8. Dead Yet?

8. Waiting For The Damn Fight To Start Already

Chapter Synopsis

Jacob is moody. Paul is in his house, eating his Doritos, and Jacob breaks his nose just for funsies. Apparently, though she’s never been mentioned before, Jacob has a sister — Rachel — and Paul has imprinted on her. This is just another bullet point on this list of things bugging Jake. The main thing bothering him, though, is wondering incessantly about Bella. Jacob is convinced that any day now they’ll get the call from Charlie about Bella being dead. Maybe she’ll “die” in a small plane crash, or a fire, or some freak accident, and then all the Cullens will disappear. Or maybe she’ll really die; maybe Edward will kill her trying to change her (or while fucking her). Jacob ponders over whether they’ll bring the body back.

Jacob is almost looking forward to such a call from Charlie. Because whether Edward changes Bella or actually kills her, that will be a breach of the treaty. Which will mean a fight with the Cullens. He’s all for making the first move – they could attack the Cullens tonight! That would surely bring Edward back, and then Jacob could take him on. But Sam won’t hear of it, because there’s no proof the Cullens have done anything wrong.

Jacob lays on his bed for a while, brooding and listening to random details of the outside world. To escape from his thoughts and Paul’s annoying laughter in the next room, Jacob eventually slips out his window (shirtless, as usual), and heads for the beach. Here, he finds Quil playing with Claire (remember, the two-year-old that he “imprinted” on?).

SMeyer writes Claire’s baby-talk in an extremely annoying fashion, and Jake describes how Quil’s role in the girl’s life now is that of a glorified nanny. He feels almost bad that Quil has to wait 14 years for Claire to be his age (remember, wolfboys don’t age), and asks Quil if he ever thinks about dating, you know, just until Claire hits puberty. Quil of course could NEVER do this — Claire-bear is his ONE AND ONLY!!! Jacob can understand – he can’t look at other girls, either, with Bella on his mind.

Then Sam sends up a howl from the forest, and Jacob takes off to see what’s up. There’s phasing and running and mind-fighting with Leah, and more running. When all the wolves are gathered (minus Quil, who has to take Claire to the Clearwaters’, and Jared, who’s having some super-happy-fun-time with his lady friend Kim), Sam basically confirms Jacob’s fears — Charlie has called Billy.

Apparently, Edward and Bella returned from their honeymoon, and Bella is “sick” with some mysterious South American disease. Carlizze has her “quarantined,” and even Charlie can’t go to visit. We, as readers, of course know that Bella is not a bloodsucker, but is instead impregnated with some mutant demon sperm. But the pack assumes that Bella has been bitten and changed, and this is the cover story. Jacob assumes Bella will eventually “die” from this disease, and then the Cullens will run away, taking a very different Bella with them. Jacob wonders if they’ll have a fake funeral.

Jake is ready to leave right then to go attack the Cullens. But the rest of the pack — Sam included — aren’t so sure. There’s still no concrete proof that Bella is now a sparklepire — maybe she really is just sick. Maybe Eddie’s glitter-glue gave her a tummy ache.

Sam is skeptical of the validity of the treaty in this case. He contests that, if Bella has been changed, it was voluntarily; she made a choice. Sam says the Cullens clearly pose no threat to the pack, or to the people of Forks. And, as Alpha Male, it’s Sam’s duty to do what’s best for his pack — even if this means ignoring the finer points of the treaty. So he says the pack is NOT going hunting at the Cullen house.

Jacob gets pissed, and leaves the meeting. He runs home, and phases back into a real boy. And it’s then that he makes his decision: The pack may be unable to attack the Cullens. But that doesn’t mean he can’t go at it alone.

Best Worst Lines

“He heard where I was going and shoved the bag behind his back. The bag crackled as he smashed it into the cushion. The chips crunched into pieces.”   (We really don’t need this much detail. Really.)

“Bada bing, bada boom — true love!”

“I wondered — would a bullet through my temple actually kill me or just leave a really big mess for me to clean up?” (148)   (Yet another reference to suicidal thoughts. Awesome.)

“My head was too crazy. The thoughts bounced around inside my skull like a disoriented swarm of bees. Noisy. Now and then they stung. Must be hornets, not bees. Bees died after one sting. And the same thoughts were stinging me again and again.”

“Maybe he’d smashed her like a bag of chips in his drive to get some?”

“Of course, I had forever to look. If you had forever, you could check out every single piece of straw in the haystack, one by one, to see if it was the needle.” (150)   (Umm.. you would not find straw in a haystack, SMeyer. That’s why it’s called a HAYstack. Dumbass.)

“’Gone, gone, gone,’ Claire sang, ‘Cwaire pway wid Qwil aaaawl day. Cwaire nebber gowin home.’”   (This is so unnecessary it’s not even funny. This child must be plagued with a serious speech impediment.)

Things That Really Irk Us

The obvious attempts SMeyer is making to have Jacob’s narration “sound” different from Bella’s. This just winds up with her trying to make him sound like some fucked-up version of Holden Caulfield, with his “It made me real sympathetic” and “He grinned at me then – real slow” lines. He also uses a ton of unnecessary contractions. Weird ones, too, like contracting every phrase that contains “had” or “would.” Like: “he’d” this, “she’d” that, “Embry’d” blah blah blah. This was really bothering us, until like the third page, where she basically goes back to writing in the same style as the rest of the book. Fail.

Jacob really just needs to get over Bella. Or get laid.

Claire and her baby-talk and Quil’s relationship with her. It all irks us. But mostly the baby-talk stuff. No child actually sounds that dumb when they speak. SMeyer just makes us hate this little girl.

Final Thoughts

Can Jacob PLEASE have a go at Edward?

Also, we’re mildly curious to find out how Bella is going to guilt the Cullens into not giving her a shma-shmorshin. Our vote is to just shove a rusty coat hanger up there. Do it dirty.

Go to Chapter 9.