3) panties, or lust, or any other word in relation to that found in a novel written for sixty-year-old women
Beta: latetolove
Double-Checker: thankthatstar
Note: The children's book "Thunder Cake" was written by Patricia Polacco.
Banner by the lovely and talented lilabut .
Thunder Cake
The air is thick. Damp and cool against her skin, it whips through the open window, and Bella is tempted to close her eyes and let the coming storm wash over her, to let the electricity comb her hair and the wind kiss her eyelids. She knows the drive by heart. And although her heart feels particularly delicate today, it knows the way home regardless-it doesn’t get lost as easily as it used to.
Turning into the reservation causes her breaths to quicken, her fingers to tap, her stomach to drop. The dreadful thrill makes her think too much too quickly and she arrives at his house faster than she should.
The old red Chevy is as petulant and boisterous as ever, and its grumblings couldn’t go unnoticed by every person within a half a mile radius, never mind every werewolf. The sound makes her wince. It feels like she’s executing a sneak attack with a fog horn blaring in one hand and a neon, flashing sign in the other.
She’s never been subtle though.
As clumsy with her feelings as she is with her feet, Bella has never been able to contain. To organize, compartmentalize, and fasten emotions where they’re most secure, where they belong-inside. More often than not, she fumbles and they spill out and over and through until they soak her sleeve and there’s nothing to do but wear it cautiously.
Today, Bella woke up drenched.
Jacob’s house is small, red, old, and perfect. But as she kills the engine and nervously fingers the keychain dangling from the ignition, she notes that this afternoon it looks particularly small, particularly red, particularly old, and particularly perfect. She’s never actually wished for her much-despised camera before this moment. This could be the last time she sees it for months or-because her mood is apocalyptic-ever.
The door groans its discouragement as she forces it open and stumbles onto the front lawn-turned-turned-gallows to the sound of wind whipping through the wind chime on the front porch. Nervously, Bella glances up at the thick blanket of pink choking the sky and shudders.
She sees the red house, the red truck and the red sky and wonders if she should just rip out her heart and throw it on the ground while it’s still her choice.
But the memory of a too-tall cliff, an ethereal boy’s voice, and an insistent pounding between her shoulder blades is proof that hearts don’t really break; sometimes you just leave them somewhere you shouldn’t.
She’s halfway to the front door when something solid crunches beneath her right foot, and she jumps back, startled. She looks down and frowns at the cracked plastic cup. It’s small, and defenseless, and a complete eyesore, and she can’t remember any other time she’s come across litter on the Reservation. So she picks it up.
And then her nose wrinkles. The cup smells like beer. Cheap beer.
A glance around and Bella notices that there are several cups scattered about, the bright blue and green plastic nestled in the grass like Easter eggs. While debating whether or not to pick up another one to check and see if they all reek, she somehow makes it to the front door and raises her fist to knock before shaking her head and just twisting the knob. This may very well be the last time she has girlfriend privileges to do little things like breaking and entering, so figures she should take advantage of it while she can, while she still has the right.
And she does still have the right.
Two steps into the house and she’s sprawling forward, the crushed cup flying from her hand as to attempt to brace herself for what was certain to be a painful meet-and-greet with the wood floor. But at the last moment she’s hauled backward so she lands half-sprawled in a warm lap.
A deep, beer-stained voice exhales against her ear. “Hey, Bella.”
“Hey, Quil.”
His chin is on her shoulder, so she can’t turn to look at him. But she can see his large arms wrapped loosely around her waist and their slightly tangled legs.
She clears her throat. “What are you doing on the floor?” Right in front of the door.
“Trapping you.”
Logical enough, she figures, and she really isn’t sure what more she’s hoping to glean when she asks, “Why?”
“To keep you trapped.”
“Because…”
“Buying Jacob some time.”
Her fingers curl painfully into Quil’s jeans. “Why? Is he…” There’s an awful constricting feeling in her chest as the air can’t seem to decide if it’s coming or going-a gasp or a scream? “Is he with someone?”
His head bobs against her shoulder. “Yeah.”
“Who?” There’s a nameless, faceless girl, who is more, more, more-more beautiful, more lovable, more Quileute-than Bella could ever hope to be, somewhere in the house with Jacob-her boyfriend, yes, still her boyfriend, still her Jacob until she’s told otherwise-and probably somewhere in his room, and the only thing in his room is his bed, and-
“Embry.”
