Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“You cut your hair,” he said, aghast.

It was too early for this conversation. My mom had had the exact same reaction, when I’d emerged from a bathroom that was now 1,300 miles away by now. It irritated me then, but it especially irritated me now- it was the first time I’d seen my father in almost three years, and the first thing he’d mentioned was not the fact that, yes, I’d grown almost a whopping four inches since freshman year, or that I was holding a potted cactus for him as a housewarming gift, but that I’d cropped my hair a la Zac Efron in High School Musical 3.

“Nice to see you too, Charlie,” I said, fumbling with the potted cactus so that I could wrap my coat more snugly around myself. “How have I been in the past three years? Just swell, thanks for asking.”

“Alright, alright,” Charlie said with a laugh, raising his hands up in mock surrender. “Sorry, Bella. Just gave me a bit of a surprise there, that’s all. Come in, the rain’s going to mess up your new hairdo.”

I hopped in the passenger seat of his cruiser, cradling the potted cactus safely in between my thighs as Charlie pulled out of the parking lot of the Port Angeles airport. Forks didn’t have one of its own, apparently, which only served to unsettle me further on the flight over. I had gone to a high school with over three thousand kids, and now I was going to live in a town with a population a little over three thousand people.

Nevertheless, Charlie tried to cheer my spirits up as we coasted down the road, sending waves of rainwater crashing into the sidewalk as the scenery blurred past my window. I leaned my head against the glass and sighed deeply, listening to Charlie gush (chatter would be a better word; Charlie never gushed, per say) about how great the football team at my new high school was supposed to be, and things of that nature.

“-And you’re going to meet Jacob Black sometime, too. You remember him? He’s Billy Black’s youngest, great kid, only a year younger than you-“

“Sounds nice,” I said, internally stamping down the urge to ask him to please, please stop talking about what was awaiting me in Forks. I knew I was being ungrateful, and I knew it had been my decision to come here- but that wasn’t quite true, was it? Mom didn’t say so, but I knew that she craved alone time with her new husband, and that my living with them was getting in the way of virtually everything she had wanted to do with him- couple’s excursions, trips to spas and resorts, traveling cross-country for his baseball games, you name it. She didn’t have to say all this for me to know it was true. I knew her like the back of my hand.

So sitting there with Charlie, some two thousand miles away from home and from Mom, it felt not unlike I was missing a limb, or some part of me that I always thought I would have, only for it to be taken away at the moment I needed it the most. The last time I’d seen her, I had snapped at her for advising me to bring a jacket on the plane ride over to Washington. The memory of it made me wince.

“-and hey, why did you cut your hair, anyway?”

I looked over at Charlie, who had apparently been talking the entire time I’d been trying hard to suppress any memories of Arizona that had managed to stick with me through the flight over. He’d never been a huge talker, but I supposed it was to make up for the fact that the two of us didn’t have much to say to each other, except comment on the new length of our hair.

I opened my mouth to tell him that I did it because I wanted to change who I was before I got to Forks, that it seemed fitting that the first drastic change I’d make before seguing into adulthood would not be moving to an entirely new state because of my inability to communicate with my mother in a healthy way, but the achingly normal act of cutting off all my hair in a fit of teenage rebellion. And then I closed my mouth, thinking better of it.

“Just wanted to see what it would look like,” I said instead, giving him a small smile. He smiled back.

“Well, while I have to admit I was a little shaken up before, it does look good on you,” he told me, leaning his arm across the back of my chair in a move that suddenly whisked me back years ago, to a time where I’d come over to Forks on vacation and he’d make that exact same move. “It makes you look older. More mature.”

“Thanks, Charlie.”

We didn’t speak much for the rest of the car ride home.

I only had a day to settle in before school began.

Luckily, I had brought only a few things from Arizona, since most of my clothing wasn’t exactly suitable for minus-40 degree weather on a daily basis. Charlie had, surprise surprise, gifted me a red truck- courtesy of Jacob Black, who was evidently as great a kid as Charlie had said-, so I only had to unpack a few boxes before I poked my head downstairs and told Charlie I was going to drive around town, looking for a clothing store or someplace where I could stock up on jackets and sweaters for the winter.

He had laughed almost raucously at that. “Good luck finding a place around here to shop for clothing, kiddo. You could drive back to Port Angeles, but it’s a pretty long drive, and I don’t feel comfortable with you going out that far. You can take some of my clothes for the first day back, okay?”

I silently cursed my mother and my own lack of sense for not buying clothing beforehand, though I allowed Charlie to pile all his old shirts and jackets into my arms and headed back upstairs, stealing a longing look at the red truck outside my bedroom window before grabbing a pair of scissors from my backpack and getting to work.

That’s how I spent my first day in Forks, curled over my father’s old shirts as I painstakingly cut the cuffs of their sleeves and the absurdly long torsos. It only occurred to me, as I was standing in front of my mirror the next morning, that I may have cut a little bit too much than what I had intended, because when I raised my arms above shoulder level, the inconspicuous green sweater I had donned- choosing it for the very reason that it was so muted and unostentatious-, rose high above my midriff and displayed the pale skin of my stomach for all to see.

I muttered a curse under my breath, before deciding I simply wasn’t going to participate much the first day- not that I was planning to in the first place- and grabbed a denim jacket from where it was hanging off the edge of my bureau just to be safe. When I went inside the bathroom to brush my teeth quickly before heading out, I stopped in my tracks.

There was a total stranger staring at me in the mirror.

Admittedly, I hadn’t seen much of myself since I’d emerged from the airport bathroom in Phoenix over twenty-four hours ago, but I had supposed cutting off my hair wouldn’t have made much of a difference anyway. But Charlie was right- I looked far older than I ever had, prior to what my mother referred to as my “little stint” back in Phoenix. The lack of long brown hair curling almost childishly at my shoulders and perpetually touching the sides of my face allowed for a prominent display of cheekbones that I’d never noticed before, the contours of my face defined in a way that was almost startling for someone who’d been told she had, specifically, a “heart-shaped” face by a whopping number of three old women in the past year (not at the same time, of course- the Fates didn’t put themselves in the retirement home I’d been volunteering at in junior year specifically to comment on the shape of my face).

When I came downstairs, Charlie evidently saw the same thing I had in the bathroom mirror. He whistled low under his breath, taken aback by the fact that his daughter had been kidnapped in the middle of the night and had been replaced by a vaguely sapphic bookshop owner living in Portland.

“Looking good, Bella,” He said, raising his coffee at me in salutations. “That old sweater of mine needed an upgrade, anyhow. You going off to school?”

“Yeah,” I responded, shouldering my backpack from where it was resting on the couch. “I’ll see you later?”

“Sure,” he said, swallowing down his coffee with a wince. I was tempted to ask him for a sip, but I wasn’t very comfortable indulging in daughterly familiarities I hadn’t performed in three years just yet, so instead I gave him a tight-lipped smile before heading out the door and into my new truck.

“Thank you, Jacob Black,” I whispered as I ran my hands up and down the vinyl of the steering wheel. It was impossible not to love the roar of the engine as I took off down the street, not to love the sheer girth of the truck as it veered past tinier, more miserable cars- that is, until I got to school, and realized virtually every parking spot was taken.

“Are you kidding me?” I said aloud as I drove past a silver Volvo and a red convertible, both of which were taking up two parking spaces more than necessary. What kind of assholes parked their cars like that?

It was already ten minutes into first period by the time I’d finally found a parking space and ran to the main office, asking the secretary for a copy of my schedule. I speed-walked to first period, clutching the schedule in my hand like a lifeline, and yanked open the door to the classroom, still fuming at the fact that people apparently thought it was okay to take up parking spaces they didn’t even need in a school parking lot, of all places to be dicks in. A rush of mortification washed over me a second later, when I realized that the entire class was staring at me and what I imagined to be the pissed-off look on my face.

“Ms. Swan?” The teacher- a very, very geriatric old man, who’d looked towards the door five seconds after everyone else- asked. Instantly, the students burst out into whispers, now gawking at me as if I were some sort of freakish farm animal that had burst into their completely innocuous AP Literature classroom, and not a frazzled seventeen-year-old girl.  “Please, take a seat by Mr. Hale over there.”

Mutely, I walked over to said Mr. Hale, who had stiffened the second I walked through the door, and was still stiff as I slid in the seat beside him. His nostrils were flaring, as if he was smelling something particularly putrid, and his hands were clenched so tightly his knuckles were turning white. Concerned, feeling as though I was most likely about to witness an epileptic seizure in the next few seconds, I was about to ask him if he was alright when his hand suddenly shot up through the air.

“Can I go to the bathroom, Mr. Wilson?” He asked through gritted teeth. Mr. Wilson nodded his assent, and Hale shot up from his seat and out the door like a rock launched from a slingshot. I stared at the seat beside me, feeling absolutely bewildered, when the curly-haired girl sitting on the other side of me leaned over.

“I’ve never seen him react that way to anyone,” she said under her breath. “Then again, I’ve never seen him react to anyone, so maybe you’re just special. Jessica.”

She added this last bit in such a rush I almost didn’t catch it.

“Bella,” I whispered back. “Is he going to be okay?”

“Who knows?” She muttered, tossing her curls over one shoulder. “He’s kind of standoffish, right? Cute top, by the way. You should come sit with me at lunch.”

“Sure,” I said, feeling almost a little endeared at the way small town kids reacted with one another. One second, a guy was rushing out of his seat to get as far away from you as possible- it was either that or have a seizure in the boy’s bathroom, and the next second, a girl you exchanged less than ten words with was inviting you to come sit by her at lunch. It almost made up for the fact that I was going to spend the next year of my life with the same group of people until graduation.

Hale didn’t show up for the rest of first period, though I definitely didn’t think it was through any fault of mine. Still, I couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that he had jumped out of his seat so quickly because of me all throughout second period. I was sitting by the wall, pondering the enigmatic nature of teenage boys, when the girl sitting beside me suddenly stiffened and knocked out.

I say “knocked out” despite the fact that she didn’t actually faint or anything, because her eyes were upturned and it was clear that she wasn’t aware of her surroundings. She was a slip of a girl, too, thin but exceedingly pretty, and I was a little afraid to touch her and bring her back to the land of the living. It turned out that I didn’t have to, though, because she snapped out of it pretty quickly.

“Are you okay?” I whispered with concern. Her eyes widened as she glanced at me.

“Bella Swan,” she breathed, face draining of what little color it had left. I stared at her.

“Um, yeah. And you are…?”

She shook her head and her eyes seemed to clear. “Sorry- that was awfully rude of me, wasn’t it? I have, um, fits sometimes. I’m really sorry you had to see that. I’m Alice Cullen. It’s nice to meet you.”

She stuck her hand out from underneath the table, and I shook it, smiling a little at the gesture, before something dawned on me.

“Hey, are you related to that guy- what’s his name, Hale? He had some kind of a fit today, too.”

Her eyes went all big and round again. “He did? Is he okay?”

“I think so? I mean, he didn’t show up for the rest of first period, but I’m sure he’s okay.”

I was not, in fact, sure he was okay, but she seemed so panicked that I felt the overwhelming urge to console her. It didn’t escape my notice that she was arguably one of the most beautiful girls I’d ever seen in my entire life, all tawny eyes and spiky black hair and smooth, alabaster skin. I had the sneaking suspicion that, if we stood up just then, she’d be an inch or two shorter than me.

She smiled at me then, obviously seeing my concern for her. “Thank you for telling me, Bella. I appreciate it very much.”

I smiled back, feeling something warm bloom in my chest, but before I could say anything else the bell rang, and it was off to AP Spanish with Mr. Hernandez. Third and fourth period went by fairly quickly, and before I knew it I was sitting next to Jessica at a lunch table, being introduced to her friends.

There was dark-haired Eric and blonde-haired Mike, both of whom became immediately flustered when I smiled at them. There was Lauren, who I already pegged as self-involved and most likely threatened by the appearance of new girls. Then there was Angela, who seemed sweet and unassuming (this perception of her by no means influenced due to the fact that she offered me the rest of her fries). We were making aimless small talk about the first day of schools and bitching about our respective math teachers, when the door to the cafeteria opened.

In came a group of absurdly beautiful teens, one by one. A handsome boy with tousled hair, a girl with long blonde tresses and killer legs, followed by a classmate in my Trigonometry class that I’d noticed due to his intensely muscular physique and charmingly disarming grin. The last of the group coming in, I noticed with some shock, was Alice Cullen and the boy from first period who’d jumped up from his seat and never returned.

“Who’re they?” I asked, jerking my head over to where they were piling onto a table isolated from most of the others. Jessica followed my gaze and broke out into a fit of giggles.

“They’re the Cullens,” she said in a low whisper, listing off their names in seamless order- Edward, Rosalie, Emmett, Alice, and, last but not least, Jasper. “Hot, right? They’ve all been adopted by Doctor Cullen and his wife, Esme Cullen. They’re not related or anything, but I still think it’s kind of creepy that they’re all together. Except for Edward, I mean. See that guy over there? He-“

“Who’s the tall one, again?” I asked, interrupting her. She looked at me, startled.

“You mean Jasper? He’s kinda quiet. Cute, don’t get me wrong, but he looks constipated, like, all the time,” Jessica said dismissively, eager to get back to who was obviously her favorite of the siblings- Edward. Though, from the appreciative looks she was sending over to the girl beside him, it was clear Rosalie was a close second.

“Is Jasper sick or something?”

“He probably collects antique dolls and stuffs them full of human hair,” Mike snorted from his perch up on the cafeteria table. “Seems like the type of guy, anyway.”

“Jasper?” Jessica repeated, ignoring Mike as she gave me a sideways glance. “Um, no. Not that I know of, anyway. Why?”

“I-“ Jasper’s eyes suddenly latched onto mine as I was about to open my mouth to speak. His expression was still just as intense as before, but it was only now that I could see he was almost exceptionally pretty, even with what Jessica called the ‘constipated look’ on his face. His honey-blonde hair curled just short of his collar, which was opened slightly to reveal pale skin stretched over delicate collarbones. “It’s nothing.”

“I thought you’d be more interested in the girls,” Lauren said snidely from beside Angela. I stiffened.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, bewildered.

“Aren’t you, like, totally lesbo or something?”

Our entire table- and, it seemed, the rest of the cafeteria- quieted. We all gawked at her.

“That’s not cool, Lauren,” Eric said with a frown. She rolled her eyes.

“Oh, come on. Look at her! She’s got that dyke thing going on. You actually pull it off really well, Bella, I’m surprised. Not a lot of girls can lop off all their hair and wear jean jackets and still manage to avoid looking like brunette Ellen Degeneres.”

Somehow, her words didn’t seem very complimentary. To my horror, tears were threatening to well up in my eyes. It wasn’t even that I was uncomfortable in my own skin for questioning my sexuality (though I was), or that I thought it would somehow make me lesser to admit I’d stared at Ariel just as much as I stared at Eric when I watched the Little Mermaid for the first time when I was seven. It was that I was not going to have a repeat of what happened last year, back home. I just wasn’t.

Instead of bursting into tears, I reminded myself that I wasn’t the same girl who’d considered jumping off a bridge because some guy called her a dyke in junior year. I was the kind of girl who rocked a pixie cut and could cut a guy with a single look. Probably, anyway.

Testing out this new quality of mine, I said, “Lauren, look, I get that it’s difficult to feel threatened by any girl who even glances at Eric for a split second, but you should trust me- he’s all yours. I promise.”

“What?” Lauren spluttered. Eric’s eyes brightened.

“You like me?”

“No!” Lauren all but shrieked. It was too late, though. All the attention was diverted from my questionable sexuality to Lauren’s nonexistent crush on Eric that I’d willed through sheer words alone. I smiled down at my knees, before I suddenly felt the back of my neck prickle. Looking over my shoulder, I saw that the Cullens were staring at me.

Emmett was doubled over in silent laughter over something someone said, Jasper obviously trying to calm him down, while the rest were blatantly gaping at me. I ignored the iciness of Edward and Rosalie’s gaze in favor of returning Alice’s warm look, mouthing, Is Jasper okay?, though I wasn’t sure if she’d be able to read my lips from so far away.

Sure enough, though, she gave me a thumbs up and mouthed, He’s fine, making the motions of her lips overly exaggerated so I could see what she was saying. I giggled. Lauren looked up from where she was still trying to defend herself against Mike and Jessica’s combined crooning of the sitting in a tree song and rolled her eyes.

“See what I mean? Total lesbo.”

Chapter Text

Though I noticed that Jasper Hale wasn’t in first period the next morning, it was only when Jessica leaned over and asked me if I poisoned his cereal or something that I realized this wasn’t common behavior. According to her, he’d rarely missed a day of school since freshman year- minus, Jessica added with a little supercilious eyeroll, his family’s week-long camping excursions, when the weather was good outside.

“He didn’t, like, leave because of me, right?” I asked with a little frown.

“Like I have any idea what goes on in that blonde head of his. Wish I could, though. He’s probably a freak in-“

“Jessica,” Mr. Wilson interrupted. “Would you like to share with the rest of the class, dear?”

I was surprised he had even bothered to turn on his hearing aids in the first place. Face flushing bright red, Jessica shook her head and stayed tightlipped for the rest of the period. I didn’t have to wait for long to get an answer, though. When I casually- or, at least, what I hoped to be casually- asked Alice Cullen what happened to her foster sibling (or boyfriend? the lines were really blurred there) in second period, she told me that he had contracted some sort of stomach virus, and probably wasn’t going to be there for the next week or so.

“It’s sweet of you to worry, though,” She said, smiling brightly at me. I coughed out a nervous laugh and rubbed the back of my neck. There was something about her that made me feel both hot and cold at the same time, like my body couldn’t exactly decide what response to choose from when interacting with her, so choosing them all instead of one.

Apparently, though, that happened to most people. Mike was happy to inform me at lunch that he saw a freshman girl accidentally trip and fall face-first into the trash can because she was gawking at Edward Cullen on his way to third period. Honestly, I didn’t see the appeal- they were all desperately beautiful, of course, the kind of beautiful that demanded to make a big deal of itself, but they were also distant and unfriendly, enough so that I was a little afraid to even look over in the off chance they were looking in my direction.

Alice seemed nice, though. When I mentioned this to my new friends (the term very loosely applied to Lauren, who still hadn’t recovered from our little roasting session yesterday), they all exchanged uneasy looks with each other.

“I mean, yeah, I guess she’s nice,” Eric said, shrugging. “But she can be so weird at times. Like, one time in sophomore year, I asked to borrow a pencil, and all of a sudden she just blanked up. Her eyes turned over in her head. It was some freaky ‘Exorcist’ type of shit.”

“She said she had seizures,” I recalled. Lauren scoffed, finally emerging from her little fit of self-pity to insert herself in our conversation.

“My cousin’s epileptic,” she said flatly, looking just beyond my eyes. “Whatever that girl has going on with her, it’s not seizures.”

“Also, why do they look so much alike, if they’re all adopted?” Jessica asked aloud, tugging at one of her curls. “Like, they all have the same color eyes, if you look close enough. And, okay, I get that we don’t have a lot of sun, but they’re so pale. It’s like, if you’re anemic, your dad’s a doctor, you know? Go get some pills, or whatever.”

“Ah, Jessica,” Angela smiled, looking up from where she was currently hunched over her binder. “You always have some wisdom to impart upon us plebeians.”  

“Oh, you know it.”

The next few classes blurred by, and before long I found myself walking down the parking lot and back to my beast of a car, unmistakable in all its huge, rusted red glory. My fingers were wrapped around the handle before I heard somebody shout my name.

Turning around, I saw Alice Cullen jog over from the red convertible I’d disparaged the owners of for taking up two parking spots the day before. I supposed that, when you were pretty enough to avoid looking like a drowned rat even in the downpour that was raging on above our heads, you could get away with murder. The rest of her family was sitting in the car, not bothering to hide the fact that they were watching us from what limited vision they could see past the water-streaked windshield. I turned my attention back to Alice and offered a shy smile.

“Hi,” she said, smiling back with that megawatt grin of hers.

“Hi,” I responded, vaguely dazed by the sheer whiteness of her teeth. She inched closer and pulled her binder over both of our heads, so that we were marginally sheltered from the heavy rain falling all around us. “What are you doing here?”

“I think I found something of yours,” She said, fishing around in her backpack to reveal a fragile silver charm bracelet- the same one my mother had bought me just before I’d left for Forks, the same one that I hadn’t noticed was missing all day long. Heart skipping a beat, I took the bracelet from her and fumbled for the clasp when, without warning, she gently grabbed my wrist and held it steady as she clasped the bracelet back on for me. We stared down at our hands- her long, delicate fingers gripping my wrist-, before she released me and took a step away. “It was lying on the floor of the classroom, and I didn’t think you knew it was gone. I meant to give it back to you earlier, but…”

She trailed off, looking pointedly over her shoulder at her siblings.

“Thank you so much,” I said, wincing slightly at how gushy I sounded. “I didn’t even realize it was missing.”

“I thought as much,” Alice laughed. “It’s a pretty bracelet. Did your boyfriend give it to you before you left Arizona?”

Her tone was playful, but I flushed in embarrassment anyway. “Um, no. No boyfriends here. My mom did- give me the bracelet, I mean.”

“Well, she has good taste,” Alice smiled, touching a half-moon charm on the chain. Though her fingers were freezing cold, I felt my skin warm at that gentle point of contact.

“Yeah,” I mumbled, knowing for a fact that my face had gone completely red. “Um, I have to go now, but I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“Sure thing, Bella.”

It was only when she was starting to walk away that I saw the car barreling down the parking lot. The windshield wipers looked like they haven’t been moved in over a year, one of them twisted in a way that didn’t inspire much confidence, and the driver- who I recognized as Tyler Crowley- didn’t appear to notice Alice walking back over to her car. Before I could even think, I was sprinting over and pushing her away from the impending accident I could see happening before it even occurred.

The last thing I saw before my body collided with the truck was the half-moon charm on my bracelet Alice had clutched, collecting rainwater in the glistening concave of its curve.

When I came to, I was lying in an unfamiliar bed with a screaming migraine Hollywood movie star fussing over me.

Dazedly, I watched him for some time before I realized that the reason I couldn’t quite place what blockbuster movie he acted in was because he was not, in fact, a Hollywood movie star, but a doctor, and that the unfamiliar bed I was lying in was a hospital cot. I groaned, eyes fluttering shut as I leaned against the pillows. My head felt like someone had taken a jackhammer and just started drilling away into my skull.

“Ms. Swan,” Not-Hollywood actor said gently, leaning over me to press his hand against my forehead. “How are you feeling?”

“I-“ The door flew open before I could tell the good doctor that I felt like a giant was using my head as his personal stepladder. In came Alice, looking distraught and wan as she flitted over to my bedside. Charlie followed close behind, his face ashy pale as he took in the sight of me lying on the hospital bed.

“Bella!” Alice exclaimed, hands fluttering over my face as if she wasn’t quite sure where to touch that wouldn’t cause me any pain. She settled for grabbing my hand, leaning over me with a look of agitation on her face. “Are you alright? Is she okay?”

“She’s going to be alright, Alice, give her some space,” The doctor said, gently pulling her away from me. Turning to Charlie, he said, “Two of her ribs are bruised, and she has a mild concussion from the impact of her head on the pavement, but she’ll be fine after a week or two of rest. I can give you a prescription for paracetemol in the meantime…”

He busied himself with a pad of paper and a pen. Alice caught me staring at him.

“That’s my father,” she explained, still whey-faced. “I specifically asked him to treat you. That was a really brave thing you did for me, Bella.”

To my horror, I saw her face contorting as though she was about to cry. Lifting my head up despite the intensifying pain, I leaned over to take her hand in mine. The shock of cold made my skin prickle with goosebumps.

“I didn’t want you to get hurt,” I told her, my mouth feeling like it was full of cotton. “Are you okay?”

“You shouldn’t have done that,” she said, ignoring my  question. “I would’ve been fine. But look at you- you’re all bruised up, and bloody, and-“

She choked a little. Then, collecting herself, she shook her head and said, “Promise me you won’t do that again.”

“Do what again?” I asked, bewildered. “I don’t usually make it a habit to push people out of danger. It was more of a one-time thing.”

She cracked a small smile at that, but it faded as she took me in. “Still- and I say this in the fondest way possible-, I can see you’re a bit of a klutz. I don’t want you to get hurt on my behalf anymore. Like I said, I would’ve been fine.”

“You don’t know that,” I protested hotly. Before she could say anything to this, Charlie broke away from his conversation with Doctor Cullen and leaned over my bed, eyes glimmering with unshed tears as he looked at what must’ve been my very much bruised and battered face.

“How are you feeling, Bells?” He whispered, like I just had my leg amputated instead of a mild concussion.

“Fine,” I said in an even tone, resisting the urge to fidget away from him and his well-meaning concern. “I just want to go home, honestly.”

 “Only two days in and you’re already getting concussed,” Charlie said, marveling at my inability to keep myself out of danger that I felt sure he would’ve already been used to by now, if my daily excursions climbing trees and running around wild as a kid had taught him anything. ”Your mother’s going to kill me when she finds out. I’ll take you home, sure, but you have some more visitors in the waiting room that you should probably speak to first.”

“What? Who?” I demanded weakly, straining my neck to try and peek out the crack of the slightly open door.

“Your friends,” Alice said, coming back to my side once more. “And Tyler. I suspect he wants to apologize for nearly killing you.”

“Oh, God,” I said, rolling my eyes. Looking at Charlie, I asked in a half-joking, half-deadly serious voice if I could pretend to still be unconscious while he carried me out the door and back to the car.

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary, Bella,” Doctor Cullen said, his fine blonde hair catching the fluroscent light and nearly blinding me. “We can push you out in a wheelchair ins-“

“I’ll carry Bella,” Alice said decisively. Before any of us could react to the fact that the girl barely reaching 5”5 and 120 pounds soaking wet wanted to attempt to carry me out the door, her hands were suddenly pushing away the covers and wriggling their way underneath my knees, while her other arm wrapped securely around my back. I gasped at the fluidity of the motion, instinctively wrapping my arms around her neck as she marched me out the door and past my friends, who I could tell, even with my eyes closed, were staring at us even as we made our way downstairs and to the parking lot.

She didn’t put me down, though, even when we arrived in front of Charlie’s police cruiser.

“How are you even carrying me right now?” I asked, too exhausted to feel embarrassed by the fact I was burrowing my nose in the crook of her shoulder, yawning against her collarbone. “Do you lift weights or something?”

“Or something,” she agreed wryly. “I’m stronger than I look, Bella. I told you before. Charlie’s going down to get the prescription- he’s probably going to take some time talking to the cashier about the most effective type of fishing bait, too, so you should rest before he comes back, okay? Save your strength for something other than pushing me out of the way of vehicles.”

“How do you know my father fishes?” I mumbled sleepily, but she didn’t respond. After a few hesitant seconds, I resisted the urge to wriggle out of her arms and instead moved closer, letting the soft exhalation of breath against the top of my head slowly lull me back to sleep.

Chapter Text

“-And when Charlie called me and told me you’d been in an accident, did you have any idea what I was thinking? Did you even spare a single thought for me when you put yourself in front of a car going ninety miles an hour?”

“It wasn’t ninety miles an-“

“I’m not finished, Bella! I should’ve never let you go back to Forks. God knows you would’ve been safer here, less accident-prone, less-“

“Mom, you and I both know that it doesn’t matter where I am-“

“At least,” my mother snapped, “if you were here, I’d be able to ground you and make sure you’re not going to go running headlong into any more- any more 2001 Priuses! And what does Charlie do? He doesn’t even take your car away, for heaven’s sake!”

“I’m going to hang up now, Mom.”

“Don’t you dare-“ Click.

I pressed the landline down on the receiver harder than I’d meant to. I knew it was pointless to try and ask Charlie not to tell her about the accident, but I still hoped he might’ve softened it for me, somehow. He knew how easily my mother panicked, especially when the issue was about me, and he wasn’t even here so that I could be passive-aggressive and tell him as much.

I was lying on the couch, generally hating life and everything involved with life. My friends had all texted me at some point or another, sending me their regards and their get-well-soon wishes, but I couldn’t be bothered to text them back. Even with the pain pills Charlie was keeping me on since we got back from the hospital, my head still ached like there was no tomorrow. All I wanted was for someone to knock me out- not enough to maim, just a little love-tap on the head so that I’d finally be able to go to sleep.

