Love Potion

Not a lot of things scared me after seeing and experiencing what I had. I was too jaded and had too little to lose. Dr. Loves-the-Cock terrified me, though. The images my mind started to conjure up before I shut them down were… I shuddered. I needed brain bleach, and I needed lots of it.

After about an hour, I snuck out of Bella’s apartment and locked myself in my own. I didn’t want James catching me, and I certainly did not want to know about the supplies he had been yapping about. I’d shown Bella some moves that would be more effective than hair pulling, and she’d have James in tears, begging for his mama, in less than twenty seconds.

The fucker from the night before was a different story, though. He was as big as Emmett, and he had nearly fucking killed her. His worthless life would be in serious danger if I ever saw him again. I might not have been as big as he was, but that didn’t mean he’d continue breathing if I decided otherwise. On my mental list of the shittiest things to do, hitting a woman was very close to the top. It was the lowest of lows, and he deserved a much worse fate than I could come up with. Torture and death were too mild.

I went to shower, and when I emptied my pockets as I was undressing, I noticed that I’d missed four calls and received three texts. That was unusual. Every call and text was from Jasper. Fuck. The same Jasper I had agreed to meet for breakfast, and now it was almost lunchtime. I quickly texted him to apologize and asked him to meet me at the diner for lunch instead. He agreed without commenting on my forgetfulness. Maybe he wasn’t so bad after all.

The shower did wonders for my back. It hadn’t agreed with a night on Bella’s couch, but pretty much my whole body had agreed with the self-defense training after breakfast – the body contact part of it, anyway. I squeezed my eyes shut under the spray of hot water.

Don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t think about it.

Crap.

I reached out and turned the water to cold, hissing loudly when it hit my back. I needed a sign in my shower stall – thoughts of the pretty firecracker not allowed. Maybe I should have it say Jake’s sister instead of pretty firecracker. That might do the trick.

Less than an hour later, I stepped into the diner. Surveying the room, I spotted Jasper in a booth with Charlie. I waved at Sue, who was behind the counter, and made my way toward them.

“You remember that,” I heard Charlie say.

“Yes, sir,” Jasper said before he looked up and noticed me. He quickly averted his eyes, blushing.

I frowned. “Hi, guys.”

Jasper nodded to me, and Charlie turned around. “Hello, son,” he greeted me before turning back to look at Jasper. “I need to get back to work. It was nice to meet you, Jasper.”

“You, too, sir,” Jasper said formally.

Charlie smiled serenely at me before leaving. I sat down in the seat he had vacated and looked expectantly at Jasper. “All right, what was that about?”

“Nothing,” Jasper replied quickly.

“Bullshit,” I countered and sent him a look I hadn’t used in a long time. I had mastered it when I had been dealing with privates who thought they could get their bullshit past me.

It seemed to work on Jasper, too. He bit the inside of his cheek and sighed. “You have people who really care about you here, Edward. Mr. Swan was just reminding me of that fact.”

I opened my mouth to speak, but I didn’t really know what to say. The fact that Charlie had…well, whatever he had said to Jasper, I was touched that he cared enough to even bother.

“You know I’m not here to cause trouble, right?” Jasper continued. “And I couldn’t be happier for you that you have a place and people that mean something to you, just like you do to them. After the way your own family and your best friend treated you, you deserve to have some decent people in your life.”

“Thanks…I guess,” I said. What did he expect me to say?

Jasper nodded with a small smile. “So, tell me about how you’re doing now. You said you were here visiting a friend originally, but then got offered the bartending job?”

I nodded. It was technically true, and also the watered down version I had offered him over the phone. Figuring if we were going to try to revive our long dead friendship, I had to make an effort, too, so I told him the more detailed version. I told him about Jake, about Afghanistan, and about how the Swans had welcomed me in Forks.

Jasper listened like he had back when we were friends. It was strangely comforting. He, in turn, told me about how he had ditched all thoughts of going to law school after completing pre-law in college. It had been another wedge in his failing relationship with Alice. With me not going to college at all, and Jasper abandoning his law school ambitions, it had been up to her alone to fulfill all my dad’s stuffy ambitions. According to Jasper, she hadn’t done so well, feeling pressured into law school and hating every minute of it.

