Author's Note: I know a lot of people didn't like BD, and I wanted to throw my own spin on a couple of things. Let's forget about any wedding happenings or details in Eclipse, such as Billy and Jacob receiving their wedding invitation and Jacob running away. This is another take in BD, some silly thing drawn up in my own head, and hopefully you'll like it. Sorry this chapter isn't terribly original, but it's needed to get the story along. Thanks.

Chapter 1
"The Trick is To Keep Breathing"

My heart thudded loudly in my chest. I could feel it, pressing heavily against my rip cage, threatening to explode and leave me dead, a lifeless lump of cold flesh on the soggy ground. Why did I have to go through this? Couldn't Edward leave it be? Maybe we could, should simply elope, run away together to some scanty wedding chapel in Vegas like Charlie and Renee managed when they were together – albeit briefly. They'd never have to know, and I wouldn't have to go through this. Not here, not now.

Edward eyed me cautiously from his peripheral vision. He could feel my tense posture, the hammering in my chest. I fought to swallow the lump that had formed in my throat.

Marriage is such a big step. A huge step, really. And while I know, I absolutely know that I want to spend every minute of every waking day by Edward's side, the simple thought of admitting this to Charlie made me cringe. I can't do it. And Jacob… My heart ached.

"What are you thinking?" Edward asked me. His eyebrows were knitted together, more concern. It radiated off of him like the cold from his skin. I forced what little smile I could.

"Oh, nothing," I lied, regretting it almost instantly, knowing that he could see right through any façade I put up. "…Actually, I'm thinking that we should just elope. Let's go to Vegas! And nobody has to know."

He smiled his crooked smile. "You'd do that to Alice?" He squeezed my hand, the cold of his touch oddly comforting. I leaned my head against his shoulder and sighed. He was right, trying to back me in between a rock and a hard place. There wasn't any getting out of this. Not that I could see, at least.

In all my years – all 18 of them, gloriously short compared to the lifetime that Edward has lived, all under the shadow of his secret, the secret of being a Vampire – I never imagined myself walking down the isle. Not the way that most girls think of it, how they see it. The perfect painting of a foufy white dress, flowers, hair and make-up and men in tuxedos – it just never came to me like that. Maybe it was some subconscious thinking, my way of hiding from the absence of married parents, but I doubted it. I was fine with my parents being divorced – they simply didn't belong together, and you can't force love. Just like I couldn't force the magnets together… for long, at least.

But I could see it now, see the painting Alice was trying to compose for me, though still hiding most aspects. She'd purchased me a wedding dress already and while it was completely beautiful, it still had my nerves tightly balled in my stomach. A wedding, marriage… me? It just didn't seem like it fit together quite right. But Edward and I? We fit together perfectly. It didn't matter that we were worlds different – not in the sense that we knew nothing about one another, but because we are different. I'm human, a frail and breakable human. Edward… he's a vampire. A beautiful, perfect, untouchable vampire. A lion who fell in love with a lamb.

I knew from the very first moment I set eyes on him and his family, all alike in their milky, icy cold complexions and topaz eyes, that they were different somehow. But they didn't frighten me, not at all. In fact, I wanted to be closer to them. Well, not all of them. Just him mostly. I loved Edward from the get-go, though I might not have admitted it entirely.

And just like that, we were together. Well, not just like that. There were sketchy times, some trial periods. Edward had to save my life, not once, but more than a handful of times. He saved me from being crushed to death by a car, saved me from a sick, sadistic vampire hell bent on my blood. He was the hunter, and I was the hunted. But I was still alive, somehow. I was still alive, thanks to Edward and his family. A family of vampires.

But they weren't bad vampires. Not at all, in fact, they called themselves Vegetarians – a little inside joke that I was well aware of. While it's true that vampires drink blood to survive, they don't have to drink human blood. That's why they called themselves vegetarians. They chose to drink the blood of animals rather than to take the life of humans, whether they deserved it or not. They were the good among the bad, soulful creatures intent on making the world a better place, somehow.