When the doorbell rang, I genuinely debated whether or not it was worth it for me to drag myself out of bed and send whatever well-wisher had come away, before I finally forced myself to get up and answer the door, wrapping myself in a blanket.

Standing in front of me was Alice Cullen.

She was holding a small Tupperware container in one hand, and a few loose sheets of paper in the other. Smiling, holding up the container- which I could now see held some sort of pound cake inside-, she asked, “May I come in?”

Dumbly, I stepped aside to let her in.

“Your house is really nice,” she told me, gazing around with bright, twinkling eyes. “Is your dad home?”

“No, he’s, um, at the precinct,” I said as I led her to the living room, where I had made a comfortable nest for myself using quilts and throwaway pillows on the couch. I shoved some of the pillows over to make a spot for Alice to sit on, discreetly kicking some bloodied tissues underneath the couch. “Do you want me to get you anything, or-“

“No, silly,” she said with a grin. “You’re the injured one, remember? I brought something for you- baked it myself, actually.”

She opened up the Tupperware container, revealing a spongey yellow cake inside. My stomach rumbled mortifyingly at that precise moment, a reminder that I hadn’t eaten much at all since our visit to the hospital. 

“Sorry if it tastes off,” she said, watching me with a keen expression on her face as I broke off a bit of the cake and brought it to my lips. “I haven’t baked anything in a long while; Esme had to help me out with some of the shopping, actually. Did you know they have cake mixes at the supermarket?”

I laughed in disbelief at the earnestness in her voice. “Wait, you didn’t know that? You just baked cakes from scratches as a kid, or something?”

Alice bit her lip and shrugged, looking a little more reticent than she had before. “My old mother was a big believer in homegrown foods.”

“Esme’s your foster mom?” I said as elegantly as I could through a mouthful of cake, which was actually pretty good, for all that Alice downplayed her baking abilities. She hummed in affirmation.

“You should meet her sometime, actually,” she told me. “She wants to meet the girl who so gallantly saved her daughter from harm’s way. The rest of my family does too, come to think of it.”

 “Really?” This was news to me.

“Of course!” She said in a “that-should-be-obvious” tone, as though I shouldn’t have thought otherwise in regards to the family that apparently hadn’t spoken to other students, aside from themselves, for the past three years of high school. “You’ll be meeting Jasper once you come back next week, actually. He’s finally gotten over his stomach flu.”

“I’m glad someone’s enjoying their week, at least,” I sighed. “My head’s been feeling like it’s about to explode every day since the accident.”

“Are you taking your meds?” Alice questioned, face creasing with concern. I was tempted to say, yes, mother, but despite how sweet and friendly I found Alice, I felt suddenly shy at the prospect of returning her characteristic playfulness. Instead, I held up the bottle of ibuprofen on the coffee table for her to see. 

“They’re not helping, though. I can barely sleep at night.”

Alice stroked her chin thoughtfully. “You know, when I was younger and couldn’t sleep, my mother would whisk up a sleeping tonic for me to take at night. I still remember the recipe, if you’d like me to make it for you.”

“Would you?” I asked, with not a little surprise. I didn’t think that this was how my day was going to turn out- Alice Cullen, sitting on the living room chair beside me, offering to make me a magic sleeping potion so that I could ignore my overwhelming headaches at night-, but I wasn’t going to refuse her.

“That all depends if you have saffron and ginseng in your kitchen.”

Twenty minutes later, I found myself nursing a hot cup of tea between my hands, eyes fluttering shut as the steam caressed my face. I felt Alice’s eyes on my face as I took a few tentative sips.

“It’s amazing,” I breathed out, relishing the hot sweetness splaying itself over my tongue. “I think you’re going to get me addicted.”

“Just a little bit of hot water and some restoratives can make all the difference,” Alice smiled, touching my hand gently. I looked at her, and was startled to realize that I still didn’t know why she came over, aside to bring me cake and make me tea.

As if reading my thoughts, she leaned over the coffee table and lifted up the loose leaflet of papers she’d put down beside the Tupperware container before.

“Before I forget,” she said, “these are the assignments you’ve missed in Spanish. Though, if I’m being honest, they just gave me an excuse to come and see you. I still haven’t thanked you for saving me, have I?”

“No, but said that I was brave and also that I should never do that again,” I recalled. Alice smiled wryly.

“While that still holds true,” she told me in a serious voice, “I also did want to thank you. Not many people would’ve done the same thing that you did for me, Bella. You’re really special, you know that?”

I felt my face heat up measurably, though it was nothing compared to when she finally got up to leave and hugged me, tight enough that I could hardly breathe throughout the embrace. When she let go, there was a smile on her face that made my heart beat a little bit faster.

“I’ll see you next week, alright?” She murmured, giving my arm one last squeeze before heading down the driveway and back to her car. I watched her drive away, still holding the cup of tea she’d made for me, before I slumped against the doorway and resisted the urge to laugh, or scream. Or both.

When I finally came back to school, Jasper Hale was back in English class. Though I’d only seen him the one time, it was like a huge change had come over him since I’d first met him. Gone was the mildly constipated look on his face, instead replaced by a sweet quirk of the lips as I took my seat beside him.

“Thank you,” he told me in a low voice, the first words I’d ever heard out of him that weren’t contorted with some sort of repressed pain. “Alice told me what you did for her. I don’t know what I would’ve done if something were to have happened to her.”

“It was nothing,” I said, slightly startled by the intensity of his words. “She would’ve done the same for me. How are you feeling, by the way?”

“Feeling?” He repeated, his brow furrowing slightly. “What do you mean?”

“Alice told me about the whole stomach flu thing,” I explained, lowering my voice as Mr. Wilson walked into the room and set down a heavy stack of papers on his desk. “I had a virus for a week back when I was twelve, so I know from experience that those things are the worst.”

“Oh. Right. Well, I suppose I’m lucky that it didn’t get any worse than it already was,” Jasper said, wincing at the memory. “It wasn’t a very pretty sight.”

“Probably not,” I agreed lightly, not sure what else to say. The conversation lulled awkwardly, but before I could ask him if I should’ve brought the Tupperware container Alice had accidentally left at my house, Mr. Wilson told us to open up our copies of Jane Eyre to page thirty-four.

When class was over, I tried to approach Jasper, but he left the classroom before I could ask. I decided to ask Alice next period.

“You can just bring it to my house, if you’d like,” she said, her voice suspiciously innocent. Something occurred to me just then.

“Did you leave the container there just so I’d be obligated to bring it back and meet your family?” I asked, and she smiled slyly.

“You don’t strike me as the type who would willingly meet someone’s family if not forced to,” she informed me. I gasped in mock-hurt.

“Maybe I’ll just steal the Tupperware container for myself,” I said teasingly, momentarily forgetting my fear of being anything but overly formal and slightly social awkward when it came to Alice Cullen. Her eyes lit up in delight.

“If you do,” she said, her voice edged with a promise, “I’ll just have to break into your house and steal it back. And how would you explain to Charlie that there was a dark-haired vagrant who’d broken into your house because you didn’t want to come home to meet the family?”

I couldn’t tell if she was being serious or not, and told her so. In response, she just tilted her head back and laughed, which wasn’t exactly reassuring.

When lunch finally came around, Lauren asked me what that look on my face was supposed to mean.

“What are you talking about?” I asked exasperatedly, bending my head a little so I could get out of the crossfire of Eric and Mike’s mini-food fight.

“The look on your face, like you’ve just been asked to prom by Prince Harry himself. What’s up with that?”

“Alice Cullen wants me to come over to her house to meet her family,” I snapped, and all the conversation at our table stopped. Jessica’s head snapped up from where she had been talking with Angela about some econ homework that had been assigned last night, looking not unlike a hound dog following the scent of a wounded fox.

“She asked you to meet her family?” She repeated, eyes huge. “You’re not pulling my leg here, are you, Bella? Because if you are, I’m going to kill you-“

“Yes, she did,” I said insistently. “Why is that so weird to you guys, anyway? Is it that crazy that she’d want me to come over?”

“She’s probably going to try to get you initiated into a Satan-worshipping cult,” Eric whispered from the left, mini-food fight momentarily forgotten. “Whatever you do, Bella, don’t eat or drink anything that she gives you. It’ll probably be laced with something.”

“Eric, do you always have to be the dumbest person in the room?” Angela asked with irritation, much to my astonishment. Angela was normally as quiet and docile as a mouse; it was surprising to hear her speak with such vexation. Turning to me and softening her voice, she said, “I’m sure you’ll have a good time, Bella. Don’t listen to anything Eric- or anyone else- says, okay? He’s just jealous that you’re going, because he’s had a major crush on Alice for so long.”

 “So then it’s not going to be any different in Bella’s case,” Lauren said in a nasty voice. I stiffened.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” Lauren said in a singsong voice. “Only that you’re obviously obsessed with Alice Cullen, despite the fact that you’ve known her for barely over a week.”

“God, what is it with you and Bella’s sexuality, Lauren?” Jessica asked, obviously annoyed with this prolonged topic. “You’re like that dad from American Beauty who gets all upset when he thinks his son is gay, because he’s totally repressed himself.”

“Don’t ever compare me to Chris Cooper again,” Lauren snarled. “His hair is thinning.”  

“Wait, so what should I do about the Cullens?” I asked, redirecting our conversation back to the matter at hand. “Should I actually go over?”

“Why not?” Angela said, shrugging. “What’s the worst that can happen? Besides, it’ll be interesting. I always wanted to see what their house looks like.”

“Plot twist: they don’t actually have a house, and they live in a cave in the woods where they sacrifice virgins to the Dark Lord,” Mike offered helpfully. We all stared at him.

“So,” I said slowly, “you think that they sacrifice virgins to Lord Voldemort-“

“No, don’t be ridiculous!” Mike said, rolling his eyes at my ignorance. “I’m clearly talking about Darth Vader-“

“Mike, how is that better in any way-“

“Can you guys just stop judging me for a second and listen to my reasoning, maybe?”

Across the cafeteria, I caught Alice’s eye. She was leaning against Jasper, laughing at something he had told her. I felt my heart squeeze, as if someone was gripping it tightly in their fist, and had to shut my eyes tightly before turning back to the others and disparaging Mike’s conspiracy theories along with them.  

Chapter Text

“I wasn’t kidding, you know,” Alice whispered.

Most of the class was already half-asleep or getting there. The documentary our teacher put on was dull enough to sedate an elephant, and the senior class of 2007 was no match for C-list celebrities in breeches and off-kilter wigs.

Except Alice, apparently, who had looked over her shoulder to ensure our teacher was, in fact, looking at profiles on eHarmony before leaning over to talk to me. I tore my eyes away from the screen- which was admittedly fairly easy- so I could look into her face instead, which was open and earnest.

“What are you talking about?” I whispered back, though we both know what she’d been talking about.

“You should come meet my family,” she said in a low voice, a smile playing on her lips that I could see even in the dark. “Tonight, if you’re available. I can drive you to my house after school- it’ll be so much fun, you’ll see! I’ll even let you choose the music, if you’re good.”

“Alice,” I began, in an apologetic voice, but she raised her palm and cut me off.

“Bella, my mother’s already making dinner for eight tonight, instead of seven. And believe me when I say that makes a world of difference. It’s too late to back out now.”

I thought it over, and then sighed. “What’s she making?”

“Penne all’arrabiata,” she whispered. “A true American dish, you’ll love it.”

I hesitated before nodding my head slightly. Alice squealed with delight, before cutting herself off and looking up to make sure that our teacher hadn’t overheard us. Thankfully he hadn’t, too engrossed with whatever middle-aged woman and her three kids from a previous marriage he was gawking at on his computer screen. 

“I have to get changed, though,” I said, looking down at my outfit dubiously. I wasn’t exactly wearing “meet-the-parents” clothes right now. Thankfully, Alice didn’t try to convince me otherwise, instead agreeing to drive me home before taking us back to her place.

“Jasper’s going to have to come with us, though,” she told me casually, and I jumped a little.

“Wait, Jasper’s coming with us to my place? Isn’t he hitching a ride with your siblings?” I asked, a little desperately. Alice shook her head, biting the inside of her cheek as if to suppress a grin.

“Rosalie has to stay late to retake a physics test she blew off, and she refuses to let any of us drive her car back home. Edward and Emmett are going to wait for her, so Jasper’s going to come with us. Unless you have any objections…?” She looked at me, her eyes almost impossibly wide. I shook my head furiously before I was aware I was even doing it.

“Um, no, not at all!” I said, though I was internally screaming at the idea that not one, but two Cullens were coming to my house and were going to sit on the couch that was older than I was in the living room while I tried to throw together an outfit that wasn’t completely uninspired. The tender way Alice touched my arm more than made up for it, though. The region of skin her fingertips grazed felt impossibly warm as I turned back to the documentary.

Of course, I regretted it later when I saw Alice pointing me out to Jasper and the others in the cafeteria at lunch. Their heads automatically swiveled in my direction, and in my haste to bend down and get out of their view I accidentally banged my chin against the table.

“Nice going, klutz,” Lauren snarked as I rubbed at my chin dazedly.

“Like you weren’t the same for weeks after you accidentally tripped over Rosalie’s foot in the hallway in freshman year,” Mike said, rolling his eyes. Lauren flushed scarlet, but before she could add anything Jessica bounced over to my side.

“So, Bella,” she said, in a careful voice, “any updates on the Alice Cullen front? When are you meeting the fam?”

“Tonight, actually,” I said, in as casual a voice as I could muster. “Alice is driving me over to my place to change, and then we’re going over to her house to eat dinner.”

“Dinner? Seriously? I don’t think I can remember the last time I saw the Cullens eating anything,” Eric said incredulously from beside me. I looked over as inconspicuously as I could manage, and sure enough, though the Cullens had trays laden with food, not a single one of them were so much as poking at their lukewarm beans or frijitas.

“Maybe they’re health-conscious,” Angela suggested half-heartedly. “There’s a lot of glucose in school meals, actually. They-“

“Moving on,” Jessica said pointedly, flipping her curls over to one shoulder. “You should probably, like, take photo and video evidence of what you see in the Cullen house. You could make hundreds, probably. Freshman me would’ve swooned to see what Edward’s room looks like.”

She sighed dreamily. Mike poked her in the ribs.

“Earth to Jessica, come in Jessica,” he said, in a monotone robot voice. She blinked out of her reverie and swatted his hand away, an irritated and slightly embarrassed expression on her face.

“Well, if you’re going to your place to get changed, you might as well add a little something extra to your wardrobe.” With that, she untied the blue scarf around her neck and tugged it around mine, tightening it a little before stepping back to admire her work. “There. You can give that back to me tomorrow. You’ve got to tell me all about what happens, okay? And don’t be shy texting me during dinner. My phone’s always on.” She waved her pink Razor in the air for emphasis. I nodded, not planning to follow up on that offer at all, and spent the rest of the school day in a sort of daze until I finally found myself waiting at Alice’s locker.

She arrived after a relatively short time, with Jasper on her heels. I couldn’t help but give him a once-over, just to see if he changed his mind over the past week about somewhat tolerating- if not liking- me, but his expression was neutral as he returned my gaze steadily. He seemed a little more amiable than the last time I saw him, eyes trailing down to the scarf Alice had just complimented before flickering back up to my face. Flushing, I turned back to Alice.

“We ready to go?” I asked, masking my dawning panic with an overly cheerful tone. If Alice noticed, though, she didn’t say anything, instead complimenting me on Jessica’s scarf before throwing her arm around my waist with a casual gesture- as though we’d been doing that for years- as we walked down the parking lot and to my truck.

“Are you sure it’s safe to go inside?” Jasper asked, and it took me a second to realize that he was joking.

“Oh, please,” I said, opening the door for him and Alice to go through. “It’s hardly older than yourself.”

“I doubt that,” Jasper muttered as he crawled onto the backseat, Alice snuggled up against his side. I put the gear in reverse, and soon enough we were making our way to my house. I was surprised, and mildly horrified, to note that Charlie’s cruiser was in the driveway when we arrived.

“Bella? That you?” Charlie called as I pulled the door open. He paused in his tracks when he saw Alice and Jasper coming in behind me, mouth hanging slightly open and eyes wide, as if he was looking at a crime scene instead of two perfectly innocuous teenagers. Perfect teenagers, anyway.

“Hi, Mr. Swan,” Alice chirped. “How have you been?”

He stared at her for a while longer before I coughed, pointedly.

“Fine,” he said, still staring at her in a way that made me want to bang my head against the wall. “Just here on my lunch break, ‘s all. How are you two doing? I haven’t seen you in a while.”

“We’re doing fine, thank you for the concern,” Jasper said, and then actually smiled. The sight made my heart falter for a few seconds. “We’re just here so Bella can get her things from upstairs. We’re having dinner tonight at our house.”

I never heard him say my name before. The way he said it- rich and deep in his baritone voice- made my heart falter for another few seconds. It didn’t exactly help matters that I was suddenly struck dumb by the fact that he had a slightly Southern drawl I had never been aware of before.

“That’s right,” I said unsteadily, when my heartbeat finally got back on track. “I’m just going to go upstairs now- I’ll be quick-“

“That’s fine,” Alice smiled. “Mr. Swan can keep us company.”

“Please, call me Charlie,” I overheard Charlie say as I made my way up the stairs and to my room, where I promptly collapsed against the door. I forced myself to breath in deeply before heading to my bureau and rummaging around in something that would be appropriate for dinner with a group of devastatingly attractive people I’d exchanged maybe a few words with before throwing their daughter/sister away from an oncoming collision.

“Where the hell are all my dresses,” I growled underneath my breath, throwing clothes over my shoulder. I could barely believe that I didn’t have one thing available to wear. The only thing that was somewhat decent was a strappy summer dress that used to belong to my mother’s back in the ‘80s or so. I pulled on a denim jacket before checking my reflection in the mirror to make sure I didn’t have something in my teeth. Frowning, I tousled my hair a little and then hauled my ass downstairs before Jasper and Alice would leave without me.

Both of them paused in the middle of their conversation with Charlie when I came into the living room. I fidgeted.

“Should I change, or-?”

“No, no,” Alice said hurriedly. “It’s just…”

“I got it,” Jasper murmured, and got up from the couch to touch the ends of Jessica’s blue scarf that was still tied around my neck. “May I?”

Mutely, I nodded. He pulled the ends a bit and looped them around before taking a step back, though not without his hands lingering on my neck for longer than I would’ve thought he’d want to be in contact with me for, even with all this newfound cordiality on his behalf.

Charlie watched this all from his seat on the couch, an infuriatingly knowing smile on his face. I resisted the urge to stick my tongue out and instead followed Alice out the door, waving a goodbye to Charlie before heading back to my truck.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Alice said, grabbing my forearm lightly before I could slid into the driver’s seat. She and Jasper exchanged a glance before she took a step closer and said, “Why don’t I drive?”

“What?”

“Bella…” she began softly, but Jasper cut in before she could speak any more.

“You drive a bit slower than we’re accustomed to, that’s all,” he said. I opened my mouth to defend myself, took one look and their faces, and realized the argument was over before it even began.

“Fine,” I groaned. “But if you crash my car, Alice, I’ll be legally obligated to kick you in the shin.”

She eyed me critically, as if thinking over whether or not I would actually kick her in the shin, before giving me an impish smile. “I think that’d hurt you more than it’d hurt me.”

“This is your house?” I blurted as we pulled into the driveway. Hidden by trees as it was, I wasn’t exactly sure if they were taking me to their place or, like Mike said, driving us deeper into the woods so that they’d be able to sacrifice me to Satan in a more secluded area, as Mike had said they would.

I was wrong, though. Standing in front of us was a huge, sprawling mansion, made almost entirely of glass. As I gawked, the door to the house opened, and a woman appeared on the front steps, smiling at us as we made our way over to her.

She was arguably one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen. Her face was tender and heart-shaped, light brown hair falling into soft curls that caressed the skin of my neck as she gave me a light hug.

“It’s lovely to meet you, Bella,” she said in a warm voice. “My name is Esme. Alice has told me all about you. You’re even more beautiful than she mentioned.”

Alice wasn’t blushing, but she seemed more fidgety than I’d ever seen her look before. Before I could return the compliment, Doctor Cullen stepped out of the house and extended one hand for me to shake, giving me a genial smile as I did so.

“It’s nice to see you’re looking better, Bella,” he said.

“Uh, thanks, Doctor Cullen,” I mumbled, not sure what to say.

“Please, call me Carlisle,” he said, in almost complete mimicry of Charlie just a half hour ago. He stepped aside to let me in. The house was even more impressive inside than outside, but I could barely get more of a glimpse as I was led down the hallway to the dining room. Inside, Rosalie, Edward, and Emmett were already seated, all looking distastefully down at the most lavish and elegantly decorated bowls of pasta I’ve ever seen, before or since.

“Bella,” Alice said, placing her hand on the small of my back, “this is Rosalie, Edward, and Emmett.”

We all exchanged somewhat guarded glances.

“Nice scarf,” Emmett finally said, his face breaking into a smile. Reflexively, I smiled back.

“Thanks,” I said, hand going up to my throat to touch it. “Jessica Stanley gave it to me.”

Edward muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, “Oh, God.” Carlisle shot him a warning look before turning to me, softening his expression.

“Please, Bella. Take a seat.”

A minute later found me sitting at the table, Alice and Jasper on either side of me, as I hesitantly raised a forkful of pasta to my lips. My eyes fluttered shut almost of their own accord.

“Do you like it?” Esme asked eagerly from across the table. “It’s been quite a while since I made f- such elaborate dishes, I wasn’t sure if it’d be your taste, exactly.”

“It’s fantastic,” I promised her. “Usually, I live off of microwave dinners and preservatives, so this is great.”

“Well,” Esme said, tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “I wanted to make something that’d you’d enjoy. I- we’ve- wanted to meet you for a very long time. It’s a great thing that you did for Alice, Bella. From the bottom of a concerned mother’s heart, I wanted to thank you.”

I felt the blood rush into my face at her words. Edward tensed a little from beside his seat next to Esme and Carlisle, but I ignored him- he’d barely had a word to say to me, anyway- and gave Esme a warm smile.

“I know Alice would’ve done the same for me,” I said, repeating my past words to Jasper, though I knew no such thing. Alice took my hand underneath the table and squeezed it, gently. “But, um, it was really no trouble. I kind of didn’t think about it, actually.”

“Are you always so accident-prone?” Jasper asked two seats away, though his tone was playful enough for me to relax the muscles that tensed up automatically at the sound of his voice. I didn’t know why, but for some reason, it was like my brain went on hyperdrive whenever he spoke.

“Well, there’s a reason I was voted class klutz back in Arizona,” I responded, shrugging my shoulders as I lifted another bite of pasta to my lips. It occurred to me that, though Carlisle and Esme were making their way steadily through their own dishes, most of the others hadn’t touched their plates once. I waved that thought away as Emmett opened his mouth to speak.

“And do tell, Bella, why you chose our lovely little slice of paradise here in Forks as your new home away from home,” Emmett said, mimicking an old-timey news’ reporter’s voice. I stared down at my plate, mulling over his question.

“Uh, well, I guess I just wanted to give my mom and Paul- her husband- some space. They just got married, so I figured she’d want a little alone time with him, without her teenage daughter getting in the way of things.” I smiled self-deprecatingly at that. “She and Paul are out somewhere in Nevada, anyway, and I don’t really think I’d be able to tag along to the casinos with them.”

“Do you keep in touch with any of your friends back in Arizona?” Esme asked politely.

“Well, you see, Esme, I didn’t actually have many friends in Arizona, because most of the senior class I left behind either ignored me or called me out on being literally the quietest person in the entire school,” I said, but when it came out of my mouth it translated as, “Some of them, but not all.”

“I’m sure they miss you, at any rate.”

“Are we done with the small talk now?” Rosalie gripped, before I could respond to that. Esme frowned.

“Don’t be rude, Rosalie. Bella’s our guest.”

Rosalie rolled her eyes and slumped- not exactly slumped, per say, Rosalie didn’t seem like the type of person to slump anywhere- back into her chair, poking at her food with a distasteful look on her face. I tried not to wince.

Thirty minutes passed in the same way- Esme and Carlisle, asking questions about what Arizona was like, if I was enjoying living in Forks, how my father was doing, etc., me trying not to shovel the rest of my pasta into my mouth like a barbarian, despite the fact that my stomach was steadily rumbling-, until Carlisle stood up to collect the dishes. Most of which, aside from mine, were almost completely untouched.

“Let’s go upstairs,” Alice whispered afterwards, half-dragging me out of the dining room. “I want to show you my room before we head back.”

“Okay,” I whispered back, almost giddy as I followed her up the stairs and to her room at the end of the hallway, feeling almost drunk with the sheer amount of attention I was being shown by her.

Her room was exactly how I pictured it. Baby blue walls, white furniture, large, spacious bed with delicate, winged doves carved on the bedframe and bedposts. Her entire wall to the south of her room was entirely glass, showing the world outside with such clarity I had to resist the urge to press my nose up against the glass.

“What do you think?” She asked from behind me, and if I didn’t know any better I’d say she sounded suddenly shy. I turned to her and beamed.

“I love the color you painted your walls.”

“I painted them myself,” she told me proudly. She sat down on her bed and patted the space next to her, which I hesitantly lowered myself down onto. The mattress below was surprisingly springy, as if it was brand new.

“Sometimes,” Alice said, “in the morning, I can just stare out that window for hours on end. Not moving, or breathing, or anything. It’s so serene. So tranquil. Have you ever seen something so beautiful, you couldn’t bear to rip your eyes away from it, because you didn’t want to miss a single detail?”

Every time I look at you, I thought dazedly, lost in the way her eyes glinted and the light caught the inky strands of her hair, and then promptly blanched at the fact that that was something I had thought- me, who had never really thought of anyone in that way before, much less a girl I’d known for less than a month. It was usually my mother who made terrible romantic decisions, not me. It shook me to my core, that my body had made up the decision to be irrevocably attracted to Alice without my mind even registering it until right then and there. If only Lauren could see me now, I thought bitterly to myself.

“I wish I could see it,” I offered weakly, when I suddenly realized Alice was waiting for a response.

“You should sleep over one day,” she said, politely ignoring the way I jumped at her words. “It would be really fun. We’d do manicures and watch movies and make popcorn, everything you’d like. And then you can see the view from my window in the morning, and believe me, that alone is enough to make me want to freeze time in a bottle.”

She spoke so wistfully, I couldn’t help but ask, “Has anyone ever slept over at your place before?”

She shook her head. The look on her face made me want to hug her, and yet again I was shook by the intensity of my feelings. It was like all my feelings had been placed behind a dam- a very sturdy dam, built by serious businessmen and their company that values their efficiency beyond all else-, and the floodgates were opening without any warning.

“Esme and Carlisle aren’t very strict when it comes to those sort of things,” she said, oblivious to the mental breakdown I was having beside her, “but for some reason, not many people really approach me or my siblings at sch- Bella, are you alright? You look pale.”

“Fine!” I exclaimed, a little too loudly to my own ears. Wincing, I adjusted my volume. “I’m fine. Um, that really sucks, and all those people are totally missing out on your company, Alice. I’d love to have a sleepover sometime.”

What are you doing?! I silently screamed at myself, even as the words came out of my mouth. I couldn’t think straight right then- I needed to get away as fast as possible, think clearly and calmly about what I was possibly going to do about the muddled mess of my own emotions. And having Alice right next to me, leg almost pressed against mine, feeling her breath on her cheek as she leaned over to check on me, wasn’t really helping matters.

“Alice,” I said, my voice slightly cracking on the last syllable, “I think I should go now. Charlie’s probably wondering where I am.”

She gave a little oh! of exclamation when she checked her clock and realized the time. I furiously tried to ignore how endearing that sound was, as well as the small forehead smack she made for emphasis.

“Sorry, Bella,” she said, smiling at me. “Let’s get you home.”

We walked out of her room and back down the hallway, but Alice suddenly paused at one of the doors.

“Let’s go see Jasper before we leave, okay?” She asked, not waiting for a response as she pushed the door open. Jasper’s back was turned to us when we came in, scribbling down something on what I later saw was a moleskin journal. His room was as different to Alice’s as night was to day. The walls were painted a deep, rich red, lined with classical Hollywood movie posters in a way that wasn’t like Jessica Alba posters tacked up messily on other teenage boys’ bedroom walls, but in a way that made me feel like I was legitimately looking at a room that was meant to be a tribute to the classics- movies, books, even clothing, with an elegant white shirt with flared sleeves lying on his bed.

