That's How We Roll
"New York City"
((Note: Thank you for so many reviews and hits. This is by far my most successful story, as of yet.
Really, though, send reviews telling me where the Cullens' plane should go next. I already have New York City, St. Louis, and Rome down. Please give me more cities, adventures, and information about places. Thank you!))
"Because we can?!" I shriek at Edward, "That's the most idiotic reasoning behind stealing something that I've ever heard! At least when I commited grand-theft auto in Italy it was for a reason."
Jasper reaches back and squeezes my hand, trying desperately to calm me.
"No," I say, slipping away from his grasp. He sighs and turns back around.
"It's not like we can turn back now," he whispers. True. I think. Very true, indeed. We're probably wanted or something by now.
"No, we aren't," Edward laughed. I turn over to him, annoyed at his constant surveilance of my thoughts. Raising my eyebrow, he continues, "The guy who owns this plane is drunk somewhere. He probably won't realize that it's missing." He winks at me, knowing that I can find out for sure.
I close my eyes and consentrate. A man who's drunk somewhere. That doesn't really help, but I somehow manage to drift into a vision. He's exiting a bar; his tie loosened, his clothes dirtied. He fumbles around for his cell-phone before making a call. He calls for a cab and ends up going home--completely oblivious to the fact that he was supposed to be on this plane at that time.
My eyes flutter open, and everyone seems to be looking my way. "What?" I ask.
Bella stops twisting her hair and says, "So what did you see?"
I roll my eyes at Edward, who's already heard the answer in my head, "The man won't realize what happened. Not for a while, anyway."
"See?" he says smuggly. "Nothing to worry about."
"Not for now," I warn, "but once he realizes that a valuable asset is mysteriously missing, I'm sure that he'll do something about it."
Edward shrugs his shoulders, not really caring about the situation. Bella turns to me, "Don't worry about it, Alice."
"Aren't you the policeman's daughter who never lets us drive over the speed limit without freaking out? I can't believe that you're allowing this."
"It's not like they'll catch us," she replies bluntly.
It's true. I'm not going to pretend that we're like normal people who can just get caught for stealing. With our abilities, it would be impossible for anything short of the Volturi to stop us.
Still, I've had my fair share of grand-theft auto. There have been Porches and Corvetes and Mustangs. There was even once a Ferrari. But it isn't as if I just walked down the lane, saw the fancy car, and took away with it. And it wasn't preestablished, either. The only times I've ever stolen was out of pure necesity--when either Bella needed help fast or we were saving Edward's life or the like. It's never been anything quite like this.
Well, that is, until now.
I turn around in my seat towards a small window about the size of a dinner plate. First, the hills and trees look familiar, but we fly higher--over the low cloud coverage. It's like taking a ride through rolling mist. I'm not sure how Edward can command the plane when the visibility is probably that of only ten feet.
Somehow, though, we manage. We fly quickly through the clouds, until they are simply odd puffs here and there. I can still see everything below us. The trees, the streams and rivers, roads, and after only a little while, we can see Forks.
"Hey, look!" Bella yells excitedly, pointing down from her larger window. I look over, along with Jasper and Edward. Down, directly below us, is Bella's house, the cruiser in the driveway.
The cruiser.
"Bella?" I ask, somewhat shaky. "What did you tell Charlie about this?"
She turns over to me and cocks her head, "About leaving?"
"Yes," I say, with little patience.
She smiles and whispers into my ear, "I told him we were going to Vegas." Jasper and Edward laugh, obviously able to hear her whisper.
"No you didn't," I remark with squinty eyes.
Bella laughs, "You're not very good at looking angry or unpleased." Yeah, I know. "I told him that we were going on a road trip."
"What did he say about it?"
"He didn't really care. I told him that you were coming along, so he automatically let me. He thinks that you're a good role-model, after all," she says. She tips her head back over to the window and twirls her hair.
Edward points, "There's school... well, there was school. We're going too fast for you to be able to see it now."
It's true. We are going pretty fast. Good.
A few games go by, Bella eats her smelly McDonalds and takes a nap, I listen to my new iPod, and we eventually fly for four hours over the heart of America before the plane begins to lower in altitude and slow. I look out of the window, expecting to see dark blackness, but am surprised to see so much light. There are so many buildings all around us, and I'm beginning to grow nervous about Edward's piloting abilities.
"Where are we?" I ask, a bit frightened of the looming sky-scrapers.
Edward turns towards me and smiles, "New York."
I'm curious if he's telling the truth.
"I am," he laughs.
"New York... City?" I ask, slightly confused as to how we managed to fly across the country in only four hours. Maybe a plane is like a car. There are speed limits, but that doesn't mean that we are going to follow them. Does that work in a plane, though?
