Born to love again

From a whisper to a scream

Bella Swan has dreams she can't remember. Realistically terrifying dreams with meanings she couldn't possibly comprehend and tonight was one of those nights. It was a strange vision of a doe darting through the woods, her fragile legs trembling and her chest panting. Following closely behind is a white panther with blue eyes, the creature was huge, larger than anything she had ever seen before and the savageness with which it stalked left no room in her mind to doubt it was a hunter.
Bella in her dream jumped in front of the panther when it leapt at its prey, claws extending towards her chest. The feline soared right through her but when she turned it wasn't the panther that had been defeated.

The doe had fangs and in its jaws was its predator. Bloodied and defeated, the hunter had become the hunted. The doe turned its eyes on Bella's and inside of them she saw a fire that threatened to swallow her whole.

When she opened her mouth to scream– nothing came out.

Bella woke up screaming from a nightmare she had no recollection of. Breathing heavily as she sobbed and choked and screamed until her throat hurt.
Charlie made some noise in the living room, but otherwise didn't stir to check on her. Who would after what he's lived through?
Her night terrors have woken her nearly every night like this for the past couple of months. Ever since the Cullens left. Ever since Edward–

Bella stuffed the thought back into the deepest abyss of her mind. It was 5 in the morning, still dark outside but she couldn't bring herself to fall back asleep for the next 2 hours. What she could do in waiting was get ready for school. She slowly trudged to her closet and she eyed the surplus emptiness that enveloped half of it. Where once hung expensive and unwanted clothing from Alice were empty coat hangers. He had taken them all, along with everything else that could remind Bella of them.

Her eyes darkened dangerously. She slowly trudged through the rest of her closet. Before pulling out a dark purple coat and a simple 'Linkin Park' tee. Laying it out on her bed before going to her bathroom.
Getting into the shower was always the hardest part because that required motivation. Motivation she didn't have, motivation to get into that tub, to squeeze that pineapple shampoo into her hand and lather it through her hair, not strawberry, not after–
She thought about forgoing the shower altogether.

What kept the water running was the slight annoyance she would feel if she heard Charlie hounding her once again about not bathing. She didn't feel much of anything anymore, but that doesn't mean she wants to sit through another hour's lecture longer than she had to.
When she finished she dried her hair with a towel, and slowly put on her clothes one arm through a sleeve, minutes at a time.
It was arduous work and as much as she didn't want to go in today it needed to be done.
Although she couldn't really tell you why at this point.

She didn't bother looking into the mirror. She knew she looked just as bad as she felt. Disgusting.

When she finished, she grabbed her bag and sat at the dining room table. She was waiting for Charlie now. Lately he hasn't trusted her to drive her own truck to school, something she would've been miffed about months earlier if she wasn't so tired. Bella didn't know how long she sat there, staring blankly, but by the time she became aware again the sun had risen and Charlie was situated in front of her with a despondent expression on his face, an expression of defeat.
There was a bowl of cereal on the table that she didn't even bother to pretend to eat.

And suddenly Charlie slammed his hand on the table, causing her to flinch, to wake out of her stupor and her eyes to widen.
"You're going to live with your mother."

It felt like he had slapped her, and he might as well have, It would've stung less. For the first time since he left she could feel her blood boiling through her veins. The outrage made her foam at the mouth, made her want to rage and scream, he had no right.
"Why?" She questioned instead. Her tone was even but there was that unmistakably cold fury present.
The disbelieving look on his face almost made her look away in shame. Stay strong for Edward, you need to be here in case he comes back.
A part of her knew he was never coming back for her.

"Are you kidding me Bella? You are not the one who has to sit here and watch his baby girl turn into a zombie right before his eyes because of some–" Her eyes trembled dangerously but he still spat out the word with hatred, "Boy."
"You are not the one who has to wake up to you screaming every single night, who is scared out of his goddamn mind because he doesn't know how to help you," He sighed, "Because he was never taught how to help you."