He turned around when we heard us come in.

“Hey, Jazz,” Alice smiled, leaning against the doorframe. “I wanted to show Bella your room. Is that okay?”

“Be my guest,” he said, opening his arms wide. I couldn’t help but stare at the way his shirt pulled across his abdomen, clinging to his lean muscles in a way that was extremely distracting. I flushed when I realized he was looking at me and instantly ripped my gaze away. Now was not the time to get hung up over another Cullen. One was enough.

Jasper, however, didn’t seem to get the memo. When I gathered up enough courage to look back at him, his gaze was heavy and low-lidded- either come hither or I know you’re attracted to me and it’s making me debate whether or not I should kick you out of my room right now, I couldn’t tell which one.

“I like your posters,” I said finally, after a long period of silence. He smiled.

“I’ve been collecting quite a few over the years,” he said. “My favorite is the ‘It Happened One Night’ one, naturally.”

“Wow. Wouldn’t have expected you to be into rom-coms,” I said jokingly, and then instantly wondered why every word that came out of my mouth to a person I liked was either completely insensitive or an awkward assumption about them.  Thankfully, he didn’t seem offended, if the smile spreading across his face had anything to say.

“I love them,” he said, and then his gaze flickered to Alice. “There’s something quite beautiful about being able to find lightheartedness in a situation that makes your heart beat faster and your palms sweat at an unholy rate.”

When I looked at Alice, she was returning his gaze with an adoring expression on her face. My heart did that weird clench-y thing it did when I saw the two of them together, but now, I really wasn’t sure which one of them I was more jealous of.

I made sure to school my expression into something more appropriate than gut-wrenching sadness and confusion when Alice looked back at me.

“We should head out,” she said, blowing Jasper a kiss. He caught it with a smile that made my legs feel a little like jelly as I followed Alice out of his room, down the stairs, out the door, and safely back into the comfort of my car.

“Promise me you’ll tell me what time you’re free, Bella,” Alice said once I climbed into the driver’s seat. She rested her chin against my rolled-down window as she spoke. “We should make plans for a sleepover. I’m counting on it.”

“Maybe next week, sometime,” I said vaguely. First, I needed to figure out whether I’d be able to sleep in the same room as Alice without rushing to the bathroom in the middle of the night to have a panic attack, spurred on by my own baffling feelings.

She seemed appeased, though, and touched my hand briefly before walking back up the driveway, waving to me before disappearing inside the house. I stared at the hand she’d touched, before pulling out of the driveway and speeding down the road as fast as my clunker of a truck could take me.

Chapter Text

 I found myself spilling my relationship problems to Jacob Black not even ten minutes after I’d first met him.

The next afternoon following dinner with the Cullens, I found him idling in my living room as his father and Charlie settled down on the couch, watching a baseball game on the television with beers in either hand. When I paused in my tracks upon seeing then, Charlie and Jacob’s father got up from their seats and gave me matching smiles.

“Bella,” Charlie said, clapping his friend on the shoulder, “this is Billy Black. And his son, Jacob- you remember Jacob, don’t you? He fixed up your car for you, all nice and sound.”

“Jacob,” I repeated dazedly, instantly being flooded with a dozen half-forgotten childhood memories of playing with him and his sisters. “Jacob, oh my god- of course I remember. Thanks for fixing up the car for me, by the way. It’s a godsend.”

“It was nothing, really,” he said, though the flush that spread across his neck and cheeks gave him away. “Is it working okay for you?”

“I was just about to go out for groceries,” I said, holding up my car keys. “Wanna come along and see?”

“Sure.”

I ignored Charlie and Billy’s knowing looks as we walked out of the house, Jacob’s arm brushing casually against mine. We clambered into the truck and shivered together until the heat finally blasted out of the A/C, inciting sighs of relief from the both of us as I finally pulled the car in reverse and down the street.

“I didn’t even have a car back ho- in Arizona,” I told him, holding the wheel with one hand so I could wiggle the fingers of the other in front of the vent. “It was really sweet of you to do this for someone you haven’t seen in years.”

“Seriously, Bella, don’t even mention it,” Jacob said, smiling. “I’m pretty sure the memory of you pushing Rachel’s face against her cake on her ninth birthday is going to stick with me until the day I die.”

“Oh my god,” I said, laughing in mortification as the memory came rushing back to me. “I almost completely forgot about that. Did she recover?”

“They say there’s still icing in her hair even today,” Jacob said somberly, only breaking when I did.

We arrived at the supermarket soon after that, and were just beginning to delve into an argument about whether or not a single, standalone package of Lays chips could be considered dinner, when I accidentally pushed my cart on the toes of someone I never expected to see at a rip-off Food 4 Less.

“Bella!” Alice grinned, maneuvering my cart slightly so that the wheels weren’t sitting directly on her foot. She had a basket of junk food resting in one hand, the other hand resting on Jasper’s arm beside her, who gave me a lopsided smile in greeting. “What are you doing here?”

“Jacob and I are just getting some food for tonight’s dinner,” I explained, still bemused by her presence in the store. I was still under the impression that she had some kind of debilitating disease that disallowed much weight gain, or that she was taking appetite suppressers, or something of that nature. I never saw her so much as take a single bite of her dinner the other day- or Jasper, for that matter.

Besides that, I supposed I would’ve never expected to see a Cullen- even one as personable as Alice- to be in as commonplace of a store as the tiny local supermarket that offered little to no organic vegetables and fruits or vegan desserts, such as the ones I’m sure Rosalie would’ve been most interested in. If only there was a Whole Foods in Forks, I lamented on her behalf.  

I snapped out of my inner monologue as I suddenly realized Jasper was talking to me.

“And you’re… acquainted with Jacob Black, Bella?” He was asking, the corners of his mouth twisting downwards in what could only be described as distaste. I turned to Jacob to ask if he’d met Jasper before, when I saw that Jacob had almost entirely tensed up in the 2.5 seconds we’d ran into the Cullens, looking like he’d just ran into a viper’s nest instead of two other teenagers.

“Um, yeah,” I said, now definitively confused. “He’s an old family friend. Do you guys know each other, or…?”

“We’ve met,” Alice said in a careful voice. “How is your father, Jacob?”

Jacob’s gaze suddenly flittered to her face, looking surprised, as though he hadn’t seen her there before. His expression softened slightly, but not by much. “He’s fine. We’re just on our way back home, aren’t we, Bella?”

“Yeah, but- what are you guys doing here?” I asked, directing my attention back towards Alice and Jasper. Alice held up her basket so I could peek inside, sifting through bags of chips and packages of cookies- certainly not anything I envisioned Alice ever partaking in before.

“It’s for our unconfirmed sleepover next week,” she told me, with a confidential wink. “I’m planning ahead. It’s good I caught you now, actually- I wasn’t sure about whether or not you preferred regular Oreos or the white chocolate-covered ones…”

I saw Jacob stiffening beside me. I quickly reassured her that any form of Oreos was good enough to me, and bid them a hasty goodbye before placing the haul Jacob and I had gathered down on the self-checkout station.

“You’re having a sleepover with her?” Jacob asked under his breath before I could say anything, peering over his shoulder to ensure that they were out of earshot. I frowned as I scanned the first item from the cart.

“It wasn’t really solidified or anything, but yeah, I guess I am. Do you know them?” I spoke in a whisper too now, paranoid by Jacob’s paranoia. Jacob wringed his hands in what I assumed was an uncharacteristic show of nervousness from him- throughout or entire car ride, he’d been nothing but open and friendly. It didn’t seem like him to be anything but thoroughly confident.

“Not really,” he said, looking hesitant. “My dad does, though. He says, um…”

“Yeah?” I prompted, when Jacob lapsed into silence. I felt a little nervous myself, feeling as though Alice and Jasper could hear everything we were saying, somehow, even from across the store.

“He says that they’re dangerous,” Jacob finished reluctantly. I stared at him in surprise. Whatever I was expecting, it certainly wasn’t that.

“Like how?” I asked, not sure I wanted to know the answer. “They get all their cars and clothing from drug money or something?”

He laughed a little at that, before cutting himself off and looking immediately contrite, like he was hearing his dad’s warning reverberating inside his head. God knew my mother’s voice did that enough times with me. “I… it’s probably nothing. Just a bunch of superstitions. Let’s head back to the car, okay?”

“Sure,” I agreed, though I was nowhere near done questioning him.

We piled into the car with our loot, and were just beginning the drive back home when Jacob suddenly asked, “So, do you like Alice or something?”

 I nearly swerved into a tree.

“What?” I asked, a little wild-eyed as I turned around in my seat to stare at him. He looked taken aback by my over-the-top response, before his lips curled into a smile.

“You do, don’t you? Either that, or she likes you. Is Jasper in the mix, too? He was looking at you almost the entire time we were there.”

“No!” I protested, sounding loud and defensive even to my own ears. “Me and Alice- and- Jacob, are you crazy, or-“

 “Me thinks the lady doth protest too much,” Jacob said, with a shit-eating grin on his face. I groaned.

“I thought you didn’t even like the Cullens,” I complained as we came to a stoplight. He fidgeted uncomfortably in his seat.

“It’s not me who doesn’t like them,” he said finally. “It’s my father.”

“Billy?” I asked in surprise. “Why doesn’t he like them?”

“I- I really shouldn’t be talking about this, Bella.” Jacob said, his voice taut as he directed his gaze out the window and away from mine. In a moment of inspiration, I locked the doors. His head swiveled back in my direction.

“Oh, come on,” he said, pulling at the door handle. No give. “Are you seriously going to lock me in here unless I tell you?”

“You shouldn’t underestimate the girl who pressed your sister’s face into a cake when she was nine years old,” I responded lightly, feeling a slight rush at my own daring- which was kind of sad in hindsight, really. I never would’ve pulled it off with anyone that wasn’t Jacob, but the fact of the matter was that being around him was like being transported back to my childhood. I had no qualms indulging in behavior meant mostly for twelve-year-olds if it meant I was going to get answers from him.

“Fine,” he acqueised as the light turned green. He spoke as I drove, looking at my face every so often so gauge my reaction to his words.

“My dad says that, um, that they- well, that bad things happen when they’re around. Strange things. Things that don’t really have an explanation. He thinks they’re these harbingers of, like, bad luck or something. I mean, have they ever acted strangely when they were around you, or…?”

“Uh, not that I’m aware of,” I said slowly. “Though Alice- never mind.”

“What did Alice do?” Jacob asked curiously. I flushed.

“She, uh, she picked me up in her arms after I got a concussion. Like, bridal carry. She weighs less than me, and she’s an inch or two shorter, and it just- I don’t know, it seemed weird at the time.”

“Hm.” There was a crease forming between Jacob’s eyebrows. “Bella, I- look, I can’t tell you anything more, I think. Just… do me a favor, okay?”

“What?”

“Look up something online. Look up the, uh, the ‘Cold Ones’. You’ll see what I’m talking about.”

“Jacob, if you want to get me into Budweiser, I’m just going to be up front and say that I don’t really drink much anymore-“

“What?” Jacob sputtered. “No, it’s not- it’s not a beer ad, Bella. Also, Budweiser sucks. Blue Ribbon’s where it’s at.”

“Jacob, you shouldn’t even know what Blue Ribbon is. You’re only sixteen years old.”

“You’re literally only a year older than me, what is this-“

“It screws up your brain, you know. Collapses your synapses and everything.”

“Okay, now I know that’s not true-“

“It totally is!”

“Be-e-lla!” I liked the way he said my name, stretching it out into three syllables, the way a little brother might after you teased him about having a crush on an older girl. I was still laughing as we pulled back up into the driveway and walked inside the house.

I didn’t have enough time to look up anything, as it turned out. I was busy preparing dinner with Billy in the kitchen, who apparently loved to cook almost as much as he loved to hear about what I’d been doing for the past eight years or so. When I said ‘nothing,’ he laughed raucously.

“I’m sure you’ve done something,” he said, eyes twinkling. “Breathing? Eating?”

“Well, I guess I’ve done some things, yeah,” I said, smiling as I maneuvered around his wheelchair to put the diced vegetables in my hands in the boiling pot of water.

“Leave anyone behind back home?” He asked curiously. I looked at him in confusion, and then began to laugh as I realized what he was asking me.

“Uh, no. I’m all clear on that frontier.”

“Well, it just so happens that Jacob-“

“DAD!”  Jacob yelled warningly from the living room. Charlie’s laughter wafted through the open kitchen door as I ducked my head and tried to fight the flush that was spreading across my cheeks. We spent most of the night in the same fashion, chatting and laughing and generally bonding in a way that would've made most Lifetime movie families envious, before finally waving Billy and Jacob off and collapsing into my bed.

To my immense surprise, the next morning, Jessica invited me out to shop for homecoming dresses with her and Angela in Port Angeles.

“I would’ve invited Lauren,” she said in a whisper, giving the blonde a nervous look out of the corner of my eye, “but she’s been acting up lately. I think it has something to do with the fact that she thinks Eric is going to ask you to homecoming.”

“Please tell me you’re kidding,” I said, giving Eric a side look. I’d barely exchanged more than several words to him for the past couple of weeks; he was far too invested in the new DS Mike had bought him for his eighteenth birthday to really pay attention to me in any shape or form. Besides, I was pretty sure he was harboring a crush on Mike, if the long, lovelorn looks and the dreamy sighs in his direction at various times was any indication. I wasn’t exactly thrilled by the idea of attending homecoming with someone who was going to moon over somebody else waltzing across the room while I rested against the wall, sipping lukewarm punch and wishing I was anywhere but there.

I wasn’t aware I said all that out loud until Jessica broke into a fit of giggles.

“Uh, Mike isn’t gay, Bella,” Jessica said matter-of-factly. “He’s going to ask me out to homecoming, after all. I’ve been told so by three verifiable sources. And believe me, you’re going to get way more offers to homecoming from cuter boys. Half the senior class is completely crushing on you, after all.”

“They’re doing what now?” I all but squeaked. She grinned.

“So is that a yes on dress shopping today?”

“Uh, sure. Lemme just check with Charlie to make sure it’s okay.”

“You call your dad by his first name? That’s weird.”

I excused myself to go outside and call Charlie. As it turned out, he was ecstatic by the notion I wasn’t turning into the little hermit he’d been afraid I was going to transform into all my childhood, and encouraged me to drop by home first so I could get money from him.

I felt two pairs of eyes glued on me as I walked back into the cafeteria, slipping my phone back into my pocket. I shouldn’t have been surprised, but there was still a thrill running up my spine as I turned around and met Jasper and Alice’s gazes, who instantly ripped their eyes away from mine the second they saw me looking at them. I ducked my head and smiled goofily at my shoes, something Jessica picked up on as I reclaimed my seat beside her.

“By the way,” she said in a low murmur, “when I said the entire senior class, I wasn’t just speaking about the non-Cullen portions of it. Did you see the way Jasper, like, ogled you when you came back in? His gaze should be illegal. I mean, he’s not as cute as you-know-who, obviously, but c’mon.”

“Jessica!” I whisper-shouted, wishing I had brought a hoodie with me so I could zip myself entirely up. “Seriously?”

“What?” She said innocently. “It’s not like they can hear us talking about them, sheesh.”

But from the twin smiles that had spread across their faces when I finally risked looking back at them, I wasn’t so certain that was entirely true.

Chapter Text

“It’s not what, good girls do,” Jessica screamed, “not how they should behave!”

“My head gets so confused, hard to obey-y-y!” Angela screamed back, inciting a startled laugh from both me and Jessica. Our faces were flushed by the wind that was currently whipping at our cheeks, forcing our hair into our mouths as we rolled down the 101 Highway into Port Angeles, smooth and steady in Jessica’s mom’s new convertible (which she apparently made Jessica swear not to crash before handing the keys over, as Jessica later confided in me).

They both looked at me in expectation, so I sighed, suppressed a smile, and yelled out to the wind and the dozens of other drivers on the road giving us irritated looks, “I kissed a girl and I liked it!”

“Taste of her cherry-chapstick,” Jessica hummed, before turning the radio down low and turning in her seat to give me a knowing grin. “Bella, Bella, Bella. You still didn’t tell me who you’re taking to homecoming yet-“

“Shh,” Angela hissed, turning the radio back up again. “This is my favorite part!”

“We can listen to Katy Perry anytime,” Jessica said, rolling her eyes as she turned the dial down low once more. “Angela, it’s 2008. I have an iPod, you know.”

I slid down low in my seat as they bickered over the volume dial, silently thanking Angela for interrupting when she did. The truth of the matter was that I wasn’t even sure if I was going to homecoming with anyone or not. Angela still didn’t have a date, so I could’ve gone with her as friends, but if I was being honest with myself, the only people I actually wanted to go to homecoming with were dating each other. I didn’t know exactly how to break that to Jessica, though, who looked more ecstatic about our trip into Port Angeles than I’d ever seen her look before.

“And there’s the cutest restaurant there, too,” Jessica gushed, having finally come to a compromise with Angela and putting Katy’s voice at a medium volume. “They have the best ravioli there, it’s to die for. My cousin works there, too, so we can totally get him to bring us wine if we ask for Victor Stanley.”

“All I wanna do is find homecoming dresses, Jess,” Angela said, absent-mindedly twirling a strand of black hair around her index finger. “My mom would kill me if she knew I’d been drinking when I was out with you. She’s already upset with you about the nail polish incident, you know.”

“The nail polish incident?” I asked curiously, ears perking up. A bright flush crept up the back of Jessica’s neck as she exited the freeway, refusing outright to answer any of my questions and giving Angela a death-stare as she turned around to explain.

“Tell you later,” Angela promised me under her breath, smiling. I smiled back, feeling light and carefree in a way I hadn’t for a long time as we parked Jessica’s car on the street and started walking towards the department store.

Ten minutes later, I found myself wearing the ugliest dress I’d seen in my entire life. The iced coffee Jessica had bought on our way here came out of her nose when she saw me in all my bedazzled purple glory.

“Isn’t this thing illegal in, like, forty states?” Angela asked as she gingerly touched the fabric. I groaned, unable to comprehend how on Earth I’d allowed them to wrangle me in a dress that might’ve been popular in 1982- me, who hadn’t worn dresses since the first grade.

“Maybe you can go in a pantsuit,” Jessica suggested half-heartedly. “I saw Jessica Alba wearing one in People Magazine last week.”

“Jessica Alba isn’t attending homecoming,” I said, sighing as I struggled to escape the furry beast that was clinging to my skin. Angela giggled and pulled at the sleeves, eventually freeing me from its rhinestone clutches.

“I think you’d look good,” she offered. “It would really match with the cool, um, ‘short hair, don’t care,’ vibe you have going on.”

“Oh, is that what I have going on?” I asked teasingly. Angela grinned and was about to reply when her eyes flickered down. Her cheeks turned red in a record speed, and when I followed her gaze I realized to my mortification that one of my bra straps was nearly slipping off my shoulder.

Oblivious, Jessica said, “I mean, yeah, but, like, I think a short black cocktail dress would be way cuter. You have the legs for it, you know? I’m probably going to have to get, like, an über-long Maxi dress to cover up these bad babies.”

She slapped her thighs, frowning when they made a slight jiggle. The sound tore Angela’s eyes away from me, and I put on the next dress faster than I put on anything in my entire life.

“Oh, come on, Jessica,” Angela groaned. “You’re, like, a size three.”

“Size two, actually,” Jessica sniffed. Her displeasure turned into one of surprised consideration when I finally emerged from the dressing room once more. Angela whistled lowly as I turned around for them to see, the blush still not quite gone from her cheeks.

“That one’s actually really nice on you,” she said, sounding almost shy. I gave her a big grin.

“You think so?”

“Cu-ute,” Jessica said, rolling the black satin in between her fingers. “Didn’t I tell you that a short cocktail dress would do the trick?”

“It’s expensive, though,” I said, frowning. “It’s nearly ninety bucks.”

“Didn’t your dad give you money?” Jessica asked concernedly.

“Yeah, but, like, I don’t want to spend it all in one place.”

“Oh, please,” Jessica sighed, waving all my concerns away with a flick of her wrist. “I can wipe my ass with ninety dollars. I can find ninety dollars in between my cushions, probably.”

“Alright, Jessica,” Angela said with a grin, jabbing her in the ribs slightly. “We get it. You eat Matsutake mushrooms for breakfast and crap solid gold nuggets every night.”

I laughed loudly at that. Jessica made a rude gesture at us both, ducking her head and bursting into a heap of giggles when she realized that one of the cashiers was giving us an open expression of horror.

After we picked out Jessica and Angela’s dresses- a deep blue dress with a slit in the front, and a modest cream-colored shift, respectively-, Angela somehow managed to convince Jessica to see an old horror flick at the nearby theater. Jessica spilled her popcorn on me about a thousand times, and by the time we were walking out of the movie theater I was still brushing kernels off my jacket.

“It wasn’t even that scary,” Angela said, rolling her eyes pointedly. “The special effects were from the fifties, Jess. The fifties.”

“Hey, don’t disparage the fifties,” Jessica snapped. “Grease came from that era.”

“Uh, it actually came from the seven-“

“Oh, hey,” I said brightly, interrupting them both. “Is that the restaurant you were talking about, Jess?”

Their eyes followed the pointed end of my finger to the restaurant across the street, neon sign glowing dimly in the evening darkness that was already beginning to settle across Port Angeles. Jessica squealed in delight.

“Yes! And tonight’s Victor’s shift, too!”

Angela’s hands flew to her stomach, her expression twisting unpleasantly. “Jessica, I ate way too much popcorn. Can we wait an hour and then come back or something?”

“There’s nothing to do for an hour,” Jessica frowned, clearly disappointed by our lack of excitement at meeting her fabled older cousin. “All the good shops are closing already.”

“Not true,” Angela countered. “There’s that bookstore a few blocks away from here.”

“Bookstore?” I repeated, my ears perking up. “I’ve actually been meaning to go for a while.”

“Ugh. Fine. But if we don’t get Victor as our waiter, one of you guys are gonna have to sweet-talk whoever is into giving us wine. Or free dessert. I’m okay with that too.”

That’s how I found myself seated at a computer half an hour later, staring at ads for Budweiser on the screen. I silently cursed Jacob under my breath. I knew typing in something as ludicrously vague and ill-defined as “The Cold Ones” would get me nothing but pictures of beer and beer paraphernalia. Half-heartedly scrolling downwards, my mind wandered until something caught my eye.

I clicked the link, confused at its lack of pro-alcohol content in the description. It brought me, inexplicably, to a webpage about Quileute legends. One of the interweb links charmingly shared the same nickname as the most Caucasian beverage out there, so I clicked that as well. I skimmed down the page, idly wondering if Jessica and Angela were still giggling over the human anatomy book in the next aisle, when I spotted a paragraph that made me stop in my tracks.

It was a description about said ‘Cold Ones’. Pale skin, superhuman strength, predisposed to avoiding the sun at all costs, the whole shebang. I sat there at the computer for a while, wondering why on Earth Jacob would direct me towards a webpage about Quileute vampires- or, at least, Quileute depictions of vampires-, when it suddenly hit me.

“Oh my god, Jacob,” I muttered under my breath, a reluctant smile twitching at my lips. “You can’t be serious.”

And then I stopped smiling as I continued reading.

Firstly, Jacob didn’t exactly seem like the type to yank my chain about a perfectly innocuous family like the Cullens. He said himself that he wasn’t the one to harbor any ill will towards them, though Billy was evidently another story. Secondly, and a little creepily, the ongoing description was starting to match most of what I knew of Alice and Jasper. Pale, cold skin I could vouch for, having both seen and brushed against it myself. I was literally lifted into the arms of a girl that might’ve weighed 120 pounds soaking wet, so that was a checkmark for the superhuman strength thing. And they were somehow, miraculously, always absent on the sunny days of the month. There was no way anyone dug camping so much, not even when they lived in a place that got maybe fifty hours of sunlight a year.

“Found what you were looking for?” Angela asked from beside me. I yelped and closed the tab as quickly as humanly possible. Her presence startled me out of entering the crazy train my mind was just beginning to board, but even so, it was hard to shake the pressure to keep on reading as much as I could.

“Yep!” I said, as cheerfully as I could manage. “Ready to go, how about you? I’m starving.”

“Uh, yeah,” Angela agreed hesitantly, giving me one last look of concern before stepping to the side to let me out of my chair. “Let’s go get some food. And by the way, I’m not sweet-talking anyone into giving me free wine, so, just putting that out there.”

As it turned out, we didn’t need to sweet-talk anyone. The second he saw us, Jessica’s curly-haired cousin Victor directed us to our table, with a wink- or what I assumed was a wink, though which might’ve just been an eye twitch- in my direction and a promise to fetch us something special for tonight’s dinner.

“Isn’t he great?” Jessica asked dreamily. Angela and I exchanged worried looks.

“Jessica,” I said, in a slow voice. “He’s your cousin. As in, the two of you are related. By blood.”

“Hey, this is a no-judge zone, okay?” Jessica said defensively. Dropping her voice down to a low whisper, she added, “Besides, he’s, like, a really good kisser.”

“Jessica!” Angela shrieked in horror, making Jessica crack up, doubling over so that her forehead rested against the tablecloth.

“Oh my god,” she wheezed, “you should’ve seen your faces. I’m kidding, obviously, God. Angela, do you seriously think I’m the kind of girl that hooks up with her cousin?”

“I mean…” Thankfully, Angela was saved from having to climb out of the hole she dug herself into with Victor’s presence, juggling three cups of wine in his hands with an almost expert grace.

“And there’s more where that came from, if you know what I’m saying,” he said, aiming another wink/eye twitch at me. Jessica stared at his back as he walked off to serve his next table, grimacing when she turned back to us.

“I genuinely can’t believe you would think that. I mean, me. With him. Somebody gag me with a spoon, please.”

“Would you rather be gagged before or after you’ve drunk your wine?”

“Good point.”

We lifted the cups to our lips and sipped. When Jessica put hers down, a bright red smile had spread across her face.

“I feel so sophisticated right now, like I’m Carrie Bradshaw or something. I want to drink red wine every night.”

“I just want to get drunk,” I said, deadpan, and we all laughed.

“So, guys,” I said carefully, when our food had finally arrived and we came to the natural lull in conversation that occurred after stuffing huge portions of pasta inside our mouths in silence, preoccupied by the sheer amount of food in front of us to make any attempt at conversation until said food was safely resting in our stomachs. “Hypothetically, let’s say that you discovered something about someone that’s completely unexpected. Like, so unexpected you think it’s a prank. Would you confront them with that you knew, even if you heard from a reliable source that it was the truth?”

Angela hummed in consideration.

“I guess it depends on what that something about them was,” she said, taking a delicate bite of her angel hair pasta. “Like, is it that they’re gay? Do they sell drugs?”

“My cousin- another cousin, not Victor,” Jessica hastily clarified, “well, his classmate had told me that he slept with his best friend’s girlfriend at a party the night before. But when I confronted him about it, because his best friend’s girlfriend happened to be my best friend at the time, he told me he couldn’t have slept with her because she was pregnant with his best friend’s baby at the time. And then he called me a bitch for implying he had betrayed his best friend’s trust by sleeping with his girlfriend. So I think that you should wait and make sure that it’s true before saying anything to them.”

Angela and I stared at her in silence.

“Your family is something else, Jess,” Angela said finally, shaking her head in wonder. She turned back to me with a warm smile. “Did that answer your question, Bella?”

Not really. Actually, not at all.  “Yeah, thanks.”

We finished dinner up quickly after that, though Victor was reluctant to give us a free dessert after he nearly got busted by one of his other coworkers for giving us wine without showing him our IDs. Jessica dropped Angela off first, then me, giving me a cheerful wave before taking off down my street. I lifted my hand in a goodbye gesture, though she was already gone, and started walking to my front door before I noticed something weird.

There was a car parked on the curb directly in front of my house. I could barely see the make and model in the darkness, but something about the way it glinted silver in the moonlight was familiar enough to make me pause. Shaking my head, I ignored it and went inside the house, eager to escape the coldness that was beginning to nip at my exposed skin.

I was just shucking off my jacket when I heard Charlie’s voice coming from further inside the house.

“Bella,” he called, his voice sounding oddly nervous, “come in here. There’s someone who drove a long way to see you.”