"No," Edward whispers.
"Then...?"
"It's just a really nice plane. I think that it runs a lot faster than you figured," he says. Looking over at Bella, he speaks so softly, "Would you mind waking her? She's taken a nap for long enough. Besides, she'll want to see this."
I nod my head, and tap Bella ever so lightly on the shoulder. She drifts peacefully away from her slumber and looks up at me with glaze in her eyes. I whisper that Edward asked for me to awake her, and tell her to look out of her window. She slowly turns to the lights lifting from the darkness, and her mouth forms a little circle.
"No way," she says, incredibly skeptical of what she's viewing. "We are not in New York!"
"New York City," Edward smiles, lowering the plane closely.
"Um..." I start, "Edward? What are you doing?"
He lowers the plane yet lower until we're literally inbetween the buildings. I start to recognize them. Broadway. The building that hosts TRL on MTV. The World Trade Center site; an odd square of lonliness. The Empire State Building. We're flying way too low--I can't believe that we haven't been shot down or something.
"Edward?!" I scream. Jasper and Edward just laugh at me.
"It's okay, hun," Jasper says, reaching for my hand. Bella seems comatose. She's staring in utter amusement at the sights.
"I've..." she begins, "I've never seen anything like this." It's true. The furthest east that she's ever gone (besides Italy, of course) would be Albuquerque. And, in Italy, she really didn't see anything. The entire time that I had been driving, she was worrying, thinking about Edward, and paying absolutely no attention to the city around her. A part of me wishes that we could have visited a few sites after the incident with the Volturi, but I understood that she needed to return home. We can only keep Charlie at bay for so long, anyway.
The plane is coasting down to the street below, littered with cars rushing out of the way. They're trying anything in desperation--parking on the sidewalk, abondoning their cars, speeding through red-lights. It's utter caus, and we are the ambascade. I glance at Edward, squeezing the armrest with my hands until I'm sure that my nails have cut into the tan leather.
"Alice, stop worrying--it's not like I'm going to get us killed. Just live a little," he says, a bit irritated with me. I try to ease into my seat over the seconds that we fly lower. In a breath-taking moment, we hit the ground and roll quickly on the street. Nearly every car is off of the road by now.
That is, all but one.
A sporty, red convertable, with the radio bass thundering, is sitting at the redlight ahead. Edward and Jasper point to it and pull the plane alongside the convertable. Two men, each wearing sunglasses and what Jasper would call "gangster clothes", sit in the convertable talking it up and laughing--the radio killing their hearing the whole while. Bella runs over to my side of the plane and opens up the window, sticking her head and hand out.
One of the men notices, and his jaw drops in utter amazement. Edward chuckles as he hears the thoughts radiating off of the man. His friend notices that the man has stopped talking and slowly turns around. Looking dead at Bella, he lowers his sunglasses (which may I add are completely useless since it's night) and his mouth opens in a gasp.
"Hey!" Bella yells at them, waving her hand and smiling. One of the men manages to limply wave his arm back at her before we lift off into the air as the light turns green. I quickly close the window, Bella gets back to her seat, and we can't stop laughing. As hard as we try, it just won't stop. The looks on their faces were priceless.
As the laughter calms into an oh-my-gosh-can-you-believe-we-did-that thrall, we drift back into the cloud cover of the night. I somewhat wonder if that's all we're going to do in New York City. Is that it? I ask to Edward. He turns around and shakes his head.
"We're going to drop the plane off outside of town; call a cab," he says.
Bella tips her head his way, "what are we going to do?" It's obvious that she's hoping there will be a little time for sleep added into the schedule.
"We'll do whatever any of us want," he smiles, "I was thinking we start things off by heading over to a night club."
Jasper's eyes light up and he smiles a wide, cunning smile. "Do we all have our fake ID's?" he asks.
Bella rips an ID out of her walet, "I do!" I stare over at her in shock. When did she ever get a fake ID?! I mean, of course I have mine--I always have one with me. But how long has she had that?
She turns my way and smiles, "I made it." So she admits it. I grab it away from her and study the ID. It's real. Well, illegal, but actually real. I can only think that she had some help with this; maybe from her policeman father.
It's as if she knows what I'm thinking when she takes and back and adds, "The police station has loose security. It's really easy to walk in there and take my picture." I think that's when my jaw dropped. I wasn't sure whether to scold her or be immensely proud of her sneaky work.
Edward laughs, "Bella, you crack me up. I honestly didn't think you had the guts."
"Hey!" she shouts angrily, but playfully, at him. I just shake my head and giggle a little. This is turning out to be one hell of a trip.