And I loved them. I loved them all, especially Edward's "sister," Alice, who was my best friend. And she was the devious mastermind behind the huge wedding celebration for Edward and I, the reason why we couldn't just leave today and jump a plane to Vegas. She was the reason I was stuck in between that rock and hard place.

We were sitting on the soft in Charlie's house, the small two-bedroom place he'd purchased with my mother when they were first married. I didn't want to imagine the look on his face when I told him what was going on, that Edward and I were going to be married. The simple thought of his anger washed over me and spread like ice water over my limbs. This wasn't going to be pleasant.

"What are you thinking about? Honestly, now. It's killing me." Edward stared at me, his amber gold eyes deep with concern. He couldn't read my mind like others, and it annoyed him greatly. Sometimes it annoyed me, too. It'd be so much easier if he could pick my thoughts and feelings out of my head, rather than having me express them. I was a lot like Charlie – quiet, keeping mostly to myself. That is, until I met Edward. He brought so much out of me, so much good. I could talk to him, but it was still difficult at times.

And not to mention, I didn't want to hurt his feelings by expressing my fear. But there was something he had to understand. My father wasn't going to take this well at all.

Or maybe he already understood that. I wouldn't doubt it, seeing as how his sister, Alice, could pull the scenario out of the air with her ability to see into the future. Although her visions were not 100% set in stone – things change, and so did the future – I wasn't willing, and neither was anyone else for that matter, to bet against Alice.

The antique ring on my finger, my gift from Edward that had once belonged to his mother all but a century ago, weighed on my hand like a bag of bricks. I fidgeted, unsure of myself. I wasn't unsure about my decision. I love Edward. Every fiber of my being loves Edward. I just didn't know what to say.

"I just… I don't know," I said, frowning. I could feel my eyebrows pulled together, the pucker of flesh in between them. "I'm worried."

"We're doing this backwards, I'll admit. I should've asked Charlie beforehand instead of springing this on him. But… I think, in all honesty, that it'll be easier this way. He can't reject me if you've already made up your mind, and he knows that."

The sound of tires against the brick driveway thudded in my ears. A blank whirring sound came from the cruiser as Charlie pulled up to the house, and it seemed like the world was standing still.

My throat went dry, numb. I couldn't swallow. I began to shake, my hands twitching anxiously on my lap. Edward grabbed my hands and rubbed them, trying to make me warmer, to calm me down. But he had no body heat to speak of.

"Calm down, Bella. Breathe. Relax."

The car door slammed shut. I could hear Charlie's heavy footfall on the cement path that led up to the front door of the small house we lived in. He knew Edward was here – the shiny silver Volvo parked in front of the house was a dead indicator of his presence – and I was sure he wasn't too happy about it. Charlie was upset with Edward after he and his family left me, and I kind-of lost my mind until he came back. He treated him poorly ever since.

Edward squeezed my hands, a kind of reassurance. I licked my lips, preparing myself. The front door swung open, and Charlie thumped inside.

"Charlie, could we speak with you for a moment?" Edward called out to my father and Charlie, still dressed in his police uniform, his boots wet from the rain-sodden ground, turned towards us. He walked into the living room, eyeing us skeptically.

I could feel my heart going haywire, my palms becoming slick and clammy. "Dad…"

"Bella?" he asked, placing himself, not gently, in the worn chair he favored. "What's going on?"

He didn't notice the ring. My head started to pound.

"Dad… we're… Edward and I, we want your blessing, Dad." I wasn't sure that I was actually breathing. My chest hurt so bad. "We want to get married."

I watched as his face reddened, an unsaid anger boiling under the surface. "…What?" His eyes darted from me, to Edward, and down to our hands. It was then that he noticed the shiny ring on my finger. His face went from red to white as a sheet. Was that sweat beading on his forehead?

