This is a response to nadia the demented one's challenge where each sentence has to begin with the next letter of the alphabet... and you notice the title too? :)

Please review?

All the time, all she heard. But it wasn't just him, it was all of them.

Consciences, they say they are. Dads, moms, brothers and sisters, friends, as if she needs any of that. Emily said that, Emily said they were like sisters, and yet she still went and ripped her heart out and stomped it into the ground, into the muddy La Push soil.

First was Sam, she said she would stay away, but she didn't, she couldn't, of course it was impossible, Leah sees that from Sam's head, from Emily's eyes, from the way they look at each other and the way they touch each other.

"Go away," Jacob mumbles at her, wallowing in his own guilt and misery and pain. How could he have hurt her so much, how could she have hurt him?

"I don't think so, this isn't only your land--well, why don't we think of your filthy bloodsucker girlfriend, I'm sure she would love to be here right now--sun and treaty and all," Leah snaps back, the unusual said sun catching on her hair and turning it red and black and brown and gold, "probably love to fight with that newborn strength of hers."

Jacob glares at her, tries to keep his shape together. Killing her isn't an option, he tells himself.

Leah sighs dramatically, flops down on the dirt-grass near him. "Maybe you should give it a chance," she suggests casually. No one listens to her, so there's no danger in saying what she wants to say.

"Oh no, Leah--I'm staying just where I am; after all, 'this isn't only your land'."

Pacific air swirls as Leah mutters "Idiot," wondering briefly, feeling briefly, some twinge of rejection and sorrow. Quietly, in her own mind, she likes the feeling, revels in it, because this werewolf sitting near her wasn't in any way Sam, and it was good that someone other than Sam made her feel.

Risks--that's what it is, to open your heart to someone and watch them do the same to you; which, slowly, carefully, Leah does. Sam and Leah did exactly that on the first day of their first year of high school; scared freshmen dodging the seniors, the sophomores, the juniors, and then they were invincible with love.

"Too bad I'm leaving, then, because then you'll be alone...again..." Underneath the bitterness and anger is just more and more pain, and Leah can't forget it yet, can't look away, can't pretend everything's alright.

Varies, the pain does, but never enough--there's the hatred, the bitterness, the anger, the hurting other people, there's every sort from every book...and she still can't do a thing about it.

"Wait," Jacob whispers, his voice shaking, "stay, Leah, please." Xerox copies of the same feelings as hers, mostly--the general ideas: the pain, the fear...close enough.

"You are...beautiful," he whispers what feels like hours afterwards, realizing, reaching out a tentative hand, thinking that he was miserable for long enough--no one said he'd stop being miserable, just distract himself from the agony of everyday--and besides, where was Bella Swan anyways...probably for a honeymoon or two, and Leah flushes in spite of herself--even though he doesn't feel hot to her touch, Jacob warms her easily, he just needs to try.

Zigzags trace the movement of his hand, but Leah wants more, she leans into the touch that's familiar and not familiar, warm and cold, good and bad, but just a distraction...the tears spill over as pain mingles with bitter happiness.