This epilogue is also dedicated to JAustenlover... and to everyone else who took the time to read/review this fic. Thank you.

Just Breathe

~ * ~

Jasper Whitlock

"So, that's it then." I survey the pile of boxes containing what little stuff I have left here.

"I guess so," Bella replies, quietly. "It's not as bad as I thought it would be."

"No, I guess not. I'm still dreading it, though."

"We'll be okay."

I'm feeling a little melancholy, but mostly just exhausted.

I run a hand across her bare stomach and then place both of them on her naked hips. "Shower first?"

She leans back into me and I kiss her neck and her shoulder. "Yeah," she says before turning a little in my lap to kiss me. She pulls away after a minute and smiles. "It really won't be so bad; most of our stuff is there already."

"Yeah, I just hate the unpacking part," I say, lifting her off me. I was going to say something else but I'm temporarily distracted by the sight of her bare ass. I reach out to squeeze it but she turns around and my smile widens. Even better.

"Jasper." Her tone is scolding. "Let's move before my brother gets home."

I resist the urge to pull her back onto the couch, and follow her into the bathroom. "Do we get to shower together every day now?"

"I don't know; can you wake up when I do?"

I frown. "Can you start showering at night?"

She laughs and turns on the water. "We've got time to figure that out. We can shower as often as we want, I guess."

"Yeah. I doubt you'll complain about the water bill as much as Peter does."

"I'm going to resist making a joke about you showering with Peter...for my own sake, mostly." She laughs again and we step in.

She laughs a lot now, and the sound of it never gets old. I let her stand directly under the water so she won't be cold, and I wrap my arms around her. Her wet skin, the smell of her hair, the taste of her mouth, the sound of her voice: none of it ever gets old. It's been over a year and it keeps getting better.

"I'm glad we waited this long. It was really hard sometimes – or tempting, I should say – but I'm so excited." She turns and I lean down to kiss her.

"I know, the timing is perfect. I can't fucking wait to sleep with you every night, by the way." She raises an eyebrow and I clarify before she can say something snarky. "I mean literally sleep, too. More or less."

"It's different, right? I know you sleep over a lot, but it's different, don't you think?" She's all cute with her twinkling eyes and I can't help but smile like an idiot at her. She tilts her head back under the water and then wipes it from her eyes and waits for my answer.

"Yeah, it's different." I lean in for another kiss and my hands move to her waist. I nudge her back a bit, trying to get her up against the wall, and then she pushes her shower poof thing into my chest.

"We need to take a literal shower, baby." She's used to the fact that I can't keep my hands off her, and has infinite patience. She's pretty handsy herself most of the time, but I know right now she's mostly worried about Peter coming home.

We quickly get cleaned up and then head back into the main room to get the boxes sealed up before we start loading them into the van. It's been a little over a year, and since nothing ever gets old, and since everything just gets better, we've decided to move in together. Well, we decided two months ago, but it took us a month to find a decent place close to work and school, and then Bella wanted to give her roommates a month's notice as well, to give them time to find someone else to take her room. Between her zoo of a house and me living with her brother, I'm surprised we waited as long as we did.

But it's been kind of a whirlwind of activity since Peter and I moved out here, and only recently did things really start to slow down to a normal pace. Peter and I moved a little over a month after I first came here to see Bella, and both of us scrambled to find jobs. I was looking for an actual start to my career, but Peter just needed something mildly major-related while he waited to start school in January. Jane, one of Bella's housemates, ended up hooking him up with one of her contacts at the National Institute of Mental Health, and he quickly landed an office job assisting a few psychiatrists there. He wasn't doing a hell of a lot with his major, but it was a decent paycheck and a great employer to have on his résumé, as well as a great place to network.

By some stroke of miraculous luck, a little over a month after getting here, I landed a job as a Marketing Coordinator with DC United, the local Major League Soccer team. I'd found it on a job board, and though it wasn't exactly sports management, it was definitely the in that I needed. Not to mention, it was a pretty fun job most of the time, and I wasn't opposed to staying in Marketing if it worked out that way.