-and she has a guy’s name. Pretty girls with masculine names always seem even prettier than they would be if they were named ‘Tiffani’ or ‘Megan’ because the irony is alluring so-
“They’re trying to destroy the evidence.”
-so they’ve been doing something they shouldn’t have-because Jacob is still her boyfriend, even if she wants to kick him in the teeth at the moment-and they’ve being doing it Jacob’s house, in his room, on his bed. Jacob and Embry having been doing it-
Jacob and…Embry.
Embry is a boy’s name. Bella knows a boy named Embry. So does Jacob. Maybe…
“Embry Call?”
Quill snorts. “Christ! And I thought I was the one plastered. Yes, Embry Call. Do you know any other poor soul unfortunate enough to be named Embry?”
She doesn’t. The nameless, faceless girl with the pretty, boy’s name fades slowly from the forefront of her mind, moving to sit cool and calm and confident in one of the not-so-distant corners instead. One knee bent, she pulls out a cigarette and smirks.
Bella blinks and focuses on Quil instead. With a bit of twisting and squirming she can see his face and notices that he looks mellower than usual. And his breath smells. But he’s smiling compliantly. “So, did you mean…like that kind of evidence?” She points to the abused plastic cup lying a few feet from them.
Quil swears. “I missed one!”
“Actually…” But she decides ignorance is bliss in this circumstance. “Don’t worry, I got it for you, see?”
He tilts his head and says sincerely, “Thanks, Bella. Jacob would shrink-wrap my balls if you found out we’d been drinking.”
“Your secret’s safe with me.”
“You’re the best.” He squeezes her so that she has trouble finding her next breath.
A shadow falls over them. Bella has never been happier to see Embry Call.
“Hey, Emb-”
“Jake! Quil’s doing Bella on the living room floor! And he’s not using protection!”
“Shhhh!” Quil hisses. “I was just trying to buy you guys some time so you could hide the-” Quil’s hands move from her sides to her ears, and she watches him mouth the letters: A-L-C-O-H-A-L.
She rolls her eyes and pries futilely at his vice-like wrists. “I already know.”
“No you don’t.” And then to Embry, “No she doesn’t.”
The situation should be funny and playful, but it’s not. The words are silly Quembry words that usually make her laugh and tease back. But she can’t laugh because it’s taking everything she has not to cry. There’s a knot in her throat that tastes like acid and a lead weight in her stomach that’s shackling her to the floor. Bella’s nervous and overwhelmed and unbearably hot cradled between Quil’s too-warm hands.
She places her tiny palms on his chest and pushes. The action would have been futile if not for the familiar arm that wrapped her body and lifts the same time a much-beloved hand pulls at the forces keeping her prisoner. Bella’s heart speeds in greeting.
“Quil, I don’t care that your girlfriend will be chest-less for another14 years. It doesn’t mean you get to molest mine for practice.”
For a fraction of moment Bella forgets the burn in her throat, the weight in her stomach, and the nameless, faceless, pretty girl with a manly name smoking smugly in her mind. Jacob is holding her and calling her his girlfriend.
“Oh, but, Jake, your chest is so big and manly! And-and big! I just can’t help it. My hands want your body.”
“Yeah, I bet they do.”
But then her feet hit the ground and Jacob withdraws, his hands not lingering like they would have a week ago.
A week.
She hasn’t seen him in a week.
Slowly, she turns. He’s rolling his eyes at Quil, but then they lift to catch hers. They look guarded, solid, masking, finite, unreadable for the first time in…ever.
It’s strange, but she feels blind. “Jake.”
“Hey, Bells.”
This is the part where they kiss-usually. But Jacob is hesitating. He’s eyeing the space between them like it’s a fathomless pit of fire that’s too risky to cross, and when he rocks back on his heels, she feels the rejection in his low sigh. Her legs start to tremble. She bites her lip.
But then a quiet, unsettling noise expelled from deep within Jacob’s chest touches her ears just before his fingertips. Carefully he guides her face upwards, and the new proximity of his eyes allows her to see that the unreadable front has melted just enough to reveal the steely determination lurking underneath.
She can’t recall a time he’s ever kissed her so softly. The touch of his mouth is slow, questioning, and she’s afraid to touch back-afraid that he doesn’t want her to (doesn’t want her). Jacob and hesitancy are strangers. And now they’re dancing together slowly from one corner of her mouth the other. His tongue traces the seam of her lips so briefly that she only manages to catch a trace of mint toothpaste before he pulls away.