“She dropped out and works as the PA for some executive,” Jasper said. “Carlisle isn’t happy, but it beats the alternative she had planned originally. After dropping out of law school, she wanted to sell cosmetics. I was sure your dad was gonna have a heart attack when she told him.”

I didn’t care about my dad’s reaction to a touch of reality. How he had ever thought he could play Alice and me – hell, even Jasper – as his own personal puppets was beyond me. “What about you?” I asked. “What are you doing if you didn’t go to law school?”

“Here you are, boys,” Sue interrupted, setting down a tray with food on the table. I realized we hadn’t even gotten around to ordering yet and looked at her, amused. She smiled at me. “Everybody likes burgers, Edward, and everybody loves mine. See, I even brought you coleslaw.”

I chuckled. “Thank you, Sue. You’re the best.”

“And sadly, I know it,” she said, winking. “Enjoy!”

“Thank you,” Jasper and I chorused like the spoiled bastards we were.

I quickly snatched the portion with the biggest helping of coleslaw. “That’s clearly mine,” I said with a grin.

Jasper laughed. My love for all things coleslaw was not new, so he knew all about it. His own coleslaw intake was all normal and boring. In fact, rating people by how much they enjoyed their coleslaw was not a bad way of separating the good from the bad. The pretty firecracker also knew how to slather it on generously, as did Charlie. I didn’t know about Sue, but she seemed too awesome not to be a coleslaw lover, too. She was Jake’s mom, after all.

“I’m glad they’re indulging your coleslaw obsession around here,” Jasper said. “Remember when your mom tried to make it?”

“Ugh,” I said, wrinkling my nose. “That shit was not coleslaw. It was…drowned salad?”

“I don’t know what it was, but it was definitely horrible. They have a cook now, you know,” he told me.

“No offense, man, but I really don’t care,” I said, leaning back in my seat and looking at him. “I know they’re my parents, but they’re also strangers to me. They have no interest in me, and frankly, the feeling is mutual. Tell me about what you’ve been up to instead.”

He nodded, and I knew he understood. A lot of time had passed, and we had both grown and been through a lot. But deep down, we still knew each other.

“Well,” he said, beginning to smile. “After everything had settled down after you left and the excitement of the engagement wore off, I started thinking if maybe you had been onto something. I wrestled with it for years, but finally I decided that I wanted to go my own way instead of Carlisle’s. When we were around ten years old, do you remember what I wanted to be when I grew up?”

I thought back and smiled. “Yeah. You wanted to be a detective. When we played, you always insisted on being Sherlock Holmes, and I had to be that dopey Watson. We’d either stash Alice somewhere and pretend that she’d been kidnapped, or cover her in strawberry jelly and tell her to be a dead body.”

Jasper nodded satisfied. “Exactly. I’m a private investigator. I have a small business in Seattle.”

“For real?” I asked, gaping slightly. That was possibly the coolest thing ever.

“Yes,” he confirmed. “Neither Carlisle or Alice was impressed with that decision, so I got a taste of what you went through. Only I was four years older than you were when you went through it and still had my family and all my friends from college. You didn’t have anyone.”

“I’m not going to lie and say that it didn’t suck,” I said after sampling the coleslaw. It was excellent, of course. “There were so many times when I could have used some support from home, even if it was just knowing they were there, waiting for me to come home safe. At the same time, it made me grow up when I needed to. I don’t know…if I’m honest, I don’t think as much about them now as I used to when I was deployed.

“But hey, fuck that. It’s all in the past. Dude, you’re a private dick!” I laughed as he cringed at the term, but he had used it himself in the past, so there was no mercy from me.

“Yeah, calling it that was a lot more fun when it wasn’t my job,” he admitted sheepishly.

He told me about his work while we ate. It wasn’t as glamorous as I’d expected, but there were some really interesting aspects, and I was happy that he had followed his own dreams instead of my dad’s. It earned him a lot of plusses in my book. Before we parted ways after lunch, he told me that he would be sticking around for another day or two. He said he’d be at the bar that night and to please keep the clingy, flirting dude away from him. I just laughed. James’ fascination with Jasper kept him out of my hair.

