Chapter 1

I didn't think we'd have a Labor Day weekend with us all home together ever again. Was that because I was too arrogant to believe I'd ever end up back here? Probably, but I chalked it up to my belief that Alice wouldn't ever come back from New York.

We'd been at The Downtowner for awhile already. I know this because I was drunk. Not just a little drunk either. Completely shitfaced. Yep that was me. I hadn't realized the degree of the situation until I'd gone to get us another round. I was fine getting to the bar and I didn't have a problem remembering which drinks I had to order. Mike asked me if I wanted Jessica to bring them out to me on her next trip through and I said "sure." Then I looked over at her bustling from table to table and realized that might not be for another forty-five minutes or so. The place had definitely filled up since we'd first gotten there and scored a table out on the back deck. I told him to lend me a tray and I'd carry them back myself. He looked at me skeptically and asked me if I was sure about that, which offended me a little. I waitressed and bartended for two and a half years while I was in college. I think I could handle twenty feet with one tray of drinks. Of course at that point I hadn't realized yet the state of my inebriation.

The moment of realization came when I felt the cold wetness spread across my jeans in the doorway of the back deck. I made it to the door without any problem, but somehow as I pushed it open with my shoulder, I looked down to see the drinks toppling from my tray. To this day I swear that I was holding that tray steady. In my drunken state I couldn't figure out why the hell the glasses were leaping off the tray like rats from a sinking ship. That was the moment of realization. In some small portion of my brain, I realized the amount of alcohol I had consumed was the reason the tray looked stable when it obviously was not and my mind voice said "you're drunk". But the bigger part of my brain was still confused as to why the glasses were falling off my unmoving tray. I glanced up in bewilderment to see Rosalie, Alice, and Angela in the corner table laughing at me. I shrugged and turned around to head back to the bar.

I wasn't too drunk to not feel embarrassed when I had to go back and ask Mike to remake our drinks. And I was a little sheepish when I suggested that Jessica bring them out to us when she had a chance. He was sweet about it, but he still gave me that bartender look I knew so well. The one I gave out to all the drunken idiots late in the evening when I was the one behind the bar, the only sober mind in a room full of pickled brains. Fuck. It was different on the receiving end. At least he didn't make me pay for them again. I tipped him heavily. I would have overcharged for that second round if I'd been the one mixing them.

I went back to the table empty handed and shrugged when Alice gave me that look wondering where the hell her drink was. "Jess is bringing 'em over in a bit," I said and looked away as she smirked and shook her head at me. I looked over at Rosalie, who was grinning but didn't look any more than slightly buzzed. Angela didn't look affected by the liquor at all. What the fuck?

"Why the fuck am I always the drunkest fucker at the table?" I asked to no one in particular.

Rosalie just shrugged off the question, recognizing it as the rhetorical question it was.

Angela, on the other hand, tried to figure it out. "How many have you had?" She asked.

"The same as you have, fucker." I snarled, because the truth was that we had ordered each round together, but for some reason I was at the point that I wouldn't know how many we'd had, and they weren't. And Alice was smaller than any of us and had been drinking doubles for each of my pussy drinks. I gave her a dirty look.

"You're just a lightweight, Swan. No need to be embarrassed by it." But the way she said it made it seem as though she was specifically pointing out that I should be embarrassed by it.

"Whatever. Twat-face." I flipped her the bird and she laughed at me. Jessica interrupted at that moment to deposit our drinks at the table. She gave me a pointed glance as she slid one over to me. I tried to bring up some hatred for her, but the fact was that I didn't have anywhere for the superiority to come from. She wasn't the only one stuck in this damn town doing a job she hadn't imagined when we were in high school. And I was the drunk piece of shit that had made her job harder by leaving a mess over in the doorway. I took the high road and slid a tip her way with a quiet thanks as I sipped my Tequila Sunrise. I needed my liqueur disguised as juice or I couldn't stand to drink it.

I glanced over at them while we all sat quietly for a moment lost in thought. I was usually a happy drunk, but tonight something was off. Maybe it was just how everything had somehow turned inside out and sitting here looking at all of them was making me face it in a way I hadn't before. I wasn't sure, but I knew well enough from being a bartender that evaluating the state of your life when you are three sheets to the wind is a horrible fucking idea.

The truth of the matter was that it wasn't supposed to be this way. I was the one who was supposed to leave this piece of shit town and never come back. Alice always talked about going to New York as soon as she graduated, but honestly, none of us actually believed her. She was Rosie's younger sister, two years behind us in high school. We hadn't really ever hung out back then, but she was around a lot: in the car after school when Rose would drive me home or around the house when I was hanging out at their place, hiding from my life. I always kind of got the impression that she didn't like me. Turns out that wasn't the case, but I never knew that until she came back from the Big Apple and called me up. I'd always kind of think of her as my best friend's sister, but we had become friends somehow too.

