Once More With Feeling
Chapter 1
BPOV
Damn, I muttered as I grabbed my backpack from my bed without realizing that it was unzipped spilling the contents onto the floor. Why after all of this time is it now that Charlie decided to take notice of the fact that I spend most of my free time holed in my room with nothing but my Ipod and books to keep me entertained? It's not like I'm out doing drugs or drinking, I don't smoke, in fact I do nothing that would be considered "normal" for an average 17 year old to be doing. Then again I never claimed to be average. My mom Renee always said that I was an old soul. I personally think that since she refused to grow up and take care of me it just naturally fell on my shoulders to do that for her. Once she married Phil and I new that she would be taken care of I decided to come spend my senior year of high school with my dad and give them some much needed newlywed privacy. Charlie seemed pleased to have me come live with him, maybe because he was in desperate need of some taking care of himself, but I can't be sure. Charlie and I have always had a comfortable relationship because I don't mind solitude and he doesn't hover. That's why now after three months of living here, I can't believe that he has taken it upon himself to see that I have more to occupy myself than books. He has decided that I needed a hobby and according to him since I love music so much I should take piano lessons. I mean seriously has he met me? He knows that I can't even walk and chew gum at the same time, how does he expect me to play a piano? That takes so much more coordination than I have.
I'm still bitching to myself about all of the injustice of being treated like a five year old that needs to be "well rounded" so that mommy and daddy can show off; as I reach the staircase making my way down and naturally miss the last step only to land firmly on my ass. "Great it just gets better and better." I hear Charlie chuckling in the kitchen and walk in to see him reading the paper with a cup of coffee in his hand. "Bells I am about to leave to go fishing with Harry, I will be home later in the evening maybe we can just go to the diner tonight, I hear that they are going to have berry cobbler on the menu again tonight and you know that's my favorite." "That's fine Cha I mean dad" at least if I have to go through the torture of piano lessons than I can get out of dinner duty tonight. He gets up and puts his cup in the sink and is about to head out. He stops like he is remembering something and says "Oh yeah, here's a check for your lessons tell Edward that I am going to pay for a month at a time instead of weekly if that's ok, and here's the address , you are supposed to be there in 45 minutes and the Cullen place can be kind of hard to find so I suggest you leave shortly, I don't want him having to wait on you." "fine dad, just let me get some juice down and I will leave." "Ok Bells, I'm gone. Don't give Edward a hard time and try to have a good time." Yeah right I'm sure it's just going to be a blast but I keep that to myself. I mean really a teacher named Edward. I can just see him now, a balding overweight man who lives in a dusty old house with a million cats scattered around. That is enough to make me shudder but then I continue with my musing and can all but see him sitting next to me with a ruler in his hand ready to pop me with it every time I make a mistake.
I hastily wolf down a pop tart and a glass of orange juice, rinse out my glass and put it in the dishwasher. I gather up my things making sure that I have my keys and make my way to "the beast" as I refer to her. The beast, being my truck, was a welcome home present from Charlie. He bought if from his best friend Billy Black. He and his son Jacob were here waiting with it by the time that Charlie had picked me up from the airport. It is a monstrously big, loud, truck probably circa 1964 but it was perfect. I have never been one for flashy things. My needs were simple, I guess you could say that I'm a less is more kind of girl. The only problem that I had with the truck is that it's a manual transmission and I had never driven anything but an automatic. Jacob was kind enough to teach me how to drive it. As were driving in the high school's parking lot while I got used to it, he leaned over and told me that his dad and my dad were intending this meeting to be a prequel to matchmaking. I just groaned and he laughed. "He said not to worry," because while he thought that I was gorgeous I just rolled my eyes at that and blushed, he was taken. He had met Nessie (aka Vanessa) on the reservation and from the moment he laid eyes on her he just knew she was the one. Love at first sight. From that moment on he was my best and truly only friend since I moved back to Forks.
I carefully back the beast out of the drive and begin to follow the directions to Edward Cullen's home. On the way out of Forks I pass by the diner and notice Jessica and Mike, followed by Lauren and Tyler and finally Angela and Ben filing out towards the street. I have classes with all of these kids but Jessica and Lauren are absolute bitches to me. I heard that it was because they had heard their boyfriends Mike and Tyler betting on which one of them could get me to go out with them first. Yeah right as if…. I don't date, even if they weren't taken I would have never agreed to a date with either one of them. Angela and her boyfriend Ben are completely different than the other two couples but it seems as if they are always together so I don't have a lot of opportunities to become great friends. I do have a couple of classes with Angela and we sit next to each other since she is the only girl in the whole school that has attempted to nice to me. We have traded a couple of short phone calls over the past couple of months and we have even gone shopping once together. I was speaking with her yesterday about these piano lessons that Charlie was forcing me into. She said that she could sympathize since she is a minister's daughter and for some reason she was expected to play piano too. She said that she had taken lessons for about a year until everyone realized that she was hopeless. Great that was encouraging…. Angela is on the gymnastics team and if she wasn't coordinated enough to play there was no way that I would be able to do it.