Confused, I followed the sound of his voice into the living room- and promptly dropped the bag holding my homecoming dress when I realized exactly who it was I was staring at.

“Hey, Bella,” my mom said, smiling at me. “It’s good to see you.”

Chapter Text

“Mom,” I said weakly, “what are you doing here?”

“Well, I wanted it to be a surprise,” she said, eyes twinkling in merriment and evidently completely oblivious of the discomfort that seemed to be rolling down Charlie’s body in waves, “but Paul’s visiting his mom in Neah Bay, a few miles north of here, and meanwhile I thought I’d come into town and check in on how my baby girl was doing, since she never calls me back!”

Her voice got a little strained at the end there, obviously fighting hard not to show the frustration that was practically leaking through her pores. I knew she hated it when she couldn’t reach me in a moment’s notice, but I’d been so preoccupied with my worries over school and the Cullens and the concussion that was still giving me somewhat of a hard time, I’d barely spared her a second’s thought in the past two weeks.

Evidently, that had been a huge mistake. I should’ve known she would do something as erratic and harebrained as turn up, unannounced, at my father’s doorstep to surprise me. I smiled weakly and gave her a light hug, though I couldn’t pull away fast enough before she tousled my hair with a frown.

“Bella, I really wish you didn’t cut off all your hair like this,” she sighed. “It was so beautiful before. Aren’t you scared people will- I don’t know, think you’re a boy, or a lesbian or something? We don’t want to have a repeat of the incident from last year, you know.”

“Mom,” I said, horrified. “Can we not? Please?”

“What incident?” Charlie asked from his seat on the couch, brows furrowing in concern. Mom and I shared a glance. We never told him about my little stunt with the bridge last year, and I sure as hell wasn’t planning on doing so now.

“It’s nothing,” Mom said finally. I felt nearly weak with relief as she gave Charlie a reassuring smile. Even she, who didn’t know how to take social cues from anyone- or particularly care, for that matter-, knew not to press the issue further. “But your dad agrees with me about the hair. Right, Charlie?”

She turned to him expectantly. He averted his eyes, a slight flush coloring his cheeks. I resisted the urge to slam my head against the doorframe of the living room. I knew that he never got over Mom, not even fourteen years after she’d left him, but I didn’t imagine in all said fourteen years that I would ever have to experience the full truth of the matter firsthand.

“I like it,” he muttered after a pregnant pause. “It brings out her, uh, cheekbones.”

“Thanks, Cha- Dad,” I said, giving him a thankful smile. He winked in return, when Mom turned back to face me.

“Are you staying here?” I blurted out. She gave me a mildly panicked look.

“Of course not!” She said, her lips twitching in a nervous smile. “I’m staying with an old friend of mine from high school. You might know her daughter, actually- her name starts with an L, I think. Lisa? Laura?”

“Lauren?” I all but shrieked.

“That’s it,” she said triumphantly, snapping her fingers. “You two friends or something?”

“How long are you staying for?” I demanded, ignoring her question. The smile faded from her lips.

“Aren’t you glad to see me, Bella?” She asked, her voice uncharacteristically soft. ‘Glad’ wasn’t exactly the word I used for the emotions that were currently bubbling in my chest upon seeing her. Frustrated, maybe. Homesick, yes. But glad? Definitely not.

“Of course,” I said anyways, knowing she wouldn’t let go of the issue until I gave her the answer she was looking for. “Of course I’m glad to see you, Mom. It’s just a… surprise, that’s all.”

“Well, let’s go up to your room, and you can tell me all about what’s been happening, okay?” Without waiting for a response, she bounded up the stairs and disappeared around the corridor to where my room was. I stared after her, a little surprised that she remembered the layout of a house she hadn’t been in for over a decade, before picking up the bag I’d dropped on the floor and running upstairs after her.

“I like what you did with the place,” she told me, when I went inside my room. Her expression was tender as she touched the fabric of my curtains, the wood of the rocking chair in the corner of my room. “I didn’t know how much I missed it until I came back.”

I was silent, waiting for her to get on with the point I knew she had already had full-formed in her head before she even came here. She must’ve forgotten that I’d spent years watching her dodge questions and give evasive half-truths to her friends.

“Bella,” she began, taking a deep breath. “I want you to come back home.”

My mouth turned dry.

 “What?” I said, after a full thirty seconds had passed. She gave me a pleading look as she sat down on my bed, hands clasped in her lap as though in prayer.

“You don’t understand, Bells,” she whispered. “I miss you. You’re my baby girl, you know? Don’t get me wrong- it was fun at first, traveling around with Paul without a care in the world. Sure, I get to go to five-star resorts every month with spas and lazy pools, and yes, okay, maybe I do take advantage of Paul’s old baseball pals and drink their wine and eat at their Mediterranean fusion restaurants, but it’s just not the same at home without you, Bella.”

Her voice broke a little on the last syllable. I stared at her, aghast. Looking at her- really looking at her-, I could see that the time I had spent away from her had not done her much good after all. She looked like she hardly slept; there were prominent bags under her eyes, and her eyeliner was smudged in the corner. Her entire face looked like a crumpled, used napkin. It wasn’t a sight I was accustomed to seeing on my mother, who was normally so full of life and exuberance it was nearly impossible to keep up with her.

“Can I tell you the truth, Bella?” She asked, her voice low and thick. At my concerned nod, she continued. “Paul isn’t really visiting his mom in Neah Bay. I mean, he is, but I think- I think he’s cheating on me. I think he’s really visiting his mistress in Neah Bay.”

I sank down on the bed next to her, staring at her with an open expression of horror on my face. I was already overwhelmed by her very presence, and the confession that was coming out of her mouth was making bile rise in my throat.

“Are you positive?” I asked finally, unsure what else I could possibly say.

“Yes,” she said, her eyes clouding with tears. “I came back to the hotel where we were staying a few days ago, and his laptop was open, so I- I don’t know what came over me, but I looked at the screen, and there was an email from a- a girl who said she was looking forward to seeing him when he was at the town center!”

She burst into tears at that, leaning against me for support. I sighed as the worry drained out of me and was replaced with a slightly more pressing one, putting my arm around her and rubbing soothing circles on her skin like she would do for me when I was upset as a kid.

“Mom,” I began, my voice soft and calming, the way you would talk to a startled horse, “that could mean anything. It could be a business offer. It could be one of his friend’s wives, or their one of their daughters, or something. It doesn’t have to automatically be an affair, just because it’s from a woman.”

“But she said explicitly that she was, and I quote, excited to see him after so long! What could that mean if not the worst?” Mom sniffled. I had to bite the inside of my cheek to fight off the truly inappropriate smile that was spreading across my lips.

“Mom, look, I know you’re thinking the worst right now, but it’s Paul we’re talking about. Paul,” I repeated for emphasis, “who gave you a 24-karat gold necklace for your birthday the week after you met. Paul, who took care of your sick mother when he found out that she had contracted pneumonia. Do you really think he could do something like that?”

“I don’t know, Bella!” Mom cried, looking up at me through still-wet eyelashes. “Everything’s been so- so unstable since you left. I don’t know right from left anymore. I don’t even know my own husband anymore. That’s why you have to come back. You have to fix this.”

“What? Why do I have to fix this?” I asked, looking at her like she’d grown a second head. “You don’t even know for sure that he’s even cheating on you! There probably isn’t even anything to fix!”

“So you don’t believe your own mother?” Mom demanded, teary-eyed again. “What’s the matter with you? I should’ve never let you come to Forks. You were never this cold when you were back home.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t,” I agreed, standing up from the bed suddenly. “I was just severely depressed and nearly threw myself off a bridge because I hated who I was and the people I was with when I was in Arizona, that’s all.”

She fell silent at that.

“I thought we weren’t going to talk about the incident,” she said quietly. I scoffed in quiet derision.

“Oh, we can talk about it,” I said stormily. “Just as soon as you tell me one thing.”

“What?” She muttered, staring down at her entwined fingers.

“Are you taking your meds?”

She gave me a betrayed look.

“That’s none of your business,” she told me, standing up from the bed as well and moving to the window. “None at all, Bella.”

“Yes, it is,” I said, my voice raising higher and higher with each syllable. Something inside of me ignited at that look on her face, like I’d just kicked her where it really hurt. “It is when you show up out of the blue, wildly accusing your loving husband of cheating on you with almost no proof, begging me to come back home after less than three months in Forks. It is when I know that I was the one who always reminded you about your psychologist’s appointments, and made you take your pills every night, and did everything that you should’ve done yourself. It is when the reason I came here in the first place is because I was sick and tired of taking care of you all the time!”

We lapsed into a deeply uncomfortable silence after my outburst.

Finally, she grabbed her purse from my bed.

“I should go,” she said, refusing to look at me.

“Yes, you should,” I mumbled, looking down at the floor, my hands curled into fists at my side. I heard her hesitate in the doorway, before she stormed downstairs and out of the house without so much as a goodbye to Charlie. I was still standing in the center of my room when he rushed into my room, looking alarmed.

“What happened?” He asked, his face ashy and worn when I finally turned my gaze up from the floor to look at him. “Why did she just leave like that?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I whispered, my fists clenching hard enough that I could see my knuckles turning white.

“Bella, what did she say to you?” He pressed, oblivious to the oncoming emotional breakdown I could sense was about to happen at any moment. “What did she say?”

I kept quiet, not trusting myself to speak. That didn’t deter Charlie, whose hands were suddenly on my shoulders.

“Bella, I’m your father,” he said, gently rubbing at my skin in mimicry of the circles I’d drawn on Mom’s back. That didn’t stop me from tensing like I was bracing for an attack. “You can trust me. What’s going on?”

“I don’t want to talk about it!” I shouted, allowing my frustration and anger and general upset at Mom’s visit to twist myself out of his loose embrace and fall onto my bed with a loud thud. “Just- just go, okay?!”

“Bella-“

“GO!”

He gave me a hurt look before stepping out of my room and closing the door shut. I breathed hard through my nose, staring at the space he had occupied before doubling over and putting my head in between my legs as the tears began to fall.

I loved my mom. There wasn’t even a question about it. Some sick part of me might’ve even liked the fact that she was so dependent on me, just a little, because at the very least, it meant she needed me just as much as I needed her. But there was nobody on the planet who could’ve spurred on such an outburst from me like she could. Nobody could make me feel as frustrated and upset as she could, because I knew that, if I wasn’t looking after her all the time, she would spiral out of control without me. Paul wouldn’t be there to remind her to take her Depakote or her Prozac, when he was constantly traveling all the time- even when she was with him. I doubted, in their six months of marriage, that he could even begin to guess the full extent of how much she needed someone to take care of her.

I just never understood the effect that had on me until now, with her unexpected appearance into the semi-normal life I’d managed to carve out for myself in the two months I’d lived in Forks.

I left for school before Charlie woke up the next morning, prolonging our inevitable confrontation for as long as I could possibly manage. I didn’t think I seemed too off when I arrived in first period, but Jasper gave me a concerned look the second I slid into my seat beside him.

“Are you alright?” He murmured as Mr. Wilson hobbled around the room, writing character archetypes on the blackboard with quite possibly the loudest, most screechy piece of chalk that ever existed in high school history. I winced, covering my ears with my hands before answering him.

“Sure,” I said, giving him a shaky smile. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Your palms have cuticle indentations on them,” he said suddenly. Confused, I looked down at my hands for the first time that day to realize that he was right. Apparently, I had clenched my fists hard enough last night to have left clearly visible marks of my frustration on my own skin today. The thought wasn’t a very pleasant one.

“It’s nothing,” I told him. Before he could respond, I raised my hand to answer a question I’d barely registered from Mr. Wilson, avoiding any further conversation Jasper could’ve tried to make with me. For some reason, though, as the hour went on, I felt the nervous energy that had been clinging to me like a second skin since I saw Mom slowly melt away- even when her face, terribly hurt by my outburst, appeared in my mind’s eye, that calm energy stuck with me all the way through English. I had a weird feeling that Jasper’s presence had something to do with it, since the second I left Mr. Wilson’s classroom, I felt the panic begin to set in.

I headed straight for the girl’s bathroom instead of second period, locking myself in a stall before sliding down against the floor (of which I’d normally have many problems with placing my butt against, but as of right then couldn’t possibly care about less) and bursting into tears. I’d never cried that hard since junior year, right before the bridge incident occurred. I supposed, though, that the fear that your mom might’ve become maniacally depressed after you screamed at her for something that was out of the bounds of her control, and was probably going to do something drastic if somebody didn’t talk her down, was on par with being called a dyke by a seventeen-year-old boy, if not more so.

“Bella?” a voice quietly asked from outside the stall, after a solid thirty minutes of crying. Somehow, I wasn’t surprised to recognize it as Alice Cullen’s. “Are you in there?”

I tried to stifle my sobs, pressing my fist into my mouth, but they escaped me anyways. Alice fell silent, before I heard her try to turn the knob of the door.

“Please open the door,” she whispered, pressing her forehead against it. “Please let me know you’re okay.”

“I just want to- to be alone right now,” I gasped through my tears. “Please just leave me alone right now.”

She turned silent once more, and then her footsteps began to recede across the bathroom tiles and out the door. I sat on the floor, my head cradled in my hands as I wept some more, until I heard her come back in again- this time, accompanied by a heavier set of footsteps. When I peeked out from the gap underneath the door, I saw a familiar pair of men’s shoes pointed in my direction.

“You didn’t,” I moaned, pressing my wet face against my knees in mortification. “Please tell me you didn’t bring Jasper in the girl’s bathroom because I’m currently having a panic attack.”

“She did,” Jasper’s voice told me somberly from behind the door. “I can confirm it.”

Once more, at the sound of his voice, my anxiety ebbed into something almost tranquil, the kind of peacefulness that could only be brought on by an active effect, like playing white noise on your headphones for an hour before you fell asleep.

“I know you didn’t want to talk about it before,” he continued, in a soothing voice, “but Bella, we’re your friends. We want to understand what’s going on. It’s the least we can do, after everything you’ve done for us.”

Silence ensued. Finally, I forced myself to my feet and cracked the door open a bit.

“Are we really friends?” I asked, hating the fact that I was even asking the question, like I was a lonely thirteen-year-old girl who had been invited to a party by the most popular girls in junior high and wanted to know if the invitation was made in earnest or as a prank.

“Of course we are,” Alice whispered invitingly. I let out a deep sigh and pushed the door all the way open, marching straight past them and to the sinks, where I could at least try and scrub the patheticness from my face. When I looked at my reflection in the mirror, I saw Jasper and Alice looking at me with twin expressions of distress on their faces. “Bella, what’s going on?”

“It’s my mom,” I admitted finally, shutting my eyes so I could pretend I wasn’t confessing everything that was going wrong with my life to the only people I’d ever wanted to consider me cool or, at the very least, functional. Even if Jacob did think they were vampires. “She came back from Arizona. She wants me to come back home with her.”

The quiet that pervaded the air at my words was off-putting. When I opened my eyes, I saw that the expressions on their faces had managed to become even more intense in the sheer anguish that was twisting the corners of their mouths and eyes. I stared back at them, more than a little startled by how strongly they were taking the very, very hypothetical situation of my leaving Forks for good.

“And are you?” Alice asked, after another minute or two had passed. “Going to go, I mean.”

“I don’t know,” I confessed, leaning against the stainless steel of the sinks for support.  “I- it’s not like I want to leave, or anything, but if I don’t go with her, I’m- scared of what might happen to her. She needs me.”

“Bella, she’s your mother,” Jasper argued in a hushed voice. “She can take care of herself.”

“You don’t understand,” I said, letting my eyes fall shut again. I couldn’t bear to see the kicked puppy look on my own mother’s face, much less the face of the boy I’d been harboring incredibly confusing feelings for since September. “She’s bipolar. And I’m not saying that in a bitchy teenage way- she is literally bipolar. She forgets to take her pills, sometimes. Not even my stepdad knows the kind of trouble she can get herself into without someone looking over her.”

“Bella…” Alice murmured softly. “Let me tell you something. The worst possible thing you can do for someone with a mental illness is to make them feel like they're being a burden- or worse, that they're infantile. You can tell your stepdad- someone who can help her in ways that her daughter can’t. Trust me on this, okay? I’ve had experiences with mental illness before, and though it’s not fun in any way, shape, or form, it’s easier to handle when you know there’s someone that’s going to look out for you, make sure you don’t do something you regret. I know that it's hard to handle- believe me, I know-, but you can’t be that person anymore, and that’s alright. Your mother needs to be able to understand that both she and you are going to be alright, and she can't do that if you think it's not going to be alright, alright?”

My eyes fluttered open at that. Alice had inched closer to me throughout her entire speech, and now she was close enough that I could see each individual eyelash, the way her pupils dilated when she directed her gaze at me.

“Do you understand? Everything will be okay,” she said again, almost pleadingly, and this time, I nodded in reluctant agreement, rewarded by the truly radiant smiles that spread across both hers and Jasper’s faces at the movement.

"I'm going to go call my mom," I whispered finally, turning to leave before I suddenly thought better of it. Before I could mentally brace myself for it, I was throwing my arms across their necks and hugging them tightly, tight enough that it would've bruised anyone whose skin wasn't made of solid Teflon. They stilled underneath me, before I felt two pairs of hands- one small, the other large, both just as cold as the other- press against my back.

When I stepped back, all the blood in my body had crept into my face.

Chapter Text

“Wait, wait, wait- Renee’s your mom?”

I resisted the urge to sigh in exasperation and nodded for what seemed to be the hundredth time.

“Yes, Lauren, Renee’s my mom- and honestly, I would’ve thought you would’ve figured that out sooner. Hasn’t she been staying at your house for the past two days?”

“Yeah, but, like, she’s so chill compared to you, I just never made the connection.”

The urge to hit Lauren in the face was getting stronger every second we stood in the lunch line, holding my tray so tightly my knuckles turned white. Mom hadn’t been answering any of my texts, not since our little spat in my bedroom the day before, and though it was difficult to admit to myself, I needed Lauren’s help.

She was clearly enjoying every minute of it, if the self-satisfied smile that was currently spreading across her face had anything to say.

“So, let me get this straight,” she drawled. “You want me to drive you to my place so you can apologize to your mom for being a bitch, right?”

“That’s, uh, not how I would’ve worded it, but yeah, basically.”

“I would love to, Bella,” Lauren said, giving me a saccharine smile as we moved further along the lunch line. I groaned internally; I could hear the ‘on one condition’ forming on her tongue before she even said it.

Sure enough, the next words that came out of her mouth were, “On one condition, naturally.”

“Naturally,” I agreed dryly, wondering what sort of twisted question she was going to ask of me. Did I like Alice Cullen, perhaps? Would I give her fifty dollars for gas money, plus all the humiliation at my hands? Would I tell her why Mom and I had been fighting in the first place?

I sighed. “Let’s hear it.”

“Did Eric ask you out to homecoming?” She asked, her speech so quick and garbled I had to repeat each individual syllable in my head in slow-motion to make any sense of it. I stared at her, thoroughly bemused.

“I thought you said you didn’t like him,” I said slowly. Lauren’s cheeks flushed bright red as she pointed out the turkey sandwich she wanted to the lunch lady, who looked absolutely bored to death by our irreverent teenage drivel.

“I don’t,” she snapped. “But I want to know if my friend since middle school made the unlucky mistake of asking out a lesbian to homecoming. It’d be embarrassing for him.”

“For the fiftieth time, Lauren, I’m not a lesbian,” I said, trying hard to keep my voice even. The lunch lady gave me an odd look as I pointed out a nearby slice of lukewarm pizza that I wanted (though want was a strong word for food that looked less like food and more like painted pieces of cardboard). “There’s more than two sexualities, you know.”

“Hey, I watch Queer Eye, okay?” Lauren said defensively. “I don’t need a lecture from you. Now, did Eric ask you out to homecoming or not?”

“No, he didn’t,” I bit out, feeling my already-feeble grip on my temper slip as we emerged from the lunch line and out into the cafeteria. “He’s all yours, all five-foot-eight of him. Now will you drive me to see my mom after school?”

“Ugh. Fine,” Lauren muttered, though she looked happier than I’d seen her look in a while when we rejoined the others at the table, taking a very obvious seat beside Eric and giving me a ridiculous amount of side-eye all the while. I rolled my eyes before they inevitably landed on the Cullens. More specifically, on Jasper and Alice, both of who I’d been slightly afraid to look at for the past half hour. I was mortified by my breakdown in the bathroom only an hour ago, even more mortified by the fact that I’d seemed unstable enough to warrant Alice bringing Jasper into the girl’s bathroom to calm me down.

But they weren’t giving me the pitying glances I was afraid they would all through lunch. Instead, they seemed to be engaged in a hushed, furious argument with the others, all five faces looking intense and somber- or, at least, more so than usual.

As if reading my mind, Jessica said, “Wonder what’s up with them today?”

“Maybe one of them got diagnosed with mono and they’re breaking the news to the others, since they’re all totally macking on each other,” Mike suggested helpfully. Jessica and Angela simultaneously groaned.

“Not another one of your Cullen conspiracy theories, Mike,” Angela pleaded, but there was no need. As if hearing us, the Cullens collectively straightened up and stopped bickering, instead poking at their lunch trays with disinterested looks as per usual. We stared at them, long and hard, but they didn’t so much as blink.

“Even if they did have mono, you wouldn’t hesitate to smooch Rosalie,” Eric pointed out. Mike shoved him away, but that wasn’t exactly a deterrent- Eric’s eyes lightened at that bit of contact between them. It was almost painful to watch.

“I mean, duh. It’s Rosalie. Like you wouldn’t do the same for Emmett.”

“What?” Eric sputtered out. Mike looked at him with wide eyes.

“What do you mean, what? You do like him, right?”

“What?” Lauren squeaked, her eyes almost bulging out of their sockets.

“It’s totally fine, dude,” Mike reassured him, ignoring both their reactions. “I’m super supportive. You know, my cousin’s gay too, I could set you up with him-“

“No! Oh my god,” Eric moaned, letting his head fall dejectedly against his binder. I could hear him mutter a “what did I do to deserve this” as Mike blathered on, reassuring him of his fabled gay cousin’s sexual prowess and overall good looks- “you know, for a guy. And also my cousin.”

“Not a single word of this,” Lauren whispered under her breath, grabbing my arm so tightly I could feel the indentations of her fake nails biting through my shirt. “Not so much as a breath or I’m kicking you out of my car on the way home, are we clear?”

“Crystal,” I muttered, biting the inside of my cheek to avoid smiling.

As my rotten luck would have it, Mom wasn’t home when we finally arrived at Lauren’s place. She was out shopping in Port Angeles with Lauren’s mother, according to the multicolored sticky note the latter had left on the pristine kitchen counter, and wouldn’t be back for the next few hours at least.

“Typical Mom,” Lauren grumbled. “She doesn’t even give me a heads up? Like, what are we even supposed to chow on until they come back?”

“Wait, what? You want me to stay over?”

“Uh, yeah,” Lauren said, tossing her cornsilk blonde hair over her shoulders. “I’m not going to drive you all the way back to your house-“

“It’s like five minutes away!”

“-and besides, I got Aquamarine on DVD, and Jessica and Angela have some sort of personal vendetta against Emma Roberts, so you’re going to watch it with me until our moms get back.”

I opened my mouth to argue, decided better of it, and instead sank down on her couch while she dialed the number for the only pizza place in Forks and yelled at the unfortunate server not to forget her cheesy bread like he did last time.

“Where’s your dad?” I asked when she snapped her phone shut.

“Dead,” she said, fiddling around with the DVD player with a disgruntled expression on her face. I stared at her in horror. 

“Lauren, I’m- I’m so sorry, I didn’t know-“

“Just kidding,” she snickered, shoving the Aquamarine CD into the player with more force than necessary. “He’s actually hanging around with his new family in California right now.”

“That doesn’t really make me feel any better.”

“Me neither, Bella. Me neither.”

She sat down on the couch next to me and unceremoniously wrapped the nearby afghan over her shoulders, snuggling in without so much as a look in my direction to see if I’d like to join her in her fuzzy burrito of warmth. I leaned back against the arm of the couch and let my mind wander as the movie started, drifting until Lauren’s finger suddenly poked me in the ribs.

“Ow!”

“Sorry,” she said, not looking very sorry at all. “Don’t you think I could totally rock blue highlights like Sara Paxton?”

“Who’s-“ I began, and then cut myself off, shaking my head. “Yeah, Lauren. Definitely.”

“My whore mom probably wouldn’t let me get them,” she lamented sorrowfully. “But I know I would look good in them, I know I would. And nobody even dyes their stupid hair here, or has piercings, or looks even remotely cool. Except the Cullens, I guess.”

“What about Eric?” I asked. Apparently, that was the wrong question to ask, because her expression shuttered.

“Eric’s an asshole,” she scoffed. “Like, I always knew he was, but he was really an asshole today. I can’t believe he didn’t tell me he was gay. I mean, I’ve known him since sixth grade.”

Maybe he was scared off by the fact that you kept on calling me a dyke the first day of school, I wanted to tell her, but the look on her face was not unlike that of a kicked puppy’s. It must’ve been a blow for her to realize the guy she had denied her feelings about for a ludicrous amount of time was never going to look at her the same way she looked at him. It was the same look that must’ve been on my own face whenever I thought about Alice or Jasper.

So instead of being an asshole, a la Eric, I laid a hesitant hand on her shoulder. She looked at me, startled, but I took a deep breath and pushed through.

“Lauren, nobody in high school understands what the hell they’re doing. They think they might, they think they have a grasp on relationships, but deep down, we’re all just dumb children, who’re just trying to escape the most awkward years ever unscathed.”

“Thanks, Bella, that really makes me feel better,” she muttered. I rolled my eyes and pressed on.

“Now, boys- especially high school boys- are fickle as hell. They change their mind all the time, they don’t know what they want, and they definitely don’t know what girls want. But luckily for both of us, the world isn’t limited to high school boys. Even if no-one loves you now, someday, someone will. And you’ll thank your lucky stars that you didn’t settle for someone like Eric, when you found someone like- I don’t know, Edward Cullen. Minus the general creepiness.”

“Jeez, thanks, Oprah,” Lauren said, but her voice had none of the bite it usually did. I removed my hand from her shoulder, and we settled back against the couch, but I could feel her eyes flickering from the TV to my face, looking more hesitant than I’d ever seen her before. After a while, she broke the silence again- this time, with a new waver in her voice.

“Look, Bella. I, um, Ioweyouanapology.” She said this all in one word. I raised my eyebrows.

“I’m sorry, Lauren, can you repeat that?”

She gave me an annoyed look, pulling the afghan tighter around her body, before taking a deep breath and continuing.

“I owe you an apology,” she muttered, looking as though every word that came from her lips physically hurt her. “I know I’ve been a bitch to you since your first day in Forks, basically, but, um, I never really thought I could hurt you. Like, the first time I saw you, I thought, ‘Now, there’s a bitch who isn’t afraid of anything.’ And it was kinda scary, because I always thought I was that bitch, but you? You were really that bitch, and I never-“

The doorbell rang in the middle of Lauren’s monologue. She groaned and got up from the couch to grab the pizza box from the poor delivery guy, pressing some loose dollar bills and change in his hand before slamming the door in his face.

“Where was I?” She asked, setting the pizza box down beside us.

“I was really that bitch,” I supplied. She nodded sagely.

“Right, right. You were really that bitch, and I guess I felt threatened by how easily you seemed to take everything. Like, nothing would faze you. I wanted that so badly, and I guess I thought the best way to go about getting it was to be an ultra-mega-whore to you. So. Like. I’m sorry.”

I gave her a hesitant smile.

“Thanks, Lauren. And for the record, everything fazes me. Just putting that out there.”

She smiled back. This time, we leaned back and watched the movie with no new developments, save for the new feeling of comradery in the air and the hissing of pain that erupted from our throats when the burning cheese of the pizza hit the roofs of our mouths. By the time Aquamarine was tearfully embracing Hailey and Claire, we heard a car pulling up in the driveway.

“That must be my mom,” Lauren said, and, sure enough, a carbon copy of Lauren, aged around thirty years older or so, walked into the house. The only difference between them was the sleek bob Lauren’s mom sported and the crow’s feet she was developing, though somehow, in her own way, she made it look fashionable.

Behind her was my own mother, who dropped her purse when she saw me.

“Bella!” She gasped, hand going to her heart. “What are you doing here?”

