Previously: Weird sex cult cabin in the woods.
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Marines: Bella says that it only takes one word to remind her of her priorities: Renesmee.
Congratulations. You only need to be reminded of the existence of your newborn in order to remember that maybe all night fucking in the woods is weird when you have a two-day old baby.
Kirsti: Parent of the year right there.
Annie: She’s perfect and the greatest and the best. Just not at being a parent.
Mari: Bella sighs because Renesmee should be awake soon but then she starts freaking out about what her “baby” will look like today. Edward tries to calm her by telling her that they will be home in two seconds. The next part has to be shared in full:
“I probably looked like a cartoon character, the way I sprung up, then looked back at him– his diamond body faintly glinting in the diffuse light– then away to the west, where Renesmee waited, then back at him again, then back toward her, my head whipping from side to side a half dozen times in a second. Edward smiled, but he didn’t laugh; he was a strong man.”
What the shit?
1- Telling us that this is cartoonish doesn’t actually excuse the fact that you still thought this was a good thing to write, Stephenie. It’s awful.
2- Perfect mom Bella can’t even decide if she wants to see her newborn baby or fuck Edward for the 87th time. Wow.
3- WHIPPING FROM SIDE TO SIZE HALF A DOZEN TIMES IN A SECOND.
4- “He was a strong man.” You guys, what? He’s strong for resisting the urge to laugh? I mean, I guess, but why suddenly switch to the past tense and make this more awkward?
Catherine: There’s so much to question here. Like why “diamond body” seemed like a sexy descriptor to Meyer. I don’t picture sexy when she says that. I picture fucking an ice sculpture.
Annie: Yep. This was stupid and more proof that Meyer was paid by the word.
Mari: Anyway, Eddie tells Bell-bell that her new vamp life is all about balance. I mean, sure, she’s already the best baby vamp that ever lived, and is super good at not killing people and being strong and fast, but she is struggling to not have sex all day so wow plot and tension.
In the end, Bella just reminds herself that thanks to plot contrivance, Renesmee sleeps so they can have sex all night every night, hopefully only in the mind of Stephenie and the troubled souls who find that appealing. Hopefully we never have to hear about it again. Don’t say anything, please, and let me keep my hope alive.
K: FINGERS CROSSED.
Mari: Bella holds onto the hope of all-night-long so that she can be a good mother, except she struggles to think of herself as a mother, especially because her baby got here super fast. Bella is stressed out again thinking about how fast Renesmee is growing. She wants to hurry up and get ready, but apparently, Alice’s gift to her is a closet actually bigger than the rest of the sex cabin. And all the clothes are in white garment bags so she can’t see what’s hers or what anything is. That’s got to be the most illogical way to set up a closet, but okay, thanks Alice. Bella is so shocked that all these clothes are hers. She says that Edward says Alice’s name like an explanation and she says it like an expletive. I mean, it is a stupid closet, but really these are the very least of your worries, Bell-bell.
Bella unzips the first bag and it’s a pink dress. Edward offers to help and actually SNIFFS OUT A PAIR OF JEANS AND A T-SHIRT. He follows his nose to an outfit. And Bella mesmerizes all the scents of the fabric so she can avoid silk and satin. WE ARE 60% THROUGH THE FINAL BOOK OF A 4-PART SERIES AND WE ARE SNIFFING CLOTHES.
Catherine: But WHY can they not just use their EYES??!! If they took everything out of those stupid garment bags, they could just look at the clothes like we disgusting humans do and their lives would instantly be 30% easier.
K: Seriously. The clothes sniffing thing is so fucking weird. SO WEIRD. I also love that stretch cotton apparently has a different scent to regular cotton which has a different scent to denim???
Annie: I love that these are all SUPER IMPORTANT details that we need to know. You’re not helping yourself here, Meyer. I am convinced you’re paid by the word.
Mari: Edward gets dressed too and we pause to admire how omg perfect he looks in his khakis. I mean, Bella keeps saying she’s freaking out about super-fast growing Renesmee but here she is. Admiring khakis. (C: She wants that khaki skirt back so bad. I hope Alice burned it.) (K: Why the fuck does Edward always wear beige or white clothing?? Is this a Mormon thing?!?!)
