This Love Is Wildfire

Even Love Fails Sometimes

*15 years ago*

"This isn't going to work, Charlie." Renee Swan  sighs as she runs a hand through her tangled hair.

Her husband stares blankly at her, not fully processing what it is she is telling him. His thoughts drift to their two daughters, what's going to happen to them? He doesn't want their eldest daughter to think love wasn't real.

"Renee, what about the girls? We can't just—"

"I can take Isabella with me to Arizona, Arabelle is already in school and I'd hate to move her out of it—"

"Please, there must be something we can do? Couples counseling? Something. I don't want you to leave..."

Charlie sighs heavily as his words fall on deaf ears, as he holds back tears, he tries to think how they're going to break this to their children.

"I'm sorry Charlie, but I can't keep living like this. I can't keep... We can't be children forever, we have to grow up sometime." She hitches her bag around her shoulder with another painful sigh.

"I'll stay at the motel tonight. I'll come back for my stuff and Isabella tomorrow."

Before Charlie could get a word in, she walks out the front door, seemingly shutting herself away from her family, from there on out. Charlie sits heavily in his chair, putting his face in his hands, wondering where it all went wrong.

"Daddy?"

His head snaps up at the small voice, looking over to see his eldest daughter with tears in her eyes.

"Does–Does Mommy not love us anymore?" She hiccups and it breaks his heart, not knowing she had been there the entire time.

"No, no of course not baby." He pulls her into his lap, placing a kiss on her head, rocking her softly.

"Mommy...Mommy just, wanted to go somewhere else. And—and Daddy's job wouldn't let him go with her." He sighs going for a version of the truth, not wanting to entirely lie to his daughter, but not wanting to paint her mother as the bad guy.

Charlie tries to think of the best way to explain something so detrimental to a child. He can't say that Renee doesn't love him enough to stay, because well, one should never shatter the illusion of love for a child.

"A-and she's gonna take baby Izzy with her too?" He looks down into her blue-green eyes wet with tears, and sighs sadly.

"Yeah baby. But it'll be okay, alright? I promise everything will be alright."

Charlie brings his daughter close into his chest and
spends the night, rocking his daughter back to sleep wondering how the hell he's going to do this, hoping he doesn't screw this up too.

~~~

Over the years, Charlie and Arabelle become closer than any father-daughter relationship could ever be. After that fateful night, Ara only saw her sister for some Christmases or summers, but it was usually just her and Charlie, and she was okay with that. They enjoyed the routine they had created.

When she was younger, Arabelle tried to stay in constant contact with her mother and sister, but soon she began to realize they were just "too busy" for them. At first, this broke her heart and she wondered what she could have done for her mother and baby sister to not want to interact with them at all. In later years, it created a dislike for the two in Arizona, especially when she was old enough to fully understand what happened that night.

But she didn't need her mother or even her sister. Arabelle has her amazing, supportive, and hardworking father, and a whole other family on the La Push reservation. She was the only (other) girl lucky enough to be  invited on her Dad's "Boys Only" fishing trips (with Leah Clearwater of course), which made her a constant presence in La Push.

Making friends with the kids on the reservation was easy, they included her in everything; from making mud pies when they were younger, to going cliff jumping once they were all old enough. She was an outsider welcomed in with open arms. She was even included in knowing about the tribal history. Things not even Charlie was privy to, things that will affect her in the future.

Due to her always coming down to the Reservation, Sue Clearwater offered her a small, part-time job helping to take care of the elderly on the reservation. Teaching her the traditional, Quileute ways of healing with herbs, but also teaching her a bit of Western medicine as well. And once she is finished with school, she hopes to be on the reservation more often than not.

On the outside Arabelle Nicole Swan seems to be like every other girl living in dreary Washington, but it isn't just the boys on La Push who have a secret to hide.