Jasper had a headache. It was impossible and senseless since he was an immortal vampire and all that, but there it was. Making his head pound and blurring his vision every once in a while. He'd been buying aspirine for the past two weeks, and it had worked quite nicely (a vampire's physiology wasn't that different from a human's after all) but the last days the pain had come back stronger. And hiding it from Edward or Alice wasn't easy, but he'd already caused too many troubles to the family, and wasn't willing to be in the spotlight again for another century or so. He'd been lucky Alice wasn't looking into his future too often, busy as she was preparing a major party for her birthday. Anyways, the pain made him gloomy, which wasn't a good thing for an empath, so he had to use all his concealment mechanisms so no one would find out.

Jasper was hunting with Emmett one evening when the subject came up.

"Hey, Jazz, I know you're trying to control yourself, but you're bringing me down. Is something up?"

Crap. He'd been so concentrated on Edward and Alice that he'd totally forgotten about his very good friend Emmett.

"It's nothing important, Emmett, don't worry about it."

"But it is something, then" His brother insited.

"I'm fine, really. And I'll try to control myself more to stop bringing you down, ok?" Jasper gave the other vampire the best smile he could muster and tried to distract Emmett with jokes about bears.

"Dude, I'm trying to be serious for once, don't mess with my head! I don't mean to tell you to hide whatever's bothering you better, I mean that you can talk to me about it. I'm here, you know?"

"And I appreciate it, but I told you that I'm fine."

"You're not finishing that deer?" Emmett suddenly asked.

"No"

"Then you're definitely not fine."

Jasper let out an almost inaudible laugh and dissolved his brother's worry with his gift. As much as he appreciated Emmett's concern, he didn't think he could do anything to help the situation, so he preferred to keep hiding it.

A week after that trip with Emmett to the woods Jasper hadn't had a single drop of blood. Somehow, the sole thought of hunting made him nauseous. That couldn't be good. Anyhow, that night was Alice's party and she was the only one important, it was her night. He'd take care of himself after that.

The party was going to be huge, which didn't help relieving his avoid the hyperactive Alice, Jasper went into the deserted kitchen and tried to get some peace, focus himself, get a better grip of his mind. Just then, Bella walked in the kitchen and looked at him with complicity.

"You too want to escape and don't come back 'till tomorrow morning?" She asked, with a shy smile.

"Oh, that'd be simply wonderful..." Bella's smile grew ten sizes and she continued talking.

"I was talking with Edward earlier and...."

But Jasper wasn't hearing anymore. The world, with all its images and sounds, had started to blur and the vampire discovered that he couldn't focus on anything. The colours and shapes of the things surrounding him were all wrong and he was falling inevitably.

Bella's POV (Some minutes earlier)

It was 4 hours before the oh-so-important P- Night (yeah, P is for party) and I already wanted it to be over. It was going to be huge, with a lot of vampires that were strangers to me but friends of the Cullens. I didn't feel like it. Not one bit. Being charming and polite with strangers had never been one of my hobbys. But everyone was so excited.... even Edward was all the time talking about how he was going to catch up and tell all his old friends about his new family. And I was supposed to be there and smile when they mentioned me.

Trying to get out of that festive climate, I went to the kitchen that would most likely be empty. When I was arriving a felt a lot of things: hurt, sadness, emotional exhaustion... That could only mean one thing: Jasper. He was standing near the counter with a tired expression. The moment he saw me, the previous turmoil was replaced by a smooth calm. Boy, was he gifted.

"You too want to escape and don't come back 'till tomorrow morning?" I asked, trying to make conversation.

"Oh, that'd be simply wonderful..." Jasper answered with his deep voice.

Finally, someone who understood me! Encouraged by it, I continued talking:

"I was talking with Edward earlier and he seems to think that..." In that moment I noticed that Jasper's eyes seemed out of focus, and that he was swaying dangerously "Jasper? Are you all right? Jasper?"

He started blinking a lot, and suddenly he was falling forward. I rushed to him and caught his head and his shoulders before he hit the floor, amazed at how light he seemed.

"Jasper? What's wrong?"

OK, now I was starting to panic. Jasper's eyes opened and closed, but he didn't seem to be seeing anything. In one of the moments his eyes were open he tried tried to catch my sleeve with one of his shaky hands, but before he could do it he went totally limp. That only made my panic increase exponentially. What the hell was going on? If vampire's weren't supposed to be able to sleep, passing out had to be impossible! Was that another thing I didn't know about? Did it had something to do with the emotions I felt earlier? What was the protocol in these cases?

"Carlisle! Someone! Help!"

Right now, I wished Edward could read my mind so he'd hear my desperate calls for help, and came to tell me what to do. I was still cradling unconscious Jasper's head in my arms, and silently praying that someone would come to that door. But no one did and Jas per wasn't waking up.

A/N: As always, excuse my English mistakes, it's not mother tongue! When I have exams nearby I always get on writing overdose... Did you like it? Should I continue? All feedback is welcome! You know you want to review!