But being with her made me feel like a fraud. She admired me because I was genuine and honest and true to who I was despite what other people thought. But people got the impression that I was tough and strong and facing the world head on unafraid, when the truth of the matter was that was Alice. Alice who had left for New York right after graduation with hardly any money or plans. Alice who stayed out there living off Ramen Noodles and sleeping on friend's couches when she couldn't afford a place to stay. Alice who didn't give a fuck if she was going about things unconventionally. In the meantime, I was hiding out in my shell of toughness and fearlessness in fucking Forks. So yeah, looking at Alice made me feel like a big fucking fraud.

And don't get me started on Rosalie. I could hardly ever get her to leave the house in high school. She was such a homebody. I struck out on my own and went away to college while she stayed home and commuted to a college nearby so she could still live at home. Then, all of a sudden, I'm coming home and she's leaving the state to go to a different school to work on her Master's. Oh, and Angela, who was always the worst student of all of us, is heading there with her, because somewhere along the way she had grown a brain and joined the chemistry department too and was getting her Master's as well. Did I mention that they loved to travel all over during breaks? Yeah, New York on New Years, Las Vegas at Christmas, Jamaica for spring break.

It wasn't that I wasn't happy for them, because I was. These three women were my closest friends. They take me for who I am and love me despite of it. It was just a lot to take sometimes, when I'm the only one who was a complete fail at life. I was the one who always planned to go to college to escape this life. I was the one who always talked about seeing the world. I was the wild one. And yet it was them who had done all the things I was meant to do. It was me I was frustrated with, but it was easier to deflect those feelings onto them.

But I shook that shit off because they didn't deserve it. And like I said before, I'm smart enough to not partake in a pity party when I'm already FUBAR.

"Dude, did you bring me pictures of naked black penises?" I asked Alice, taking my mind off my shit.

"No."

"Fuck man, you promised!"

"No, actually I didn't. You assumed."

"I think you're mistaken. You tried to convince me that you had snapshots of all these huge chocolate sausages you tasted while involved in all your debauchery out east, and I told you I'd believe it when I saw it. To which you replied that I'd better be ready to eat my words of disbelief. Any intelligent person would infer that meant you were bringing me proof."

"Don't try to call yourself an intelligent person when you're slurring your words, twat-taco."

"Hey Rose, how do you feel about your baby sister being a bigger skank than me?" I asked, grinning over at her.

"Well, Bells, I usually try not to think about her sexual escapades at all, something I'm successful at whenever you're not around to bring it up."

"Yo, Ali. How is it that I've always been the one with the slutty reputation, when you're the one with all the experience?" I asked, and I was only half joking because it was true. People had always thought I was pretty loose and compared to Rosalie I was, but Alice had me beat by a long shot.

"I'm pretty sure that's because I've always been private when it comes to my bid'ness and you've always been an open book about pretty much every aspect of your life. It's one of your charms." She blew a kiss at me and I laughed at her, because that shit was so true. Alice was downright lip-locked when it came to anything involving her life, even things other people wouldn't really consider private.

"Dude, remember that rumor that went around about you and James?" Rosalie asked me.

"Which fucking rumor, Rosie? I lived in hell with that asshole for five years. There were more goddamn rumors than I care to remember about that sordid little affair." I snorted.

"The one where you blew him while he was taking a shit on the can," she said and then all three of them were laughing.

"Fuck, Swan. I forgot about that. What was that like anyway?"

"Fuck off, Albert. That wasn't true and you know it. Why the fuck would anybody ever think I'd do that? I mean, how would that be enjoyable for either of us? Shit. People are fucking stupid. They'll believe anything."

"Dude, I'll never forget the look on your face when Jasper asked about that. I swear he would never have worked up the nerve if it hadn't been like 4 in the morning."

"When were you ever hanging out with Jasper Whitlock at 4 in the morning?" Angela asked. J.P. Whitlock had been at the top of the high school food chain and I had decidedly not been. Despite the fact that we were chums in class and the hall for those last couple of years, it would have been unacceptable for us to have hung out.

"Science Olympiad," I responded. "The universal leveler of academic hierarchical systems."

"Yeah, we were cool enough to hang out with when we were away from all the preppy chippies at state championships. Especially Bella. Everyone loved her cuz she was so much fucking fun." Rose volunteered.

"Apparently not fun enough to hang out with when it would have injured their reputation at school. But I guess I must have been an open book if he felt like it was ok to ask me if I sucked James off while he was defecating. Even if it was 4 in the fucking morning."