Sue refused to let me pay for lunch, so I stayed behind to bus a few tables and help out with whatever I could. Then I picked up groceries and did some laundry. I felt almost normal. At least until I spotted James in his fluffy bunny slippers, and I had to run to make it into my own apartment before he saw me. Crazy neighbors were normal, too, right?

I fixed myself some dinner before heading down to work. It was nice to cook, even if I wasn’t that good at it. As long as it was better than what they served on deployments, I was happy, though. And it was. Compared to that slobber, my own creations in the kitchen were gourmet meals. In Afghanistan, when the food had been particularly bad, Jake had drowned whatever slop we’d been served in ketchup, closed his eyes, and chanted coleslaw, coleslaw, coleslaw while he ate. He had insisted that it helped.

I smiled sadly at the thought of my friend and looked around my apartment. His apartment. I wondered what our lives would have been like today if the sniper attack and roadside bomb hadn’t happened. Jake would probably have been right here, living in this apartment and working the job I now had. He would have been laughing and living with his friends and family, and he and Bella would have been taking the shit out of James. I would probably have been preparing for another tour overseas, seeing no reason to linger stateside when I could be of use somewhere. Had it not been for my bad knee, I would probably have made the Army my life until the day I got too old. The thought alone was enough to make me partly depressed now that I had gotten a taste of civilian life. If only Chief was here…

There was a loud banging on the door, and I startled from my thoughts. “Chop chop, lamb chop! We’ve got thirsty people to serve and delicious asses to ogle!” James called through the door. “And I know you’re not making babies because Bella is out here, and you can’t make babies on your own!”

I snorted and put my dish in the sink. The guy was more baby obsessed than any woman I had ever met. Making sure I had my keys and cell phone, I left the apartment and somber thoughts behind. Bella and James were waiting outside my door – him humping a large green plant and her shaking her head while trying not to laugh. I decided not to ask.

It was a relatively busy night at the bar. At least busy enough for me to miss Rose, Emmett, and Jasper arriving. Suddenly, Rose was seated in front of me, though, smiling at me like I was her new best friend.

“Hey, Rose,” I greeted her.

“Hello, Edward,” she replied. “I’d like a Tequila Sunrise and permission to punch Jasper, please.”

“Coming ri-” I started and then frowned. “Um, what?”

“Get working on that Tequila Sunrise, and I’ll explain the second part,” she replied.

“Yes, ma’am,” I muttered. A moment later, I placed the drink on the counter and looked expectantly at her.

She smirked and took a sip. “Not bad, newbie. Now, can I please punch Jasper?”

“Thanks,” I said. “And um, why are you asking me?”

She shrugged. “I just thought I’d be polite. He told Emmett and me over dinner exactly what kind of craptastic friend he’d been to you. I then figured I had a choice – I could be the friend of Emmett’s random college roommate with the annoying, druggie girlfriend, or I could be the friend of someone Jake thought very highly of. It wasn’t a difficult choice. And you may be a tough soldier and all that, but I’d totally punch Jasper in your honor. Well, if I don’t trip first, that is.”

I laughed, but I was genuinely touched because I had no doubt that she was being serious. “I appreciate it, but please don’t punch anyone on my account. Jasper and I kissed and made up.”

“So unfair,” James commented as he passed behind me.

“But he was such an epic asshole!” Rose objected. “How can you just forgive something like that?”

“It was a long time ago, and we were both young,” I replied. “My dad tried to influence him just like he did me, and for a while it was easier for him to control Jasper because of Alice. I don’t know. When he first contacted me, I didn’t want to even talk to him, but now I’m kinda glad that I did. He’ll never be my best friend again, but after everything, I’ll settle for less.”

She frowned and sipped her drink. “You’re a better person than I am.”

I shook my head and thought about all the people I had killed, all the people I had let down and disappointed, and all the different choices I could have made. “No, I’m not.”

Rose shrugged with a smile. “We’ll just agree to disagree. I’m just glad you’re not the creepy stalker I thought you were.”

