Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight, or any of its' characters.

BPOV

As I looked around the large auditorium filled with people gathering for the conference, I couldn't help but laugh. Maybe it was the lady seated three rows ahead of me dressed head-to-toe in various tribal clothing, or the majority of men sporting gray tweed business suits with suede elbow patches, or quite possibly the adventurous soul who had the balls to dress as Indiana Jones. Most likely it was a combination of three at once that pushed me further over the edge, causing me to hide my face in my shirt to stifle the laughter.

"What's so funny there Chuckles?" I heard the high-pitched voice of my pixie best friend ask.

"Huh? Oh, well I was just taking in our surroundings," I tried to whisper quietly, but failed miserably as my voice broke with laughter. I had always been a loud laugher. No matter how hard I try to laugh at a socially acceptable decibel, the sound still bursts forth and I am unable to stop. In fact, one boy I dated back in high school refused to go to comedies with me because I embarrassed him with my boisterous laugh. What a boob that guy was. I mean, it's not an annoying laugh, just a little loud.

"You know," I observed, "we're not the coolest people as a group."

At this point Alice looked around and spotted the Indiana Jones man and laughed.

"That is so true," she replied. "But what did you expect from a bunch of archaeologists, Bella?"

"Good point."

At this point, I was tired of sitting and watching the slides projected on the screen showing the remains of a feline skull found in North Dakota. Seriously, who's idea was it to show pictures of dead, domesticated cats?

"Why don't we go find Rosalie and check out some of the other venues around here? I'm done with this." I was hoping Alice was done with this too, because I was bored out of my mind. Luckily, she nodded eagerly and we left quietly and began walking downstairs to the main floor of the convention center.

"Look, there's Rose." Alice spotted Rosalie looking at one of the booths offering information about a dig in Cairo over the summer.

Alice got to Rosalie first and pinched her on her side to get her attention while saying, "What's up Goldie Locks?" Rosalie jumped, startled, but then laughed.

"Not much Pixie Dust. You guys are already done with that presentation about that Native American tribe in North Dakota?" she asked while arching an eyebrow.

"Ugh," I groaned. "It was not what I thought it was going to be. The doofus up on the stage just showed us a bunch of pictures of bones from all these small animals. He didn't even talk about the tribe itself! So we decided to bail out and find you."

Rose chuckled. "Alright, well let's go grab something to eat. I'm starving."

The three of us walked down the streets of San Jose, looking for someplace to eat near the convention center. It's hard to believe that we are nearly done with school and about to start getting our feet wet in our field of archaeology. The three of us are all in our last semester at Sacramento State. While at school, a teacher of ours recommended getting some field experience in before committing to pursuing our Masters degrees. So that's what we're doing. We're at an archaeology conference in San Jose making contacts and scoping out digs that we might be interested in for the summer.

Alice, Rosalie, and I met freshmen year at orientation and haven't separated since. Alice and I were roommates, but Rosalie spent most of her time in our room since her roommate, Jessica, was the most annoying gossip on earth. I think Jessica was just intimidated by Rosalie, which is not hard to believe considering Rosalie is stunningly beautiful. At 5'10, and thin but with beautiful curves, long blonde hair, and striking blue eyes, she could get any man she seeks out. She also doesn't take crap from anyone, and sticks up for her friends.

Alice on the other hand is around 5 feet with cropped brown hair and hazel eyes. She's so petite that we call her our "pixie". But she is most definitely the most beautiful pixie I've ever seen. Alice is also fiercely loyal to people, as well as being a shopaholic and a bundle of energy.

All of the sudden I noticed something on the ground that I was about to trip over. Out of instinct I tried to stop, but my body's momentum kept pushing me forward, causing my toe to catch on the asphalt anyway. With an "Ugh…crap!" I tumbled to the ground, my shoulder taking the brunt of the fall. It was silent for a moment before I heard the loud guffaws of my friends.

"What the heck was that, Bella?" Rose got out between laughing fits.

As I stood from the ground, I looked around me to see what caused the great tumble, only to see nothing. While looking down at the ground, realization of what caused the fall set in. Apparently Alice came to the same conclusion, because the next thing I know I heard her voice burst through her giggles.