“Is this your daughter, Renee?” Lauren’s mom asked, giving me a curious look as she patted down her perfectly coiffed hair for any flyaways (there weren’t). “It’s, er, lovely to meet you, Bella. I’ve heard so much about you. I didn’t know you were coming, otherwise I would’ve set out something for you girls to-“

“Yeah, yeah,” Lauren said, waving her concerns away. “Look, Bella and Renee need to talk. We’re gonna give them some space, okay?”

“Lauren-“

“I’ll let you paint my nails,” Lauren sighed exasperatedly. Her mother’s eyes lit up, and she didn’t make one sound of protest as Lauren led her down the hallway and to what I assumed was the bathroom. Mom turned to me, chin jutting out as it always did when she was upset.

“What are you doing here, Bella?” She demanded, squaring her shoulders as if preparing for a fight. I fiddled with the silver charm bracelet she’d given me and shifted my weight on either legs, trying to decide how to word the whirlpool of emotions I had been feeling.

“I- I owe you an apology,” I said finally, parroting Lauren’s words to me. She crossed her arms against her chest and said nothing, instead waiting for me to continue. “I didn’t mean to lose my temper at you. I just- I guess I was just scared for you, Mom. Scared that you were getting bad again, or that you weren’t taking your meds, or-“

I paused, watching her mouth press into a thin line, and decided to switch tracks.

“I know I never called you, those first few weeks I was in Forks, but I never told you why, either. I was scared that, if I heard the sound of your voice, I’d just want to come running back to Arizona and never leave you again. I know it’s no excuse, and if I know how bad- how much things had changed for you, I would’ve called you sooner, and not just bottled up all my emotions like that and waited for the explosion to happen. But I did. And I don’t know, I’m- I’m sorry.”

Her face softened. She took a few hesitant steps closer to me, before slowly engulfing me in a huge hug. My arms found their way across her shoulders after a second or two, and I hugged her back almost as tightly as she was hugging me, breathing in the scent of her jasmine perfume with a shaky inhale.

“I know, baby,” she murmured, stroking my hair before pulling away a little to look me in the face. “I know how you feel. Home didn’t feel like home without you there, that’s why I pressured Paul to go on a month-long road trip in the first place. I was so upset when you left like that, you know, with your hair all cut off for no reason, and-“

She paused, looking at my expression, and decided to switch tracks.

“Well, I was trying to distract myself at first, but eventually I found myself lost in a bad place. I don’t know why I didn’t tell Paul I stopped taking the Depakote pills or my Prozac, but I just- wanted to feel like I could take care of myself for once, without you or him fussing over me all the time. And I just… lost track of myself, I suppose. I didn’t mean to scare you like that, honey. Really, I didn’t.”

“I know, Mom,” I said into the crook of her neck, letting in another deep inhale before stepping out of her arms entirely. “I know. But you need to tell Paul. Okay? He needs to know. He loves you more than anything.”

She smiled, a little wistfully. “I know. That girl from the email was just one of his friend's daughters, as you said it was. And I will tell him, eventually. I just- I just want to spend more time in Forks before I join him up north, okay? I want to give myself a little distance, spend more time with you. And you’ll be able to watch over me here, anyways. It’ll be a win-win situation for everyone, you’ll see.”

“Sure, Mom,” I said, a little gingerly. “Just- try letting me know beforehand, the next time you come to Charlie’s.”

“I will. Pinky promise.” And, true to her word, she held out her pinky for me to entwine with mine. I smiled as I did so, feeling something tender and warm bubble in my chest as she gave my hand a squeeze before letting go. “Will I see you soon, Bells?”

“Uh, well, homecoming is coming up this week, but-“

“Homecoming!” She said with a little gasp, her eyes all alight. “You’ll let me help you get ready, won’t you? Who’re you going with?”

“Just with some friends,” I shrugged. She looked more than a little dissatisfied at that.

“Really? No boy’s caught your attention yet?”

I smothered the laugh that was threatening to burst through my lips. It wasn’t a boy that had caught my attention, not exactly, but I didn’t know how to word that to my mother, who was already looking a little overwhelmed by the sheer number of turns our conversation was taking. Or maybe I was just projecting.

“Not really, but you’ll be the first one to find out if they do,” I promised, shouldering my backpack. “It was good to see you, Mom.”

“I bought some good dresses, you know. You can borrow one of mine if you-“

“I’m good, thanks.”

“Oh, you didn’t even see them yet! Just come and have a quick look-“

“Mom. No.”

“Bella, come on, dear, don’t be stubborn. Look at this one- it matches the color of your eyes!”

“I’m not wearing a miniskirt to homecoming, Mom!”

Chapter Text

 “So, any plans for homecoming?” Alice chirped cheerfully the next morning.

I groaned, rubbing at my temples with all the gravitas of a world-weary professor. After our conversation at Lauren’s house, Mom insisted I go with her to the movies in a celebration of our newfound respect for each other and familial bonding time and whatnot, but I should’ve known in advance that “going to the movies” in Mom-speak was “watching three movies in successive order after the other because none of the attendees at the movie theater do their jobs”. I trudged home at nearly 2 A.M., Love Actually reruns still flashing beneath my eyelids as I fell into a fitful sleep.

Alice, meanwhile, looked like a ray of sunshine. And I meant this literally- while on other days I might’ve been entranced by the sheer yellowness of her honey-colored summer dress and matching slippers, I felt like I was going to have a seizure if I looked at her for too long. More so than I usually felt, anyways.

“Not really,” I told her, leaning back in my chair and sighing. “I mean, Jessica and Angela and I went shopping for dresses days ago, but I don’t have a date yet, and I’m pretty sure I’m just going to attach myself to Angela all night and lean against the gym wall awkwardly. The usual, you know?”

“No date at all?” Alice pressed, bizarrely hyper-fixated on what should’ve been a very obvious fact of life. “Nobody’s asked you yet?”

“Uh, no. Why is that so strange? I’m sure plenty of girls haven’t gotten offers yet.”

“True,” Alice conceded, before giving me a sly smile. “But then again, none of the other girls look like you.”

My skin pricked with goosebumps, for whatever reason. Forcing my voice to become light and playful instead of croaking like the pubescent twelve-year-old boy I most definitively felt like, I asked, “And what’s that?”

“Now you’re just fishing for compliments,” Alice said, laughing. “Surely you must know that you’re one of the most beautiful girls in the nearby thousand-mile radius.”

I felt the blood rush to my face so quickly it made me light-headed. I quickly directed my attention towards the telenovela our teacher had put on so as to avoid teaching a class on a Friday afternoon, trying hard to wave away the words that hung like a flashing neon sign before my eyes. Was there even a platonic way to tell someone that they’re the most beautiful girl in the nearby thousand-mile radius? Did friends just tell that to each other casually, as though it was a simple fact of life?

“Well, if you’re not going with anyone,” Alice whispered, ignoring my attempts to concentrate on the Spanish soap opera unfolding before our eyes and insisting on continuing the English one that was unfolding in real life, “you should come with me and Jazz.”

My heart stopped beating.

“What!?” I all but shrieked. Senora Diaz gave me a dirty look from across the room.

“I mean, um, what?”  I asked, in a quieter voice.

“Jazz wanted to be here for this,” Alice continued, as if she wasn’t blowing my entire mind right then and there, “but I just can’t wait any longer. Even if it does mean that we have to forgo the roses and doves we were planning on presenting to you in a public area later on today.”

At the expression on my face- which must’ve been truly miraculous to see-, Alice laughed and said reassuringly, “I’m kidding, Bella! We wouldn’t even know where to find doves in Forks.”

“I’m pretty sure we don’t even have a PetCo,” I said dazedly, feeling a bit like I had died and entered a limbo state in which I was experiencing a very surreal encounter with my innermost desires/fears, which inevitably included being asked to date by Alice Cullen (and, by extension, Jasper). “Wait, wait- do you mean, like, you wanna go as a group, or, um…”

“Tell you what,” Alice said, lowering her voice when Senora Diaz shot us another glare from her desk. “Come talk to us at lunch, and we’ll discuss it more then. Sounds good?”

I didn’t quite trust myself to speak yet, so instead I nodded and prayed to God this wasn’t some bizarre dream spurred on by watching too many romantic comedies in a row with my mother chewing popcorn obnoxiously loud beside me.  

Come lunchtime, my heart was beating so fast in my chest that I was paranoid every person that bumped into me in the hallway could hear it from sheer proximity. I grabbed the straps of my backpack for support, took a deep breath, and entered the cafeteria with the air of a seasoned veteran launching herself back into the war that robbed her of her good leg and her will to live.

My eyes instantly flittered toward the Cullen table, but Alice and Jasper weren’t sitting there as per usual. Instead, they were seated a few seats away at a table that was normally overrun by cheerleaders and the dance crew, but of whom were now clustered at one of the back tables and whispering amongst themselves, probably wondering why two-fifths of the almighty Cullens had disbanded from their loyal group for the day.

“Bella,” Jessica hissed as I neared my usual table, “what the hell is going on-“

But I didn’t pause as I walked past the table and slid into the seat across Alice and Jasper’s table, who, true to their word, had a bouquet of roses on the table. I stared at them uncomprehendingly as the entire cafeteria seemed to hush all around us- minus the dance crew and cheerleaders, who burst into a new fit of whispers and giggles. 

“You weren’t kidding about the roses, huh?” I asked weakly, forcing myself to lift my eyes from the bouquet and to their faces. They were both smiling at me, but if I had never met the Cullens before and knew them to be people who never experienced any semblance of apprehension in their entire life, I would go so far as to say that they looked nervous, their pallid faces whiter than usual.

“It was an excuse to go flower shopping,” Jasper said, his smile becoming wider and more inviting, and though his voice was low and even, I could barely hear him over the sound of the blood roaring in my ears. “Do you like them, Bella?”

“Nobody’s ever gotten me flowers before,” I admitted, my voice sounding smaller and younger than it had in a very long time. Jasper and Alice exchanged a look. “Why- um, why did you guys do it? Why did you get me flowers?”

“Bella,” Alice said, looking almost helpless. “I like you. We like you.”

My mouth opened and closed like a fish. For an awful second, Henry Kosowitz’s voice echoed in my head- “-and you’d be lucky to find another dyke who liked you!”- before Alice’s words filled the space his left behind.

I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts entirely. Jasper sighed and moved his hand across the table so that his fingertips were touching the soft skin of the inside of my wrist. I stared at his fingers like I’d never seen them before, long and artistic and leaving me shockingly cold despite the tiny point of contact between us.

“Bella, it’s okay,” he said soothingly, as though I was a small child. “I know you’re overwhelmed at the moment, but please, please, don’t be afraid. It’s going to be alright.”

“I know it is!” I snapped, my voice high and tinny. Attempting to soften my voice, I repeated, “I know it is. I just, uh- can you, like, explain this to me? Because if I’m being honest with you guys, I’m a little lost right now.”

“It’s a little like this,” Alice said, tugging her blouse down slightly so I could see the elegant curve of her neck even more prominently than I could before. Politely ignoring my little intake of breath at that sudden flash of skin, she opened her palms wide and continued, “You see, Jasper and I are together. I love him more than anything, and I’d like to believe the same goes for me as well.”

“You know it does,” Jasper said, smiling at her. I looked between them as though I was watching a Ping-Pong tournament, not wanting to lose track of what the other was saying for the life of me.

“And as for you? Bella, I know I’m not only speaking for myself when I tell you that we’ve never met anyone like you before. Beautiful, yes, but also assertive, and witty, and self-deprecating despite the fact that you really haven’t a reason to be at all.” I opened my mouth to protest, but Alice held up a firm hand to silence me. “You truly don’t know the effect you have on people, and it’s absolutely crazy to me. In the most non-creepy and intrusive way possible, I find myself watching you play with your charm bracelet in Spanish more than I actually do my work, because I’m more intrigued by the movements of your fingers than in the conjugation Spanish verbs- which we both know is a great interest of mine, so that’s clearly saying something big.”

I gaped at her, still smiling in amusement at her own joke. Who told their friend-or did I dare to think crush?- that they tracked the movement of their fingers rather than pay attention in class? Who listed out someone’s finer qualities- even if they were totally nonexistent- like you would in one of those romance novels Mom liked to read sometimes, even when a nosy cheerleader was straining her ears to listen to our conversation less than a yard away from us? Already it was feeling like an out-of-body experience, like I was back in the theater with Mom, watching this entire exchange happen to a girl who certainly was not me on the big screen. 

But they weren’t done just yet. Jasper took over from Alice’s little monologue with a swiftness that would’ve left me impressed, had it not been for the fact that any and all emotions I was feeling at the moment were completely and utterly indescribable.

“There’s not many people who would’ve been able to cope with all the troubles you’ve had since your first day in Forks,” He said, looking at me with an earnestness that was hard to bear. “But you have gone above and beyond what was expected of what Lauren Mallory believed to be a brunette Ellen Degeneres.”

I huffed out a laugh, still unwilling to believe this was how my Friday afternoon was shaping up to be.

“You asked us why we got you the flowers, and I can really only answer it by saying that the due cause of it is by the fact that you risked your life to save someone you’d known for less than a week. By your admittedly endearing ignorance in cult classics. By the way that you drive slower than my grandmother- who was alive before the invention of cars, metaphorically speaking-, and yet I could still be in the same vehicle as you all day, simply because you’re in it. I know this isn’t what you’re accustomed to, I know it’s unconventional, but Alice and I would like it very much if you would allow us to take you to homecoming, Bella Swan. If for no other reason than the very simple fact that we like you, and we hope you like us too.”

They stared at me, so much expectant hope in their bright, tawny eyes, it was hard to breathe. It was even harder to form words, too. What saccharine romantic comedy did this conversation come out of? More importantly, how in the absolute hell did I manage to attract the attention of the only two people I ever thought I’d like, simply by doing the exact same things that forced me away from Arizona in the first place?

Never had I felt more aware of my own self in that moment, of every little breath I took, every shift I made in my seat, every twitch of my fingertips against the cafeteria table. Never had I been more aware of Alice and Jasper than in that moment, Jasper’s fingertips still touching my wrist, Alice’s palms still held wide in a gesture of entreaty. To me, Bella Swan, self-proclaimed queen of the nobodies (and of brunette Ellen DeGeneres wannabees, apparently).

“As much as I love the Darcy-esque soliloquy,” I said, as dryly as I could manage if only to distract them from the tears that were springing in my eyes, “I would’ve been content if you guys had simply handed over the bouquet of roses and asked me to homecoming with one of those kitschy signs, instead of all- of all this."

I made a sweeping gesture at them, encapsulating the fact that they were trying to win me over by listing my virtues and giving me declarations of love to rival even the most softened Byronic protagonists out there to show what this meant, exactly. Twin smiles broke out on their faces.

“So does that mean you’ll go?” Alice asked eagerly, clutching my arm tight enough that I briefly lost all circulation in it. The combination of both their touches was enough to make me lose my grip on the English language for a split second.

“Only if Jasper promises me he'll let me switch my heels for his shoes in the middle of homecoming,” I said finally, wiping the tears that had begun to stream down my face as surreptitiously as possible. Jasper’s fingers encircled my wrist in a way that had my heart racing in my chest all over again.

“I’d be honored to,” he told me solemnly.

Chapter Text

“Oh my god.”

“It’s really not that big of a deal,” I said, but I was beaming regardless, bringing the bouquet close to my face to obscure it from Jessica’s searching eyes, bigger than I’d ever seen them before. I should’ve figured Jessica’s reaction would be something like this when I finally came back to my own table, still flushed to my roots and disbelieving of what had literally just occurred before my eyes only moments before, but I supposed I underestimated Jessica’s interest in a Cullen who wasn’t Edward.

“Oh my god,” she repeated now, ignoring me. “Oh my god? Oh my god. Did that seriously just happen or did Lauren lace our drinks with something?”

“Don’t flatter yourself, Jessica,” Lauren said, frowning at her. “I wouldn’t waste quality cocaine on you guys, of all people.”

“It seriously happened,” I confirmed, unable to wipe the dorky smile off my face. “They asked me to go to homecoming with them.”

“Yeah, uh, how does that work, exactly?” Eric asked curiously from his perch on top of the table, nudging me slightly with his foot. “You guys are all just going to go together as what, a couple? Like a threesome but rated PG-13?”

“For the record, I am totally supportive of Bella and her PG-13 threesome,” Mike said reassuringly from beside Eric. “Especially when one-third of it is Alice Cullen. Like, damn. Nice going, Bella.”

“Uh… thanks. I think.”

“Well, I think it’s only logical,” Angela said decisively, blushing when everyone turned to look at her. “I mean, you saved Alice Cullen’s life the first week of school, you’re the only person who has seen what the inside of their house looks like, and you’re pretty much the first person Jasper has talked to all year that isn’t the Cullens or his teachers.”

“I just- I didn’t realize that they liked me,” I said, defending my cluelessness for some reason beyond my comprehension. “They’re so- you know, they’re so- and I’m so- you know?”

“Can’t say I do,” Angela told me, her eyes warm. Jessica sighed loudly before I could respond to that.

“Well, while you’ve been asked to homecoming by not one, but two Cullens-“ she held up two fingers for emphasis, “-I still haven’t been asked out to homecoming by anyone.”

Jessica looked pointedly in Mike’s direction, but he wasn’t paying attention. A little bit louder, she repeated, “By anyone, Mike. Anyone.”

His head snapped up in confusion when he finally realized Jessica was talking to him.

“That’s too bad, Jess,” He said, leaning over to give her an awkward, consolatory pat on her arm. “Eric and I are going together, but if you want, you can tag along with us!”

“Wait- you’re going together-together? As in, together-together-together?” Jessica asked in horror. Mike and Eric exchanged bashful smiles.

“After I teased him for having a crush on Emmett, I realized that he wasn’t the only one with a crush on the big guy,” Mike said freely, either ignoring or completely oblivious to the look on Jessica’s face. “And then I realized that the only person I thought was cuter than Emmett was Eric, so then one thing led to another, and now, um, now we’re going to homecoming together. Also, I think we’re dating?”

“We are,” Eric confirmed, his grin wide and almost shockingly bright on his ordinarily saturnine face. “We didn’t find a right time to tell you guys, but I- I guess this is us coming out.”

“Oh, God,” Lauren muttered in exasperation, rubbing her temples. “It figures that the only guy I liked turned out to be gay and in love with Mike, of all people.”

“You liked me?” Eric squeaked, at the same moment Mike said, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“If you don’t know by now, I’m not going to tell you,” Lauren told him. Mike stuck his tongue out at her, to which she responded by giving him a manicured middle finger. Jessica gave Lauren a thoughtful look.

“Did anyone ask you out yet, Lauren?” She asked. Lauren gave her a suspicious look.

“Why do you ask?”

“We should seriously go together.” At Lauren’s unimpressed look, she continued, “Oh, come on, Lauren. Bella’s going with two Cullens and Mike and Eric are going together, and- I don’t know, I think Angela’s bringing a cardboard cutout of some obscure TV character to homecoming with her, right?”

“Mulder from the X-Files,” Angela confirmed without looking up.

“Exactly. We can’t let them outshine us, right? We’ll totally be, like, a lesbian power couple. And we can do mani-pedis at my house beforehand.”

It was this last bit that made Lauren perk up a little. “Will your stepmom make us those banana split sundaes like she did in middle school?”

“I’ll convince her somehow,” Jessica promised, sounding only slightly desperate. Lauren gave her another long, searching look, before eventually sighing.

“Fine. But I’m not letting you do anything but my nails, got it? I don’t trust your makeup skills.”

Jessica’s hand fluttered over her heart at that, but before she could say anything, the bell for fifth period rang. I grabbed the bouquet before I left the cafeteria, unable to resist one last sniff before realizing that I was going to have to carry them around for the rest of the day, thorns digging into my skin.

“The price you have to pay to go out with two of the cutest Cullens,” Jessica observed, as one of the thorns finally broke the skin and sent a few drops of blood onto the cafeteria floor.

Jacob Black, to my dismay, did not have the same reaction as my other friends.

He and Billy were at our house for dinner again, and while Billy and Charlie argued what was the best way to mince tomatoes downstairs, I had led Jacob up to my room, where he didn’t hesitate in jumping onto my bed with a bounce big enough to make him nearly hit his head on my ceiling.

I took a seat beside him, exchanging a few details about how school was going and my mother’s sudden appearance in Forks (omitting the more unsavory details), before I finally ventured at the topic of homecoming. I should’ve expected his reaction at telling him I was going with Alice and Jasper Cullen, seeing as though he seemed to be under the belief that they were actually bloodthirsty vampires, but I couldn’t help myself- it was like I had to tell anyone and everyone I knew that two of the most attractive people I’d ever seen in my entire life actually wanted me, of all people, to go with them to homecoming.

“You can’t be serious,” Jacob said, his face paling. I rolled my eyes at him.

“I thought you said you didn’t believe what your dad said about them,” I told him. Jacob groaned in frustration and leaned back against my pillows, giving me a disbelieving look.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean I don’t think they’re dangerous! Didn’t you look up what I told you to?”

I laughed incredulously. “Jacob, wait, are you actually being serious right now?”

He stared at me, jaw clenched. I stopped laughing and stared back at him, fingers bunching up the fabric of my blankets nervously. He sure as hell didn’t seem like he wasn’t being completely serious, in which case I was stumped on what to do. I never actually met a person in my entire life who thought that the local townies were bloodsucking vampires- except Mom, maybe, but that was only what she called her old landlord.

“Jacob, these are teenagers,” I said, stressing the last word so he could understand just how ridiculous he was being. “They’re not some- some ancient, evil beings that crawled straight out of Transylvania or whatever.”

“Don’t twist my words, Bella!” Jacob snapped, standing up from my bed so suddenly it made me dizzy. “Look, you think I don’t know how crazy I sound right now? I know what I’m saying, Bella. Maybe they’re not, like, full-fledged vampires or whatever, but they’re something. My dad, he- he told me some things after we met for the first time, and I-“

“What, Jacob?” I asked, my incredulity fading into something like anger as I stared at his back. “What on Earth could he have told you to make you do a total 180 on the Cullens? You said yourself your dad was superstitious!”

“That doesn’t mean he’s wrong!” Jacob shouted, his fists clenched at his sides. I jumped at the heat in his voice, still not entirely able to comprehend that the funny, friendly sixteen-year-old I’d met not even two weeks ago was apparently laboring under the delusion that the only people who ever seemed to take an interest in me were honest-to-God vampires.

“Jacob,” I said, trying to keep my voice as calm and even as possible, “I’m going out to homecoming with Alice and Jasper. We’re going to have a good time, and we’re going to dance like wasted white girls at a frat boy party, and nobody’s going to be sucking on anyone’s neck. Well, unless they ask nicely, in which case I will happily concede-“

“You don’t get it, Bella,” Jacob muttered, shaking his head at me, as if he wasn’t the one trying to convince me that my homecoming dates were bloodthirsty killers. “If they suck on your neck, they’re going to bite your neck.”

“I don’t see anything wrong with that,” I shrugged with feigned lightness, still aiming for levity despite all evidence that Jacob Black would rather choke on his own toenails than joke about the Cullens.

“I’m just trying to protect you, Bella,” He said, finally turning around to look at me. I winced when I realized his eyes were glittering with unshed tears. “Please- please, if you’re going to go to homecoming with them, at the very least, don’t be by yourself around them. Have another person with you at all times. Don’t let them lead you anywhere, don’t drink anything they give you without making sure you know what’s in it-“

So I probably shouldn’t give it up to them in the middle of homecoming, then, I mused, but wisely kept my thoughts to myself this time around.

“I’ll be safe, Jacob,” I told him instead, pretending not to notice as he wiped at his eyes. “I promise. And if they do turn out to be vampires thirsting after my blood, well, hey, I’ll come back as a ghost specifically so you can tell me that you told me so. How does that sound?”

“Not entirely unappealing,” Jacob admitted as he sat back down on the bed, hesitating before inching closer and wrapping his arm around my shoulders. I tensed a little, but allowed myself to relax and burrow a little closer to his chest. He was running as hot as a furnace.

“You okay?” I asked, looking up at him concernedly.

His smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.

“I’ve been kinda sick lately, I guess,” Jacob said, shrugging as well as he could with his arm still around me. “Just a side effect of that. Do you know what you’re wearing to homecoming?”

Chapter Text

I had been staring at my reflection in the mirror for a little over ten minutes when they finally arrived.

I hadn’t taken up Mom’s offer to do my hair and makeup, something I regretted now, struggling to keep my hand still long enough to finish the cat eye I’d been waging war with for an embarrassing amount of time. When I finally won the battle, it was a little over six o’clock, and I’d been too focused on drawing on the infuriating eyeliner that was going to sprain my wrist from all my efforts with it, that I hadn’t looked at myself- looked at all of myself- since I entered the bathroom.

So when I took a few steps back and looked at my reflection in the mirror, I was unsure what to do with the fact that I resembled a young Morticia Addams attending her first cocktail party. My hair had been gelled enough times that I had to duck my entire head inside the sink to get it out and forgo any notion I might’ve had that I could possibly do anything with my hair aside from stare at it in dismay. It was the first time I wished I had my long hair back- at least then, I had options. The only option I had now was to run my fingers through it and hope to God I didn’t just look like I hopped out of bed. Regina George could eat her heart out- short hair never looked sexy pushed back.

The rest of me was another story, though. I had managed not to fuck up the smoky eye makeup and eyeliner too badly, but I still felt like the dramatic red lipstick Jessica had lent me was way too vibrant on my face, sallower than usual due to the fact that I was just now coming to terms with the full extent of the notion Alice Cullen and Jasper Hale were going to take me to homecoming.

“Get a hold of yourself, Swan,” I muttered, staring into the reflection of my own eyes in the mirror. “They’re going to take you to homecoming, and you’re not going to spaz out. Or step on their toes. Or accidentally push the punch bowl to the ground with your elbow like last year. And everything is going to be just fine.”

I didn’t believe one word of it, but to quote Jessica, at least my boobs looked good in this dress.

And then the doorbell was ringing, and I promptly lost my grip on the bathroom counter and slammed my chin on the way to the ground. Groaning, I forced myself onto my feet and ran to my room to grab my shoes and purse (courtesy, once again, of Jessica, who’d reassured me that I was doing her a favor by taking it, since her dad had bought her a Gucci handbag that was so much cuter). My heart was pounding hard by the time I was walking downstairs and towards the voices coming from the living room.

Charlie was standing in the center, looking more awkward than ever as he talked to Alice and Jasper, both of whom looked so stunningly beautiful I had to resist the urge to lock myself in the bathroom and refuse to come out. I felt like a gremlin who’d just crawled out of the sewers to join civilized society compared to them- Jasper, with his fitted black suit and charming smile, and Alice, with her floor-length white dress and matching flowers in her hair. It was unfair that two people could be so effortlessly pretty, and I was about to tell them so when they suddenly turned around and spotted me.

“Bella!” Alice cried in delight, rushing over to take my hands in her own. “You look radiant. Doesn’t she look absolutely radiant, Jazz?”

“Wonderful,” Jasper agreed, shooting me a smile that sent a thrill running down my spine. I squeezed Alice’s hands in return, feeling a bit dizzied by all the attention I was receiving from them, and turned to Charlie, whose mouth was hanging slightly open.

“We’re going to head out,” I told him, which seemed to spur him back into consciousness. He shook his head slightly and gave me an apologetic smile, waving around a small camera I’d never seen before in his left hand.

“No can do, kiddo,” Charlie told me. “Your mom is forcing me to take pictures of you and your- uh, dates, before you leave.”

“Ch- Dad, seriously?” I groaned.  Alice put a hand over my mouth before I could protest any more, turning to give Charlie a bright grin.

“We’d love to, Charlie.”

Sighing, I allowed myself to be repositioned by Alice in the middle of our trio, hers’ and Jasper’s arms wrapping around my back and shoulders. Feeling my skin prickle with the close proximity to them, I hesitantly placed my hands on the smalls of their backs and forced myself to smile for the camera. After a few more excruciating minutes of this, Charlie allowed us to go, yelling to make good decisions as the front door shut behind us.

“Your dad’s such a sweetheart,” Alice told me admiringly as we clambered into her car. Jasper opted to sit beside me in the back, and the way his fingertips stopped just short of grazing my thighs distracted me for a good minute or two before I registered what she said.

“Oh- yeah, he, uh, he’s definitely something.”