It’s not a “hello” kiss. And she wishes he hadn’t kissed her at all. If she presses her lips to his, can she give it back?
Jacob’s watching her carefully as his hands disengage her face bit-by-bit.
“Dude, you’re standing on my hand. Can’t feel my pinky.”
Startled a foot into the air, Bella nearly trips over Quil for the second time in five minutes, but Jacob raises his foot and Quil’s freed arm springs up to steady her, one of his hands landing on her…
“Quil!”
“Accident, man. Total accident.”
Flushed red, Bella doesn’t risk moving a muscle. Her left foot’s trapped beneath one of Quil’s sprawled legs, his right hand is clasping her thigh, and his left is still molded to the back pocket of her jeans.
Emby is snickering off to the side.
Jacob’s voice is a low threat. “Quil…”
All innocence, he raises his eyebrows. “Oh, has she stopped falling?”
Bella nods quickly. “I’m fine. Thanks.”
He smiles lazily. “Why, yes, you are fine…”-the heat of Jacob’s body is suddenly right at her back-“…and I’m going to put my hands right over here.” He sits on them. “I’m telling you, Jake, it’s the beer…ed. Beard.”
“…”
“…”
“…”
Quil’s eyes shoot anxiously to Bella before snapping back to Jacob. “Yeah, I’ve been trying to grow a beard and it’s like…taking control of my body. Makes me do things I don’t want to do. Not”-he flailed his elbows-“that I wouldn’t want to touch your ass, Bella. It’s not that I don’t find it appealing. In fact, I can now tell you-given my first hand experience-that your ass is actually quite nice. Very round…and soft. If you were my girlfriend I would touch it all the time. Jacob’s a lucky-”
This time she falls to the floor on purpose. Arms wrapped around Quil, she buries her face in his neck and hides a sniffle. “I’m so glad that we’re friends.” Tears-the perpetual sign of her humanity-press imploringly at the back of her eyelids, but she blinks them away before glancing up Embry, who’s staring rather owlishly. “You too, Em. I love you both so much. We’ll always be friends”-she swallows a gulp on insecurity-“no matter what, right?”
“Uh…” He looks at Bella nearly suffocating Quil on the floor of the Black’s living room to Jacob standing-unreadable once again-what seems like miles away, his dangling hands trembling. “Sure, Bella,” he answers distractedly. “We’ll get BFF tattoos and everything. Already got a secret handshake in mind.”
She watches his eyes. They don’t leave Jacob. She watches Embry watching Jacob because objects in mirror are always closer than they appear and the wreck is coming, coming, coming…
“Like the one from A Walk to Remember?” she murmurs mournfully.
“Yeah, but with more-” He freezes and blushes a pretty pink. Finally his eyes swing to her. “A walk to what? I have no idea what you’re talking about. Sounds like crappy horror flick. Something Jacob would watch and then spend an entire week reenacting. Shot Dead anyone? I can still hear the awful Alex Pettyfer impersonation.” The disgusted look he casts Jacob’s way never finds its target.
Jacob is staring at Bella and her sad face resting on Quil’s shoulder and her dim eyes waiting for his next move.
She waits and waits and waits…
“Shit,” he mutters finally and reaches down to trail a hand across her hair. “We’ve gotta go.”
“We do?” Rebelliously she tightens her hold on Quil. She doesn’t want to go. To go somewhere alone where talking-heartbreaking-can happen. Jacob’s too kind to rip her heart out in front of an audience.
Risking a glance up at him, she notes the determination has returned in full force. Someone’s playing with the light switch.
“Come on, Bells.”
Internally she flinches at the shortening, tightening, and softening of her name. Bells has always meant good things, has been whispered against her lips, chuckled into her ear, and moaned along her neck. But now it’s stuck on lure, dangled invitingly before her eyes. But she’s not a fish; she’s a Swan.
She takes his outstretched hand anyway, and he leads her into the kitchen.
Jacob Black. In the kitchen. With the pet name.
Above the sink is a line of cabinets Bella has never seen inside of before. They’re too high for her to reach without assistance, but Jacob doesn’t even have to extend his elbow to flick open the doors and pull out a worn, red folder, the paper kind that isn’t protected with glossy plastic. Inside is a thick stack of miscellaneous paper, some full-size, some half-sheets, some note cards, some white, some pink, some green. All of them are covered in a neat, loopy scrawl and spotted with small stains. The edges are yellowed.