I snorted. I really liked Rose. I went to serve some other customers, and that took me further toward the end of the bar where Emmett and Jasper were sitting. I overheard Bella talking to them – well, talking to Emmett. She seemed to be giving Jasper the cold shoulder and ignoring his attempts to get her to talk with him.

I chuckled to myself. She was pretty fucking amazing. Between her, Charlie, and Rose, I seemed to have my own little private army, ready to stand up for me. It was exhilarating to have people like that in my life, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to take them for granted. I didn’t know what I had done to deserve them other than being lucky enough to call Jake my friend, but I was going to treasure them, that much was certain. As long as they wanted me to keep sticking around, I couldn’t come up with one single reason to ever leave Forks. It was like when I had found my place in the Army – I felt like I belonged.

I served a sullen-looking Renee, who was no doubt disappointed that Charlie wasn’t working. According to Bella, Renee never showed her face at the diner because she was scared of Sue. She just had to wait for the nights Charlie worked at the bar. The poor woman had been trying to get his attention for more than twenty years. Bella had told me so. It kind of made me feel sorry for her – wanting something she couldn’t get for that long.

I tried talking to her, but she ignored me whenever I wasn’t bringing her a new drink. Instead I overheard Bella tell Jasper how proud she and everybody else had been when Jake had joined the Army. The pretty firecracker didn’t need to learn self defense – her words were enough to make a grown man cry. I couldn’t help but smile as she continued to tell him how she and Rose had made cookies and treats for Jake’s platoon when he had been overseas, because every soldier deserved to be reminded of how much the people back home appreciated his or her sacrifice. Ouch. Jasper needed to watch out before he really pissed her off.

James marched up to me like a diva on a mission. I hoped it didn’t involve any talk of babies. “You. Me. Back room. Now,” he said, prodding a finger in my chest to accentuate each word.

“Um, no thanks,” I replied.

“It wasn’t a request, sugar cane. It’s serious business,” he said and tried to push me toward the back room.

I didn’t move an inch. He seriously needed to start working out if he wanted to push me around.

“I’ll climb up on the bar and tell everyone how much I enjoyed it when you licked my nipples last night if you don’t move right now,” he threatened.

“What the fuck?” I spluttered. “You wouldn’t!”

“Try me,” he said with a smirk.

I sighed and hung my head. One of these days, I would need the upper hand when it came to James. Maybe I needed to enlist Bella and Emmett’s help. Surely Jake’s old pranking partners could come up with something to make the diva simmer down a bit.

James knew he had me and waltzed ahead of me out back. Once we were out of earshot from the bar and its patrons, he turned to me. “Okay, man meat. As much as I’d like you to actually lick my nipples, I have some serious issues I need to address. First of all, why the ever-loving fuck didn’t you tell me that Donkey Dick out there was an asshole – and not in the good way?”

“Jasper?” I asked, ignoring most of his ramblings. “Who said he was an asshole?”

“He said so himself, which I suppose counts for something, but he can be as divinely delicious as he wants, but if he doesn’t treat you well, he automatically goes on my shit list,” he said and took a much needed breath. “It doesn’t really matter if he’s got the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen, or the softest looking hair, or an ass that is just begging to be bitten, or thighs I just wan-”

“I get it!” I interrupted, suppressing a shudder at the thought of anyone biting Jasper’s ass. That was just…ugh.

“Of course you do. After all, it’s pretty obvious how gorgeous he is,” James agreed. “I just wanted to assure you that you’re far more gorgeous, so I’ve got your back, lover. If he messes with you, I’ll karate chop his pretty ass for you.”

“As disturbing as that thought is, thank you, James. I appreciate it,” I said. “I’m sure it won’t be necessary for you to do anything to his ass, though.” Where was that brain bleach when you needed it?

He gave me a satisfied nod. “All right, onto the second part of the agenda for the evening. I officially call your bullshit.”

“What bullshit?” I asked.

“Whatever bullshit you and the Indian princess are trying to feed me,” he replied, narrowing his eyes at me. “How stupid do you think I am, huh? There’s no way you two have even attempted to make babies, and I don’t know why you would lie to me so cruelly. All I do is love you.”

