Disclaimer: I do not own Alice, or any part of Twilight. I am making no money off of this. I am poor.


She was born twenty three minutes after the new year began, ushering in 1901 with the frenzied joy that accompanies a new born child. After trying, and failing, to conceive a child, Walter and Clara Brandon had turned to modern medicine. They spent years going from physician to physician, spending their life savings on new age remedies. Eventually, after their money was gone and the last bottle of fertility tonic was empty Walter and Clara gave up hope. A year passed and time began to take its toll on their relationship. Walter's law firm had lost a startling amount of cases in the past year, and could not afford to pay all of its workers. He had been losing business to the firm of Morrow and Scott, and now he had began to lose his employees too. He no longer had enough man power to win cases, and it would seem that Walter Brandon, LLC was going to be out of business in a few short months. Meanwhile, Clara had begun to look after her sister's children. What at first seemed like a good idea had revealed itself to be a rather bad one. Clara hoped that being around Nellie's children would help fill the void that her infertility had created. Yet, to be so close to something that you want so badly--to hold it in your arms and read it stories, to look it in the eyes and see everything you can't have--is a most sublime form of torture that Clara became well acquainted with. Nothing seemed to fill the vast emptiness that Clara lived in. It had begun to consume her, and she was slowly wasting away.

Suddenly, everything changed. Clara discovered she was pregnant. She and Walter were in disbelief. They had let go of their dreams of having a child. They had reassured themselves that fate never intended them to have a family. And with these false reassurances, they had let go of hope. But somehow Clara had become pregnant, and with this miracle the Brandons began to hope again. With this hope came dreams; they dreamed their child would be a doctor or a world explorer. They dreamed of infinite futures for their unborn child. This child would be one of the most well taken care of children in all of Mississippi, they decided, because fate had given them what they wanted most in the world: a family. Yes, the Brandons decided, it would seem that fate was not as cruel as they had thought.

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Clara had been in labor for almost six hours when bells began to chime, announcing the beginning of 1901. Biloxi had been experiencing torrential rainstorms all day, masking the presence of time in an all consuming darkness. For all Clara knew she could had been in labor for days, not hours. Another horrible pain racked her body and Clara screamed.

"You're almost ready Mrs. Brandon, you're doing good." Doctor Hason looked to the nurses, "Where's Alice?" he asked.

The nurses made eye contact with each other. A nonverbal exchange between the two made it seem as if the shorter one had lost. She patted her pompadour, looked from Clara lying in bed to the doctor who had his stethoscope pressed to her stomach, and sighed; "I'll go get her," she said. There was something unsettling about Alice. All the nurses avoided her, and if confronted with this fact they'd stammer and say, "there's just something different about her, she's not quite right" . The short nurse cursed her luck as she made her way towards the nurse's station.

"Yes, Marge?" the lithe blonde sitting behind the counter asked.

"Dr. Hanson wants you in the maternity ward, the Brandon woman is about to give birth."

"Alright. Susan," the blonde said turning to the red headed woman next to her, "will you watch the station for me?"

Susan popped her gum and nodded slowly as Alice stood. Alice was an intimidating figure. She was tall, taller than majority of doctors that worked at St. Joseph's Hospital. Her blond hair was pulled back into a tight bun, which exaggerated her sharp features. She didn't talk to the other nurses unless it was necessary. People seemed to recoil from her presence and she found that it was best if she avoided contact with others. It had always been that way. Despite all this, Alice did exceedingly well with the patients. One touch of her cool hand to a patient's brow and their pain seemed to fade away. Her voice could make a dying man forget about the cold chill of death and take him back to the warm days of his youth. It was because of these special people skills that Alice did most of her work in the maternity ward, tending to the mothers and their newborn children. Entering the room Alice looked at the doctor.

"Ready Nurse?" he asked.

"Yes Doctor."

"Take your place by Mrs. Brandon."

Alice took a sponge and a pan of water over to Clara and began to wipe her brow as the woman in the bed moaned. Alice rung the sponge out in the pan and pressed it to Clara's brow, "Everything's going to be alright Mrs. Brandon. The baby will be here in no time. The first baby of the year, what a divine gift."

"Alright Mrs. Brandon," the Doctor said, "this baby is ready to come out now. When I say push I need you to concentrate all your effort on pushing. Ready Mrs. Brandon? Okay. Push."

