All Grown Up: The Story of Jacob and Renesmee Part I

How the Tables Have Turned

Jacob

I may have acted a little irrational about the whole Seth thing, but it felt rational to me. My kids were going to be small for such a short time, that I wanted to enjoy it while it lasted. With just me, Nessie, and our children. Was it so wrong I wanted us to have them to ourselves? Nessie's family was around all of the time, but that was different. They were usually there because they were helping us. They did not have a magical compulsion to spend all their time with my daughter. I just didn't want somebody up my ass all the time, bothering us. I wasn't ready for a son-in-law yet! Not then, when Mollie still didn't even breathe on her own at night. I just didn't understand why it had to be her. The smallest one, the one who had the most trouble, who I'd shed the most tears over. Ness said maybe she was being rewarded for having such a hard start to her life. The rest of it would be easy now. She did point out, however, that it would have been hilarious if Seth had imprinted on Swan. I had to agree, she'd have given him a run for his money.

The twins were two months old now and were doing amazing. No more monitors and wires, we were so happy about that. And so were they apparently, they laughed all the time. They laughed at everything, or at nothing at all. They were starting to remind me a little of Anthony. Two more Anthonys would be amazing. Two more Swans, however...I loved that girl more than life itself, but one of her was plenty!

They were behind Swan and Anthony for sure, development wise, but still ahead of where a two-month-old human would be. They were small, but the numbers on the scale were going up, and that was exactly what we wanted. They could scoot a little bit, drag themselves around with their arms, but they didn't ever get very far with that.

Now that the twins were doing things besides just sleeping all day, Swan was starting to get jealous. She was never mean to them, she still loved them. But when she felt she wasn't getting enough attention, she was quick to make herself known and remind us she was there. If I was playing with them on the floor, she would crawl into my lap and say, "My Daddy!"

"That's right. I'm your Daddy, and you are my Swan," I would tell her.

We had a really nice, low key time celebrating Nessie's birthday, Bella's too. We had a party for them at the house, we didn't make a huge deal about it. Just family, and a cake that Esme had made. Anthony was in heaven with all of that icing.

I searched hard for the perfect present for Ness. I wanted something that could make her smile every day. I finally found it, a plaque with elegant script, that pretty much summed up the way I felt about her. Well, no words could do that, but it was cute.

You are the cheese to my macaroni, the horizon to my sky, the bacon to my eggs, the laces to my sneakers, the jelly to my peanut butter, the gravy to my mashed potatoes, the smile to my face, the bubbles to my bath, the milk to my cookies, the ink to my pen, the ketchup to my french fries, the water to my ocean, the icing to my cupcake.

She was thrilled, and so was I. She asked me to hang it up in the kitchen so that she could look at it all the time. After everybody had gone home, she and I were in the living room playing with Xandra and Mollie. We could hear Anthony in the kitchen, reading Ness's gift out loud to Swan. After he read the last line they were both quiet for a moment. Then Anthony said, "I wish I had a cupcake right now."

Of course, Swan said, "Me too."

Seth was the first to arrive, and the last to go home that night. I had to admit, one good thing about Seth hanging around all of the time, was at least he helped out a lot. I had not taken the trash out once since he imprinted, who could complain about that? At Nessie's urging, I had actually gone to the cottage to talk to Edward about it. Bells had gone hunting with Alice and Jasper, so it was just us. And he couldn't seem to keep the damn smirk off of his face.