The First Meeting.

I wiped a trembling hand on my denim-covered thigh. My pores had not gotten the memo that it was a rainy September and sweating was not necessary.

"Hi, my name is Bella." Even set at a barely audible pitch, my voice seemed to echo in the bare classroom. "And I'm a third year nursing student."

"Ok, seriously, who came up with this support group shit?" Rosalie said, turning away from me before I finished my introduction. Her thin hips dug into a croaking desk.

"Professor Cullen," the other girl said – Alice. The chair looked mammoth with her in it.

"The psych guy? Great." Rosalie groaned. "I preferred high school detention."

"Stop being so dramatic. I'm sure it won't interfere with your mission to fuck every guy in Seattle."

I blushed at the swearing and stifling tension in the room. We were barely ten minutes into the introductions and the passive-aggressive bullets were firing in every direction. Except mine. The one advantage of being invisible.

I don't know how, but Alice didn't shrivel under the heat of Rosalie's glare. She turned a page of her magazine.

"It's called being popular. I'm not surprised you don't recognise it."

I debated whether to jump in and steer the conversation away from the hostility that would put no-man's land to shame. However, the thought of confronting Rosalie's glare and Alice's sharp tongue had my heart sprinting in panic.

"The popularity contest, really? What are you sixteen?"

"Umm," I hummed half-heartedly, my throat convulsing as it resisted the urge to never speak again.

"It's cute that you thing popularity is a high-school thing. When I'm successful in life and you're using your pathetic sketches you call art as toilet paper, you'll see that popularity is a forever thing."

Alice barked a laugh.

"Umm." I raised my hand in an awkward 'let's not kill each other on the first day' wave.

Rosalie turned towards me. "And of course they stick me with the girl who's such a freak she can't fucking speak to other members of the human race. Fan-fucking-tastic." And with one last crippling glare, she marched out of the room. The tail of her beige coat flapped dramatically before the door slammed shut.

Silence. Except for the rustling of pages turning as Alice flipped her magazine shut.

"So, anyway," she said standing up and slinging her bag over her shoulder. "Same time next week?"

A/N Review? Haven't yet decided whether to make it a drabble or just a full-blown fic... thoughts?