"Oh my God! You just tripped over the painted lines!"

Sure enough, the thing that caught my attention was the painted lines in the parking lot.

"Wow. I am such a struggler," I said while trying to keep a straight face. But as soon as I made eye contact with Alice I couldn't hold it in any longer. The three of us glanced at the ground, and then absolutely cracked up.

After a few minutes I noticed people where looking at us like we were crazy. This one lady shot me the dirtiest look while walking by.

Rose noticed the hate glares being sent our way. "Jeez," she spoke. "What in the world is that chick's deal?"

"I know!" I said to Rose a little too loudly. "We're not crazy, just really intense laughers. It's not like Alice was professing her undying love for Aladdin again, or you were hiding from the 'scary clown-like' bushes," I said using finger quotes.

"Hey!" Alice defended. "Have you not seen Aladdin? That guy is totally smooth. He's got the whole 'total bad boy with a heart of gold' thing going on. And any man who is able to have a monkey as a best friend and not look crazy is definitely my kind of people."

"We know Alice," I said trying to jump in before she went on her spiel about how he was the perfect blend of cockiness and humility.

"You know," Rosalie started with a haughty look on her face, "I don't appreciate you belittling my fear of bushes, especially the ones that resemble clowns. What if there was some creeper hiding in there waiting to pounce on me? Huh? Did you ever think about that?!"

I was trying so hard not to laugh but when Rosalie kept going on about the bushes I couldn't control myself.

"You know, the fact that the bush looks like a clown would work in the creeper's favor too. Because Creeper would assume that when his victims come across the bush they'd get distracted and be all 'Wow, this bush looks just like a clown!' and then BAM, Creeper comes bursting through the shrubs."

What made that statement infinitely better was the fact that when Rosalie talked about bursting through the shrubs, she actually used her arms and jumped outward, as if to give us a visual of how it would go down.

"You're right Rose. What was I thinking? Clearly, bushes pose a serious threat to all, especially those easily distracted by clown-like greenery." I stated in a mock serious tone.

Rosalie narrowed her eyes at me, but eventually her features softened and she cracked a smile. "Well at least I don't have an irrational fear of Triscuits!" she threw in my direction.

"What? Some of those edges are really sharp, okay?" I argued while pointing to my mouth.

The three of us continued snickering while walking towards the Quizno's across the parking lot to get some sandwiches. The guy working the register kept raising his unibrow at us in a "come hither" kind of way. Alice's face was priceless. She looked liked she'd just witnessed Michael Moore give Bill O' Reilly a lap dance. Confused and disgusted, but just couldn't look away.

When we got our food from the wannabe seductive unibrow man Alice whispered, "If ever there was going to be a Creeper who hides behind clown-like bushes, that would be the dude!"

The mental image that came to me from that statement put me in hysterics. Mainly, because it was so true. I could totally see our Quizno's guy hiding behind bushes, hoping to lure young women in with his untamed unibrow.

Wow. Maybe we are crazy.

After eating, we decided to head back to the convention center and continue our perusal of the various digs offered over the summer.

"Oh my God," shrieked Alice. "Greece! Freakin' Greece!"

Rosalie and I followed in her direction to check out the dig in Greece, where I noticed the guy who had dressed up as Indiana Jones was also lurking.

"Did you have any questions about the Delphi site?" a cheery female voice asked me. I turned to face an attractive young woman with strawberry blonde hair and a genuine smile.

"Oh, actually yes. My friends and me are interested in finding a dig site to work on for the summer. Are you part of the team working in Delphi?" I asked while taking the pamphlet she handed me.

"Yes I am. My name's Tanya. I've been working in Greece for the last 13 months. My husband and I head up the team. It's absolutely beautiful there, and the site is so rich with history. We have a few spots open that you can apply for. Are you or your friends majoring in Mediterranean Archaeology?"

"Um no," I replied sheepishly. "We're all Anthropology majors specializing in Archaeology. Is that a problem?"

"Oh no. Not at all," she said eagerly. "But it does help your application if you happen to be specializing in the field of study surrounding the dig site. This is a highly sought after dig because of its location, so having an advantage to tip the scales in your favor always helps."

