We Are Family

Is It Time To Go?

The entire clan had bustled in through the back door once they were given the okay by Carlisle. The first to meet Bella, as expected, had been Edward. He knelt beside her, taking in her face in his hands and speaking quietly only to her. Bella nodded mutely, a response to what had clearly been a question from Edward. Satisfied with her response, Edward took the seat beside her and pulled her impossibly close to his side. 

The others had taken seats on various couches and chairs placed around the living room, each of them waiting for either Carlisle or Esme to speak, the latter opened her mouth only a few moments later. 

"I think it is time to pull you guys out of school, all of you, you can finish your education in the U.K. and then move onto college or university from there." Esme started, Carlisle nodded beside her, "Three days tops to sort everything should be doable, we have certainly uprooted much faster previously," He said. 

"Three days is more than doable, and would be better for the treaty too. Once Charlie speaks to Billy and the wolves get wind of the move, they might prove to be a problem," Jasper said, his eyes flicking to Bella every few moments. 

"Jasper is right. We don't want to fight our way out of town. If they want to cause a problem they will, even though we haven't directly broken the treaty. They know that at some point in the future, after we leave, Bella will be changed. So let's get to work."

...

Edward and Jasper had gone up into the attic to retrieve boxes and suitcases first, what seemed like a hundred of them lined the second-floor hallway, along with many flattened cardboard boxes waiting to be made and packed.

Bella could see that the Cullen's clearly had a flow as to how they packed, preparing to change lives for the umpteenth time. Everyone started with their own spaces, whether it be a bedroom or an office or both. Jasper had started in his study and then moved on to the library to start packing up the thousands of texts that lined the shelves, whilst Alice started on their bedroom. Like Jasper, Esme had started with her own study whilst Carlisle had gone to the hospital to tend his resignation and iron out any loose ends, and then to the school to unenroll everybody.  Edward was in his room, pulling CDs and records from the shelf and placing them neatly into assembled cardboard boxes with the assistance of Bella. Emmett was pulling clothes out of his and Rosalie's shared closet in their bedroom, putting them either in a suitcase, tucking them into garment bags or putting them into boxes for donation, whilst Rosalie had gone into the garage to prepare all of their vehicles for transport. 

Leaving would mean that Bella was sadly saying farewell to her beloved truck, of course, Edward had offered to retrieve it in the middle of the night whilst Charlie slept, but Bella had declined his offer, Bella felt that it was time to say goodbye to this time in her life.

The donation boxes had been stacking up in the hallway, most of them just holding onto specific pieces that they loved or had memories tied to. Bella herself had only kept a few pairs of jeans and three of the tops that she preferred the most. Alice had been speaking about a shopping trip for most of that afternoon, so Bella knew they would all have stocked closets soon enough. 

Bella had tried to make herself as useful as possible, eventually settling on helping Jasper in the library until Edward finished with his own room. Most of the furniture was staying, being covered with sheets until the next time the Cullen's decided to return to Washington. Bella's anxiety had been bleeding into Jasper for the majority of the afternoon, her panic slowly increasing since she had spoken with Edward about going to Charlie's whilst he was at work to retrieve some of her possessions. Edward had immediately offered to go with her, but despite her worry, she had shook her head and told him that she would be perfectly fine, leaving him in his room with a kiss as she went to find Jasper in the library.