“He seemed to be alright with the notion that you’re going to homecoming with both of us,” Jasper observed, his fingers now lightly touching the ends of my dress.

Feeling my face burst into flames, I leaned my head against the window and said, “I only told him a few hours ago that I was going with the two of you, so he didn’t exactly have time to have a good old-fashioned freak-out. But he’s taking it pretty well, I think. So, uh, what about your- I mean, did you, um, did you tell Carlisle and Esme about, y’know, going to prom with me?”

“They love you, Bella,” Jasper assured me. Hesitantly, feeling like I was going to try and defuse a bomb more than hold a boy’s hand, I entwined my fingers with his and placed them both on my thigh. His smile grew wide and- dare I say it?- almost bashful as he tightened his grip on my hand. It astonished that even that tiny movement was enough to make my heart start going crazy inside my chest. Nobody had ever affected me like that- except Alice, of course.

And maybe- okay, no maybe’s about it- Megan Fox, that one time I watched Jennifer’s Body with Mom back home.

“They couldn’t stop singing your praises after dinner last time,” Jasper continued, seemingly unaware of the condition he was putting me through. His hand was refreshingly cold against my warm, sweaty palm, which under other circumstances I would’ve been incredibly embarrassed about, but couldn’t muster up the energy it took at the moment. It was beyond mortifying that a simple touch of his fingers incapacitated me so much- and, judging from the small smile that was playing on his lips as he looked at me, he knew it perfectly well. “You were our first houseguest in ages, so they tried to prepare as much as they could.”

“It was great,” I told him. “Carlisle and Esme are really- they’re really-“

Now he was rubbing his thumb against the back of my hand. It was distracting enough to make me lose my train of thought until Alice prompted from the front seat, “Really what, Bella?”

“Great,” I finished lamely.

After what could’ve been either ten minutes or ten years later, Alice pulled my truck into the school parking lot, making sure to adjust her flower crown in her pocket mirror before bouncing off of the car seat and opening the back door for me and Jasper.

“Very chivalrous of you, Alice,” I noted teasingly.

“That’s Jasper’s forte,” she said, giving me a dazzling smile before taking my hand in her left and Jasper’s in her right, leading us towards the gym’s entrance with the determination of an army captain leading his troops into battle.

Almost all the school seemed to be packed inside, either gyrating their hips together when the chaperones weren’t looking, idling at the punch bowls, or making out in the corners of the room where they thought it was too dark for anyone to notice. For a school the size of a high-rise apartment in Port Angeles, the party planning committee decorated the gym with surprisingly sophisticated strobe lights and disco balls, strategically placed at different areas of the room so as to give them the optimal location to send Alice into a seizure.

“Alice! Alice, oh my god, are you okay?” I all but shrieked, Jasper and I leading her into a more secluded area of the room- or, as secluded as it could get, with the amount of students inside. Thankfully, she seemed to snap out of it quickly enough, shaking her head before turning her bright eyes to our concerned faces.

“Sorry!” She said, touching my arm apologetically. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you two like that. I just- I think I need some punch.”

“Bella, will you…?” Jasper asked a bit breathlessly, turning to me with pleading eyes.

“Yeah! Yeah, of course,” I said hurriedly. I rushed to the punch bowl, where, of course, there was a huge line ending somewhere near the ass-end of the gymnasium. Biting my lip, shifting my weight on either feet as I desperately scanned the line for someone I could cut in front of without invoking the anger of a teenager who’s been standing behind someone who clearly went to Taco Bell before homecoming, I couldn’t help but breath a sigh of relief when I saw Lauren and Jessica near the front of the line.

Lauren was decked toe-to-toe in monochrome- slinky black dress, white headband, black bracelets, and white heels, as compared to Jessica’s decisively more colorful knee-length purple dress and sparkly hair clips. The latter perked up when she saw me, giving me an appreciative whistle as I approached.

“Looking good, Bella! Didn’t I tell you that dress would be a good idea?”

“You did,” I conceded, giving her a small smile as I slipped behind her as non-invasively as possible. “When did you guys get here?”

“Well, we’ve been standing in this freaking line for the past ten hours or so, so I kind of lost all concept of time,” Lauren told me, shifting her weight on either leg restlessly. I couldn’t help but notice the fact that her hand was brushing against Jessica’s, and she didn’t seem particularly keen on moving it anytime soon, judging by the blood rushing into her cheeks when Jessica’s fingers twitched upwards into hers. I bit my cheek to suppress a knowing smile as she continued. “Where’s your posse of Cullens?”

“Only two of ‘em, Lauren,” I corrected. “They’re, um, busy right now. I’m getting Alice some punch.”

“Cute.”

“See, when you’re using that tone, I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or-“

The gym doors opened, and in stepped the missing three members of the Cullen posse. The gym seemed to collectively quiet down as Rosalie, Edward, and Emmett appeared in full view under the flashing strobe lights of the gym. Rosalie was obviously gorgeous as always, dressed in an elegant white dress and an updo that wouldn’t look amiss on the cover of a Vogue magazine, while Emmett and Edward were wearing midnight blue and black suits that looked like they costed more than Charlie’s mortgage.

They beelined to Alice and Jasper the second they saw them, and I couldn’t help but groan aloud. Beside me, Lauren was trying- and failing- to stifle her snickers.

“You have to bring punch back to Alice in front of the rest of them?” She asked incredulously. I looked at the image the Cullens collectively made when completed and gulped. I knew Alice and Jasper more intimately than anyone on campus- aside from the obvious-, but it’d been a good, long while since I saw them hanging out with their pseudo-siblings. The tableau they made wasn’t exactly welcoming, even if they did look almost unbearably beautiful.

“Maybe I can just hang out with you guys instead,” I suggested weakly. Jessica gasped loudly as this as we took another step forward in line.

“Bella, no," she said loudly. "This is your shot with a Cullen- with two of them. You can’t give up so easy. All you have to do is march on over there, give Alice her punch, and be like, ‘Hey.’”

“Hey,” I said dubiously, trying to imitate her, and she shook her head furiously.

“No, no. You’re getting the delivery all wrong. You have to be like-“ and here she turned her entire body to me and put her hand on my arm in a suggesting manner, “Hey.”

“Seriously, Jessica? I’m your date,” Lauren complained loudly as we finally neared the punch bowl. Jessica gave her an apologetic hand squeeze, to which Lauren’s entire body seemed to tense up and turn inside out at.

“Look, don’t worry too much about it,” Jessica told me confidingly as we ladled the punch into our cups. “I heard someone spiked the punch bowl, so chances are, Alice will be too buzzed to care if you totally blunder in front of her and Jasper’s siblings. Well, gotta go- they’re playing Kesha on the speakers!”

With that, she dragged Lauren off to the dance floor. Swallowing dryly, I somehow made my way to where the Cullens were standing without tripping over anything or spilling the punch all over my dress, miracles of miracles.  

“Alice!” I said once I arrived, a little breathlessly. Upon hearing my voice, the Cullens turned simultaneously to face me, revealing a shaken but otherwise unperturbed Alice. Jasper was standing next to her, putting his arm around her shoulders protectively. Gingerly, I walked around Rosalie to hand the punch to Alice. “I, um, wouldn’t actually drink that. Somebody spiked the punch. Sorry.”

“It’s the thought that counts,” Alice reassured me. I laughed a little, unsure exactly what I was laughing at, before Emmett finally took mercy on me and gave me a big bear hug to break the tension. Not that it lessened Rosalie’s scowl or Edward’s penetrating stare when Emmett finally stepped back, but I supposed it really was the thought that counted.

“You look good!” Emmett told me, giving me a clap on the shoulder that nearly made my knees buckle under the weight of his hand. “Gotta love a classic cocktail dress. Rosalie has a whole closet full of them, she just-“

“I just didn’t understand why I should wear something a cigarette aunt would wear at a family function she desperately wants to blow off, you know?” Rosalie finished. Edward laughed a little beside her, making me flinch, before Jasper came to my aid.

“We’ll talk more about… things… later on, okay, Rosalie?” He said, in a significant tone.

“Seriously?” Rosalie snapped, looking like a vengeful Greek goddess in her anger. “You’re giving us the curtain call right after Alice told us she-“

“Rosalie.” Jasper said, his voice sharpening. Rosalie rolled her eyes but finally took the hint as she led Edward and Emmett to the punch bowls. I watched them go with a shudder before turning back to Alice and Jasper, who were staring at something across my shoulder. Turning around, I saw that Angela had finally arrived with her cutout of Mulder from the X-Files, beaming as she dragged it out to the dance floor to join Lauren, Jessica, and Mike and Eric, the latter of whom had shown up around the time Rosalie was giving me a backhanded insult.

“Your friends are something else, Bella,” Alice said in a tone of wonderment, staring after them with what seemed to be genuine envy in her eyes. I was not only a little surprised by her words- I never would’ve expected Alice, arguably the wealthiest, prettiest, and most accomplished girl to have ever graced the halls of Forks High School, to be jealous of my incredibly ordinary friends. But when I looked at Jasper, he, too, was seemingly enraptured by Mike’s clumsy breakdancing and Eric’s attempted moonwalk.

“Do you want to join them?” I asked, half-teasing, half-deadly serious. Jasper gave me a fleeting smile before turning his body to Alice and rubbing her arms in a seeming attempt to warm her up. I felt my cheer dwindle a little at this show of affection. It seemed that, even when they had both declared their crushes- could I even call it a crush?- on me, it still hurt me with every reminder I received that they would always be closer to each other than they would be to me.

“Alice needs some rest after that scare, but you’re more than welcome to join them for a while. We’ll be watching over here,” Jasper told me, before making an abortive attempt to reach out and touch my shoulder until he thought better of it and receded backwards. I looked to Alice, hoping that she might say something, but she just gave me a small smile before gesturing towards my friends.Stamping down the hurt, the urge to ask them why they were essentially shooing me away from them when they literally brought me a bouquet of roses and a heartfelt confession just a few days before, I trudged over to where my friends were on the dance floor.

“Bella!” Mike cheered when he saw me, yelling loudly over the sound of vibrant pop music so that I could hear him. “Where’s Alice and Jasper?”

“They’re-“ I looked over my shoulder to where I left them, but they had seemingly disappeared. I swallowed past the lump in my throat as I looked back at Mike. “They’re busy. C’mon, let’s dance!”

“That’s what we’re doing, dude!” Eric shouted, his expression almost indescribably happy when Mike helped herd people away from the dance floor so that they would have enough space to do a conjoined worm dance on the ground together. The resentment that bloomed in my chest, hot and heavy, wasn’t me begrudging them of the fact that they were having fun, but of the fact that I was supposed to be writhing around on a dirty gym floor with Alice and Jasper, not watching Eric and Mike do it for me.

The more I tried to distract myself- doing shots of the spiked punch with Jessica- and, later, a very dubious-looking Angela-, singing karaoke with Lauren after said spiked punch shots, going to the girl’s room to throw up a little because all of those spiked punch shots were starting to add up-, the more I fixated on the fact that, after barely more than five minutes of arriving to homecoming together, Alice and Jasper had ditched me.

“Am I being clingy, is that it?” I asked Jessica, who was slumped against the bathroom wall. “Do they just- hic- not like me, and this was all some sort of elab- elaborate plan to humiliate me?”

“No way in hell,” Jessica slurred drunkenly, which wasn’t very inspiring. “They totally have a crush on you. Want a piece of that booty, amiright?”

“Hm?” I muttered, pressing my forehead against the cool glass of the mirror to cool down. The room felt very hot all of a sudden, and I wasn’t sure how much of that was because of the fact I was getting drunk off spiked punch or because Jessica was beginning to ramble about how much she wanted Lauren.

“An’, it’s like, I’m trying- hic- so hard to get her to like me,” she said, “and she’s just acting like this is all some kinda- some kinda favor she’s- hic- doing me, you know?”

“You should tell her that,” I said, eyes fluttering shut. I listened to the sound of Jessica dragging herself across the floor to the toilet bowl, which she promptly heaved in before slowly clambering to her feet and approaching the counter. I stepped back while she rinsed her mouth and took a good, long look at herself- at the both of  us- in the mirror.

She snorted. “Look at us, Bella. We’re really white girl wasted now.”

I didn’t really know what that meant, but I got the sinking feeling she was right. My hair was sticking up in the back, my dress had ridden up to the tips of my thighs, and my eye makeup was smeared so that I resembled a drunk raccoon more than an innocent attendee of homecoming. Jessica wasn’t exactly better off, what with the fact that her dress strap was slipping off a shoulder and she had lost her left earring somewhere on the dance floor.

“No wonder Alice and Jasper left me,” I groaned. “I’m a mess.”

“No, you aren’t,” Jessica said hotly as she swayed on her feet. “You gotta find them, Bella. You gotta show them what they’re missing. Put on those moves, girl. Show ‘em what you got.”

She turned to leave the bathroom.

“Where are you going?” I called after her.

“I’m going to convince Lauren that a shl- sloppy makeout underneath the bleachers is in her best interests,” Jessica said over her shoulder. “Wish me luck!”

And with that, she was gone.

Sighing, I forced myself to follow in her footsteps outside the bathroom, eager to get away from the smell of vomit that had been pervading it as other unfortunate partygoers made pit stops after drinking a little too much of the punch. I staggered underneath the force of the strobe lights, before I forced myself to sober up and scan the crowd for any sign of Alice and Jasper.

After a few unsuccessful minutes of this, I decided my chances would be better if I stepped outside for a little while, away from the rhythmic swaying of hips on the dance floor, and chaperones yelling at the two teens who had evidently spiked the punch bowl in the first place. I shivered a little as I closed the door to the gym behind me, the cold seeping into my flimsy stockings and bare arms. There were a few kids scattered here and there- three lying on the grass of the football field, stargazing, a few others passed out on benches or getting past third base near the basketball courts.  

And there were noises coming from the woods behind the locker rooms.

Curious, too drunk to acknowledge the fact that the noises were most likely coming from a kid who was on the receiving end of his first blowjob, I walked and walked until oak trees and pine-cones replaced the teen-movie stargazers and intoxicated teens and makeout sessions, allowing the noise to recede at last into chirping crickets and the rustling of bushes nearby.The noises got louder as I plunged deeper into the woods, stumbling a little when the heel of my left shoe got dislodged by a burr on the ground. Grumbling under my breath, I took my shoes off entirely and forced myself to walk on, not bothering to wonder how the hell I was supposed to find my way back in my intoxicated state and the dark.

I was getting closer, and closer still, until I found myself in a clearing. And I wasn’t alone.

Even in the dark, I could see that the body crumpled on the floor was losing blood. It spread, a viscous and thick liquid making its way across the trampled grass and onto my bare feet. This wasn’t the alarming thing, though. The alarming thing was that there were two figures standing above its broken form, arguing about how best to dispose of the body without someone noticing.

“We need to chop it up before we do anything,” said a horribly, horribly familiar voice. “We can’t let him come back.”

“We won’t,” the other voice said. “But we need to bring him back to Carlisle before we decide anything else. We need answers, we- we need to know why he was here in the first place, why he was following-“

And then, because it was me, and because someone up there had it out for me, I accidentally snapped a twig underneath my bare foot. The two figures spun around instantly, their fangs- fangs!- bared, dripping with blood, their hands and clothing coated with the stuff, their eyes gleaming impossibly in the moonlight. It was only after a few heart-palpitating moments had passed that I realized that the people in front of me were not, in fact, axe murderers, serial killers, or moviegoers with a proclivity for watching vampire horror movies, but Alice and Jasper Cullen. 

"Hey," I said then, in exactly the way Jessica had shown me, before I passed out.

Chapter Text

When I woke up, I was lying in the backseat of a car.

Groaning, I lifted my head- which felt like it became a million times heavier since homecoming- and rubbed my eyes, trying hard to escape the murkiness that washed over me like a wave. Alice and Jasper sat in the driver’s and passenger seat respectively, both quieting when they realized I had awoken.

“What,” I said in a hoarse, cracked voice, “the fuck?”

My head began to pound almost as hard as my heart as I watched Alice and Jasper exchange a look, obviously debating whether or not to break it to me that I’d gotten mild to severe brain damage from fainting after I hallucinated them sucking the blood out of a woodland creature because I got roofied at prom, and now they were on their way to the hospital to patch me up.

None of this was helping my headache.

“Bella,” Alice said carefully, “what do you think you saw?”

“What do I think I saw?” I repeated incredulously, not at all comforted by the uncharacteristic tremulousness of her tone. “I don’t know what I saw, because the punch was spiked and everything I saw afterwards is implausible.”

“Humor us,” Jasper said, turning around in the passenger seat to look at me. I swallowed past the lump in my throat and avoided his gaze as I spoke.

“I... guess I saw you guys drinking the blood out of a body in the middle of the woods. But like I said, I was hallucinating, and you guys aren’t Satanic ritualists or vampires, so-” 

“Bella.” Jasper cut me off. When I gathered the courage to look up at him, I saw that his eyes, normally tawny and bright, had become a deep, dark red, almost maroon in the reflection of the headlights on the street. “You weren’t hallucinating.”

My throat seemed to be squeezed by an invisible hand in the darkness as I stared at him.

“What?” I finally croaked, the pressure in my head now rising to a crescendo. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean? That what I saw was really true, and you guys are- you guys are-“

“Vampires,” Alice agreed darkly, and even in the pitch blackness of the night, I could see that her hands had clenched on the steering wheel so tightly that her knuckles were beginning to turn white. I laughed, a little hysterically, until I realized she wasn’t joking.

“Oh my god.”

“We didn’t want you to find out this way,” Alice continued, seemingly oblivious to the mental breakdown that was occurring in the back seat.

“Or at all,” Jasper added quickly. “We never intended for you to see that, Bella, we-“

“Stop the car,” I said. Alice said nothing, instead continuing to drive on, though by this time I could see that her nails were digging into the foam of the steering wheel. Jasper touched her arm, and she let out a shaky sigh.

“Stop the car, Alice,” he murmured. We came to a gradual stop, and it was only until the car became completely stationary that I opened the door, walked a few feet into where the road began to meet the wild grass growing across the fields next to it, and began to puke my guts out.

I vaguely registered my hair being held out of my face as I retched, and when I looked up, pressing the heel of my mouth to my lips, I saw that Alice had tugging my hair away from my vomit trajectory, Jasper holding a small bottle of water beside her. Quietly, without speaking, I took the bottle from him and held it to my lips.

“Did you take this from homecoming?” I wondered aloud, weakly. “I don’t really see you as the drinking water type anymore.”

“Bella...” Jasper said, looking unbelievably, impossibly sad. I felt myself get angrier as I stared at his face, at Alice’s face beside him, mirroring the same regret and sorrow as the other. To be certain, I was seriously pissed off with them for leading me on for the past few months with their end goal not being to move to a decent apartment in Port Angeles with me, but instead to drink my blood and throw my lifeless body into the woods.

But I was even angrier with myself for allowing this to happen. How did I not see it before? How did I allow myself to be so misled by my own desire to be liked by these two people, who were obviously too good to be true? Of course I, of all people, would end up attracting two vampires to me. Of course the girl who slashed the tires of the jock who called her a dyke in tenth grade would end up in the middle of a darkened road with creatures who liked to drink blood on the side of attending high school over and over again, even though they stopped being actual teenagers for a while.

A wildly inappropriate laugh bubbled up in my throat as I clutched my head in my hands. Jasper’s hand suddenly found its way onto my shoulder, but before I could somehow manage to shake him off, I felt a wave of instant calm wash over me.

“What the fuck?” I whispered, unable to muster the same bite as before. “How are you doing that?”

“I can influence emotions,” Jasper said in a hushed voice. “Not anything impossible, but I can make people more inclined towards anger, or humiliation, or joy, if I want them to be so.”

“And I can see the future,” Alice added, in the same quiet tone, the kind of tone you’d use at the bedside of an elderly bedridden relative who wasn’t going to make it out of the hospital in anything but a hearse. “Or, well, glimpses of it would be the more accurate term.”

“Oh, is that all?” I asked, feeling the barest inklings of irritations gather up in my stomach, struggling to emerge past Jasper’s calm. “You guys can’t walk through walls or shoot lasers out of your eyes, huh?”

“Unfortunately not,” Alice whispered, her face scrunching up as though she would cry. It was too late, though; I beat her to it, stepping away from Jasper until the calm faded away and was replaced with a stinging sensation in the backs of my eyes.

“I guess I should congratulate you guys on one thing, then,” I muttered, the tears finally springing into my eyes. I turned my face away from them, trying to keep them at bay without much success.

“What?” I registered one of them saying vaguely.

“You actually made me believed you liked me,” I said, my voice hitching into a sob. “Like, really, really liked me. Enough to comfort me when my mom- and bring me roses- and- god, how could I have been so stupid? How could I have believed that anyone could seriously want my mess?” 

“We were never lying when we told you we liked you, Bella!” Alice protested, jarringly loud in the wake of the quiet we’d been sustaining for the past five minutes. Making an effort to lower her voice, she repeated, “We were never lying to you about that. Everything we said before still stands.”

“Oh, yeah?” I scoffed through my tears, which were streaming down my face in a way I would’ve been embarrassed by had I not been more overcome by the fact that my homecoming dates were bona fide creatures of the night. “Like when you led me to believe that you didn’t suck blood out of squirrels as a pastime? Or that you wouldn’t come to school because you were on camping- God, camping- vacations with your family, when you really just didn’t want to step into the sunlight?”

Jasper made to put his hand on me again, but I took a step backward. “Don’t touch me!”

“Bella, please,” Alice said, her voice distraught. I could see the hem of her dress was being ruined by the mud in the fields, but she didn’t seem to notice as she took a step closer to me, looking tragically beautiful in the moonlight. I resented her for it. I wanted there to be a way to shut my feelings off when it came to her and Jasper, but evidently I couldn’t do it, because when she took another step forward, and another, until her arms were wrapped around me, I didn’t make a move to fight back.

“Come with us,” Jasper said quietly, tucking a stray lock of hair behind my ear. “We’ll take you back to Charlie’s so you feel safe, and we’ll explain everything to you there. Everything.”

“I doubt I’ll feel safe ever again,” I sniffled, but allowed them to lead me back to the car, against my better judgment. I figured that, even if they were lying to me and were taking me to the most secluded part of the woods to drink my blood and kill me, I’d at least stop feeling the way I was feeling. Like the world was turning upside down, and leaving me right-side up with it.

The drive to Charlie’s house was the most uncomfortable thing I’d ever experienced in my entire life.

I stared out the window the entire time while Alice and Jasper exchanged worried looks they thought I couldn’t see in front of me. I refused to respond to any of their attempts at talking, though, and after a while they gave up and drove in silence as my heart turned to stone in my chest and sank into my stomach.

I didn’t know what to feel, other than understanding the very basic fact that my entire world was imploding, and all I could do was watch. Vampires were real, and my homecoming dates were two of them. Sure, why not? My suspension of disbelief had permanently faded the second I saw Alice and Jasper drinking the blood of a dead body. Anything could be real, now.

But that wasn’t what scared me- not really. No, the really scary thing about it all was that, even despite everything, I still liked them. They probably killed thousands of naïve seventeen-year-olds who were too nosy for their own good in the past, and I still couldn’t help but smile when I thought about Alice bringing me homemade cake, or Jasper explaining facts about pretentious movies I wouldn’t possibly care about, had it not been him who was speaking about it. The full extent of my own feelings scared me so much, I could hardly catch my breath.

“We’re here,” Jasper murmured, as Alice pulled up into the driveway. Numbly, I climbed out of the car and unlocked the front door with the key that Charlie kept under the mat, too tired to really care that Jasper and Alice were watching my every movement and they could most definitely break in, if they chose to.

Before I could pull the door open, though, Alice placed a hand on my wrist, shaking her head.

“We’ll come in through the window,” she said, like that was a normal thing that people said to each other. “It’s best that Charlie doesn’t see us in this state.”

“In what...” I trailed off. It was only then that I realized blood was still dripping down the sides of their mouths and down their chins. Trying to resist a full-body shudder, I nodded my head in acquiescence, before turning around and stepping inside the house.

“Bella?” Charlie called from the living room. “That you?”

“Yeah,” I heard myself calling mechanically. I heard him get up from his chair and trail into the foyer, giving me a cautious smile.

“How was it?” He asked. All of a sudden, a wave of love and regret washed over me, mingling together and forcing my throat to close up. With a little choked sound, I threw my arms around him with wild abandon, pressing the side of my cheek against his chest in a way I hadn’t since I was a kid.

“Bella?” He asked, sounding thoroughly bewildered even as his arms wrapped around me. “Are you okay? You’re not hurt or anything, are you? Did they do anything to you? I never liked the look of that Jasper boy, I-“

“No, Dad,” I sniffled, and Charlie’s arms tightened around my shoulders. “I just missed you. I’m sorry I’ve been acting so distant, ever since I came here. I’m really, really sorry, Dad. I know I haven’t told you much of anything, and I- I just- I’ll try to be better, okay?”

“Oh, Bella,” Charlie sighed, resting his chin against the top of my head. “You’ve always been a good kid. I don’t want you to be anything but yourself, because who you are right now, is someone to be proud of. I don’t know what’s going on right now, but whatever it is, it’ll pass. You hear me, kiddo?”

I sobbed a little in response, completely overwhelmed by his kindness and love, and the fact that I might be dead the second I stepped into my room. Reluctantly, I forced myself to let go, giving him what I hoped was an assuring smile when he looked at me in concern.

“Sorry,” I said, pressing the heel of my hand to my eyes. “It’s just been a long night.”

“You should get some rest, then,” Charlie said, returning my smile. I nodded and turned to go upstairs when he called my name.

“Yeah?” I asked, turning around.

He hesitated, before saying, “You know I love you more than anything, right? I know I don’t say it as much as I ought to, but I really do love you, Bella. You’ve really grown up to be one-of-a-kind- stronger than your old man-, and I am so, so grateful I have you as my daughter.”

My throat closed up again, this time so intensely that I was a little afraid I would choke. Not trusting my voice to work, I nodded and turned away before he could see his strong daughter fall to pieces at his words.

When I finally came to my room, I felt as though I’d aged a hundred years overnight. All I wanted to do was throw myself onto my bed and sob, but Alice and Jasper were occupying my bed, talking in a hushed whisper and immediately quieting when I closed the door behind me. My window was open, cold air gusting through and into my room.

“How do you guys know which window is mine?” I asked, as I crossed the room to close it. Alice and Jasper exchanged a glance.

“Jasper’s control isn’t that great when it comes to blood, Bella,” Alice said finally, placing a comforting hand on Jasper’s when he tensed beside her. “When you first arrived at Forks, your blood was so overpowering to him, that I was a teensy bit... afraid for you.”

She tried to gauge my reaction then, but I said nothing, facing the window. Tears were still running down my face, but thankfully she didn’t pause in her explanation to question me on them.

“So I might’ve, um, found out where you lived and sit in the tree branches outside your window to make sure nothing happened to you,” she continued, her voice getting quieter and quieter as Jasper’s face turned guiltier and guiltier. “He never would’ve hurt you if he had a choice about it, but your blood was singing to him, and... honestly, if I was several years younger, I might’ve had the same reaction. I’m just used to restraining myself by now, though.”

“And when I was finally able to control myself around you,” Jasper said in a low voice, “I got a better grip on your emotions. And I was really afraid for you, Bella.”

That got a reaction out of me.

“What?” I said, spinning around to look at him. He stared down at his hands, looking frustrated.

“You were... you felt... so much. When your mom came to visit for the first time, the pain practically radiated off you. I had to ensure nothing bad would happen to you, Bella. You don’t know what I- what we’d-“ here he tightened his grip on Alice’s hand- “do if anything bad should happen to you.”

“I thought Alice could see the future,” I said dully. “Wouldn’t she be able to predict if I was going to off myself?”

Alice shook her head. “For some reason, Bella, I can’t seem to discern your fate. I mean, I can see petty things- where you decide to go after school, for example, or what you’d order at a restaurant-, but I can’t see what will happen to you when it’s important. Life or death. Everything gets sort of muggy, the more intense the circumstances are.”

“It’s like with Edward,” Jasper said mutely. “He can’t read your mind at all.”

Of course he could read minds.

“What does that mean?” I asked anyways.

“Usually, he can pick up on what people are thinking instantly. But with you... well, there’s a reason why he was so frustrated when you came to our place. This has never happened before- not once in the past hundred years or so-, and it’s almost unprecedented for our powers not to work.”

