Ebb and Flow (Twilight x Reader)

Chapter 12

I could feel it was too early again when I woke, and I knew I was getting the schedule of my days and nights slowly reversed. Looking to the side revealed Bella still asleep on the bed. I lay on the pullout and listened to the quiet voices of Alice and Jasper in the other room.

I rolled till my feet touched the floor and then staggered to the living room.

The clock on the TV said it was just after two in the morning. Alice and Jasper were sitting together on the sofa, Alice sketching again while Jasper looked over her shoulder. They didn't look up when I entered, too engrossed in Alice's work.

I crept to Jasper's side to peek. "Did she see something more?" I asked him quietly.

"Yes. Something's brought him back to the room with the VCR, but it's light now."

I watched as Alice drew a square room with dark beams across its low ceiling. The walls were paneled in wood, a little too dark, out of date. The floor had a dark carpet with a pattern in it. There was a large window against the south wall, and an opening through the west wall led to the living room. One side of that entrance was stone—a large tan stone fireplace that was open to both rooms. The focus of the room from this perspective, the TV and VCR, balanced on a too-small wooden stand, were in the southwest corner of the room. An aged sectional sofa curved around in front of the TV, a round coffee table in front of it.

"That's mom's house," I said quietly, dread building in my stomach.

Alice was already off the couch, phone in hand, dialing. I stared at the precise rendering of my mother's family room. Uncharacteristically, Jasper slid closer to me. He lightly touched his hand to my shoulder, and the physical contact seemed to make his calming influence stronger. The panic stayed dull, unfocused.

Alice's lips were trembling with the speed of her words, the low buzzing impossible to decipher. I couldn't concentrate.

"Y/n," Alice said.

I looked at her.

"Edward is coming to get you and your sister. He and Emmett and Carlisle are going to take you two somewhere, to hide you for a while."

"Edward is coming?"

We all turned to see Bella exit the room. She seemed to be much more alert than I was at the moment.

"Yes, he's catching the first flight out of Seattle. We'll meet him at the airport, and you'll leave with him."

"But my mom. . ." Hysteria built in Bella's voice.

"Jasper and I will stay till she's safe."

"I can't win, Alice. You can't guard everyone I know forever. Don't you see what he's doing? He's not tracking me at all. He'll find someone, he'll hurt someone I love. . . . Alice, I can't—"

"We'll catch him, Bella," she assured me.

"And what if you get hurt, Alice? Do you think that's okay with me? Do you think it's only my human family he can hurt me with?"

Alice looked meaningfully at Jasper. Bella's eyelids fluttered, as if a sudden bout of tiredness washed over her. . .

Then she stood up, forcing her eyes open, and I knew she'd just overpowered whatever Jasper had tried to do to her.

"I don't want to go back to sleep," she snapped.

It was then, though, that the phone rang. Alice picked it up and listened, then began speaking very rapidly.

"I'm going to go check out," Jasper told Bella and I. "We're going to relocate closer to your mother's house." Then he left.

"They're just boarding their plane," Alice told us after she'd hung up. "They'll land at nine forty-five."