The Lemonade Stand has spent so many years bringing you the best the Twilight fandom has to offer, and we are very excited to have the chance to offer you even MORE. We've watched stories grow and develop from first post through COMPLETE, and now we're lucky enough to share previews of the stories that will soon be your new addiction.
Today we are excited to feature fanficsR4nerds, author of Lockdown, Knocked Up and With Grace. She's sharing a preview of her upcoming new fic Summer with the Swans.
Summer with the Swans
by
FanficsR4nerds
Summary: 12 miscommunications, 11 hikers lost, 10 poisoned muffins, 9 yogis stretching, 8 drunken confessions, 7 enemies made, 6 ruined dinners, 5 wedding plans, 4 intrusive parents, 3 nosy neighbors, 2 family food fights, and 1 whole summer with the Swans.
~~0x0~~
For the first time in a very long time, Bella Swan was nervous. She’d thought that at the tender age of twenty-four, she’d completely mastered fear.
But she was learning, it turned out the more you loved someone outside of yourself, the more vulnerable you were to things like caring about their welfare.
It was, she thought as she plucked at her surprisingly restricting blouse, a fair trade. Caring about others had brought her into the arms of some of the best people she knew.
You didn’t turn your back and run when those people’s lives were being hauled upside down.
“Are you sure about this?” Bella almost didn’t recognize her own voice.
Beside her, Esme reached out, taking her hand between her own.
“Yes, Darling. We are quite sure about all this.”
For her part, Esme Cullen sounded calm, serene even. Bella couldn’t quite wrap her head around it.
To put it bluntly, Esme and Carlisle Cullen had been royaly fucked over. The business empire they’d built from the ground up had come crashing down around them in a matter of days. The lynchpin, one Jay Jenks, had embezzled millions from their company. Whatever the weasel hadn’t run off with was being wiped away between lawsuits and back taxes. The Cullens were facing something beyond bankruptcy; they would be completely destitute.
Bella had been trying to convince them, at the very least, to go after Jenks, but Esme and Carlisle were convinced Karma would take care of things. She’d even resorted to going with them to the meeting with their lawyers in a last-ditch effort to save them.
“Esme, please,” Bella begged. “This isn’t just about you two. What about all your employees?” Bella would use any tactic she could to make Esme see reason.
But Esme pat the back of Bella’s hand and offered her a smile.
“All will be well, darling. You’ll see.”
~~~~
Edward Cullen was exhausted.
It had been a long few weeks for him and his loved ones. After much arguing, his parents finally agreed to move with them to the States while they got back on their feet. They were forced out of the family home, and most of their possessions were sold to make up for the millions they owed. All the items the Cullens owned were now boiled down to the contents of four suitcases.
Bella had been working around the clock to find an apartment they could afford. Their original destination had been Los Angeles, but prices were just too steep to house four adults on only two incomes. Then, the job Edward had lined up in Los Angeles fell through. With potentially only one income to settle them, their choices had grown even thinner.
It had come down to only one choice, and it hadn’t been a choice Bella had made lightly.
“Tell me this is a good idea,” she whispered to Edward as they stood on the curb of the Seattle airport.
“It’s the best solution,” Edward said softly. “We’ll be able to get back on our feet while living somewhere affordably.”
Bella let out a long, heavy sigh.
An old Chevy Tahoe pulled up and parked in front of them. Bella watched her older sister Kate climb out of the front seat, and Bella extracted herself from Edward’s embrace to greet her.
“Bella,” Kate murmured, pulling her sister into a hug as soon as she was close enough.
“Thank you for picking us up,” Bella whispered, hugging her sister firmly.
Garrett, Kate’s husband, was busy pulling open the trunk and helping the Cullens load their bags.
“Are you sure about this?” Kate asked, pulling back from Bella to look at her sister.
Bella let out a breath.
“Not even a little bit.”
Kate frowned but nodded. They packed the car, and Edward and Bella climbed into the back seat, leaving the middle row for Esme and Carlisle. The car was packed, and Bella felt the walls closing in around her.
She was moving back to Forks. Not just Forks, but back to her parent’s house. The house she’d moved out of at eighteen and swore never to move back to.
It wasn’t a good option, but it had ended up being the only option.
One summer. That’s what she and Edward had agreed upon when they had resorted to this plan. They would live with the Swans for one summer, and one summer only. They would make sure Esme and Carlisle were back on their feet, and Edward and Bella would both find a way to make enough money to move back to a large city, far from the crazy, small-town life of the Swans.
Everything would be fine.
After all. …they were only spending the summer with the Swans.
~~0x0~~
Be sure to put fanficsR4nerds on alert. Summer with the Swans begins posting on May 1, 2023.