I nodded and then continued looking through the pamphlet as Tanya left to answer some other people's questions.

Greece would be such an amazing adventure. Not only because it is breathtakingly beautiful there, but also because the oracle of Delphi has always intrigued me. But the dig was for 6 months, and what we were looking for would be around 2 or 3 months.

Rosalie, Alice and I looked through the pamphlet and pointed out interesting facts. I noticed Rosalie kept shooting disapproving looks at Indiana Jones man before she started to speak.

"You know, some people are just an embarrassment to our profession. I mean seriously, look at that guy! People like him are the reason why every time I tell someone what I'm going to school for, they always assume I'm just a die-hard Indiana Jones fan and don't take me seriously."

I noticed that during Rose's little rant, the guy dressed as Indiana Jones turned to look at us with a raised eyebrow. Obviously I wasn't the only one to notice because Rose established eye contact with him and then spoke louder.

"That's right, I'm talking about you, dill-hole. You look like a fool."

Indiana Jones man broke into a huge grin, and only then did I notice how attractive he was. He was clearly over 6 feet tall and was totally ripped. He definitely looked like an ex-football player or wrestler or something. When he smiled, I spotted cute little dimples on his rugged face. He began walking toward us and removed his hat, revealing curly, dark brown hair. Rosalie looked like a deer caught in the headlights.

"Crap! Now he's coming over here!" she whisper yelled at us.

Alice rolled her eyes at Rosalie. "Well, what did you expect Rose? You just randomly called him a foolish dill-hole."

"Well, he is a foolish dill-hole," she said with determination. "I stand by my comment."

And this is why I didn't take Rose to the 49ers game versus the Oakland Raiders. She has absolutely no filter and Raiders fans get crazy. Knowing her, she'd probably start antagonizing the other team and then we'd both get shanked. No thank you. I strive to live a shank-free life.

"Hmm. So apparently there's some anti-Indiana Jones people in the house," I heard a deep male voice say.

Rosalie turned to him annoyed, "I am not anti-Indiana Jones. In fact, I currently remain unaffiliated."

Indiana Jones man laughed and stuck out his hand. "Hi. I'm Emmett Cullen."

"Rosalie Hale," she said as she grasped his hand in hers. He then turned to look at Alice and me, waiting for us to offer our names.

Alice bounced forward and grabbed his hat. "Wow! This is just like Indy's hat! How weird! Oh, I'm Alice by the way."

"And I'm Bella."

Emmett chuckled as he pried his hat out of Alice's grip. "So, are you guys thinking about going on the Delphi dig?" he asked while motioning with his head to the information table we were standing in front of.

"Well," I offered, "it looks really interesting, but the dig's for 6 months. We want to go on a site just for the summer, just to get a taste of the work we'll be doing after we finish the graduate program."

Emmett nodded. "Yeah, it's the same for me and my 2 younger brothers. We're all Archaeology majors at the University of Washington and we're looking for some summer digs."

"Wait," Alice interrupted, "you're all archaeology majors? Isn't that a little odd for a sibling trio to pick the same thing?"

"Well, with a dad like Carlisle, we were all destined to get the itch to play in the dirt," Emmett replied with a smirk.

Something caught my attention. "Hold up. Did you say Carlisle was your dad? As in the Carlisle Cullen?" I asked with a hint of wonder in my voice.

Emmett's smirk grew more pronounced as he nodded to my question.

Alice was the first to flip. "Oh my God! Is he here with you somewhere?!" she shrieked while pulling out a compact mirror to check her make-up. Rosalie started fluffing her hair and adjusting her shirt so it better complimented her figure, while I just stood with my mouth hanging open.

"Jeez Emmett. Do you have to drop Dad's name to get attention from every female here?" said a smooth voice from behind me. I whipped around and came face to face with a pair of mischievous, sparkling green eyes.

Holy heart failure, Batman!

AN: This is my first fanfic. Let me know what you think :)

Oh, and on a side note. Most of the story will be in Bella's POV, but you will see others' as well

So I must ask... Epic Fail?

-rj