And with all the effort Clara had left, she pushed. A scream tore lose from her throat and in the hallway Walter put his head farther into his hands. At Doctor Hanson's repeated prompting Clara put every fiber of her being in to pushing. She was exhausted, but exhilarated. She was going to have a family. At the end of the bed the doctor called the short nurse over and whispered something in her ear. The doctor spoke up, "You can relax Mrs. Brandon". Clara laid back onto the bed, panting. Alice spoke up from beside her,

"What is it, Doctor Hanson?"

He looked up at Alice, and then Clara. The doctor cleared his throat. "Mrs. Brandon, your baby is in breech position. We should be able to…" the doctors words seemed to fade. Clara's throat tightened. The doctor's lips moved but no sound was coming out. What was happening? Breech position? What was that? Could fate be cruel enough to take away her baby before she even had a chance to meet it? Clara's thoughts raced and she started to hyperventilate.

"Mrs. Brandon, Mrs. Brandon!" the doctor attempted to get Clara's attention, "Mrs. Brandon, I need you to breath! Alice, calm her down!"

Alice had put down the pan and the sponge, her hands went to Clara's. "Mrs. Brandon," she said forcefully as Clara's clouded gaze met hers, "I need you to focus. Breathe Mrs. Brandon."

Doctor Hanson put his stethoscope to Clara's stomach, pulling it away he said, "The baby is distress. You need to keep her calm, Alice."

Alice regathered Clara's hands into her own, she look Clara in the eye, "You can do this. The baby is going to be okay. It's just backwards, that's all. You can do this Mrs. Brandon."

"My baby…" Clara panted from the bed. She could hear the blonde woman, but not the doctor. What was happening to her?

"Will be just fine. You need to breathe Mrs. Brandon, for the baby," Alice said. For the baby. The room began to regain its shape before Clara's eyes and she could hear the doctor talking,

"Okay, Mrs. Brandon, when I say push, push. Ready Mrs. Brandon? Alright, now push."

And on the doctor's orders, Clara pushed, determined to deliver her baby. Clara heard Doctor Hanson's declaration of, "It's a girl!" and fell back on to the bed, exhausted. Next thing she knew Alice was placing the newborn girl into her arms, and Walter was by her side. The baby was the most beautiful thing they had ever seen. She had layer of fine black hair on the top of her head, and big blue eyes that were gazing up at her parents.

"A girl," Walter said, "she needs a name."

"Yes". Clara responded, not taking her eyes off the baby in her arms. She could not believe that she was holding their child in her arms. The whole experience seemed so surreal.

The couple sat in silence, gazing at their newborn child. The baby was struggling to keep her eyes open. Clara spoke, breaking the silence, "I think we should name her Alice."

"Alice? I'm not sure." Walter looked down at the girl, "What about Mary?"

"I don't know Walter," Clara sighed, looking down at the sleeping child, "Alice just feels right."

The couple stayed silent, admiring the newborn once more. "How about a compromise?" Walter asked. Receiving no response from Clara he continued, "What do you think about calling her Mary Alice?"

"Mary Alice Brandon," Clara said, testing the name out loud, looking upon the small child in her arms. "Mary Alice Brandon. Mary Alice. Our little Mary Alice." She looked down once more and smiled. "I like it," she said.

Walter smiled at his wife and dropped a kiss on to the top of her head. He turned his gaze back to their child, the little Mary Alice, and smiled. He was brought out of his revere by the short nurse, Marge, entering the room. She made her way over to the beaming couple, "What a beautiful baby! And what did you two decide to name her?"

"Mary Alice," Clara said, not taking her eyes off of the child.

"Oh," the short nurse was taken aback. Alice? As in Nurse Alice? Marge hoped not, she would never name a child after that odd woman. It just seemed to be asking for bad luck. Marge shook her head. She turned her attention back to the Brandons. "Mr. and Mrs. Brandon, I would like to present to you a certificate from Chrysanthemum Formulas. Every year they donate a certificate for a year's worth of free formula to the first baby born of the year. This year, on behalf of Chrysanthemum Formulas and St. Joseph's Hospital, I would like to present it to you, along with our warmest wishes for a happy new year."

Marge handed the gold embossed certificate to Walter and, with a final glance at the child, left the room. Walter looked at the certificate and then into the face of his wife. As Mary Alice lay in her mother's arms her parent gazed into each other's eyes. Time seemed to slow down. The storm thundering outside the window appeared to fade away as the Brandons sat inside the white washed hospital room. After everything that they had been through Walter and Clara Brandon finally had the family they always wanted. It seemed as if fate had smiled upon the Brandon family and that things could only get better from here.


A/N:

It looks like this is going to be a two chapter story, following Alice to her entry into the mental hospital. The next chapter should be up by the end of the week.

This is my first Twilight story. So please, tell me what you think: Review!