Alice at Christmas
Chapter one- Black Friday
6 am
Jasper's POV
It was the darkest day of the year, the longest, most grueling day I could barely face it. Bella and Edward had taken Renesme and chickened out, they were somewhere in the Forest. Since they had taken the Renesme, Jacob wouldn't be around today. Emmett's hand kept twitching for the remote, and Carlise was at the hospital, even though it wasn't his shift. Esme had bailed out and gone to Denali, leaving it up to me, Rosalie and Emmett to deal with Alice today. Black Friday.
Alice was already doing some 'light' online shopping. She had spent at least a $100,000 at Victoria's Secret online, for Rosalie and Bella. She would take Emmett and me with her to carry bags, and calm down shrieking store people that she had moved to fast in front of. We had one other duty, assigned by Carlise, to prevent her from killing any of the sales clerks that tell her that they are out of a shoe in her size or some such.
I could feel the excitement and fear pulsing around me. Alice's Excitement was almost enough to drown out all the other emotions in the room, and it would have if Emmett's fear hadn't nearly matched it. Rosalie was an interesting case. She enjoyed shopping with Alice, because Alice found her new clothes for her to admire herself in, but she hated dealing with the humans in the stores. From her I got a cross between minor annoyance and minor excitement, which paled in comparison to her pleasure every time she looked at Emmett.
Or a mirror.
I just breathed deeply, and attempted to soother the emotions around me before they began to affect me. Why, oh why hadn't I bailed when I had the chance? The only other person that hadn't bailed, that wasn't happy about going, was Emmett but he did whatever the hell his 'Rosie' told him to do. This was going to be a long day.
Noon
As soon as the closest mall had opened Alice was off like a bullet dragging us with her. Now, four hours later, Emmett and I were carrying enough bags that we made elephants look like wimps, and I had already had to stop Alice from killing a stupid little 17 year old blonde girl who didn't even check before telling Alice that they were all out of the black fringed heels in size 5.
It's probably a good thing Alice didn't get her hands on those ones. She wanted to put Bella into them, and even as a vampire that girl can be a klutz sometimes. At least now when she trips she doesn't get blood everywhere and cause severe emotional damage to Edward….
I considered making Alice feel very, very, tired, but I knew she'd catch me on that one. As Vampires we never get tired, but for some reason I can make us feel that way. I can't quite make any of us fall asleep, but I can get them pretty comatose.
Alice wouldn't care while I was doing it, I wouldn't let her, but she'd skin me alive in the morning. For someone her size she had incredibly long, strong fingernails that she was very willing to use when you got in the way of her shopping.
I let my mind wander further and further away as I simply followed Alice and let her stack more and more bags onto me. So far I was carrying, in order of who they were for;
Bella: purses, at least six of them, a blue ball gown, some elaborate hair clips and a video camera with high enough pictures per second to capture Renesme running. Edward: lots of CD's, all new emerging artists so that he wouldn't already have them, also some black shirts and a tux. Esme: she had the smallest bag, Alice had ordered her furniture that matched our house in Greenland. Carlise: Alice had gone the least overboard with Carlise's gifts, she had gotten him a gold plated stethoscope, and a silver encrusted tongue compressor, neither of which he'd ever use. Renesme: she had gotten her 3 new wardrobes, all the same clothes in sizes gradually getting bigger so they would still fit her in a few months.
Alice seemed to be about halfway through her list. My wife is crazy with a capital C sometimes.
Just before we were planning on leaving I told Alice I needed to hunt after such a long day around humans, but really I was certain she wanted to shop for me and I didn't want to force her to get creative on how to get rid of me. That never ended well.
I also was desperate to get out of the stores with their 'perfume' man that stuff smelled awful!
I decided on the Goat Rocks, a few less bears wouldn't kill anyone. Soon Emmett and Rosalie joined me. Rosalie came because she wanted to be alone with Emmett, which meant I had to find some way to ditch them before her emotions got really annoying.
I grabbed a bear and headed home, taking the long way across the mountain range. I didn't want to attract attention but I needed to run.
I loved Alice, really I did, but the next few weeks were going to be hell.