In a way, I'm still not sure if it was all luck or something else. After almost half a year of nearly everything going wrong, the moment Bella and I were together and in the same city, everything just fell into place in such a bizarre way that it had me wondering if all the shit with the three of us didn't just somehow happen for a reason. And because things had sucked for so long, it felt even better to have everything go so right.

Of course, just because things worked out nicely upon the move didn't mean that everything was perfect. Both Peter and Bella were still dealing with the loss of their father, and while day-to-day life slowly got easier, both of them still had pretty dark times. On top of that, some of their issues with their childhood – specifically with their mother's absence – were only exacerbated by Charlie's death. Bella still had a hard time trusting anyone, including herself, and Peter constantly struggled to keep a balance between caring for his sister and needing to control every aspect of her life. It wasn't so much that he wanted to replace their father for her, he just had such a hard time facing his own grief that it somehow translated into him obsessively, and somewhat subconsciously, trying to shield her from everything in an attempt to distract himself.

All of this stuff and more came to light after Bella suggested – after a particularly bad fight with Peter, which then somehow turned into a fight among the three of us – that they attend grief counseling. She realized pretty early on that even when they felt happy or content, sometimes the sadness and anger over the loss of their father was still lurking below the surface, affecting the way they dealt with nearly everything. I didn't go to the counseling, obviously, but Bella talked about it a lot with me, and Peter sometimes did, too – and in the end, it had a huge impact on all of our relationships with one another. We all still occasionally deal with the residual shit from the last year, but it's way better now, and the good, healthy place that all three of us are in makes this move an even more logical next step.

Not to mention that I'd just really like to be able to fuck my girlfriend without consulting the schedules of thirty-seven other people. And I think Peter would like to go back to pretending that sort of thing doesn't happen, period.

As we're taping up the last couple boxes, we hear the key in the front door and then it swings open and Pete walks in, a pizza in hand.

He smiles but it quickly morphs into a grimace as he surveys our wet heads. "Thank fucking God you two are moving out."

Bella rolls her eyes. "Oh please, don't make me remind you about Valentine's Day, Peter."

He sneers. "Whatever. Be right back, I need to go bleach the bathroom."

I grab a slice of pizza from the box and call over to him, "You might want to do the kitchen table and the counter, too."

He doesn't turn to me, but merely raises his hand and extends his middle finger.

"You asked for it," I mumble, smirking. Just as I'm about to take a bite, Bella swats me on the back of the head and steals the pizza from my hand. She always prefers my food to her own, and it's a wonder I haven't starved to death yet.

I slide my arms around her waist and in the absence of pizza to eat, I attack her neck instead. She giggles as I place sloppy, open-mouth kisses at the base of her neck, and then the giggles turn to little moans when I make my way up to the spot behind her ear. When she tilts her head to the side to give me better access, my hand slides along her bare arm until I've managed to reclaim my pizza slice.

"God, you're such a bastard," she says, huffing and shaking her head once she's recovered. She takes her own slice from the box, and I squeeze her shoulder before patting her on the butt.

"You've got packing to do, baby. Don't try to distract me."

Peter walks out of the bathroom a moment later, just as the front door opens again and Charlotte bursts in with bags on her arms and a pie in each hand.

"Babe!" Peter's face lights up when Charlotte steps into the room, and then it brightens further when he sees the pies in her hand. He quickly takes them from her as he gives her a peck on the lips. "Are these mine?"

She rolls her eyes and turns to Bella and me, dropping the bags on her arms onto the floor. "I brought a housewarming pie for you guys, and also one for Peter and me!"

"That's awesome, Char, but are you really supposed to make yourself your own housewarming pie?" Bella asks, leaning over to take a look at the pies in Peter's hands.