Jacob flips through them too quickly for her to make out any of the words, so she lowers her eyes to their clasped hands. The contrast of their skin is lovely and familiar, almost as comforting as the actual sensation of her fingers interwoven between his. Lifting her free hand, she traces a finger along his forearm.
“Aha!” Jacob exclaims while removing a creased sheet of notebook paper from the folder. “Got it. Now let’s see.”
After taking a cursory glance at the faded writing, he purses his lips and hands it off to Bella, who raises her eyebrows at the first line: “Thunder Cake.”
Beneath it are listed several ingredients and brief instructions for preparation and baking.
“Jake?”
“Yeah huh?”
He’s towed her over to the pantry so he can shuffle through the cans and boxes. His hand alights triumphantly upon the bag of flour and he pulls it out to place on the countertop.
“What’s a Thunder Cake?”
According to Quil, Embry, and Jacob-and just about all of the boys in the pack-Quileutes are big on food and ceremony. Every event she goes to there’s the traditional engagement feast, the New Year’s sweetbread, the ceremonial Super Bowl chip dip. What if this is a ceremonial breakup cake? The title sounds ominous enough.
Jacob, who’s just recruited the baking soda and salt to join the flour, turns sharply. “What do you mean?” he asks, eyebrows pinched.
Bella shrugs self-consciously. All of her words that evening are chosen carefully. “I’ve never heard of one before?”
He looks genuinely shocked. “You’ve never read it?”
“Read…the cake?”
He smiles and she lets out a wobbly breath of relief.
“No, no. It’s a book. A children’s book about a girl who’s afraid of storms.” He gestures animatedly with the hand that’s not holding hers. “Her grandmother is Russian, I think, and to make her less afraid of the thunder, they bake a cake together.” His dimples peek out at her for the briefest of moments. “My mom used to read it to me.”
A reassuring squeeze. “Were you afraid of storms?”
The way he snorts and shakes his head makes him look sixteen for the first time since he started phasing. “Nah. But I acted like I was”-he borrows her habit, bites his lip-“so we could make the cake. But I think she might have figured me out after the fifth time or so.”
His plunging sigh scrapes the bottom of her heart.
“But she always read it anyway.”
“Moms do that.”
“Yeah.” His smile leaves without a backward glance. “Yeah, they do.”
And maybe she’s signing her death warrant, but she has to ask: “Why are we making one now?”
He glances down at their twined fingers and then at the kitchen window.
“A storm’s coming.”
There’s a short lull of silence a la double entendre, before Jacob is lightly tugging her out the kitchen, through the-now-empty hall, and straight out the front door. The sky has started to change, the red seeping out to leave the approaching clouds gray and dark and rain-filled.
“Where are we going?”
“Emily’s. We don’t have all the stuff we need.”
“Jacob, do we have to do this now?”
“Watch. When you see a bolt of lightning you count until you hear thunder. That’s how many miles away the storm is.”
“I think we need to talk.”
“Did you hear that? Only six miles. We have to get the cake in the oven before it gets here.”
“Jake-”
They’re at the end of the gravel driveway-the end of the summer, the end of pretenses, the end of enough time-when he stops too and turns too suddenly, and all she can see are his eyes.
They’re heartbroken.
“I have to show you now, Bells,” he pleads. “So you can do it for our kids someday.”
Any air she had in her lungs evaporates with her future-she-never-really-thought-about-but-always-counted-on-because-Jake-and-Bells-never-had-to-worry-about-forever because his voice is
h
o
p
e
l
e
s
s
and more honest than the sweetbitter words. Ever after is gone and JakenBells has become Jake and Bells, and she feels that soon they will be
Jacob
and
Bella.
Let’s live a little longer in a world I’m about to take away.
The air comes back slowly along with the feeling in her clenched fingers. “Okay, Jake.”
He goes flat. “Okay.”
Lightning flashes as they restart forward down the road. She counts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5-
KA-BOOOOOOOOOOM
And though it’s selfish and childish, Bella steps closer to Jacob so she can press her face to his shoulder. He touches her hair.
He’s selfish, too.
So they walk slowly. By the time they get to Sam and Emily’s house, the storm is three miles away. And as Jacob holds open the front door, he stares up into the ever-thickening sky and mutters, “We’re not gonna make it.”