He looked like he might actually start crying, and I was a little torn. I didn’t like lying, but I also didn’t want to tattle on Bella since it had been her idea. “Why do you think we haven’t tried to…um…aren’t together?”

“Oh, please,” he scoffed. “If you’d practicing for babies, you wouldn’t be able to keep your hands off each other. I sure as hell wouldn’t if I’d had you writhing naked in my bed. Just sayin’.”

I closed my eyes briefly and leaned back against the wall with a sigh. “Bella thought it might get you off our backs, and I kinda agreed. No offense, but we don’t need a pushy matchmaker.”

“Aw, that’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever said to me, baby cakes,” he crooned. “But seriously, why don’t you want my help if you love her, but you aren’t together?”

I stared at him, replaying his words in my mind. If you love her… If I loved her? Did I love Bella? I thought about the look in her eyes when we talked about Jake, the sound of her laugh when we ganged up on James, how her body had felt against mine when I had been teaching her self-defense techniques, how she had stood up for herself that first day outside the cemetery, how scared and broken she had looked when her stupid ex had come to the bar, how undeniably beautiful she was, and how her big heart had changed my life before I had even met her.

I vaguely heard James calling my name before running out of the room, screaming for someone to call 911. However, I was too preoccupied to care. My whole world was shifting around me, and it felt similar to an earthquake or a missile hitting nearby, only without the structural damage and the casualties.

Bella came running in, and that made me smile. Gone was the earthquake, and I knew. I had fallen for the pretty firecracker. James was going to buy more baby clothes when I admitted it to him, I just knew it.

“Edward? Edward, answer me, damn it! Are you sick? Do I need to get a doctor?” Bella fussed. “James, go get a chair and a glass of water. Maybe his knee is hurting.”

I shook myself out of it. Returning to reality was like venturing out on the first patrol the first time I had been overseas – pretty fucking scary. In my head I could be in my own little love bliss, but in the real world I had to deal with the consequences – either act on my feelings or watch her love someone else. Scary shit for a mentally stumped ex-soldier who hadn’t talked about his feelings in years, and who had no idea how to treat a lady.

“I’m okay,” I told Bella while avoiding her eyes. I was afraid she might see right through me and laugh. “I just…I just got caught up in my head, that’s all.”

Bella paled, and I wondered what the hell I had said. “About…what happened in Afghanistan?” she asked softly.

Aw, hell. How did this go from love to war traumas? I didn’t want to lie to Bella, but I also couldn’t be honest – at least not right then. So I tried both and probably failed. “No, not exactly,” I replied. “Just some stuff. You know how you sometimes realize something important, and it takes your breath away because it was so damn obvious, but you just didn’t see it?”

She looked at me curiously. “Um…sure?”

I snorted and shook my head. “Never mind. I’m sorry I worried you and James, but I’m fine.”

“James came out screaming that you had fallen into a coma, and that we should call 911 and ask them for a helicopter so you could be airlifted to Seattle. He was also willing to donate a kidney and give blood,” she said, finally cracking a smile again.

We walked out and met James by the door.

“Oh, sweetums! You’re awake!” James cried and nearly tackled me to the floor in his eagerness to hug me. My back got slammed into the door frame, and for a brief second I almost wished I was in a damn coma. That shit hurt.

“Not for long if you don’t stop choking me,” I muttered.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized and let go of me. He put a bar stool down. “Here you go, sit that squeezable ass of yours down. I’ll get you a stiff drink. Unless, of course, there’s something else you’d like stiff instead.”

“James, leave him alone and go do your job,” Bella said, trying not to laugh.

“Yes, boss lady. Just shout for me if the stud muffin needs mouth-to-mouth,” he replied and saluted her.

I picked up the stool and put it away. “I’ll just go back to work and pretend the past fifteen minutes never happened,” I told her.

She laughed. “Good luck with that.”