She shrugs, and after Pete has deposited both plates on the counter, she stands on her toes to give him another kiss. "Well, ours is mostly just for Pete, anyway, and I'm the only lunatic who makes pies in August."

"Is our pie apple?" Peter asks. When she nods, smiling, he grabs her face and kisses her again. "You're the best lunatic girlfriend ever."

Although Peter still lightheartedly grumbles about Bella and me sometimes, Charlotte is another reason why he became more accepting of our relationship. When they met, they hit it off immediately, as Bella and I suspected they would, and it was love at first baked good. Peter quickly became consumed by Charlotte and her awesome cooking, and then suddenly he lost interest in carrying around a grudge over his best friend hooking up with his sister. They got together officially a few months after Bella and I did, and now it only makes sense for Char to take my place at the apartment.

"Okay, Jasper. Let's eat and start loading Alec's van. I told him we'd have it back tonight." I'm halfway finished my second slice of pizza when Bella snatches it from my hand and, with a smug smile plastered across her face, wanders into the living room to tape up the last box.

~ * ~

"Goddamn it. Fuck this fucking thing." I whip the damn Allen wrench and it clangs against the iron bed post. "Why is it so goddamn hot in here?" I grumble out loud to myself. I yank my shirt over my head and throw it and then after a moment, I stretch to pick up the wrench again and give it another go. From the bag, I pick a screw that looks like the one in the incredibly vague illustrated instruction booklet and press it into the hole. Of course, it's the wrong fucking screw and it's too small, so it drops into the hole, and then I hear it clink to the bottom of the inside of the post. I curse again and drop the piece of frame I'm working on. The whole thing makes a loud clatter that is both satisfying and enraging.

I stay on my knees, panting and hunched over the scattered pieces of bed, trying to come down from an intense IKEA rage. After a coffee table, three stools, and a bookshelf, I'm about to go on some kind of homicidal rampage.

"Everything okay in here, baby?" Bella's voice comes from the doorway and she sounds mildly concerned, as she should be. I remind myself that she is my girlfriend and that I love her and that this bed is for her, and that somehow, someday, I will figure out a way to actually put it together.

"I fucking hate the Swedish," I mumble, dumping the screws from the bag onto the floor. "What is their goddamn problem with pre-assembled furniture?"

Bella steps into the room and I glance back to find her surveying the carnage. "Aren't you one of them, blondie?" she asks, moving behind me and ruffling my hair.

I jerk my head away and search for the wrench which has apparently somehow fallen into a fucking black hole. "Finnish, Bella. Like, fourth generation. I'm no more Swedish than you are."

"Hmmm." Her fingers dig a little harder into my scalp and I feel my shoulders relax a little. "What if I told you my grandma is Swedish?"

"Well, then I think we should reconsider moving in together. Perhaps you can finish making this damn bed, and I'll move into your old room."

"Hmph. Mean." She feigns offense but she kneels behind me and presses her lips to my back. My hands still on the bed frame as she slides hers over my ribs and up my chest. "You didn't flip the switch on the thermostat all the way...I just turned the air on now. It'll cool off soon," she says between kisses. Her lips move slowly over the words on my back and as her nails start to dig into my chest, I feel pretty certain that no amount of AC is going to cool me down now.

When one hand starts to creep back down my abdomen, I exhale roughly. "In case you haven't noticed, we don't exactly have a bed, baby."

"We don't need a bed," she murmurs just before her teeth press into my shoulder. Just when I'm about turn around, grab her, and throw her down on these fucking bed pieces, her lips and hands disappear from my skin. I twist a bit and watch as she peels off her t-shirt and steps onto the mattress and box spring, which are still wrapped in plastic and on the floor next to where I'm working. "We've got a mattress."

"True," I respond, getting to my feet.