As always, the house is neat but slightly cluttered, the living room filled with charming knickknacks that sing warmth instead of screaming wastefulness. There’s a silver frame on the coffee table housing a picture of Bella and Jacob from the cookout at the start of the summer. She wants to take a closer look at it but is unwilling to relinquish Jacob’s arm, which is hugged pathetically to her chest.
Emily appears from one of the back rooms. Scarred, and smiling, and beautiful.
Bella resents her immediately. She wishes she could wear her scars on the outside. Maybe they hurt less that way.
“Jacob. Bella,” she greets as they move into the kitchen.
“Hey, Emily. We just need to borrow a few things.”
“All right,” she says hesitantly, not because she’s not okay with him raiding her pantry, but because there are tears dribbling down Bella’s face, and she’s clinging to Jacob like he’s her last lifeline-her life preserver in the middle of storm-tossed ocean.
Bella sniffles under her concerned gaze and rubs her runny nose on the sleeve of Jacob’s t-shirt. “H-h-hi, Em-mily.”
She then quickly turns her attention to the kitchen window.
Emily steps cautiously closer. It’s the mothering instinct, Bella figures, and she bets Emily can make Thunder Cakes in her sleep. With a hand tied behind her back. “Is everything okay?”
“We’re making a cake.” Jacob doesn’t sound so enthusiastic anymore. The cans of cocoa and pureed tomatoes clash violently in the plastic bag he’s pulled from beneath the sink.
“Oh. Do you need any help?” She doesn’t understand, doesn’t realize.
“No.”
I’ve already made up my mind.
Bella wants to scream, “Yes! Yes! Help us, please!” But she keeps her eyes on the horizon and counts the seconds.
“Honey?”
“Hm? She enjoys the sensation of his breath humming over her hair.
“We’ll need some strawberries. Can you get some from out back?”
Her hands convulse around his arm.
Emily’s encouraging. “Come on, Bella, I’ll show you where they’re at.”
It’s an odd thing, not having the words to say ‘no.’ The desire to behave logically, to not just express emotions but to have others understand them, puts people at the mercy of others. To realize that a person cannot be human without another to reflect their humanity back at them was a painful lesson for her to learn. And somewhere along the line, being alone became lonely for the first time.
Emily won’t understand if she says ‘no,’ and that’s almost as unnerving as Jacob comprehending the response perfectly. You always tiptoe in silence.
Jacob doesn’t physically pry away her hands but melts them away with, “Bells, honey. I just need to get a few more things from here, and scrub down one of these pans. It’ll be a couple minutes.”
She’ll do anything for Bells, honey.
A narrow hallway stretches the width of the small house, and it only takes a few seconds for Emily and Bella to reach the screen door that leads the small oasis of vibrant color that’s been carefully nurtured to perfection in the otherwise green-and-brown-and-wet-all-over scenery that is the Pacific North-West. Finding the beauty in everything is impossible. Bringing the beauty to everything is a challenge. Bella wonders what beauty she can bring to Jacob breaking up with her. Maybe he’ll be happier.
She wrinkles her nose.
“Here, let’s see if we can find a few that are a decent size.” Emily hums over the strawberries. Bella hums over the possibilities.
“How has…Jacob been…this past week?” The words fall from her lips reluctantly. But now that Jacob’s not in sight, she forgets that she’s supposed to be tiptoeing. ( stillhastobequietthoughbecauseWEREWOLVEShaveatendencyofHEARINGthingstheyshouldn’t )
Emily considers, twists a couple berries on the plant. “He’s been…quiet. A little angry. Mostly sad.”
Mostly sad. Bella makes Jacob mostly sad.
The pretty, faceless, nameless, boy-name girl extinguishes her cigarette on the wall of Bella’s mind to remind her that she’s still there. “Emily…”
Something in her voice has the older woman looking her way with ready eyes.
“Has he…imprinted?” It feels like she’s politely saying a curse word, but she has to keep her audience in mind.
Emily looks taken aback. “No. Not that I know of. If he had I don’t think…”
I don’t think he’d be here letting you blubber all over him.
“Ok.”
That’s good, she tells herself. It’s good that this is Jacob’s choice. It’s good that he’s chosen not to love her of his own free will. Bring the beauty, bring the beauty, bring the beauty…
“Bella, whatever it is you and Jacob are going through, I’m sure it will pass.”
You and Jacob…will pass.
“That boy loves you. And, well”-she smiles with half her face-“you know how you feel about him. Long distance relationships have they’re challenges, but I know you two will pull through.”
