All Characters belong to SM, I'm just changing the story up for my own amusement.

This has been edited by my wonderful beta Karisgrace!

Chapter 1:

Conclusions

I was sitting in my room contemplating how the last several months of my life have been flowing by me like a swiftly running river. It has now been five months since that fated day when he asked me to go for a walk with him in the woods. For the most part, I am unable to even remember what happened over the months following that day as I had been so lost in my own world of hurt and grief. For months I have just been living a half life, if you can even call it that. I would go to school, work, and then home, pretending to care, putting on a careful façade to keep everyone I care about happy. The problem was I could only do it for so long, and the longer that I pretended to be fine, the more numb I became to the world around me. Numb from the pain but also numb from any happiness that may have occurred as well. The huge hole that he left in my heart was unable to start healing and the jagged edges would never meet. Even if I could move past the pain there would always be scar tissue left behind that would be a reminder in the future.

He once told me he was selfish and I did not believe him thinking that such perfection could not be flawed. He was right though, he was incredibly selfish and the more I think about the more I hate him for it. Months later, here I sit still trying to get past the pain. The only thing that I can think about is why. Why had he done this to me? I know he loved me, even if I had momentarily believed him when he took me in the forest. Once he was gone and I had gotten myself lost in the wood while trying to follow him, I started to think about all the times that he had told me he loved me and all the times that we spent together. He was far too tender and loving to have been pretending. Maybe he had loved me and just gotten tired of it as he was saying. Yet, I found that hard to believe as well. That only left one conclusion and it is the one that I have been struggling with over the last few days.

He had to have been trying to save me and my humanity from his world. After my stupid birthday party and what happened with Jasper he freaked out. I knew that he never wanted to me become like him, as he thought himself a soulless monster. I knew better though. He was not a monster or soulless. He was, however, a selfish boy that did not understand that this was my life and I should have more say as to what I wanted to do with it then he should have. I always loved him and was willing to give up my humanity to stay by his side. That had been my right to decide, not his to dictate. The more I walked down this path the more frustrated and angry I became. For all of his love and self sacrificing he had completely disregarded me and my happiness. It was time that I started to live for me. With all of the conclusions I was beginning to see just how out of balance our relationship had been. This knowledge did not make losing him any easier, but it did help me to know in my heart that even if he did come back I could never take him back. I had changed far too much and the ironic thing is he is the one who pushed me to change with his idiocy. One day I may be able to forgive him for what he has done but currently if I saw him I would try my hardest to smack the stupid right out of him. I decided that I would at least work on loving myself and I need to start moving on and really mean it. First things first, I would let him go. In order to truly be free of him I needed to go to the place that meant the most to us. I needed to find our meadow so that I could move on.

I heard a car door close and it pulled me out of my thoughts; Charlie must have just gotten home. I had finished my homework like the dedicated student that I was. Laughing slightly to myself over that concept, I went down the stairs to see what he wanted for dinner. I had been neglecting him over the last several months of wallowing and wanted to make up for it. "Hey dad I was just coming down to make dinner what would you like tonight?"

He turned from the front door and looked at me standing on the stairway before replying, "Oh, hey Bells. Well, I actually brought home pizza with me. I know you haven't felt like cooking so I wanted to make it easy for you."

I laughed inwardly. Yeah, "haven't felt like cooking" was a complete understatement. The poor man has been bringing home dinner almost every night now for the past five months. "That sounds good, but tomorrow I'm making something special so don't bring anything home with you," I requested.

He did a double take at me and I could see a hopeful look in his eye. Charlie was a wonderful father but we had a strict policy of keeping emotions to ourselves. "Bells you seem different are you feeling better?"

"Well, I know that the last few months have been pretty rough. I was thinking over everything today and I came to a few conclusions. I'm not over everything, but it's time to move on."

He took in what I told him and seemed to be thinking it over. Finally, he came to a decision after staring at me for a minute. "I know it's been tough, I remember when your mom and left and took you away. It was like my heart had been ripped out and stomped on. I still love her very much, but eventually I worked through the pain. I just wanted to let you know that it will always hurt on some level, but it does get easier."

He gave me a small smile. This was more then he has ever confided to me about his lost relationship with mom. I guess in some ways we will always be able to understand each other when it comes to heartache."Come on kid the pizzas getting cold and there's a game on in just a few minutes."

Our heart to heart was over apparently. The man never ceases to amaze me, I laughed to myself.

He suddenly turned around again. "Oh, and Bells, just one more piece of advice from your old man. Friends can make a world of difference. I was down at the res the other day fishing with Billy and Jacob was asking how you were. Maybe you could spend some time with him. You may just find a good friend in him."

I gave him a small smile in return. "I may just do that dad. When are you going fishing with Billy again?

We headed into the kitchen to grab some pizza to take back in the living room. "Well we are supposed to go tomorrow actually. Want to go with me? You could hang out with Jake while I go fishing with Billy."

I had a sneaking suspicion that he had been meaning to bring this up even before our uncharacteristic chat. "Sure, I would love to go."

He plopped down in his La-Z-Boy, settled in for the game, grabbed the remote and turned the TV on. I decided to head upstairs with my dinner and give Jacob a call to see what he wanted to do tomorrow. I had already guessed that Charlie had talked to him about it. I set my dinner on the desk and grabbed my phone to give him a call.

The phone rang twice before someone answered. "Hello is Jacob there, this is Bella"

"Oh, hey Bella, its Jake. What are you doing?"

"Well I just finished talking to Charlie and he said that I could come with him tomorrow and I wanted to know if you would like to hang out. I'm sure he already had a chat with you about that though."

He chuckled a little while responding, "Yeah, he may have mentioned to me about seeing if you would like to come with him. I don't really have anything planed, but we could go hang out at the beach or in the garage. There's really not much to do around here. "

"Sounds like a plan to me Jake. I'll see you in the morning. Goodnight"

"'Night, Bells. see you tomorrow."

With that I hung up. Jake seemed like a nice boy, we had not hung out since the day I was at First Beach and he told me the legend about the Cullens. I had always planned on getting to know him better, but was always with him so did not get the chance. Oh well, I thought as I shrugged my shoulders, no time like the present.

I finished my dinner and took my dishes to the kitchen. On my way back through I stopped to say goodnight to Charlie. "Goodnight dad. What time are we leaving?"

Charlie turned to me from the TV. "I was thinking around seven or so. 'Night kid"

I gave him a nod and went upstairs to grab my shower bag and pajamas. The shower was amazing and I stayed under the hot water relaxing until it started to run cold. I was brushing my hair and looking into the mirror and for the first time since he left I really looked at myself. My hair was ragged from not having had a proper haircut in months, I had deep bruises under my eyes from not getting any sleep, and my body was much thinner than before. I grabbed my clothes and headed to my room, throwing my dirty clothes in the hamper.

All comments are welcome and appreciated.

I got in bed and snuggled under the covers, letting sleep overtake me.