"Charlie, I love Bella. I love her more than anything in this world, and I want to be with her for the rest of my existence. If I didn't have her, I'd have nothing, Charlie. And for some reason, Bella feels the same about me. Maybe we did this wrong. It would've been the gentlemanly thing to step aside with you and ask you for her hand, but we've already known, like an unspoken promise, that we were meant to be together. We're asking you now for your blessing."

Charlie's lips had gone white. His hands were starting to tremble and shake. There was a fury in his eyes like none I had ever experience before, and my stomach knotted. This was not going well.

"I don't like this. I don't like this at all." Charlie was finally speaking, his voice low and aggravated. "You two are too young for this! You've got your whole lives ahead of you. I know from experience that young love rarely works out! Why would you want to go through something like that, Bella?"

"Dad!" I said, though not unkindly. I knew what he was saying, I understood. Charlie and Renee rushed headfirst into an unfit marriage. They weren't entirely right for one another, but he wasn't over her to this very day, even after she broke his heart and left with me when I was only a few months old. I understood his pain, and I felt for him. He was trying to protect me.

Edward shook his head. I knew he could read my father's head, but didn't dare say anything of his thoughts aloud. It was a secret that only I knew. Except for a few others. Jacob. My heart ached.

"Listen, Charlie. We understand what you're saying, and we know that we're young and that we're taking a risk, but it's a risk we have to take."

"What about Jacob, Bella?" Charlie stared at me with wide eyes, eyes so much like my own. That name spoken out loud stole the air from my lungs that were already starved from my hyperventilating. "I thought you liked Jacob, Bella. Have you really thought this through?" He was ignoring Edward now.

I could feel the soft rumbling in Edward's chest and knew that he was upset, annoyed. My relationship with Jacob was complicated, difficult, and thinking of him made my heart shatter. I love Jacob, but not the same way that I love Edward. Charlie bringing it up hurt me, like a slap to the face.

"It's not the same, Dad. Please. Please understand. I want to be with Edward."

He sniffed. Edward squeezed my hands tighter. His body was stiff, his back ramrod straight beside me.

Charlie's eyes raked over Edward, taking in his face, the sincerity with an undertone of hurt in his eyes. Bringing up Jacob was a low blow. "You're throwing away your life, Bella."

"I'm not!" I protested. Was I, though? Would I honestly be throwing my life away by marrying Edward, my soul mate, my one reason for being alive. He'd saved me in more ways than one. He'd saved my life, protected me from harm, even when it came from my own two feet. And he also saved my soul. He loved me. Edward Cullen loved me, and I loved him back.

But I also loved Jacob Black, my best friend, the reason I was able to keep some shred of myself after Edward had ripped himself away from me, trying to protect me from what he considered his own monstrosity, the curse he was forced to live with with being a Vampire. I didn't care about that. None of it.

"We're going to get married, Dad, with or without your blessing. But I want it, Charlie. I want you to be the one to walk me down the isle. I love you, Dad. Please… please just listen and try to understand." Could he read my eyes, the messages I was trying to convey to him?

He huffed impatiently and brought himself to stand. "You're throwing your life away, Bella. At least Jacob never hurt you, not like Edward has. I've kept quiet about it for your sake, but I guess now's a good of time as any to bring that up. I don't think you two are a wise match, but if it means keeping you in my life, Bella, I suppose I have to accept it. I don't have to like it, though, so don't expect me to be teary eyed and sobbing at your wedding."

I just nodded, biting back the bile that threatened to spill from my mouth. I knew he wouldn't take it well, I just knew it. Edward squeezed my hands a little harder.

"I won't let you down, Charlie," he said, his voice soft and kind, despite the anger and rudeness my father had just thrown at him. "I'll always take care of Bella."

My father huffed again and stomped out of the room without another word. And I laid my head on Edward's shoulder and sobbed.