Finally, they run back to the main house. Renesmee is awake and mangling forks and spoons as a hobby now, I guess, while the rest of the family watches her. When R (sorry, typing Renesmee every few seconds HURTS) spots Bella, she throws a spoon, denting the floor (A: The fuck?), and points to her mother. Everyone laughs like this is amazing.
Bella picks R up and finds that while she’s a little taller and her hair is a little longer, the changes are less intense than they were yesterday. Wow, it seems like she might just be hurtling toward marrying age, IDK. That would be my guess.
R is hungry again, which Bella can tell after her mutant pats her cheek. Edward takes off to get her food while Bella asks how long R has been awake. Rose explains that it’s only been a few minutes and they would’ve called the parents soon because the little mutant has been demanding her mother. Esmee gave up her “second best silver service” in order to entertain her. I mean… they also could’ve just gotten Bella, but okay. I guess no one wanted to disturb the sexcapades.
K: Okay but WHY DO THEY HAVE SECOND BEST SILVER WHEN NO ONE EATS?????
Mari: I don’t know, Kirsti. Why do they breathe when they don’t have to breathe?
Everyone is kind of sniggering about because Edward and Bella had sex. They are all like senior citizens, but okay. Sex, lol. Bella tries to keep her chin high and tells R that they’ll set up her room in the sex cabin ASAP. Emmett jokes about being shocked it’s still standing. He asks if they were discussing the national debt last night and howls with laughter. 60% in. We don’t get a plot. We get bro-jokes about s-e-x.
K: At least ten million trees died so that each copy of this book could exist.
Annie: Man, that’s a depressing thought.
Mari: Bella tries to control her temper so she won’t lash out like she did with Seth. Thinking about Seth reminds her that wolves are a thing and she asks where they are this morning. Rosalie says that Jacob took off in the morning pretty early and Seth followed. Having heard more in her head, Edward asks what Jacob was upset about as he brings Renesmee’s blood. Bella has to hand the baby off to Rose for feeding. Rose explains more fully that Jacob was watching “Nessie” sleep with “his mouth hanging open like the moron he is.”
Uh, if this is true and not just a slightly racist insult thing, no one thinks it’s weird that the guy in love with a baby is watching her sleep with his mouth hanging open? No one? Not one senior citizen in this damn house?
Catherine: Seriously, is HE gonna be the one to eat her? I’m really confused. I feel like the baby is getting cold and no one’s eating it.
Annie: Watching someone while they’re sleeping is romantic, guys. Remember? How romantic it was that Edward used to climb into her bedroom window, without her knowledge or consent, and watch her sleep? It’s not Jacob’s fault that Reneesme is a little baby and can’t give consent. Romance.
Mari: The point is that Jacob just took off without a reason and Rose doesn’t care because ew wolves. Talk turns to where they’ll be moving next. Emmett is for going straight to New Hampshire since Bella is enrolled at Dartmouth. He doesn’t think it’ll be long before she can handle going to school and he “jokes” that she’ll have nothing better to do with her nights than study. Bella has to calm herself again. I feel you, girl. Every “joke” is a reminder that we still don’t know what the plot of this book is. Bella keeps her cool, but Edward growls.
Before there is any actual tension, Alice jumps up because she’s having a contrivance vision. She starts asking out loud what the heck the dog is doing that has erased her schedule for the entire day. She can’t see anything anymore. Alice shoots Bella a tortured glance and then says, “look at you. You need me to teach you how to use your closet.”
We had to interrupt 0.5 seconds of maybe a thing happening to talk about Bella’s closet again? Wow.
Edward keeps up the stupidest way of ramping up whatever plot hiccup this is by, I don’t know, hearing stuff. Turns out that Jacob went to talk to Charlie. Jacob is almost back and he thinks Charlie is following him. Bella thinks about how awful! awful! this is because of stuff and reasons and vague danger, or whatever.
Catherine: But we already know she can control herself and not kill Charlie. This isn’t tension! This is just stupid!
K: WON’T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE TREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES.
Mari: Jacob arrives, wet from the rain, mostly so that Meyer can call him a dog again. He’s all chipper and happy. Seth and Leah are with him. Bella asks for her daughter and decides to hold her until she’s sure she won’t murder Jacob. IDK. I guess that’s one way to use a baby.