“Wait,” I said, holding my hand up for them to stop. My head was getting dizzy, all of a sudden. “How old are you guys?”

They exchanged a look.

“I was born in the 1910s or so,” Alice said in a quiet voice. “The mental asylum I was at for almost two decades didn’t keep records of my birth, but I was around eighteen when I turned.”

I let out a soundless, disbelieving laugh at the phrase “mental asylum.”

“And Jasper?”

“Before the Civil War,” he muttered, tearing his gaze away from mine. “Around 1845 or so.”

I bent down slightly, resting my hands on my knees. It was getting harder and harder to breath; my windpipe felt like it was being clenched by an invisible hand that was intent on cutting off any oxygen supply.

“Are you alright?” Alice asked, her brows creasing in concern. Without responding to her question, I took off my shoes and took a seat beside Jasper on the bed, rubbing my red-rimmed eyes.

“I’m going to sleep,” I said. “It’s late.”

Almost in unison, they stood up from the bed, apologetic looks on their faces, but I grabbed Jasper’s sleeve before he could turn.

“Wait,” I said in a small, childish voice. “Don’t leave.”

“We can’t sleep here, Bella,” Jasper said in a patient tone, but I could hear the confusion in his voice anyways.

“Or at all,” Alice added. “It’s been several decades since I last slept.”

“Please,” I whispered, not above begging. “Don’t leave. Just stay with me, and in the morning- in the morning you can explain more. You can explain everything.”

I clutched the fabric of Jasper’s sleeve tighter. Gently, he rested his free hand over my clenched fist and untangled my fingers from his suit jacket.

“Okay, Bella,” he said, his voice almost trembling. I shoved myself over, trying to make room to fit three people onto my twin-sized bed without much success. Jasper inserted himself behind me, Alice lying down stiffly in front of me- obviously trying hard not to fall off the side-, and doing a better job of cooling my bed than air conditioning ever could.

As I finally, fitfully began to doze off, I felt Jasper’s palm place itself against the small of my back, Alice turning around so that her nose was almost buried in the crook of my neck. It was in this position that I had my first dreamless sleep in months.

Chapter Text

When I woke up, they were gone.

I groaned in sleepy confusion, lifting my head off the pillow and rubbing the sleep away from my bleary eyes, but there was no mistake about it. They had left- probably sometime in the middle of the night, based on the fact that the blankets surrounding me were at least seventy-five percent less cool than they were with the paranaturals lying on top of them-, without even so much as a goodbye, or even a “hey, I’m sorry that we were assholes and didn’t tell you we were actually bloodsucking vampires- you know, from horror movies?- who had no intention of ever actually being serious with you.”

My nose turned blotchy and my eyes became irritated with tears, but before I could begin another sob-fest for the third time in the past week or so, there was a knock at my window. When I looked over, Alice and Jasper Cullen were balancing themselves on the branches of the tree directly outside my window, the knuckles of Jasper’s fist resting on the glass.

Suppressing a shriek, I threw the blankets off me and crossed the room to my window in three short strides, all but throwing it open and nearly knocking Jasper off balance.

“What the hell, guys?” I whisper-shouted, keeping my voice low in case Charlie was still sleeping. Who was I kidding- you couldn’t catch Charlie awake before twelve on a day off work, but even so, I didn’t want to completely retract my statement to him last night about trying to be a better daughter. “I thought you had left!”

“We had to go back to our house to smooth some feathers,” Jasper explained dryly, clambering into my room from the window before turning around and helping Alice through as well. “Edward figured out what was going on when Jessica started wondering why your homecoming dates had abandoned you, and if you were going to track us down. He’s been, um-“

“He’s been in a state of total panic this entire time,” Alice finished, closing the window behind her as she stepped through. “He thinks that you’re going to turn us all in to the Chief of Police- well, your dad, in this case.”

I couldn’t help but snort, despite myself. “Yeah, because explaining to Charlie that my homecoming dates are actually century-old supernatural creatures would go over really well.”

We smiled at each other, before we realized the implications of what I just said. Our smiles faded. I’d almost succeeded in forgetting most of the gory details they’d explained to me last night, and yet my brain was evidently hellbent on supplying me with snippets of our conversation, such as Jasper’s “I was born in 1845 or so,” or Alice’s “the mental asylum I was staying in at the turn of the century- you know mental asylums in the early 20^th century, right?- didn’t keep my medical records on hand.”

“Speaking about that...” Alice muttered, looking guilty as she took a seat on my bed. “Bella, I know you must be so hurt by all this-“

I huffed at that. ‘Hurt’ didn’t begin to describe the plethora of emotions I’d felt in the past twelve or so hours.

“-But I promise you, Bella-“ and here she grabbed my hand- “we didn’t tell you because it was in your best interests. Really.”

“In my best-“ I cut myself off, glaring at her in indignation instead when my voice became unsteady.

“Bella, be real with yourself,” Jasper said quietly. “How would you have reacted if we had told you we weren’t humans?”

I opened my mouth to deliver a furious retort, before his words caught up to me. Grudgingly, I had to admit that I probably wouldn’t have welcomed them into my house with open arms had they told me at virtually any other point in time they were bloodsucking monsters, but I didn’t have to admit it to them.

I shrugged sullenly. “I don’t know.”

“Not well,” Alice murmured. “Believe me. And if you had, by some miracle, decided to believe us, you would have the opportunity to tell everyone about us, which is the worst possible thing anyone could do.”

“But why?” I demanded, taking a seat on my bed beside her. “Why would it be so bad for humans to know that you guys exist?”

“Oh, you mean aside from the very literal witch hunts that would emerge after such a fact became common knowledge?” Jasper mused, though he sounded more entertained than sarcastic. “It wouldn’t have been good. And besides, the Volturi would be-“

He stopped when Alice shook her head. I stared at them both.

“The Volturi?” I repeated. Alice said nothing, crossing her arms over her chest and looking massively uncomfortable.

“You promised me you’d tell me everything,” I reminded her, and she sighed.

“Fine. But we’re not talking about this here. We’re going to go over to our place-“

“The hell we are!” I interrupted, yanking myself off the bed and taking a few feet away from her and Jasper both. “So you and your family can bury my body after you drink my blood more discreetly than you could here? No, thanks.”

“Bella,” Jasper said exhaustedly, “I’m not trying to hint at anything here, but if we wanted to suck your blood, we had ample opportunity to do so before you found out who we really are. We’re not going to kill you.”

“I’d kill me,” I muttered. They gave me wide-eyed looks, and I hastened to clarify. “If I was a vampire, I mean, and I knew that some human chick knew all about the supernatural aspects of my family and I, and could potentially ruin us all.”

“Yes,” Alice agreed pleasantly, “but you wouldn’t do that, so we’re not worried about it.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because you’re a good person,” she said, running an agitated hand through her inky black hair. “Because you wouldn’t ruin someone for being different. Because you know what it’s like to be different. And because deep down, I think you still do like us, enough that you wouldn’t want to see us staked. Would you?”

I averted my eyes, saying nothing.

“Put on a jacket,” Jasper said. “The weather forecasted moderate to severe rain today.”

 “This is such bullshit,” I grumbled, even as I slid into the backseat of their car. “I genuinely cannot believe I’m doing this right now. I’m literally heading into the wolf’s den, and you guys are probably going to rip my throat out with your crazy fangs-“

“We don’t have ‘crazy fangs,’” Alice said primly as she buckled up in the passenger seat. I tried not to snort incredulously at that. She and Jasper were essentially immortal- if we did manage to get into a car accident, I was pretty sure the other driver would be way more screwed over by the impact of Alice’s body hitting into his delicate Toyota Corolla than vice versa. “And we’re not going to rip your throat out. Neither will the rest of our family.”

“Wait,” I said slowly, realizing something. “Are all the Cullens as, um, old as you?”

Jasper huffed out a low laugh as he backed out of the driveway. “Sure you don’t want them to tell you themselves?”

I pictured the rest of their family- Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie, Emmett, Edward, people I’d actually exchanged words with, ate dinner with, Cullens that weren’t just concepts anymore-, trying to tell me that they were originally Vikings, or that they were the children of wealthy Ancient Roman politicians, and resisted a shudder. My existential dread was coming back with a flourish.

“Uh, I’m good. Why don’t you guys just tell me?”

“Carlisle’s from the 17^th century,” Alice said nonchalantly, pretending that she couldn’t hear the beat of my heart audibly stop in my chest. “And Esme’s from around my time- she’s only a few years older than me, actually, but that’s too weird to think about, so I try to avoid the fact when I can.”

“Weirder than you guys depending on a hemoglobin-rich diet?” I asked, and Alice’s lips twitched upwards.

“Edward was born in 1901,” Jasper continued. “I’d be old enough to be his father if I hadn’t been turned, which is also-“ and this time, I said the words with him- “too weird to think about.”

“And Emmett and Rosalie?” I questioned. Alice and Jasper exchanged a look.

“Both born around the mid-1910s,” Alice said carefully. “But try not to ask Rosalie too much about it. She’s... sensitive about her past.”

“For good reason,” Jasper murmured, hands clutching on the steering wheel. I frowned but said nothing, mulling these new bits of information over in my head. Carlisle Cullen was older than all of Forks combined. Edward lived in an age where people still died of scarlet fever. Or was it hay fever?

It seemed as though I was going to be able to ask soon enough, because before I knew it, the Cullen house was coming into view, and Emmett Cullen was sitting on the steps leading up to the front door, giving us a big, hearty wave when we came into view.

“Bella!” He grinned, giving me a bear hug nearly the moment I stepped out of the car. I tensed, alight with the knowledge that the mouth that was nearly touching my exposed shoulder contained teeth that could rip through my skin in a matter of seconds, but a wave of Jasper’s calm washed over me. Relaxing, I tried to hug Emmett back, though him all but pinning my hands to my sides meant that all I could do was awkwardly flutter my hands against his waist.

He finally stepped back, though his hands remained on my shoulders.

“Well, I just gotta say how glad I am that you decided not to out us to the entire community and potentially risk the most powerful vampires in the world coming after us!” He said, beaming. Unsure what to say to that, I looked to Alice and Jasper for help, but they seemed just as lost as me.

Thankfully, Esme poked her head out the front door before an awkward silence could ensue. She, like Emmett, beamed when she saw me, but her eyes were glimmering with a manic concern I often saw in my own mom’s eyes when she was worried or upset about something.

“Bella!” She said, and though I could tell she was making a valiant effort to try to stamp out the anxiety in her voice, it made its way through her throat in a trembling undercurrent. “Why don’t you come inside? I’ve made lemonade for you.”

“Oh, you didn’t have to, Ms. Cullen,” I began, but she shook her head.

“Nonsense,” she said, smoothing down a nonexistent stray lock of hair. “I wanted to show my appreciation for you, erm, not telling anyone about our delicate situation, and I- well, I know this must be a real shock to you, but I hope you know nothing has changed.”

“Nothing... has changed?” I repeated slowly, tasting the words in my mouth. Her brows furrowed together when she heard the oddly staticky sound of my voice, but instead of remarking upon it, she just nodded.

“Exactly,” she said, smiling. “I knew you would understand. Come inside when you’re ready, alright?”

Before I could nod, the front door was shutting closed. I stared after her, thoroughly bemused, before turning back to Emmett, Alice, and Jasper, the latter of whom was slightly wincing. When I shot him a questioning look, he shrugged helplessly.

“I can feel her emotions much stronger than usual today,” he murmured, staring after the closed door with proper concern in his eyes. “She’s... worried.”

“She knows I’m not going to, like, say anything, right?” I asked, suddenly very worried that the only potential mother figure that was of some reliability and stability that I’d ever had believed that I was going to narc on her and her family to the vampire cops. And the actual cops, i.e. my dad.

“Sure,” Jasper said, not sounding too convinced. Emmett clasped us both on our shoulders, smiling brightly as though he wasn’t planning on murdering me the second I stepped into his house, which I desperately wanted to believe. After seeing the full extent of his muscles in the white tank top he was wearing, I didn’t want to take any chances.

Beside me, Alice took my hand into her own.

“It’s going to be okay, Bella,” she said warmly, giving my hand a squeeze. And despite myself, I believed her.

Chapter Text

True to her word, Esme set out a glass of lemonade on the coffee table in front of me as soon as we settled down on the couches, so pristine and white that I was afraid of leaning back on the cushions. Alice and Jasper sat beside me, and though I didn’t intend to do it, my hands instinctively twitched towards theirs as the rest of the Cullens filtered into the room.

“Hello, Bella,” Carlisle said, and though he was smiling, his face seemed worn-  for him, anyways. He took a seat on the armchair nearby, crossing his legs and cupping his hands over his bent knee, and it was such a human gesture that I forgot, for a second, that he was older than my great-great-grandmother. “How are you doing?”

I choked out an incredulous laugh. “Oh, just fine. I didn’t expect that this week would be the one where I finally find out that Dracula was based off a real story, but, y’know, there’s always next week to discover that Frankenstein’s monster is actually my next-door-neighbor.”

Jasper rubbed a soothing pattern onto my hand with his thumb, but even with the artificial calm that washed over me, my muscles were still tense as anything. Rosalie and Edward weren’t exactly making things easier, shooting me twin glares as they sat down on the couch opposite ours, and for adopted siblings they never resembled each other so much as they did in that moment.  

“Yes, well… I wanted to alleviate any concerns you may have about us,” Carlisle told me, leaning forward with such sincerity it made me feel inexplicably guilty- probably because I’d been accusing him in my head of murdering innocent seventeenth-century townsfolk, which I still thought was pretty justified to think of a self-proclaimed vampire, but still. It was hard to imagine him ripping anybody’s throat out.

“I’m still a bit shocked at Alice and Jasper’s behavior,” he continued, the faintest trace of paternal disapproval in his voice. “They know not to drink so close to the public, especially Jasper, and yet they put themselves and you at danger. It was immensely irresponsible of them, and for that I apologize.”

“Carlisle-“ Alice began, but he held up his hand. Even without Jasper’s empathy powers, I could tell that she was sufficiently chastised, looking down at her lap with the expression of a kicked puppy.

“It was my fault, Carlisle,” Jasper blurted out. “I hadn’t drunk for some time, and I thought we were far enough away from the party so that we wouldn’t raise suspicion. Don’t blame Alice for my absentmindedness. Besides, you know we don't drink from humans- it was a vampire, and don't you find it even a little bit concerning that Alice had no indication he'd be there until he was right outside the school?”

We lapsed into an uncomfortable silence at that, until Carlisle finally sighed.

“We’ll come back to this For now, Bella, my offer still stands- do you have any questions or concerns you’d like to tell us? I don’t want you to be afraid to be in our company, or for you to think badly of us in any way.”

I hesitated. There were so many questions that I was dying to ask- I was kidding before, but was Dracula based on a real story, like some sort of sensationalized autobiography of an actual count from Transylvania? Why did they have to drink blood in the first place, and not other bodily fluids? How did they turn somebody into one of them?

I couldn’t think of a good way to phrase all of that, though, so instead I settled for asking the question that had been sticking with me the longest. “Who are the Volturi?”

Emmett laughed lowly from his perch on the arm of the couch. “Going in for the big guns, Bella. Respect.”

“You told her about the Volturi?” Rosalie asked, her nose wrinkling like she smelled something particularly nasty. Alice heaved a sigh.

“It was an accident, Rose, we didn’t intend to tell her about them.”

Esme frowned. “Accident or no accident, that was a very dangerous thing of you two to do.”

“Sorry, Esme,” Alice and Jasper muttered in unison, and even with the thick tension in the room, I couldn’t help but crack a smile.

“To answer your question, Bella,” Esme continued, turning to me, “The Volturi are the largest and most powerful vampiric society in the world. They’re what you might consider to be our government- they enforce the laws of our world, which is what you might expect: hunts must be as inconspicuous as possible, so no attacking higher-ups, such as the president; vampiric children must not be brought into existence, whether by childbirth or by turning an actual child; vampires should not go into sunlight unless they are certain they are by themselves; werewolves should not be interacted with unless to kill them-“

“Werewolves,” I repeated to myself, feeling slightly dizzy.

“And humans must not be made aware of our existence,” Esme finished, her voice strangely choked.

“What happens if they do?” I asked, feeling a mixture of dread and anxiety ball up in the pit of my stomach.

“The human is either killed, or is turned into a vampire themselves,” Edward muttered, eyes meeting mine. I felt six other pairs land on my face, and all of a sudden I felt very vulnerable, like a preschooler lost in the middle of a holiday parade.

I opened my mouth, not sure what I was going to say, but Jasper beat me to the punch.

“That isn’t an option,” He said, clutching my hand tightly enough to hurt. “Either of those.”

“We know, Jazz,” Esme said, her expression tender. “We aren’t going to hurt Bella. But it’s important that she knows what she’s- what she’s risking, by being here. The Volturi are not a merciful sort, and if they had even an inkling of what was going on…”

“As far as I know, they aren’t clairvoyant- not like I am,” Alice said, mirroring Jasper’s action by grasping my hand and squeezing hard. “They won’t even know Bella exists, so long as we aren’t too conspicuous.”

“That’s another thing we wanted to talk to you three about,” Carlisle said, looking grim. “There’s been sightings of a rogue agent of the Volturi in Neah Bay, not too far from here. They’ve tracked him down, but evidently he’s been building up a small army of newborns to overthrow Arvo and the others. He hasn’t moved towards Forks, and I highly doubt he would attempt to conquer such a small town, but the Volturi are nearing this area, and there’s no telling where they might go for aid. It might explain why that man was lurking around your high school, anyway- he might've broken off from the original rebellion, break some rules of his own.”

Neah Bay, Neah Bay- why did it sound so strangely familiar? I wracked my brain so intensely I felt a headache coming on, until I realized where I’d heard it before. Paul was in Neah Bay- Paul, who my mother was supposed to be joining, who might’ve already left Forks to go up north.

I didn’t realize my breath was coming in sharp gasps until Alice put her hand on the small of my back.

“Bella, what’s wrong?” She asked, sounding uncharacteristically frightened as she rubbed slightly at my back.

“My mom,” I managed to get out. “My mom’s going to be in Neah Bay- she might already be there, she’s- she’s going to meet with my stepdad, I have to-“

With shaking hands, I reached for my phone. Unsurprisingly, it slipped from my hands, but Jasper caught it before it could hit the ground. When I attempted to grab it from him, though, his brows furrowed.

“Bella, what are you going to tell her?”

I stared at him uncomprehendingly. “What do you mean? I’m going to tell her that she’s in danger, that she and Paul have to haul ass out of there as soon as they can.”

“Do you really think she’ll believe you when you tell her that an army of vampires is only several miles away from her hotel?” Edward asked, and I never wanted to punch his face more than I did in that moment.

“I’ll make something up,” I responded hotly. “I’ll tell her that I contracted some sort of flesh-eating disease, or that I was diagnosed with a malignant leg tumor or something, and that she needs to come back to Forks immediately.”

“Bella-“

“Give me the phone, Jasper,” I said, steeling my voice. “Now.”

When he appeared to hesitate, I inhaled shudderingly and stared up into his face as the tears brimmed in my eyes, only partially forced. “Jasper. She’s my mom.”

He handed me the phone.

I dialed her number, fingers trembling so bad I almost dropped the phone again, and put it up to my ears. It rang for ten painstaking seconds before she finally answered, sounding slightly breathless as she picked up.

“Bella? Is that you?”

The sound of her voice flooded me with some kind of unidentifiable emotion I wasn’t even aware I had. “Mom! Where are you?”

“Just arrived in Neah Bay, as a matter of fact,” she said, and the unidentifiable emotion ebbed to allow the dread in the pit of my stomach to engorge. “Lugging my suitcases inside because Paul’s too busy shoveling the drive to help out-“

“You have to come back to Forks,” I blurted out, and then winced at the sudden silence on her head.

“Why?” She asked finally, and my mind went briefly blank.

“I got, um, mono,” I said, and then cringed. Mono wasn’t life-threatening; it was worlds away from the flesh-eating disease I’d planned on telling her I’d gotten. She laughed, sounding relieved.

“Is that all? Baby, I got mono at least three times when I was around your age. Who gave it to you- the boy or the girl?”

“What?” I squeaked out, suddenly aware that I was surrounded by superhumans who undoubtedly could hear every word Mom was saying. I resolutely avoided Jasper and Alice’s eyes, staring at the carpet so intensely I was pretty sure I’d bore a hole in it. “What are you talking about?”

“Bella, baby, Forks is a small town,” Mom said, amused, “You really think I wouldn’t find out that my kid’s been having some kind of three-way relationship with the hot doctor’s rich kids? So fess up- which one of them gave it to you?”

“Mom!” I all but shrieked, my face undoubtedly beet red. “God! Neither of them gave me mono! I just- I got it all of a sudden, I don’t know, and it- it-“

“Tell her it ruptured your spleen,” Carlisle said quietly from his armchair, a slight smile playing on his lips.

“It ruptured my spleen,” I said, grateful for the suggestion. “It’s bad. I have to, um, do surgery next week, and I want you to be here when I do. You and Paul both.”

“Paul, too?” Mom asked, sounding incredulous. Paul and I had never been exactly close- baseball bored me to tears, and Paul didn’t exactly have any other hobbies, so we never really bonded over anything, save how disgusting Mom’s casserole was. “Honey, is it really that bad? Like I said, I just got here and-“

“It’s life-threatening,” I said, and she shut up.

“Are you serious?” She asked finally, any trace of incredulity out of her voice.

“As a heart attack.”

“Why didn’t your dad tell me anything? I’m going to call him right now and give him a piece of my mind-“

“No!” I yelped, then made an effort to control my voice when Alice winced slightly beside me. “No, don’t do that. His phone’s… broken. He won’t answer you.”

Silence. Then, “Bella, I swear to God, if this is some sort of prank I’m going to-“

“Mommy,” I said softly, “it’s not a prank. I need you in Forks.”

I could tell that the ‘Mommy’ bit got to her; I hadn’t called her that since I was ten.

“Okay, Bella,” she relented at last, and the relief that rushed through my body was enough to make me fall back against the cushions, pristineness be damned. “I can’t say I’m too happy about you and Charlie keeping something like this from me, but I’ll tell Paul and we’ll be on our way.”

“Soon. Promise me.”

“I promise,” she said. “I love you.”

“Love you too,” I managed to say past the lump in my throat, and the call ended. I slipped my phone back in my pocket and reached for the lemonade on the coffee table, feeling more drained than I had in a long time.

“While I’m glad that we resolved at least one conflict today,” Carlisle said, watching me as I brought the glass to my lips, “we still have the issue of the Volturi prowling around in Neah Bay. They know that we’re here, and we don’t know how many of them they brought to fight off their rogue agent. It might very well be that they underestimated him and need to send for recruits, and we’re the closest town over that has vampires to be drafted into their army.”

“What does that mean, then?” Rosalie asked, her face blank.

“It means,” Carlisle murmured, “that Jasper, Alice, and Bella will have to be exceptionally careful over the next several weeks. That doesn’t mean you can’t see each other, or even hang out over weekends, but I wouldn’t recommend you seem very… close.”

“Like we’re dating, you mean,” Alice surmised in a dull voice.

“At least not in public,” Carlisle agreed, his voice apologetic. “I’m sorry. I know that it seems hard to control yourselves, but you must. At least for the time being. Will you promise me that?”

Alice, Jasper and I all looked at each other. I knew that, on some level, Carlisle was right- it would be totally irresponsible to go out on dates when vampiric government agents would be on the lookout for other vampires, but it was still difficult to nod my head ‘yes’ when Carlisle gave me an expectant look. Alice and Jasper slowly followed suit.

“Good,” he breathed, leaning back against his chair. “Now, do you have anything else you’d like to ask, Bella? About the Volturi, or vampirism in general, or anything of the sort?”

“Did you burn witches” came out of my mouth without my consent before he’d even finished asking the question. Carlisle gave me a bemused look.

“Excuse me?”

“Witches,” I muttered, flushing. “You were born in the 17^th-century, right? Did you go witch-hunting? And are witches even a thing, anyway? I know werewolves and vampires are, evidently, but where does it end- are ghosts real, too? Is there some kind of secret gathering for all supernatural creatures, or do you guys, have, like, racism in your communities? Like, if you’re a fairy, you can’t date a mermaid or something?”

“Oh, this is going to be good,” Emmett said, a smile spreading across his face.

“How would a fairy date a mermaid, anyway? Aren’t they on completely different proportions from each other?” Alice asked curiously.

“You’d know, seeing as you are a fairy,” Rosalie told her. Alice furrowed her brows.

“I can’t tell whether that’s supposed to be complimentary or homophobic,” she said, her voice serious, but her eyes sparkled with mirth as Rosalie shot her a scandalized look.

“Please. I’d never use a slur.”

“So that’s an x-nay on the supernatural racism or homophobia, then?” I couldn’t help but ask. From the corner of my eye I saw Carlisle rubbing at his temples slightly, even though I knew he wasn’t capable of having headaches anymore.

“Settle down,” he said mildly, “and I’ll tell you everything you want to know about supernatural racism and homophobia, okay?"

"Just like my old bedtime stories," I said wryly, but quieted down anyway. As he spoke, I felt Alice and Jasper's hands regain their hold on my own, and I shivered slightly- both at the cold touch, as well as the fact that I could feel both their shoulders brushing against mine, almost shockingly intimate to my touch-starved self. It was going to be harder than I originally realized to control myself around them, but if the consequence for my horny teenage urges was being involuntarily drafted into a vampire army and having my head ripped off from my shoulders because of my indiscretion, I'd have to try.

That was the thought I kept repeating to myself as Alice rested her head on my shoulder, and Jasper's arm wrapped around both of our shoulders. 

Chapter Text

I decided halfway through the rest of the week that I was going to be the first person to write a guide on how to navigate your budding three-way supernatural high school relationship, because apparently nobody had been in the predicament of actively dating two vampires before me.

Okay, so it wasn’t as ‘active’ as I would’ve liked it to been- Carlisle had made us promise to keep a low profile for the next several weeks or so, maybe even longer, but clearly he’d never sat next to Alice Cullen in Spanish class when she was wearing a sheer top and kept on smiling when she caught him staring at her, or had Jasper Hale’s thigh brush against his very distractingly in AP Literature, when they were supposed to be watching Romeo and Juliet.

The only thing that distracted me from them was the fact that Lauren and Jessica had apparently patched things up after homecoming- more than patched up, if the fact that they were slobbering all over each other at lunch was any indication.

Eric was watching them with a fascinated expression on his face. Angela sighed, looking very much like she’d like to bang her head against her lunch tray, and to be honest, I couldn’t blame her. She was sitting right next to them, near enough that I saw flecks of saliva spray onto her face as Jessica all but stuck her tongue down Lauren’s throat.

“How are they not running out of breath?” Mike wondered in a muted, awed voice. It was a little disgusting, sure, but I was glad to see that Jessica had managed to convince Lauren to give her a second chance after all. At least one of us was able to stick their tongue down their girlfriend’s throat- anything I had done with Jasper and Alice was strictly PG, and although I wanted to respect the boundaries placed before us (mostly by Carlisle, but my neuroticism and inability to be touched in a romantic context without short-circuiting was probably another major factor, if I was being honest with myself), it would’ve been nice to have a sloppy make-out of my own in a wildly inappropriate public setting.

I was being stupid, I knew. We were already flirting with danger just by flirting with each other, especially when the Volturi could pop in at any moment, but I couldn’t help but flush to my roots when I noticed two pairs of tawny-eyed gazes in my direction as I leaned away from Lauren and Jessica, away from the splash zone.

When Alice waved me over, I was all too eager to walk across the cafeteria, Carlisle’s warning be damned. They were sitting with the others, but it turned out that sitting with the Cullens became marginally less scary when you just watched the majority of them get sucked into an argument about the logistics of a fairy-mermaid relationship.

“As much as I’m thankful for the rescue,” I said, “didn’t Carlisle tell us we shouldn’t hang out?”

Alice rolled her eyes over-exaggeratedly- for my benefit, I knew, but I was also pretty sure she was genuinely annoyed by it as much as I was.

“It’s not like the Volturi are going to be touring the local high school, are they?” She said lightly, placing her hand over mine in what I could only assume was meant to be a soothing gesture, but made goosebumps run up my arm. “It’s not like we can’t see you anymore- we can hang out all we like at your place, or ours. The Volturi have a lot of powers, I admit, but even they can’t see through walls.”

