Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight, and I do not own Sam's Club (duh)...You know, it's kinda funny. I really didn't like Breaking Dawn, yet I'm still writing and reading fanficiton for it...weird...
I opened my eyes to the watery sunlight. Only a few rays had managed to break through the clouds and light up my small bedroom. Edward was sitting on my rocking chair in the corner. A small box was sitting in his lap. I groaned, thinking of all the horrible clothes Alice could have stuffed in the box. I shuddered
"Rise and shine, Bella. Our flight is today." Edward proclaimed as he stood up. He set the box on the seat of the chair and was by my side in a second. Literally.
"Oh!" I exclaimed as I sat up. Edward and his family were going to Europe on vacation, and I was invited to come along. When Esme first asked me to join them, I had protested. I claimed that it was a family vacation. At once she flew into a rage; well, not exactly a rage since Esme is physically incapable at being mad at someone, but her words were said with feeling none the less.
"Bella! How dare you not consider yourself one of the family." She paused to take a breath, and I dived for a chance to interrupt.
"Esme, I-" I tried to explain my reasoning.
She cut me off, though. "No, Bella. You and Edward are going to be married soon, and if marriage to my son doesn't guarantee a place in this family, I don't know what would!"
I tried going for a different tactic. "You know how I don't like Edward or you to spend money on me, and this trip will cost a fortune!" I could tell even before I reached the end of my sentence that this reason would work as well as my previous one.
Esme crossed her arms over her chest. "If you are going to be a Cullen, then you must realize that Edward is going to spoil you a little." She smiled. "What's the point of having so much money if you can't spend it on someone you love." She elbowed me playfully in the ribs, taking care not to hurt me. "And Edward loves you very much." Her grinned widened as my signature blush spread across my cheeks.
In the end Esme won, and I agreed to go to Europe with the Cullens. Oh boy.
I was drawn back to the present as Edward placed a kiss on my lips that made me go limp. "Europe, here we come!" A smile played across my face, and I saw an answering one on Edward's face.
"I'm so glad you agreed to this. You won't regret it, I promise." He smiled his crooked smile, and scooped me up in his arms. He sat down on the rocking chair and set me on his lap. Reaching behind him, he pulled out the box I had seen earlier.
Edward chuckled as he saw my expression. "Edward," I said sternly. "I'm agreeing to this 'spend money on Bella' for a little while, but this is ridiculous. I mean, you're already taking me to Europe,"
He cut in, "We were already going, and you're so light we can stuff you in my suitcase to save on air fare." I sighed at his joke and continued with what I had been saying.
"Anyways, whatever is in that box is going to be too much money and-" This time I interrupted myself. He was laughing. I looked down at myself to make sure he wasn't laughing at me. "Edward, what's so funny?"
"I thought my joke about sticking you in my suitcase was quit funny." Oh for all the- "Bella, hold out your hands and close your eyes" he commanded. His ocher eyes drilled into mine and I had no choice but to obey.
I felt a heavy object fall into my hands. Edward kissed both my eyelids and then told me I could look again. He had given me a digital camera. "For documenting your Europe experience," he said simply. Then he kissed me full on the lips.
We had been back from Europe for a few days, and I was ready to develop my pictures. I had elected myself as the driver because after spending a few weeks in Europe with Alice as my tour guide, driving me around the cities, I hadn't wanted to get in a car with her behind the wheel. Not for a long, long, long time. Especially after that particular time when we were driving up the steep and windy road to the top of a mountain in Switzerland. Defiantly not after THAT.
"Bella, would you please tell me where we're going?" Alice pleaded. I rolled my eyes.
"Like you don't know". I had made her promise not to peak at where we were going, but I hadn't thought she would abide by it. We were going to Sam's Club to develope them, and If Alice knew it she would have protested. I had made her a deal that she could come if she didn't peak at the place.
"I'm hurt, Bella, that you think I can't be trusted. Although now that you mention it..." Her expression turned sly, and I realized what she was going to do.
"Alice, NO!" I screamed. I started to panic. She wouldn't attack me in a moving car, would she? I contemplated it and came up with a conclusion; she would.
"Bella, I can't believe you're going to Sam's Club!" She said with horror and disgust. "No! I will not allow it." And with that, she leaned over and started to fight me for the wheel. My truck weaved across the road as we struggled inside. We were lucky that there were no other cars on the road.
"Alice - let go! - Epp! - No - stop - I can't - stop it - we're going out of contr - ALICEEEE"
"Bella - give me the wheel - hand it over - watch it - my shoes -NOT MY PURSE" She screamed as I stepped on it in my haste to gain control of the car.
Now that I had the purse hostage, Alice calmed down. "Bella. Turn this car around right now. There is no way I'm going to Sam's Club. They're own by Wal-Mart, you know." She didn't try to take over the car again. She valued her purse to much. I silently thanked my unplanned hostage.
By this time we had found the Sam's Club. I parked the car. Alice was still fuming; she sat with her arms crossed and her eyes on her purse. "Alice, you don't have to come in. You can stay in the car" I said.
"But I want to help you pick the pictures you want to print," She sounded like a five year old who wanted something and wasn't getting it.
"Alice, do what you want." By this point, I was to upset about the incident on the way here where we almost wrecked to care what she wanted. I got out of my truck and started to the store. She caught up to me by the doors.
I shot her a questioning glance and she replied mysteriously, "I saw somthing". I sighed, flashed my members card, and strode to the picture place with Alice in tow, grinning like crazy.
I stepped up to the machine where you can choose your pictures. I had reached a snag in my plan. I had no idea where the memory card on this camera was. I pulled the camera out of my purse and stared at it, hoping the card would jump out at me, but, alas, no such luck.