"Or a couch." She unbuttons and unzips her shorts and I feel my breathing become more labored. "Or a kitchen table." The shorts drop to her ankles and I groan. There was a time when I thought I'd never be able to shake the image of Bella in Forks, in the office, in a black bra and tiny black panties, but over the past year she's given me pink bows, red lace, black mesh, blue ruffles, and now I have a rather large image catalog to work with. Today it's pale yellow with white trim that looks amazing next to her tanned skin.

"Or a gorgeous coffee table that was a steal at only $29.99." She tosses her bra at me and I catch it and then whip it somewhere in the direction of the Allen wrench. I step onto the mattress, and as soon as I have my hands on her hips, I yank her roughly toward me. Our mouths come together hard and my hands quickly make their way to their respective hangouts – one on her ass, pulling her closer to me, and the other tangling in her hair.

Our tongues move against each other roughly and I realize it's been way too fucking long since I've kissed her. The taste of her mouth always makes me hungry for the rest of her, and after a few moments of kissing, I drag my mouth from hers so that I can taste my other favorite places: the hollow of her collarbone, her earlobe, her shoulders, her tits. I slowly work my way down her body, lowering to my knees as I kiss her stomach. Both hands rest on her hips for only a moment before I pull her down with me.

When she's on her knees in front of me, she places her hands on my shoulders and then slides them to the back of my neck. Our lips meet again in a kiss that is slower and yet more intense than the one earlier. My thumbs slip beneath the elastic of her panties and then I pull away from her mouth. "It's 10:30 and I'm nowhere near finishing this bed..."

"So," she says, kissing along my jaw, "we'll sleep on the mattress. We've got plenty of time. Now, hurry up and take off your shorts."

She's has a point, and it's pretty much how it's worked for us since the day we got together; we go slow and fast at the same time, where applicable. Because our relationship was born out of death, we know how quickly this shit can be taken away, so when it comes to us we never slow down. We consume each other, we never wait, we never hold back. We kiss and touch and profess love or desire whenever we feel like it because we know that every single moment counts for so much.

But when it comes to everything else, like the half-unpacked boxes in the hallway, the bullshit do-it-yourself furniture, the take-out getting cold on the table – that shit can wait, because there's plenty of time, and even if there isn't, there's nothing more important, ever, than what's happening right now.

"Fuck, I love you, baby," Bella groans as she lowers herself on to me. I'm pretty sure that's always the first thing she says when she's on top, and the feeling is always mutual.

I let go of the balled up panties in my hand and reach up to pull her down to me. We're both already sweating, my skin sticking to the plastic cover on the mattress, but I can feel cool air coming from the vent in the ceiling now. Bella leans forward, her long hair falling around my face as she closes her eyes and starts to bounce faster.

I want to respond, to tell her I feel the same way, but as her hips move faster, I can't seem to form the words. It's not as if she doesn't know how I feel, so instead I just try to focus on the feel of her and my breathing. When she presses her forehead to mine, my heart rate hits dangerous levels and I start to feel like I always do – blissfully overwhelmed and like I'm suffocating under my voracious need for her. I take a few fruitless deep breaths, and just when I feel like I can't get enough of her – my air – and I'm slipping under, she gasps and squeezes me and shudders above me and brings me back again.

"I love you, too," I finally murmur, slipping both hands into her hair. She whimpers and then sighs, exhaling the breath I couldn't catch.

~ The End ~

That's it! We hope you enjoyed the ride.

We're the luckiest girls ever to have Legna as our beta.

All the chapter titles in this fic were song titles by bands from the 90's "grunge era" - J's favorite genre of music. We'll put a link to a playlist of all the these songs on the thread sometime this weekend, if you're interested.

Thanks again for reading - we loved hearing from you all!

And my own personal notes: First, JA bid on me separately in the same Support Stacie auction, and writing this story with LVP has given me an extra opportunity to thank her for her extreme generosity. Mostly, though, I have to thank LVP for allowing me write this with her when the original plans for the story fell through. It's been a hell of a fantastic experience, and I wouldn't trade it for anything.