Jacob says that Charlie is on his way. He decided to go talk to him after Emmett and Rose were talking about moving cross-country. He figured the only reason that was happening was because of Charlie, so why not let Charlie in on the truth? Bella goes off about the danger! THE DANGER! Jacob pffts. The only danger is Bella and she’s got some kind of supernatural self-control, or whatever. Edward says that’s just a theory and calls him a mongrel. A MONGREL. AHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
There is always a point in my recapping that I have to stop and flip forward to see how much I have left to read. This was that point. And the answer is so much left, I need to take a break.
Catherine: Please self care. We have so much book left.
K: Like, an entire book worth of book.
Annie: So fucking depressing. I made the mistake of counting how many chapters are left. DON’T DO THIS.
Mari: I literally went to go set up my new hammock and lie there for a while. It’s okay. I’m better now. I’m back.
Edward yells at Jacob about all the emotional and physical pain he’s putting Bella through. Renesmee makes it known that she doesn’t like it when her boyfriend and her dad fight by using her creepy ass power. Edward does get through to Jacob, though, because he didn’t know Bella would be in physical pain around Charlie. Edward says that’s why he should’ve asked first. Jacob didn’t ask because he didn’t want to be stopped.
Catherine: Sort of like that time he sexually assaulted his baby girlfriend’s mother!
Mari: Yeah… sort of… *weeps*
Bella jumps in to say that this isn’t about her pain. It’s about the fact that it’s vampire life or death for Charlie now. I don’t know what that means. Now that Charlie knows he has to be turned? Or die? No one buys this. The Volturi are not a present enough danger to really sell the idea of Charlie being unable to know.
Anyway, this is all dragged out for a while, but Bella gets very angry and threatens Jacob a lot so he outs with it: Jacob phased in front of Charlie, who handled the wolf thing well. Jacob told Charlie in vague terms about how Bella had changed after her sickness and about how she knew what she was getting into when she married Edward. That part annoys him some, but otherwise, he just wants to see Bella and to be told as little as possible about the specifics.
Bella is almost thankful, but then she remembers Renesmee, which she seems to forget quite often, even when she’s holding her. Jacob told Charlie that Bella and Edward adopted her and she was a super special little girl. Jacob talks about her lovingly, and I’m skipping it so you won’t throw up the food you most recently ate. The gist is that Charlie smiled at the idea of being a grandfather and he knows that if he can deal with all the strangeness, everyone will stick around. If not, everyone will leave. Charlie says he can deal as long as they don’t tell him too much information.
Catherine: What kind of bullshit motivation is this for a POLICE DETECTIVE? “Just don’t tell me too much?” This writing is BAD.
K: And yet somehow, Charlie is still the most sensible character in this trainwreck…
Mari: Yeah, sorry, not blaming Charlie.
Jacob apologizes for causing Bella pain, but he says that things are different now. He loves her and she’ll always be her best friend, but things are more balanced now because they both have people they can’t live without. In case you missed it, Jacob means the baby Bella is holding. Jacob asks if he can hold R, and Bella says no because she’s holding her to keep from murdering him.
Annie: We also would’ve accepted ‘No, because you’re a predator and will have no access to my baby daughter, because there is no fucking way you’re in love with an infant. That’s disgusting.’
Mari: Alas.
Alice comes back and starts giving orders. She needs the wolves to get further away from her so she can see. Leah says she’s out of here instead. Alice tells Bella to hand R off after all and Jacob grins “triumphantly.” Perv. (K: GROSS.)
Edward tries to calm Bella down, telling her she can totally handle this and will be so much happier with Charlie in her life. Alice hands her contact lenses she bought just in case and they are so annoying to wear because of her perfect vampire vision. Next, they all start giving her tips on how to seem human: don’t sit too still or move too fast; let your eyes wander every 30 seconds; cross your legs for about five minutes and then cross your ankles for five minutes; blink at least three times a minute; move your hair around or pretend to scratch something.
It’s a wonder all these guys passed as human in high school. Also, why don’t vampires fix their hair or cross their legs?
K: ……………surely Bella – having literally just been a human – should know how to look human?!