Emily, Bella notices, needs to work on her tiptoeing.
“You guys should probably get home before the storm hits.”
FLASH…1…2…3…BRUH-BRUH-BOOOM
After collecting a handful of strawberries and a few puncture wounds in her heart, Bella hurries back to the kitchen, relieved to see that Jacob is in fact still there, and dismayed that he standing and frowning at the side of refrigerator
“Jacob?”
His shoulders sag at his name.
“Strawberries,” she mumbles and holds out her cupped hands filled with the red fruit. If she lowers her lashes, it’s wet, red, and beating. She hands it over to Jacob with care.
A plastic bag of goods destined to be Goodbye Thunder Cake in one hand, and Bella’s sweaty palm in the other, Jacob ventures back outside.
The lightening is more frequent, and the thunder comes quicker, a bass beat laid over the treble of wind chimes that adorn every front porch and the acoustic timbre of tree branches plucked generously by the accelerating wind. She can almost taste the moisture in the air.
FLASH…1…2…B-BOOM
It’s not Jacob leading her down the side of the road at the conception of a storm. It’s Edward leading her through the woods at the end of a vital stage in her life. She remembers the after(Edward)-how does one forget the inkblot in the middle of the third page of Mr Darcy’s letter? She remembers the nothingness of months without a heart. (Here the use of “heart” is meant as a metonymy. The actual organ remained in her chest, but the happiness, hope, will, affection, and longing represented symbolically by “<3” were conspicuously absent. Sometimes people read the word “heart” and that’s all they see. Shakespeare has done his job too well.)
She remembers forgetting what it meant to have a heart until Jacob took her hand and helped her find it (turns out it was hiding in a paper bag, beneath a can of warm soda).
If Jacob leaves today, he won’t take her heart. She’s learned never to give it away completely. Entrust pieces and parts to everyone you care for, but always keep the largest portion for yourself-you never know when you’ll meet someone else you want to share it with. Jacob’s taught her that.
But he’s also taught her to fight her for the people that are worth fighting for.
Bella digs in her heels.
It takes a moment for Jacob to realize she’s resisting, and when he does, he anxiously attempts to tug her back into motion “Come on, Bells. Honey, if we don’t get going, we’re not going to make it in time.”
She’ll do anything for Bells, honey. Anything to keep it.
But she’s not sure how. When a storm comes you unplug the electronics, shut the windows, and listen-everyone always listens. And there’s a certain amount of passivity expected. Storms are inevitable and meant to be endured.
Bella doesn’t just want to come out alive. She wants to come out completely intact. And Jacob better be on the same page in order for that to happen.
“Why were you drinking?” Not what she means to say, but meanings are subjective.
He’s thrown. This wasn’t in the forecast. In the end, he shrugs defensively. “Because we wanted to.”
“But why?”
“Just…because.”
“That’s not an answer. There has to be some reason why.”
“Because!” He raises both his arms in exasperation. His jaw clenches and releases. “Haven’t you ever wondered how many licks it takes to get to the center of the Tootsie Pop?”
Her eyebrows crinkle. “What-”
“Have you?”
“No.”
“Then you wouldn’t understand.”
As if this has ever been about understanding.
She pulls her hand from his. “I don’t want to make the cake, Jacob.”
His eyes narrow in from her empty hand to her full eyes-eyes full certainty, a few tears, and selfishness. “Why not?”
“I’m not ready.”
The sky’s lit with a fantastical strike of brightness, and Bella doesn’t get her mind completely wrapped around one before the BOOM of thunder shakes her bones. A drop of wetness lands on her cheek.
And then her wrist.
Then the top of her shoe.
Shoulder.
Forehead.
Shoulder.
Cheek.
Hand.
Forehead.
Arm.
Eyebrow.
Hair.
Shoe.
Thigh.
Nose. Shoulder. Hair. Cheek. Arm. Shoe. ForeheadHairShoulderEyeNoseFaceLegsArmsBack. Bella.
Bella woke up drenched. And she’ll go to bed that way.
Dragging a damp hand across her eyes, she blinks up at Jacob. He looks darker in the rain. “I’m not ready,” she repeats. “I don’t want to do this.”
He shakes his head, plastic bag still dangling from one hand. “You leave tomorrow. You’re flying across the entire. Damn. Country. Bella.”