I heard Alice laugh behind me, and I turned to see her with her hand outstretched. I placed the camera in her hand and she quickly popped opened a compartment, pulled out a flat plastic object, and shut the compartment before I could even see where on the camera she was working. She handed me the memory card back and gestured for me to go on.
I turned back to the big, hulking box-like thing, looking for a place for the memory card to go. I saw a slit and tried to fit it in there. To my dismay, it wouldn't fit, and I could see no other place for it. So I continued to force the card in there.
"Why" slam "Won't" Crash "This" bang "Stupid" crack "Thi-" I paused in my barrage of the evil card and machine. I had heard a crack, and prayed it wasn't the card. It wasn't. It was my nail. And it hurt. A lot.
I swore and Alice laughed. Taking pity on me, she took the card from me and slide it into a slot on the side. I stared dumbfounded at her for a second. She was was having a ball reading my facial expression.
Ignoring her, I hitched up my purse strap, which had fallen during my fight with the memory card, and concentrated on the loading pictures.
Picture after picture of Edward and I flashed on the screen at an excruciating slow pace. I huffed as the progressed stopped for a moment. "Alice, why won't these frinkin' pictures LOAD?" I practically screamed. After the memory card incident my patience was waning.
"Bella, Bella, Bella" Alice said soothingly. "You took a lot of pictures. It will take some time."
I hated common sense.
I stood by the machine tapping my foot. I checked my watch and saw that these pictures had been loading for a half hour. I wanted to scream. I glanced over at another couple who were picking out their pictures. They had come in after us, and yet their pictures were already loaded! "Alice," I whinnied.
"Look Bella" She pointed to the upper left hand corner. A small bar filled with blue stuff to mark my progress. It was a little more that three fourths full.
"Yeah!" I did a small dance in place. Then the bar stopped moving. Completely. I hit the machine, but only managed to give myself a bruise. A worker near by noticed my, shall we say, extreme actions, and came over to investigate.
"Ma'am? Is there a problem?" The worker asked politely.
"Yes" I poked the screen "there" I hit the side "is" I hit the other side "a" I brought my first down on the top of the stupid piece of crap "PROBLEM!" I finally kicked the bottom of the machine.
The man looked scared. Alice was stifling laughter. "Uh, Miss? I think you're machine has frozen. You'll have to re-load." The worker cringed, praying there would not be another outburst from this unstable young woman, then scurried back to the counter he had come from.
"Reload?" I said dangerously. I narrowed my eyes. "Oh, it's on."
I spent the next half hour doing battle with the picture machine. Needless to say, punches were thrown by both sides. Poor Alice. While trying to pry me off the top of the kiosk at one point she took a hit to her nose. Come to think of it though, I was hurt more than she was. She did manage to get me off of it, after much pulling and prodding.
Finally my pictures were loaded. Now all I had to do was tap the screen to select the pictures. I felt relatively better since Alice had thoughtfully bought me a pretzel. I had needed to eat after waging war on the picture machine.
I started choosing the pictures. I went down the row pressing all the pictures I wanted. When I reached the end, the last picture in the row wouldn't select; instead the machine jumped back to the first picture in the row and selected it again. Now, according to the stupid, evil, idiotic, evil, possesed, EVIL picture machine, I was getting two prints of Edward and I making goofy love faces to each other. Great, just great.
Thinking this was just a minor glitch in the system, I ignored it and continued selecting pictures. Surprise! The machine jumped back to the beginning after every, stinkin', row!
I was now in a fury. Alice was rolling on the floor laughing. Now the screen went haywire. I pressed the down button and it would go up! It jumped back and forth without me even touching it. I started screaming, drawing attention to us. Alice finally got her wits back, jumped up and took the waiting receipt. She then escorted me out of there, still screaming.
"WE'LL BE BACK YOU EVIL COMPANY! AND I WILL BRING MY VAMPIRE BOYFRIEND AND MY WEREWOLF BEST FRIEND TO COME AND KICK YOUR BUTS!" I screamed insanely as Alice dragged me to the car, reassuring anyone we passed that I was a little touched in the head, and I "did not have a vampire boyfriend or a werewolf best friend". She was still smiling, so I figured that she wasn't too mad at me.
Alice drove home, since I was incapable of driving. I muttered profanities all the way home, occasionally using my hands in a motion like I was strangling something.
Three days later I had calmed down enough to go back and pick up the pictures.
"Bella, I'll come with you, again. I wouldn't want to miss this trip for the world!" Alice had exclaimed when I told her I was going back. "Can I bring Jasper along for the fun too?" Fun? I asked myself. What would happen this time? I mean, all I had to do was go up to the counter and ask for the pictures under the name Swan. Simple as that. Obviously Alice saw something, but I had made a deal with myself that I would not blow up at the store.
"Fine, Alice. Do what you want. But I promise I won't make a scene." Alice grinned.
"Oh Bella," She shook her head "Don't write checks your but can't cash"
"Pictures for Swan, please?" I said to the woman at the counter. I handed her my receipt. I was so glad that it wasn't the man who I had yelled at yesterday. I was also thankful that this woman must not have heard about the "Digital Camera Fiasco" yet, as Emmett was calling it after Alice had so thoughtfully informed the rest of the Cullen family.
Alice and Jasper lurked behind me, sharing glances. Alice had filled Jasper in on what was going to happen. I sighed. I would prove them wrong.
The woman smiled at me, and went off to get the pictures. She reappeared a few minutes later, her face downcast. 'Miss Swan? I'm sorry to say this, but your pictures were accidental sent to the wrong store and deleted. You'll have to choose your pictures again."
Jasper gave the clerk a significant look and shook his head. He looked like he was at someone's funeral. He was right; it would be her funeral very soon. "You really shouldn't have said that..."
A/N: I hope you liked it! If you read it, please review it!