I got back to work. Between tasks, I admitted to myself that I didn’t really want to pretend that my little epiphany hadn’t happened, just the stuff that had happened after. I hated feeling like an idiot, and I hated hurting my back even more. Loving Bella, however… I grinned to myself, making Renee look at me like I was the crazy one. Loving Bella. Loving Bella was a feeling I could definitely get used to.

The rest of the night flew by, and afterward I had no idea what I had been doing. I only hoped I had been serving the right drinks to the right customers. I barely even remembered Rose, Emmett, and Jasper leaving. I helped close up, but didn’t follow Bella and James upstairs. Instead I stayed outside in the chilly night to try and get a little perspective that the semi-busy night at the bar hadn’t offered me.

What did a man do when he finally realized that he loved a woman? I was so fucking clueless that it wasn’t even funny. I hadn’t been in love before, but I had no problems recognizing the feeling for what it was. I just knew somehow. I didn’t know how to proceed, though. Did I ask her out? And ask her out where? And how? What if she just laughed at me? Or worse yet, told me to get lost and never show my face in town again? I needed help, and unfortunately there was only one person I could think of as a possibility.

A minute later, I was knocking on James’ door. When he opened up, he was wearing only his fluffy bunny slippers and a big smile.

“You missed me, didn’t you?” he greeted me.

“No, but I need your help. After you get dressed, that is,” I replied. “It can wait until the morning, though. I don’t want to um, interrupt whatever you were doing.”

“Me? I wasn’t doing anything,” he said innocently, looking down at himself. “Oh, you mean the no clothes bit. Well, I could say that I was waiting for you, but that would be a lie. I was just airing my junk.”

I choked on a laugh. “Airing your junk?”

He nodded. “You’d enjoy being aired, too, if you spent all day stuffed down a pair of jeans. Just sayin’, teddy bear. Now come on inside and sit your bitable ass down while I slip into something uncomfortable.”

He disappeared into his bedroom, and I sat down on the couch. His apartment had a very interesting décor. It was very James. There were brightly colored pillows everywhere, and the furniture was an eclectic mix of old, modern, and plain weird. The artwork on the walls was…erotic? Pornographic? I had no clue, but it was full of naked people.

I was rethinking my decision to ask him for advice when he came back into the living room. He was still wearing the bunny slippers, but thankfully also a pair of jeans and a basketball shirt. He plopped down on the couch next to me.

“So, butter butt. What’s up? Tell Auntie James all about it,” he said with a grin.

I rolled my eyes. “Well, it’s about Bella and what you said down in the bar…”

“You love her and need my help because you only know how to train hunky soldiers – not how to woo someone,” he stated.

“Basically, yes,” I admitted. “I haven’t been in a real relationship since high school. I saw how the other guys struggled to be away from their girlfriends or wives, and I didn’t want to put anyone in a situation like that for my sake.”

“That was very noble of you, but also very stupid. Anyone would want to wait for you to come home, sweet cheeks. It’s a fact,” he said and tilted his head speculatively. “I think the best way to get the Indian princess out of her funk and notice that she can’t possibly live without your hunky self is to make her jealous. Everyone wants what they can’t have. Just look at poor, little me.”

“Make her jealous how? Isn’t that kind of mean?” I asked. “I just figured I could ask her out or something.”

“No, no, no, no. You need to get her attention, or she might not think you mean it as a real date. Trust Auntie James on this – I know my princess. And it’s harmless. You just flirt a little with the women – and men if you feel so inclined – who come into the bar. Give ‘em that dazzling smile of yours, and they’ll be drooling so much that Bella will get jealous. It’s completely fool-proof.”

I wasn’t so sure, but when he started talking about pedicures instead, I decided that it was time to leave. I thanked him for his advice and promised to try it out. If it backfired, I vowed to buy a shotgun and shoot him.

A little later, I had showered and was lying in my bed, trying to fall asleep. I thought about the pretty firecracker, and how lucky I was to have her in my life – both in Afghanistan, where she’d kept me sane without knowing it, and here where she gave me a reason to get out of bed in the mornings. I grinned to myself.

I loved Bella.

My grin faltered. Jake would have kicked my ass. Shit. And Charlie was going to shoot me.

Damn.