Emmett barked out a sudden laugh, making me jump.

“If you turn any more red, Bella, somebody’s going to use you as an ingredient in their homemade tomato sauce,” he said, his shit-eating grin immensely smackable. To my surprise, Edward punched his shoulder before I could, looking even more unamused by Emmett’s antics than usual.

“Like you were any better when you first met Rosalie,” Jasper noted wryly from beside me, brushing a copper lock of hair out of his eyes. “You must’ve trailed behind her like a puppy for the first ten years at least.”

“I did not!” Emmett protested, and Rosalie laughed mirthlessly.

“Em, you so did.”

“Well, if worshipping the most beautiful woman in the world is a crime, then have me arrested,” Emmett murmured. Soon enough they were entangled in an embrace that made Lauren and Jessica’s look like middle-school handholding, and why, for the life of me, did everyone seem even more in the mood for romance specifically when I couldn’t be?

“You’re projecting,” Jasper said in a low voice, and I jumped. His eyes seemed darker than usual, but that was probably just the fluorescents. Or maybe the fact that my heart was beating audibly loud, even to myself.

 I opened my mouth to respond to him, but Alice beat me to it.

“Do you want to come over after school?”  She asked, looking at me from under her eyelashes. What I really wanted to do was douse myself in cold water, preferably from some mountaintop spring which was constantly doused with snow and sleet, but I didn’t know how to tell her so.

“It’ll be more private,” she said, as if sensing my hesitancy. “And we can… talk. If you’d like.”

“Wait, talk as in talk, or talk as in talk?”

“Oh, God,” Edward groaned from across the table, which I thought was a little unfair. It was a perfectly justifiable question to ask.

“You tell me,” Jasper responded with a smile, decisively ignoring Edward.

“Yes. I mean, um, we should talk, and then we can talk, if you want. Or if you want to talk but you don’t want to talk, that’s fine too. Or if you just want to talk, I mean-“

Edward stood up and left the table without another word. I blinked in his direction.

“He’s dramatic,” Alice said dismissively, waving her hand for good measure. When I turned my attention back to her and Jasper, they both looked like the cat that got the cream. “Don’t worry, Bella. We’ll talk.”

The word wasn’t stressed, but it wasn’t unstressed, either. As I tried to find the right words to stammer out, the bell rang. With a very vague hand gesture in the direction of the hallway opposite of the cafeteria, I left them watching Emmett and Rosalie attempt to touch each other’s tonsils through sheer willpower alone.

“What’s the big deal, then?” Lauren asked in a bored voice as she examined her split ends. I slumped lower in my seat. It was already sixth period, but I barely felt the last two hours pass by- I was too preoccupied with Alice and Jasper’s intentionally unclear wordplay to notice my surroundings much; my fifth period teacher had to ask me a question three times before I realized she was addressing me. “You like them, they like you- I don’t see why this is suddenly a big deal.”

“Because,” I whispered, eyeing Mrs. Mosley’s back as she turned her attention to the algebraic expressions on the whiteboard, “I literally haven’t kissed either of them yet, and now I don’t know if- if they-“

“Oh my god,” Lauren said, looking up from her hair to give me a disbelieving look. “Are you seriously afraid that they’re going to hook up with you?”

“No!” I exclaimed in protest, loud enough that Mrs. Mosley gave me a stern look over her shoulder.

“No,” I repeated again, whispering this time. “I mean, yes, but- it’s complicated, okay? I don’t understand how any of this works- there’s not exactly a guidebook online, or maybe there is, but it’s all sexualizing and weird.”

“I think I found that guidebook once,” Lauren said thoughtfully. “It was in the adult’s section of the used bookstore. There was gum in one of the porn tapes.”

“Lauren!”

“Ms. Swan,” Mrs. Mosley said, apparently at her wits end with me (which I thought would’ve arrived much sooner, personally), “would you like to share whatever undoubtedly engrossing conversation you’re having with the class?”

I shrunk back in my seat. “No, Mrs. Mosley.”

“Then I suggest you and Ms. Mallory lower your voices, hm?”

We waited for Mrs. Mosley’s back to turn before continuing our conversation.

“I just want to have kissed them before we get into anything… more, you know? I mean, how long did it take you and Jess to be comfortable enough to make out in public?”

Lauren put on a thoughtful expression. “Twelve hours after we lost our virginity to each other, I guess. Maybe fourteen.”

“Wow,” I said, momentarily stunned by this. “I did not need to know that.”

“Under the bleachers and everything. With a full moon and stars and everything. Very romantic.” She paused when she saw my expression, then sighed. “Look, Bella. From what I know of Jasper and Alice- and that’s pretty much only what I know of them from you, but still-, they’re not the kind of people who’d pressure you into lying down and thinking of England and all that.”

“Why would I think of England, we’re in-“

“Bella. Metaphor. My point is, you’re so nervous you’re literally trembling right now, and they’re going to pick up on that. Trust me,” she added, at my doubtful glance at her. “Sometimes it literally feels like Jasper’s knowing exactly what I’m feeling, y’know? So I don’t doubt that he’ll be able to pick up on how you, his girlfriend- or one of them, anyways- is feeling. And obviously Alice would never touch a single hair on your head. Well, not unless you wanted her to.”

If I flushed any more, Emmett’s prediction was going to become reality, and somebody really was going to pluck my head off my shoulders to make their homemade tomato sauce. Lauren laughed at my response, and I couldn’t really blame her by this point.

I ran an agitated hand through my hair, which was by that point almost brushing the bottom of my neck- I’d need a haircut, and soon. Maybe, a delirious little voice inside of my head said, Jasper and Alice are only into your for your hair, and if you grow it out they’ll leave you alone and you’ll never have to face the possibility of going to second base with anyone, ever.

“You’re right,” I said- to Lauren, not to the voice inside my head. “I’m overthinking this. What’ll happen will happen naturally, and I’m not going to screw things over because I feel like my skin’s going to burn off every time Alice or Jasper touch me.”

Lauren snorted. “Pussy.”

As I pulled into the Cullen’s driveway, I checked my phone. Some part of me knew I was stalling walking inside the house and going up the stairs and making everything seem even more real than it already was, but I told that part of me to shut its mouth as I opened my voicemail.

Mom’s voice flooded the interior of my truck immediately.

“Hey, baby,” she said, a slight crackle in the audio cutting off the last syllable. “So I know I said we’d come down to Forks immediately, but fifteen miles out from Neah Bay, there was this huge snowstorm- like nothing you’ve ever seen.”

I leaned forward in my seat, throat constricting.

“We had to turn back around and made it as far as Ozette- we’re staying at one of the cabins and waiting out the storm, but we’re not sure how long it’s going to take for it to pass. If I don’t make it in time for your surgery, I want you to know that I love you so much and that you’re going to be just fine, okay? We’ll get back on the road as soon as possible. Paul sends his-“

The message ended abruptly after that. I leaned back against my seat, unsure what to think. Ozette was an hour away from Neah Bay, which would’ve been more calming had it not been for the fact that vampires could apparently reach superhuman speeds, and that the rogue agent of the Volturi had built up a newborn army that would undoubtedly need copious amounts of blood to strengthen themselves.

Still, I figured she was safer in Ozette than in Neah Bay- maybe even safer than in Forks, since Ozette had even less people than Forks did, and I was pretty sure that the hundred or so people that lived in Ozette full-time wouldn’t be enough to satisfy the urges of the vampire army- probably not even enough to draw attention from them, or so I tried to tell myself.

Ignoring the undercurrent of worry coursing through me, I clambered out of the car and approached the front door, feeling not unlike how Marie Antoinette must’ve felt as she approached the guillotine. I positioned my hand against the door and then paused mid-air, the knock suspended as I debated the pros and cons of sprinting off into the woods and living the rest of my life as a virginal hermit in a cave.

The front door made its decision for me as it suddenly swung open. In the doorway was Rosalie, looking down at me with a scowl that made me wither in my shoes.

“I can literally smell your indecisiveness from across the house, you know that?” She asked me, evidently rhetorically, because she didn’t allow me to answer.  “Or maybe that’s sweat. Whatever. Go upstairs to Jasper’s room; he and Alice have been waiting for you for a while.”

Mr. Grey will see you now, I thought hysterically to myself as I slowly climbed up the staircase. I inched down the hallway at a glacier’s pace, but all too soon I was staring at Jasper’s door. Taking a deep breath, I knocked on the door before pushing it open.

“Bella!” Alice cried happily, sitting up from where she’d been lounging on Jasper’s bed. “I’m so glad you showed up. We were just deciding which movie we were going to watch.”

Wait, what?

Jasper’s head poked out from behind his TV suddenly, curls in a disarray as he beamed at me.

“I’m just setting up the DVD player now. It’s a tie between Lord of the Rings and It’s A Wonderful Life- both masterpieces in their own right, you know.”

I felt more gobsmacked than I had in my entire life, including when they both confessed their vampirism to me.

“So we’re not hooking up, then?” I blurted out, before pressing my hands to my mouth. Alice and Jasper gave me startled, deer-in-the-headlight looks. If either of them had blood in their body, I felt sure that they would’ve been blushing as badly as I was.

“I thought we were going to talk,” Jasper said, after his mouth opened and closed like a fish. “While we watched a movie or something.”

“Yeah, talk!” I said in protest, feeling very foolish and not only a little mortified. “As in talk, not talk!”

“You remind me a little of this girl that used to be in the room next to mine in the insane asylum,” Alice said dreamily, before hastening to add, “but much prettier, of course,” when she saw the expression on my face.

“Do you want to… ‘hook up’?” Jasper asked hesitantly, the phrase fitting strangely into his mouth, and I suddenly remembered that Jasper was born only a hundred and twelve or so years after America officially became a country.

“Can we watch the movie first, if we do?” Alice asked, peering owlishly at me. “I’ve been wanting to watch the Lord of the Rings for a while, but I never found the time.”

An uncontrollable laugh burst from my lips.

“Yeah,” I said, after I realized they were both sincerely waiting for a response. “Yeah, we can.”

Something warm rushed over me as I watched them prop Jasper’s pillows against his wall for optimal Lord-of-the-Ring-watching conditions, easing the anxiety I felt from earlier. The warmth turned molten as Peter Jackson’s name appeared onscreen and I felt Alice suddenly lift my legs to place over her lap, Jasper positioning himself to be used as a pillow as I rested my head against his shoulder.

“Bella,” Alice said after a while of engrossed silence.

“Yeah?” I mumbled, tearing my eyes away from Frodo to look up at her.

“Not to sound like the ingenue, but is ‘talking’ slang for ‘hooking up’ now? Because I told my chemistry teacher that I wanted to talk to her after school about one of my projects, and I don’t want her to get the wrong idea.”

I could hear Lauren Mallory laughing at me.

Chapter Text

I wasn’t even aware that I’d fallen asleep, but when consciousness slowly seeped into my sleep-addled brain, the sun was setting and somebody was stroking my hair. I sighed contentedly, arching into the touch. The only thing that made me question whether cutting nearly all my hair off in that airport months ago was the fact that it would be harder for people to play with my hair, but I’d reasoned with myself that nobody was very likely to play with my hair to begin with.

Apparently, I was wrong, because I could feel Jasper’s fingers very distinctly scratching at my scalp. From where I groggily bleared at her, Alice was still engrossed in the movie- or I suppose the trilogy; they’d evidently finished the first while I was dozing and was well off into the second-, my calves pressing against her stomach.

“What time is it?” I murmured, my voice sounding too loud to my own ears. Jasper’s fingers stilled, and I made a noise of protest in response.

“Don’t stop,” I said. I didn’t have to be looking at him to know he was smiling as his fingers began stroking my hair once more.

“It’s almost six,” he said. “You can sleep for a while longer, if you’d like. I’m sure Charlie wouldn’t mind.”

“You could sleep over, if you’d like,” Alice offered, eyes still locked on the screen. I felt myself flush almost instantly; as far as I knew, the Cullens didn’t have any spare bedrooms- not that the six bedrooms they did have weren’t impressive in and of themselves, but it would mean I’d be sharing a bed with either Alice or Jasper, and I wasn’t sure which one was worse.

As if reading my thoughts, Jasper laughed. “We don’t sleep, remember? You could take your pick of Alice’s or my bed.”

“Oh. Right.” I said, unsure if I was disappointed or relieved. I supposed I could ask Jasper, but I didn’t want to humiliate myself more than I already had. “I should probably ask Charlie if it’s okay, then. And, to be honest, I’m starving- I’ll need to pick up some food from the grocery store, and-“

“Bella,” Alice interrupted gently. “We have a fully stocked pantry and fridge. You don’t need to go anywhere.”

I stared at her, the gears in my head turning sluggishly. “But you guys don’t exactly snack on Cheetos when you’re hungry, right?”

“It’s for you, of course,” Jasper said. I shook my head, still not getting it, and he heaved a sigh, though there was a smile on his face. “After you came over the first time, we wanted to be as prepared as possible to keep up appearances, since we expected you’d be coming over a great deal more often afterwards.”

“Pretty presumptuous of you,” I teased, but I was touched. I knew the Cullens had enough money to blow on groceries and all that, but somebody had to go out and buy them with me specifically in mind, and just the thought made my chest feel warm and tight at the same time.

“So is that a yes to the sleepover, then?” Alice asked, brushing a stray lock of hair away from my face. The gesture was so tender that my throat constricted, and it took me a few seconds to grab my phone and dial Charlie’s number.

He picked up after the third ring.

“Bella, where are you?” He asked, sounding worried, and I winced. As per usual, being in Alice and Jasper’s presences had made me forget to ask if I could even go to their house in the first place.

“At the Cullens’,” I said apologetically. “I forgot to tell you- Jasper and I have, uh, an AP Literature project we need to finish by tonight. It’s going to take a while longer, so I might end up sleeping over at their house, if that’s okay?”

Charlie was silent for a good while, which didn’t inspire much confidence in me. Finally he said, “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea, Bella.”

“If I promised you we weren’t taking amphetamines, would that make you feel any better?”

He huffed out a laugh, before he got serious again. “It’s just- Bella, there’s been a few murders up at Neah Bay, which isn’t too far from here, and call me paranoid, but I don’t feel comfortable with you out there in the woods all alone. Even with the Cullens.”

I tensed. Jasper and Alice, who’d been listening in on the phone call, became so still that if I didn’t know any better, I would’ve thought they’d been literally petrified into stone.

“Neah Bay?” I asked finally. “Did you know that Mom was-“

“There with your stepdad?” Charlie guessed tiredly. “Yeah, but as far as I’m aware, she hasn’t been found murdered with two unexplainable holes in her-“

“In her…?” I asked, but I already knew the answer. “She’s not there anymore, anyways. She and Paul are in Ozette.”

“Ozette?” Charlie repeated, sounding genuinely startled. “Why is she in Ozette? It doesn’t have a single hotel, s’far as I know.”

“They were stuck in a snowstorm on their way there,” I lied- partially, anyway-, and thanking whatever God was listening that I’d called her in the first place.

“Huh. Well, good for them,” Charlie said, and it almost didn’t sound bitter, which was a big accomplishment when it came to anything pertaining Mom and Paul. “Still, Bella, I don’t know about letting you stay over there- I mean… look, you’re still with Jasper and Alice, right?”

The blood rushed to my face so quickly I felt a little dizzy. This was the second time in less than a week that somebody referenced my relationship with Jasper and Alice with them in the same room, and it was just as mortifying the second time around.

“Dad. You’re kidding.”

“I’m really not, kiddo,” Charlie said, sounding amused. “But I know you’re a smart girl and you wouldn’t do anything I wouldn’t do, right?”

“If I agree, will it get me out of this conversation faster?” I asked, resolutely ignoring Alice’s muffled laughter from the other end of the couch.

“Be home tomorrow morning, okay? Promise.”

He never got this overly protective, and it was a little disconcerting. Still, I promised him I’d see him bright and early tomorrow, before he finally allowed me to end the call. I retook my position slumped against Jasper’s shoulder and groaned.

“Your dad is adorable,” Alice said, rubbing her thumb in distracting little circles against my leg.

“Adorable is not the word I’d use,” I said, my voice muffled by the fabric of Jasper’s shirt. “Embarrassing as all hell, maybe, but not adorable.”

“Was he right, though?” Jasper asked, and I turned my head to look at him in confusion.

“He said that you’re too smart to do anything he wouldn’t do,” Jasper clarified, pushing his hair out of his eyes as he looked down at me. “So would being curled up next to two vampires be something he wouldn’t do, do you think?”

A startled laugh burst through my lips. “Um, I don’t know about that. He always had a thing for Lucy Westenra in Dracula, so he probably would actually.”

My smile faded when I recalled the less pleasant portion of my conversation with Charlie. “So. Murder victims. They’re getting more bold, aren’t they?”

“I’m just glad your mother got out in time,” Alice said earnestly. “And despite what Charlie thinks, Neah Bay is a good long while from here. It’s big enough to think that they’re not going to make plans to invade Forks or anything, at least.”

“So all we have to worry about is the Volturi banging on your door, then,” I said, false-cheerily.

“Bella,” Jasper said quietly, looking at me with an expression I couldn’t quite pin down. “Don’t worry. We’re going to be fine. It takes more than a pack of newborns to kill the Volturi’s army.”

“I’m not worried about the Volturi,” I muttered quietly. “I’m worried about you guys. What if- what if Carlisle’s right, and they attempt to recruit you? What if I’m around when they do, and they try to hurt you because of me? What if- if-“

But I couldn’t blurt out another awful hypothetical right then, because that was the moment that Jasper decided to lean over and kiss me.

I’d kissed people before- Casey Gilles in sixth grade, when we were all gathered in her basement playing Spin-the-Bottle, and then Benny Thurman behind the gym in ninth grade, in the most obvious way possible as I attempted to show off my supposed heterosexuality to the rest of our classmates-, but none of them had been a centuries-old vampire/potential underwear model; at least, not as far as I was aware.  I could feel him containing his strength so that he wouldn’t hurt me, but my lips felt fairly swollen- not unpleasantly so, but still swollen- by the time he pulled away.

I could barely catch my breath before Alice was cupping the back of my neck and pulling me forward, replacing Jasper’s lips with her own. She was more gentle, in a way, her touch a little less insistent, tongue a little less prodding and prone to causing my heart to skyrocket out of my chest, but I still had to grab her shoulder for balance when she finally pulled away, almost toppling completely into her lap as I did so.

“Holy shit,” I breathed, unsure who to point my wide-eyed look at. When I dazedly touched my lips, they felt just as wet and swollen as I’d imagined. “Holy shit. You guys actually- wow. Okay. This is cool. I’m cool.”

“Are you calmer now?” Alice asked serenely, looking a little less affected by the kiss than I might’ve liked as she leaned back against the cushions, but the twitch of her mouth gave her away.

“’Serene’ isn’t the word I’d use,” I said, repeating the phrase from earlier just to see her grin. “But, um. I think I’m still a little on edge, actually. I might need you guys to do that again- to calm me down, you know?”

It sounded cheesy as hell to my own ears, but Jasper was smiling as he drew my face closer to his once again.

I ended up sleeping in Alice’s room- her bed was slightly larger, large enough to fit the three of us comfortably when I shyly asked if they’d stay with me while I slept.

“But we didn’t even do manicures yet!” Alice had whined as I crawled into her bed, though she still curled up beside me as I dozed off to sleep. I had vague dreams throughout the night, some frightening- with Nosferatu-esque vampires looming over Alice, Jasper and I-, some painfully normal- going shopping with Mom at the grocery store back in Phoenix-, but all of them made me wake up at different points in the middle of the night, breathing heavily as though I’d just ran a mile.

“Shh,” Jasper would murmur, smoothing the hair away from my sweaty forehead (which I was far too out of it to be particularly embarrassed). Alice said nothing, but tightened her grip as I laid back down beside her, and it was the slight constriction that wasn’t really constricting at all which allowed me to doze back into an undisturbed sleep.

When I woke up, though, they were both gone. Which was to be expected- I probably wasn’t a very entertaining sight to look at for several consecutive hours, drooling on Alice’s pillow with hair in my mouth, but I still felt a little lonely as I eased myself out of her bed. I had somehow wrestled off my pants in the middle of the night, overheated even with the combination of Alice and Jasper’s freezing body temperatures, so I grabbed them off the floor and smoothed down my hair with my hand (I really did have to get another haircut one of these days), attempting to look as presentable as possible before I went downstairs.

As I tentatively peeked out the door, a smell wafted up the stairs and down the hallway, and I couldn’t help but sigh in appreciation. Somebody was making eggs downstairs, and I could hear the distinctive sizzle of meat strips on the pan as I wandered downstairs.

Emmett and Rosalie were curled up on the couch downstairs, watching a movie on the flatscreen, and I heard Emmett snicker as I passed.

“You three have fun up there last night?” He asked loudly, and I wasn’t feeling so daring to physically flip him the bird, but I did so in my head as I entered the kitchen. Esme was at the stove, humming a quiet song under her breath while Carlisle stood behind her, pressing a kiss to the back of her neck. It was so intimate, such a display of domestic affection after what was probably literal decades of marriage, that I immediately felt like an intruder even as Carlisle turned his head to smile at me.

“Bella! How did you sleep last night?” He asked, sounding genuinely interested in the answer, and I found myself marveling at how chipper he was at 8:00 A.M. in the morning until I realized that he, like all the others, didn’t suffer with a bone-tired human body every morning.

“Uh, just fine,” I said, when he was expecting more of an answer than the caveman grunt I was preparing to muster. “Alice’s bed is huge. I mean, for one person. Yeah. I mean, who else would be in there? Not that I’m insinuating that anyone was in there, I just-“

I stopped myself short when I saw Esme’s shoulders shake with barely suppressed laughter, wishing the ground would swallow me up whole as I took a seat at the countertop table. Carlisle’s lips were pressed so tightly together they were white, and I expected if he still had blood in his body, his face would’ve turned purple at the exertion it took to hold in his own laughter.

“Don’t worry, I know what you mean,” Esme said as she turned around, holding a pan of scrambled eggs in her left hand and a china plate in her right. She scraped the eggs onto the plate before setting it back down and grabbing the pan beside it in a seamless gesture that I couldn’t help but admire. Martha Stewart, eat your heart out.

“Good, because I don’t,” I muttered lowly, jumping a little when she laughed again- the super-hearing thing was undoubtedly going to get annoying. As she lifted the pan, I could see the unmistakable red streaks of bacon, and I tensed a little.

“Is that-?”

“It’s turkey,” Esme said, smiling. “It was either that or vegan bacon, and I’m not sure how that managed to become a thing in the first place, so I stuck with the safer choice.”

“Thanks for making all this for me,” I told her as she set the plate in front of me, breathing the smell of breakfast foods in deep. Since I first started living at Charlie’s, neither he nor I could attempt to make anything more than a half-assed breakfast of cereal or oatmeal, so this was a nice change. “You really didn’t have to, you know- I’d be fine with a granola bar and some orange juice.”

Carlisle and Esme exchanged a look over my head.

“We want you to feel at home here, Bella,” Carlisle said softly, and I shoved a forkful of eggs in my mouth so I wouldn’t have to reply.

After I swallowed, I asked, “Where’s Jasper and Alice?’

“Getting their own breakfast,” Carlisle said, and it took me an embarrassingly long amount of time before I realized what he was hinting at.

“Oh,” I said, and stuffed my face some more, which was evidently a pretty good way to avoid being expected to respond to my own idiocy.

“Do you have anywhere you need to be?” Esme asked in concern, and I found myself feeling genuinely disappointed as I nodded, scraping the last of the food off my plate as I did so.

“I promised Charlie I’d come home early. Will you tell them that I’ll- um, that I’ll see them in class on Monday?” It sounded excessively formal considering all that transpired between the three of us last night, but I wasn’t about to say anything more in front of Carlisle and Esme.

“Of course,” Carlisle responded smoothly, picking up my plate and heading over to the sink. “It was good to have you over, Bella.”

“Drive safe,” Esme said.

When I pulled into the driveway of my house, I spotted Jacob’s car parked across the street almost immediately. Frowning, I checked the time on my phone. It was only 8:30- definitely too early for a house call, but maybe that was just the fact that I was still groggy as all hell talking.

When I entered the house, I saw Charlie and Jacob sitting on the couch, completely transfixed by a football game on the television, but when I cleared my throat Jacob sat up immediately, looking almost guilty as he did so.

“Bright and early, just like you said,” I told Charlie, who smiled at me from over his shoulder.

“Glad to see it. Jake here’s been waiting for the past fifteen minutes to see you, and I didn’t want to disappoint him by having you slink back home at one in the afternoon. How did the project go, by the way?”

“Project? Wh- oh, yeah. It went fine.”

“Doesn’t sound like it was at the forefront of your mind,” Charlie said, his brow furrowing, and I hastily beckoned to Jacob to follow me upstairs.

“Sorry-Dad-gotta-go,” I said in a rush, waiting until Jacob got off the couch before I bounded upstairs to avoid any further line of questioning. Jacob trailed after me, closing the door as I laid down on my bed with a groan.

“What are you doing here?” I asked drowsily, rubbing a hand over my eyes. “Not that I’m not glad to see you, obviously, but it’s practically the ass-crack of dawn, and I’m surprised to see a growing teenage boy such as yourself awake before noo-”

“We need to talk,” Jacob interrupted, and I propped myself up on my elbows. I didn’t get a good look at him on the couch, but what I saw now was pretty concerning. He looked far paler than usual, his face covered in a fine sheen of sweat that made me want to get a wet paper towel and start rubbing like an exasperated mother.

“Sit down,” I said, patting the spot on the bed beside me, but he shook his head.

“Bella, there’s something I need to tell you,” he said, his voice more serious than I ever heard of him. I gave him a panicked once-over. Was it cancer? Leukemia? No- it couldn’t have been either of those things; Charlie wouldn’t have sounded so casual if it was, he would’ve given me a warning. Girl problems? Boy problems? As dramatic as sixteen-year-old boys were, he looked a little too serious for it to be anything as trivial as that.

“What is it?” I asked, not sure if I wanted to know the answer. He shut his eyes tight before opening them and looking at my face with a pensive expression.

“Promise me you won’t freak out,” he said, and I had to refrain from laughing out loud. I’d freaked out so much in the past twenty-four hours alone, I wasn’t sure there was anything in me that could startle easily anymore.

“I promise,” I said, when he gave me an expectant look.

“I didn’t know who else I could tell, but I knew I couldn’t just keep it to myself, and I-“

“Jake, just spit it out.”

“I’m a werewolf," He said, eyes shut tight as his hands balled into fists at his side.

I stared at him. When I was sure that he wasn’t pulling my leg, I relaxed against my pillows.

“Is that all?” I asked, a wave of relief washing over me. He gave a disbelieving laugh, eyes flying open to stare at me in incredulity. 

“Is that a- seriously, Bella? I confess that I’m a supernatural creature and your response is, ‘is that all?’”

“Sure. I mean, it’s just part-time, right? You’re not a full canine or anything, so as far as I’m concerned, you’re good in my book. I’m not sure how I would housebreak you, otherwise.”

He gave me an annoyed look.

“This isn’t funny! This is serious- and you know what else?”

“What else?”

“The Cullens are vampires. Exactly like I said they were, and you just brushed me off, and it was only when my dad told me what was going on last night that I realized I was right all along,” He said accusingly, though whether his veiled accusation was addressed to me for not believing him, or to himself for not sticking with his gut, I didn't know.

“Jake,” I said, as soothingly as I could manage, “I already know. They told me a few days ago.”

“They what?”

“Also, there may or may not be an rogue vampire army emerging in Neah Bay to have an epic battle to the death with the Italian vampire government,” I said, watching his face avidly as his expression changed from confusion to horror.

“What?”

“You sound like a broken record,” I said, amused, then slightly less amused when he gave me a withering look in return. “They’re not only for Italian vampires- they’re for all vampires. Sorry, should’ve been more clearer on that part.”

“Rogue vampire army?” Jacob repeated in wonder.

“Werewolves?” I asked, shaking my head as his words finally started to dawn on me, past the general grogginess and exhaustion.

“You go first,” Jacob said stubbornly, crossing his arms over his chest. 

“Fine,” I relented, knowing he wasn't going to budge an inch. “But you’re really going to want to sit down for this.”