Tiptoeing Bella becomes Stomping, Dirt-Kicking Bella in the blink of an eye. She scowls, and somehow her finger finds its way threateningly close to his chest. “You’ve been avoiding me all week! No phone calls, no visits, no anything! All summer you knew that I was leaving for school. I thought you were happy for me! And…ugh! You haven’t given me any time to-”
“Bella,” he cuts me off, face pleading, eyes soul-stealing. “You’re going somewhere great. Somewhere big and exciting. Somewhere you’ll learn to do amazing things. And somewhere I will never go.” He shakes his head, encouraging chunks of wet her to stick to his skin. “I understand.”
No, no, no. He’s understanding all wrong. “This choice was never about leaving you. I don’t want to leave you.”
It’s pouring. Harder than she’s ever seen before. And it doesn’t feel safe standing exposed like this with the rain in her eyes and the wind tearing at her from all directions.
The plastic bag, the cocoa, the tomatoes, the strawberries, and the pan all become intimate with the sopping grass. His raised arms cut through the rain unhindered and indecisive. “Then what are we doing here, Bella?”
Now. This moment. Yelling under the rain. Not holding hands. Making a Never Cake for their Never Children.
Breaths puff from deep within her chest, and she notes that rain smells like tears.
“This isn’t what I wanted.”
“Not what you-” A quick step closer and they’re nose-to-chest, the heat of his breath filtering down her face. She raises her eyes and can only see his lips moving. “Saturday. All day you kept saying how hard it’s going to be, kept going on about how it’ll be difficult to keep up with the time difference, how it’s going to take forever for letters to get back and forth, how e-mail won’t work because I don’t have regular access to a computer.”
“Yes, I know I did bu-”
“And that’s not what you want.” Fact. Cold. Hard.
“I want you, Jake.” Even when you’re breaking my heart.
“Why? Why me?”
“Why are you even asking?”
“Because I’m not sure if you’re aware of this or not, Bella, but you have a habit of playing this self-sacrificing routine, where you do the things you think you should because it makes everyone else better off, and you’re masochistic enough that you don’t mind suffering in silence.”
“That’s not what this is.” She shakes her head vehemently and says to his mouth, “Last Saturday…that wasn’t what I was trying to say. I mean, it was, but I was only saying it because you had mentioned having all of that money saved from your summer job, and I knew you had your heart set on getting those expensive car parts, but I…” Her courage wanes. Because she’s yelling at him about a summer job, and was it really this little thing that brought them here? “But I,”-she licks her lips, lowers her eyes back down to his neck-“I wanted you maybe to think about getting a cell phone instead. So we could talk and…send each other pointless pictures and…things.”
Sounds silly and she’s never been good with words.
But nothing happens without trying. It takes a half-a-step backward for her to meet his eyes. “And you want to know why it has to be you, Jake?” It’s rhetorical, so, no, he doesn’t get a say. “Because it’s like…different people make you see yourself different ways. Because when feel something-an emotion-you feel it, but then you also show how you feel it. But the showing doesn’t really matter if someone else doesn’t see it and understand what you’re feeling, or, I mean, showing. People don’t always do it right. You’re the only person who…sees me the right way, and then I see you seeing me so-”
Words, more often than not, are useless.
“And I don’t want to make the stupid cake!”
Unless you happen to choose the right ones.
“Not tonight. And not when I come back at Thanksgiving. I want to make it years from now when it actually counts.”
And unless the person you’re saying them to happens to know what they mean.
Jacob moves forward but ducks his head and lifts her chin so that he doesn’t lose sight of her soul. Air is squeezed from her lungs-in a good way-when Jacob wraps his arms around her too tightly, presses his face against her head a little too roughly, and mutters a little too sweetly, “Christ, that was what you were rambling about? Mirrors? I never would’ve guessed.” One of his hands seeks out the back of her neck beneath her wet, matted hair while the other rides low on her hip.
When Jacob kisses her now, it’s not a “hello” kiss, and it doesn’t “goodbye.” But it promises a “next time.”
She grins a tiny grin against his cheek as she pulls away. “So…you’re really not breaking up with me?”
She loves and hates the fact that he chuckles. “Me break up with you? Um, yeah, I don’t really see that happening. Ever. Why would an algae eater ever leave a perfectly dirty fish tank?”
“I hate it when you make that analogy,” she sniffles.
“At least it makes sense. You didn’t even use the word “mirror” in your mirror metaphor.”
“It was extended!”
“It was lame.”
“It-” It doesn’t matter.
FIN