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I entered the bathroom and turned the shower on, methodically taking my clothes off while waiting for it to heat up. These days the shower could barely get hot enough to match what I wanted, but I made do.
I always made do.
The shower heated up decently quickly, leaving the mirror fogged over. I was glad; it meant I didn’t have to see how pathetic I looked. I stepped into the shower, letting the water soak my hair thoroughly before I looked up into the spray, the water sluicing off of my face – hiding the tears I couldn’t bother to stop anymore.
I found I couldn’t remain standing, sobbing so hard my knees buckled, ending up in a foetal position on the shower floor. Bella Swan: pathetic. I felt it, too. I really had believed Jake, when he said he would love me forever, no matter what. Then again, I had believed Edward, too, when he had promised me forever.
I did wonder, if I was just gullible, or if I always did something that made them detest me.
I did love Jake, I really did, even if wasn’t perhaps the unconditional romantic love that he thought he felt for me. I thought I could have spent my life with him, it wouldn’t have been any problem – but then Jake met Serena, and poor little Bella Swan was left behind again, alone and unloved.
It was odd, how quickly I’d gotten used to the inhuman temperatures my supernatural friends kept – whether it was the icy coolness of the Cullens or the sunshine heat of the wolves, perhaps Jake, in particular, it all felt so much better than anything else I experienced. The showers and baths, no matter what temperature I ran them at, could quite match the temperatures I longed for, all poor substitutes for the embraces I longed for and dreamt of.
In a way, I really was pleased – and most certainly thankful – that Jake had imprinted. Perhaps I would have preferred to not have been there for it because the way his hand went slack where it was holding mine was… well, it was patently obvious what had happened, that much is for sure.
The current heartbreak did bring something into perspective for me, however. If this was how I felt when Jake, someone I more or less knew was going to leave me, someone I didn’t actually love-love left me… how had I really felt about Edward? His name didn’t tear me to shreds anymore at least, which was a nice change.
I don’t think I ever loved him.
At that thought, I started sobbing again, which was also the moment I realised that sometime during the introspective hugging of my knees I had stopped crying. It was just all so pointless. If I didn’t love Edward, I had wasted a year with him, several months grieving that he left, and for what? To properly drive home to everyone in both Forks and La Push that I was nothing but a pathetic little girl?
How Jake – or indeed any of the pack – had been able to stand me was a mystery for the ages, and they all deserved an award. Except possibly Paul, but he had always been an asshole, so it didn’t really matter. If I told myself that enough times, I might even believe it.
I was a pathetic leech lover, something he had told me time and time again, and yet, it was Paul to who my mind always returned. He hated me, I should hate him… yet he was the one I wanted to climb like a tree, no matter how crass the sentiment was.
Edward would have kittens if he heard me say something like that, it was simply too crass for his dear sweet Bella to say – or even think. I tipped my head back, leaning it against the shower wall, and let the tears fall.
They felt cathartic, now, rather than like an open, weeping wound.
The knock on the bathroom door startled me. Going by the temperature of the water, now more tepid than anything else, I had been in the shower for much longer than I should – and my hands had pruned up to match the supposition, too.
“Bella? There’s someone here to see you,” Charlie said once I acknowledged his knocking. He sounded – carefully happy, as if that were two feelings that went together.
“I’ll be right out!” I replied, hurrying to dry myself off – I left the hair damp, not much else to do considering the length and thickness of it.
When I came downstairs, I did not expect to see Paul standing in the living room. I certainly had not expected him to be carrying flowers if he were to visit.
“These are – these are for you,” he said, thrusting them at me, an uncharacteristic stutter in his voice.
I took them, slowly, as if expecting him to pull them back with a psyche! I couldn’t resist burying my nose in them, noting that they smelled amazing.
“I’m sorry for everything I’ve said to you,” Paul continued, voice grave, hands behind his back. “You didn’t deserve any of it, and I simply said it because I was jealous.”
“Jealous? Of what? Me knowing the Cullens and you don’t?” I said, incredulous. Paul had nothing to be jealous of. He looked away from my gaze, and I could have sworn he was blushing.
“I imprinted on you after the leeches left. I thought… if I denied it and drove you away, I couldn’t hurt you, and you couldn’t hurt me.”
Oh, I thought. That explained a lot.