She asked me before the end of class who I would have to be taking lessons from, I told her that it was some man named Edward Cullen. She suddenly had a very strange look on her face and started picking some invisible lint off of her sweater. I asked her what she knew about him and she said truthfully not too much, but she had this weird look on her face. I'm not sure that I believed her. I was beginning to get worried, I mean Charlie was the chief of police in this town. Surely he wouldn't be sending me to my death or having me spend an hour a week with a pedophile would he? Oh God what if he didn't know very much about him. I'm in a full fledge panic attack now.
Much too soon, I realized that I was nearing the turn off for the house that I would probably be meeting my death in today. Just two more miles and then my life would be over. Finally I pulled into the drive of what I'm sure of would become a torture chamber for me. My God this place is secluded nothing but forest around. No one to hear me scream. I catch myself slowing down to follow the drive that seemed to never end until I stopped in front of the most beautiful home I had ever seen in my life. The whole house seemed to be built of wood and glass. I have never seen anything like it before. Holy Shit, it was so beautiful that I could not even catch my breath. The sunlight was bouncing off of all of the glass, it was like prisms that we had played with in 9th grade science class. I must have really spaced out because I have no idea how long that I been standing there, when suddenly in front of me was a gorgeous girl maybe a year older than me with short, spiky, jet black hair. She was maybe 4'10 and looks like a pixie. She was actually bouncing with energy. I am seriously exhausted from watching her. She puts her arm around me and starts leading me towards the door of the house. She said that she knew that I must be Bella, and that her name was Alice. She also said that she knew that we were going to be best friends. Ok I have to give her points for enthusiasm and she did truly seem sincere. Her laugh was infectious and I caught myself giggling along with her despite my nerves. I am beginning to suspect at least that I was not going into the house to meet my death. I was not prepared however, for what I do see when I walked into the home.
The home was something that you would find inside a Martha Stewart magazine or at least in a Christmas commercial. The floors were a light natural wood, varnished to a wonderful, glossy shine. White, plush sofa's were arranged beautifully with wooden accent tables scattered very decoratively. There was a huge rug in the middle of the room, in cream, gold, black and crimson. It was stunning. There were candles burning everywhere that fragranced the room with scents of apple, cinnamon, vanilla and something else that I couldn't quite put my finger on. There was a roaring fire in the fireplace and the scent of coffee brewing which I guessed had to have been coming from the kitchen. Once I had a moment to take in my surroundings; I heard a giggle from the little pixie. I started blushing immediately; she just hugged me and said that she was glad I liked it because she "knows" that I will be spending a lot of time here. I don't know what to say to that so I just go with "yeah, ok." "Mom, we have company" she yelled. I was immediately greeted by a beautiful woman with long perfectly straight blond hair, She was dressed casually in khakis and a black sweater on anyone else the look might have been a little frumpy but on her it was stunning. I started feeling self conscious again but she hugged me briefly and said "you must be Bella, I am Esme. Welcome to our home. Please you must excuse Alice, she gets a little hyper sometimes." I just laugh a nervous laugh. "Well, I'm sure that you are excited to get to the reason for the visit, so I will let you go. Alice, please show Bella into Edward's music room." I tell Esme that it was nice to meet her and then I follow Alice into the music room.
The music room to say the least comes as quite a surprise. Where the living area that I was just in, was warm and cozy this room was a study in contrast. What furniture was in there, was contemporary in leathers with clean hard lines. There was an unused fireplace, one rug simply in cream with a black abstract design to it. In the corner of the room was a beautiful baby grand piano. "Damn, for a minute there, I had forgotten why I was here." Once I looked past the piano and through the glass walls, I noticed that this side of the house was overlooking a bluff. The view was so breathtaking that I bet if you leaned against the window and you looked down I'm sure that you would get dizzy. "Would you like something to drink Bella?" I'm sure that Edward will be down in a minute, but in the meanwhile?" No thanks, I said. I'm just trying to take all of this in. " I'm glad that you like it in here, this is the one place that truly makes Edward happy. I know that you will see what I mean, in a minute."
Alice pointed me towards the black leather sofa and suggested that I have a seat. I do and I begin to notice that Alice is uncharacteristically quiet and still. What is going on here? I believe that we sat there for about 5 minutes and I begin to truly wonder what Edward is like. Obviously, the child killing, cat loving old man is probably not correct. I begin to fidget nervously, when I hear soft footsteps echoing through the room. I have yet to look up, when I hear a smooth, velvety voice, that sounds likes sex say "Hello, you must be Bella, I am Edward Cullen."