"I swear to God, he looked like you killed his puppy when you told him he was fucking retarded to believe that shit. I think those boys liked the illusion that you were a complete sexual deviant." Rose winked at me and I flipped her the bird this time. Angela was a year above us and Alice two years behind, so a lot of this shit was only witnessed firsthand by Rosie. She held way too many of my secrets in her nicely manicured palm.

"Hey, Bella. Remember that time James threw Edward Cullen into the lockers and told him to stay away from you in front of the whole school? I never asked you what that was all about." Angela looked at me expectantly, waiting for an answer, but I felt like she'd sucker punched me.

Rose took one look of my face and answered for me. "Bella and Cullen had a thing the summer before he moved here. Oh, and a thing that Christmas break. And another thing at Easter break. Unfortunately, Bella and James were already together for the Christmas and Easter thing and she felt the need to confess about it after Cullen joined our illustrious little school."

"Fuck off, Rose. I didn't think James was stupid enough to do anything about it. I just figured I'd nip that shit in the bud before it got around some other way. Only Jamie would be clueless enough to think Edward Cullen would still be interested in me after he got a peek at his other options at Forks High."

Angela was looking at me with wide eyes and her mouth hanging open. Alice was looking pretty bored by the whole conversation, but really she had been too young to really remember the fucking ruckus it caused when Edward Cullen joined our small town. Apparently the whole Bella and Edward fling had remained between me, Edward, James, and Rosalie. It was pretty obvious by her reaction that Angela had no idea.

"Why the fuck would you bring that shit up now anyway, Ang? That's totally ancient history. I'm surprised you even remember that shit." I tried to be dismissive, but I saw a little tremble in my hand when I reached for my glass and downed the last of my drink. Fuck.

"Uh, cuz he's standing right over there," she responded hesitantly, with a nod of her head to somewhere behind me.

My gaze flew first to Rosalie, only to see her eyes fly over my head and grow huge. I choked slightly on my gulp of drink and tried to keep myself from looking over my shoulder. It was futile. I nearly gave myself whiplash craning my neck to look behind me and my long hair flew out with enough force that I vaguely felt it slap Rose in the face.

And there, inside the building, standing against the wall with a beer clutched in his hand was Edward fucking Cullen in the flesh. I hadn't seen him in years, but it didn't stop my heart from stammering in my chest. He was wearing a black shirt that was kind of shiny and clingy. It strained a little around the roundness of his bicep, which I mentally acknowledged was bigger and more defined than the last time I saw him. His hair, however, was still the bronze, unruly chaos that I remembered. And from this angle I could just make out the uneven smirk he wore that had always melted my insides.

As though sensing someone looking at him he suddenly glanced up to scan the deck through the glass doors and I whipped my face back around before he could catch sight of me and found myself staring at my three girls around the table.

Alice looked slightly amused. Angela still looked totally dumbfounded. And Rosalie was looking concerned. Which means that my face must have looked at least seven different shades of fucked up.

My mouth opened and closed once or twice before I finally blurted out "I've gotta piss," as though I hadn't just gotten a fucking form of cardioversion just a moment before. I had just become acutely aware of how full my bladder was, but I didn't move. My body seemed to be having some trouble receiving messages from my brain. I blamed in on the alcohol. Self denial is truly a gift from God.

"You realize you're going to have to walk right by him to get to the bathroom, right?" Rosalie asked, and she sounded apologetic.

I felt the blood drain out of my face. I considered the fact that my jeans were still slightly damp from having dumped all our drinks down my front earlier. I could probably piss my pants and still be able to believably blame the accident from before, right? I glanced up at Rose and asked her the question with my eyes. She gave me a sympathetic look and shook her head so slightly that I'm sure no one else even noticed.

I thought about the fifty feet between me and the bathroom door. I thought about how dim the lights were inside the bar with all the smoke and bodies packed inside. I thought about all the years that had gone by since the last time I'd met that piercing green gaze. I thought about how different I was now, how young I'd been then. I thought about my hand wrapped around a silky, thick shaft for the first time. I thought of pumping that hand up and down timidly and being rewarded with a groan and a spurt of white, creamy liquid across the back of my palm. I thought of feeling large hands warmed by the sun sliding under my bathing suit and palming the small buds of my newly developing breasts. I thought of hard stomach muscles under my fingertips. I thought of laughing green eyes and unruly hair the color of pennies and an uneven smirk and thin blank shiny material stretched around a hard, defined bicep and I accepted it. No matter how my trip to the pisser turned out tonight, I was totally and completely fucked. And not in a good way.