It had taken 72 hours from the moment Bella had left out of the front door in the sports car driven by Alice Cullen, for her to return home. Passport in hand and no sign that she had been anywhere in the Italian sun, Bella did not even attempt to act sheepish for her actions. Rather she chose to come through the front door, a clear happiness back in her steps of which Veronica had not seen her sister have in months. It was almost as if the depressed state she had been in, had been suddenly thwarted as if it had barely existed. Had never been a real thing. And it took less than a few seconds for Veronica to piece together why this sudden change in personality had occurred. For behind just a few paces, stood the tall, lanky ginger haired vampire. The one of which had caused the intense depression Bella had been in. And as she stood in the kitchen making intense eye contact with the pair of them, Veronica wanted more than anything to just shout out her frustrations. She took a second to consider how she was going to approach the two entering her house. Especially considering it was nearly 10pm at night. Her son was asleep upstairs and she knew the way of which she wanted to speak to her sister, that would wake the toddler up. And she wanted anything but to do that, to the boy who was enjoying undisturbed sleep for the first time in months. 

"Dad, Bella's home and she brought a wanted criminal with her." Veronica announced, loud enough so her father could hear her from the living room a few feet away. She was sure she looked comical in this moment, dressed in her pyjamas, fluffy bunny slippers on her feet and glass of water in her hand prepared to head up to bed for the night. But here she was staring her sister down and she guessed her sister's instant boyfriend, no longer ex. Her mind passing through how many different ways she could rid Forks of Edward Cullen, the brilliant bright red flames dancing through her mind. Charlie was quick to come through into the kitchen from the living room, an unimpressed look upon his face. But it was not directed at his youngest, rather he locked the look upon his eldest daughter. He spared no look at the teenaged boy which accompanied Bella, he quickly scanned his eyes down his daughter checking for no obvious signs of injury. Considering the last time the teenaged girl had run off for something related to Edward, she had come back with a broken leg. 

"Welcome home Bella, did you have a nice weekend get away?" Charlie started waiting for her to give him some kind of response to his words. Yet Bella remained unresponsive, as if she did not really care for any effects her actions may have had on the people she had left behind. It appeared to no longer matter what she did, considering she now seemed to have Edward back. "Okay lovely to see that you have nothing to say, go up to your room Bella, you have some school work to catch up on." Charlie shooed her away upstairs and out of ear shot as he moved to block Edward from following her upstairs. It would be the last time on his watch the boy was allowed free range inside of his house. 

"You're lucky I have Veronica and Matthew to support right now. Otherwise, I'd shoot you on the spot." Charlie turned his attention to the Cullen boy, his words strong and his threats true. He did not want Edward around his family, but he knew that he would not be able to stop his eldest daughter not now she considered herself an adult and did not need to follow his rules. Not that she had ever seemed to listen to him since she had moved in. 

"Realistically I do not want you inside of this house. But I am aware that my eldest daughter will not tolerate that so we will have strict rules. She must be home by 4pm every week day and 4:30 on the weekends. You are not allowed any further inside of this house than the living room and if you come inside of the house, I expect you to go by the time I am home." Charlie's rules were possibly the strictest he had set for Bella, but they were still lax, he knew that he knew he was letting her get off easy. He should take her passport away, make her take responsibility for her actions ban her from seeing Edward outside of school. But he couldn't bring himself to do so. 

"Yes Sir, I just wanted to apologise for leaving Bella in the woods." Edward tried to apologise but wasn't very successful.

"Next time you decide to play around with someone's feelings and then end the relationship. Perhaps don't do it in the middle of the woods where they can easily get lost." Charlie gave him the cold shoulder, immediately ignoring the attempt of an apology which had been made. 

"Veronica I'm sorry for the impact our actions may have had on you or Matthew." Edward seemed to finally remember that Veronica remained in the kitchen her stare boring into the side of his face. He turned his apologise towards the youngest of Charlie's daughters, perhaps hoping that he would be able to sway her to his side, to support him against her father. But Veronica only had mind to pay attention to one boy outside of her biological family. He was significantly taller, much more alive and definitely not ginger. 

"Look Edward, neither of us like you. I will only continue to barely tolerate you on behalf of my sister. You left her out there to die, you turned her into a shell of a person. Your actions, your leaving traumatised her to the point of permanent damage. My son has had months of his life upset by the consequences of your actions." Veronica crossed her arms, knowing she didn't look overly threatening in that moment but hoped her intent was passed over regardless. 

Edward seemed to understand that there was no chance he was getting past this and took himself out of the house. Veronica hoped that he was heading back to whatever hole he had dug himself out of. Far away from Forks never to return. But she knew better, she knew otherwise that this was not the case. He was most likely returning to some overpriced hotel for the next couple of days whilst the rest of his family returned. For despite being supposedly the teenaged son of the family, he very much seemed to run the family. To the point where Veronica, despite not understanding how vampires worked, just assumed he was the eldest and the leader of the group, cult. Whatever you call a collection of vampires. 

Once he was out of the front door, Veronica turned to her father. She was proud of him for putting his foot down, finally, and trying to put rules in place for her older sister. In her personal opinion it was about time, it was finally time for this to happen. She loved her father more than anything, but she knew he was much more lax with Bella than he needed to be. The more relaxed parenting style might have worked with Veronica, because she respected her dad, but it wouldn't work with Bella, not when she didn't have a single respectful bone in her body. 

"Well done Dad, you owned him." Veronica gave him a small cheer and a bright smile, hoping that he was aware that he had done the right thing. Rather than getting much of a response she felt herself being pulled into his side in a half hug. 

"All for you both bug."

It was then important that Veronica moved on from focusing on her older sister and Edward. Otherwise, she was very aware that it would only continue to frustrate her and make her regret almost everything. After all, she knew that the pair of teenagers would do everything in their combined power to break the rules set out by Charlie. Evidenced how only a few days later Veronica had gotten used to the sounds of the mumbled voices coming from Bella's bedroom many hours after Charlie's curfew. She did not understand the logics of how she could hear their voices from the floor above in the loft and their dad could not. But she chose to just blame it on his old age instead. Therefore, distractions were required in order to keep her sanity. 

Unluckily, this would come in the form of the latest exam season. Veronica didn't like to admit to ever struggling with her studies. She had often been seen as 'gifted' as a child, and therefore she knew many expected greatness out of her. For her to ease her school work like she had nothing challenging her. Yet every time exams came around, she found herself feeling submerged underwater, like things were just not thriving in the manner of which she expected them to do. And her grades were slipping, they were plummeting further and further down into the abyss and she was unsure she would ever be able to drag them up from the murky waters again. And she had been told, if she could not get her grades back up in specific her history grades then her place on the baseball team was under threat. Baseball remained her escape from her life at home. It allowed her a few hours a week where she wasn't the mother to her nearly 2 year old nephew, where she wasn't trying to understand and support her older sister who clearly remained struggling with her mental health. Where things were just quiet. She couldn't lose that, she really couldn't. If she lost her spot on the team, she wasn't sure what she was going to do with herself. 

That was how she found herself spending her Monday evening, instead of watching the new episode of Gossip Girl, sat at the dining table revision materials spread around her. She didn't know what it was but she could hold the facts in her head, all the really unnecessary ones, but she couldn't retain the dates. And if there was anything important she knew about history it was retaining the dates. Otherwise, it didn't work when writing the essays when you couldn't name the dates of the events you were talking about. She slumped forwards resting her head upon her textbook at the edge of the table. Eyes closed as she took a second to try and compose herself. Try to distract from the thoughts rattling around her head which were not relevant to what she was trying to do in that moment.