Dinner Party by 2nd Star tothe Right
Everything in the Twilight universe is Stephenie Meyer's. Thank you very much for letting me play with your toys.
Alice's POV
Set after Eclipse, Bella's still human
Chapter One
Jasper heard my car and was out the front door before I had even begun to pull up the driveway. He trotted out to meet me, grinning widely, and waited until I put the car in park before grabbing me by the arm, kissing me briefly, and then hustling me inside. "Bella's cooking," He said by way of explanation.
"Yeah, I saw her in the kitchen while I was driving here, but what's that about?" He was about to explain but we were nearly at the kitchen doorway, and I could hear Emmett and Bella from halfway down the hall.
Inside the spacious, immaculate kitchen was quite a scene. It could almost be something from a Norman Rockwell paining... if the kitchen weren't full of vampires. Edward heard my thought and snorted but otherwise ignored me. He was standing to one side of Bella, who had her back to me; she was chopping something on the counter and directing her boyfriend in the art of preheating the oven. This was new.
Esme was hovering over Bella's shoulder, concentrating fiercely and actually taking notes on a little yellow memo pad. They were both wearing aprons and had their sleeves rolled up, but it was actually a cute look- I'd have to try it sometime. When did they get those aprons anyway? Someone had been shopping without me…
Emmett was leaning over the island chopping block, which was threatening to collapse under his weight; his elbows were hooked over the other side and he was pelting Bella with questions, cooking-related and otherwise.
When Jasper and I came in he stopped long enough to cheer, "Hi Alice! Bella's cooking!" Bella took advantage of his distraction to ask Edward, "Is Rosalie coming soon? I need the stuff she's bringing." On cue Rosalie breezed through the back kitchen door, arms full of paper grocery bags.
Woah. Ever since their little talk a couple months ago; Rosalie had been trying out a tentative friendliness towards Bella. Or at least she was speaking to her… and apparently running errands for her... Even so, only half of this newly formed duo ate human food, so… "What's going on?"
Bella twisted around and raised an eyebrow at me, but nearly cut herself with the chopping knife, so Edward relieved her of it and she came to help Rosalie sort groceries. "I had Edward ask Rosalie to pick up some things on her way back. She was done before you were." Rosalie had I had both been on solo hunting, ah, day trips… bird watching…
Apparently I had been too preoccupied to catch what was going on because I still had no idea why Bella was cooking in our kitchen.
I closed my eyes and skipped through pictures of the immediate future like they were a scrapbook. I stopped when I saw a human family sitting down at our dinner table. I opened my eyes in time to see Jasper smiling at my expression. He gave me the details my vision hadn't.
"Carlisle's doctor friend finally wormed his way into a dinner invitation. Carlisle's been turning him down for months, and it was going to get ugly soon, but the friend invited us all over for dinner and Carlisle thought it might be…smoother… if we all met here. So they're coming over tonight and Bella offered to cook to make it all a little more natural. But none of us had much notice- Carlisle only called a couple hours ago, and since Bella is the only one who knows how to cook (Bella grinned triumphantly) it is going at a very…human… pace." (Bella glared.)
I remembered something else I had seen while I was skimming, "Bella, careful, you're going to cut yourself!" She had gotten the knife back from Edward and glanced up from a pile of red peppers, "Huh? OUCH!"
"Sorry."
It was only a tiny cut, more like a nick, but Jasper slid discreetly out of the kitchen and Edward was glaring at me as though it were my fault, so I went over to help Rosalie finish unpacking.
Instead she handed me a tube of ointment and a small roll of bandages. "I thought something like this might happen."
"Oh. Clever," I handed the supplies to Edward and was apparently forgiven.
Emmett suddenly got bored of being ignored, "Bella, how come you need different shapes of pans and what's the difference between chopping and dicing, and why is there a difference, and how come you're spraying all the pans before you put stuff in, and can you really smell this stuff 'cause I can't and this isn't any fun- Wouldn't you rather chase your food?"
There were a couple minutes of silence in the kitchen and then Bella started giggling. "Esme, could you read me off that last thing, please?"
She was promptly interrupted by Emmett, who beat me to my next question anyway, "And how come she has to know all this stuff? I mean, it's kinda interesting, but, taking notes?"
Esme passed Bella her notes and explained, "Bella and I agreed that it would more conventional if Carlisle's friends think I made dinner. So we thought I should be able to answer questions about it. You know ingredients and technique."
She made it sound like rocket science, but to a creature with no sense of smell or taste, cooking pretty much was. I nodded at their forethought (that was usually my department) and asked if I could do anything to help.
Bella, who was apparently Captain of the Day, asked me to help Rosalie make the place look ' a little more lived in.' Rosalie nodded seriously and handed Edward one of her grocery bags, then picked up the remaining ones and went to the living room. I had to ask. "What was that? The one you gave to Edward?"
Bella's voice echoed from the kitchen, "OUCH!"
Rosalie simply nodded, "That."
I had a moment's picture of Edward wrapping a bandage around a burn near her elbow. It was only a small one, and he was going over board. In another moment she would slip it off. They were so cute!
Rosalie poked me and I snapped out of the future. She passed me some magazines to put on the coffee table. As I set them out and bent a few pages to make them look used, she carefully mussed the pillows on the sofa commenting, "Bella thinks it's too perfect-looking here. Esme was thrilled, but she did say we could mess it up a little for tonight."
From the kitchen Bella yelped, Emmett laughed, and Edward sighed and reached for the bandages again.
please review, i have a little more to the story, but this is the best stopping point. i only know where i'm going to a certain point, but after that feedback would really help. feel free to say whatever you're thinking.
love, star