He pulled at his hair in stress and it was there that Bella noticed abashedly that it had gotten gray in the past couple of months. "You need help Bella and being here isn't helping, it isn't working. I talked to your mother and she agreed it was for the best."

Her sympathy vanished in a blink of an eye. "You called Renée?"
Charlie's face was furious, "I called your mother goddamn it, Isabella Marie Swan, she is your mother and I called her because you need her.
"I don't need her," Bella's words slipped out like acid, they felt hot on her tongue and she needed to let them out before they burned her too, "I never needed her, she needed me."

Her eyes caught Charlies, the burning need to spill tears felt hot but she persevered, because she couldn't shed tears anymore, because she didn't feel anything anymore other than this desire to stay in Forks, Washington. She latched onto the only thing she could, as a drowning man would a plank in the middle of an all encompassing ocean.
"What about school?"
Charlie looked confused for a moment, "What about school?" He parroted.

"I'm doing well," She challenged, "If you take me out now, so late into the school year what is that going to look like on my record? This is my senior year, you'll make it harder for me to go to college."
"I don't need you to do well in school Bella, I need you to be okay, I need to be able to go to work without having to worry about what will happen if I'm not there, I need to not have to fear the possibility of finding my only child in a ditch, alone... dead because I saw the signs and I didn't do anything. I need you to live, Bella, can you do that for me? For yourself?"
She didn't answer.

Charlie moved to take away her uneaten cereal.
"What if I went to the movies?" She proposed, "Me and Jessica Stanley and Angela Webber, we can catch up, we can be normal, I can be normal."
Charlie didn't respond and Bella felt lightheaded. She didn't know if it was because she hadn't eaten properly in months or if it had anything to do with the panic she felt, the shaking that had started at the thought of leaving Forks, of leaving Edward because what if he came back and she wasn't there?

She opened her mouth but had to close it immediately because her throat had swollen up too tight to speak and so she tried again, dry and desperate.
"What if I got a job?"
And at that, Charlie stopped considering.

Bella wracked her brain for anything at all to say, she tried to remember the words of her peers, the words she didn't have any interest in. She tried to recall something that could help her in this very moment but her brain felt like sludge and she didn't know if her fast-beating heart could take the panic she felt flowing through her veins. And then it hit her like a brick.
"There's that new Bar and Grill that opened up, Fangtasia." She remembered Jessica Stanely wouldn't stop yapping her ears off when she got the job, she never really paid attention to anything Jessica said anymore but the name almost made her laugh. 'Fangtasia', like a vampire, only vampires didn't need fangs to suck your blood, or rip out your heart, "Yeah, Fangtasia, I'm 18, I'm old enough to be a waitress. I don't need to touch any of the alcohol, I can sit at the front desk."

"Let me do this Char– Dad. Let me prove to you that I can do this. This would look good on my college applications, and it's a long time commitment. I'll meet other people, I'll get out of the house, I'll earn money. I can do this, I need to do this."

She pleaded with her father, "Let me do this."

When he didn't give a response she felt as though the air had gone out of her, as if she were a puppet and someone had cut her strings. She slumped over in her chair, crestfallen. Was this it? Was this really how things were going to end?

"Okay." She couldn't believe her ears, her eyes traced her father's face, the way his forehead wrinkled with worry lines, the thinness of his cheeks, the gray in his hair, and that look in her eyes that made her want to shy away in mortification.

"You have a week Bella, if you can't get a job, at this Fangtasia or anywhere else I'm pulling you out of school. Because God Dammit Bella, I can't make myself watch as you fall apart. I can't sit by when you are hurting and you won't talk to anyone about what happened that night. You are my daughter, my baby girl, and I love you Bella."

The confession was awkward for both of them. Charlie was never one to outright say his emotions like this, but she can tell it has been hard on him. From the tears welling up in his eyes, she can tell goddamn it. And she hated herself for it.

"Okay." She said, "Okay." She walked outside as he opened his police cruiser. Hopping into the front seat as they rode silently to school. Her hands clenched.

She wasn't going to leave Edward.