Mari: Jasper says that Bella will be holding her breath “as much as possible” (which should be forever but lol breathing) but she needs to move her shoulders because apparently moving your shoulders is how you pretend to breathe. Alice leads Bella to the sofa so she can already be sitting down when Charlie gets here. Bella wants to hold Renesmee again because it keeps her calm. Edward joins them on the sofa and then explains to Renesmee that someone special is coming to see them, but he’s not like them or Jacob and he cannot be bitten because he won’t heal. R understands and creepy powers a question to her dad: can she bite Jacob? Jacob LAUGHS.
EVERYTHING IS AWFUL.
Edward wants Jacob to leave, but he won’t because he promised Charlie he’d be there for moral support. Edward calls him a repulsive monster just for good measure, even though they are the ones trying to arrange not murdering Charlie to the best of their abilities. But okay.
Catherine: This is turning into some real “All in the Family” shit, Meathead. The next hundred years with these two constantly fighting are gonna be miserable.
K: Thank God we don’t have to read about the next hundred years…
Mari: Not that we would anyway. We do have some limits.
Everyone can hear Charlie’s car approaching. Bella asks Edward if he’s sure about this, and he is. He kisses her and it makes Bella insta-horny, to the point where Jasper can feel the shift in her emotions or whatever the shit his power is. (K: EW.) Jasper tells Edward to cool it, because they all need Bella to focus. Bella tells him they can do sexy things later and she keeps thinking about it so Jasper has to keep chastising her.
Bella listens to Charlie’s approach, counting his steps and breaths. Carlisle opens the door for Charlie, who is pretty stiff and gets right down to asking after Bella. Without thinking, Bella calls out to him, but then realizes that her voice is so different now compared to her stupid human voice. Her voice now is wind chimes because that’s the upgrade you get when you level up as a vampire. Wind chimes. Also, Bella says that calling out used some of her air supply? DEAR SWEET LORD, DO THEY NEED TO BREATHE OR NOT?
Catherine: I FEEL LIKE I’M GOING INSANE.
Mari: Charlie gets closer and closer, and Bella has to assure him several times that it’s really her. She runs out of the air she doesn’t have to breathe and has to take a big gulp of Charlie-tainted air. (K: BUT SHE DOESN’T NEED AIR????? JFC, STEPH.) She tells us all about how delicious he smells, but she controls herself because she’s super special. Charlie turns his attention to Renesmee, and Edward lies smoothly about this being his niece from his adopted brother who was killed in a car accident and now they are adopting her. Charlie asks if this is okay with Bella and she violently replies that the baby is hers. There are jokes about what young grandpas Charlie and Carlisle are. It’s going okay until Renesmee looks at Charlie and he sees her eyes, which are Bella’s eyes, which are Charlie’s eyes. Charlie starts hyperventilating until Jacob comes over and reminds him that this all on a need to know basis.
Charlie calms down and says he doesn’t want the whole story but he doesn’t want to be lied to. Edward says it’s important for him to know the public story more than the truth. Charlie tells Bella she could’ve given him some warning, but she doesn’t think it would’ve made any of this easier. Renesmee reaches out to Charlie, but Bella stops her. R creepy powers her mom so that Bella knows that even though R is thirsty, she’s overriding that feeling. Charlie asks how old she is and Edward says she’s kind of 3 months, kind of younger, kind of more mature. Renesmee waves at Charlie and Jacob beams about how special she is. This makes Charlie kind of suspicious about what role Jacob plays here and how much Billy knows about any of this. Jacob starts to give him answer, but then Charlie is like NOPE. NEVER MIND.
It’s better not to know.
Catherine: Suddenly I don’t blame Charlie. I wish we didn’t know either.
K: AGREED.
Annie: SAME.
Mari: See?
This moment is interrupted when Emmett whoops loudly because he’s watching football like humans do and the Gators just scored. Charlie takes a deep, long-suffering breath and joins Emmett on the couch to watch the game.
K: A valid choice, given the many fucked up alternatives.
Next time on Breaking Dawn: We are getting closer to the end so that action ramps up with arm wrestling in Chapter 26.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
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I am a 30-something year-old human woman who lives in Maine. I'm a freelance writer who mostly spends time that I should be doing that, watching T.V. I also love reading and comic books way too much.
I'm a 30-something librarian and I still live with my parents because I'm super broke. Leader of Team Heartless Cow. I have an inexplicable love for 90s television, eat too much chocolate, and read more than is good for me.