"You may now kiss the bride."

Edward lifted the veil from my face and leaned in to kiss me. As I prepared for the heart-stopping touch of his cold lips, something went horribly wrong. Edward's eyes turned red, his grip tightened to the point of breaking my arm-and as he leaned in to suck my body dry of its blood, I woke up screaming.

I felt a cold stone touch my hand before I could really understand what was going on in the waking world. I realized quickly that it was Edward's hand, and opened my eyes to see his face gazing into mine, his eyes the lightest color of topaz. I was grateful for this sign that he had gone hunting last night.

But his eyes will never be red, I assured myself. He's a vegetarian.

"Is there something wrong, love?" he asked, and I practically melted listening to his velvety voice.

"No...no..." I lied, despite knowing that it was worthless to try to lie to him.

"Bella-" He stopped speaking suddenly and looked to the door. "Charlie's coming," he muttered, and disappeared.

Just as Edward had predicted, Charlie walked in only a few seconds later, absolutely unaware, as usual, that Edward had spent the night. Casually, he said, "Bella, wake up and get ready-Alice called and said the two of you were going to go out shopping today..." He raised an eyebrow. "How come you didn't tell me before that you two were going to go out today?"

"Sorry, I must have forgotten," I said apologetically, rising from my bed. But truthfully, Alice had told me weeks ago that she was going to take me on an expedition for my wedding dress-she just hadn't told me the date so that I wouldn't be able to weasel my way out of it. If it had been anyone else taking me, I would have planned something to do every day so when she called, I would be busy, but Alice would know when I had given that up. So I hadn't even bothered trying to avoid her taking me away.

"Well, just hurry up and get ready-she'll be coming over in a few," Charlie told me, and left the room.

I was sure that she would come over as soon as possible, to avoid any attempts at escape that I might make. I wanted to groan, but kept it to myself in case Charlie heard. I didn't need any questions about why I wasn't looking forward to this certain shopping expenditure.

As I gathered my clothes to take a shower, I looked to my window to see if Edward had reappeared yet. No sign of him. I guessed that he knew we really wouldn't have much time together right now, if Alice was to haul me off as soon as she was able to.

I took a shower, got dressed, brushed my teeth, and headed downstairs to make myself breakfast. I wasn't sure if I could stomach anything more than a couple of pieces of toast, so I took two slices of bread out of the fridge and popped them into the toaster.

Charlie appeared from his room, ready for his job at the police station. "All right Bella-I'm off to work. You and Alice stay out of trouble," he told me, heading for the door. There was really more truth to that than there should have been-after all the trouble I managed to get into with Charlie, aided by Alice, it was a wonder that he hated Edward instead of her.

Then again, Alice never proposed to me.

"Okay, Dad; we're just going up to Seattle for a little while. No big deal."

He eyed me suspiciously and made his way out the door. Almost simultaneously, my breakfast popped out of the toaster. I took out the two pieces of toast and put them on my plate, then buttered both of them and sat down.

I knew that I had no reason to be nervous about shopping for a dress, but something about it set my nerves on end. Perhaps it was because of this small town-news spread fast and if one of these people-especially one of Charlie's friends-spotted me looking for a wedding dress, it would be the end of me. I could only imagine the stares that kind of story would provoke-it would probably be ten times worse than the stares I got from being a newcomer two years ago.

Halfway through my breakfast, Alice appeared in my doorway, all smiles. "Knock, knock," she said pleasantly, and sat down next to me. "Are you excited for today?"

"Ecstatic," I answered in the deadest voice I could manage. How was she always so perky?

"Oh, come on, Bella-chin up!"

I thrust up my chin sarcastically.

"Bella..." Alice said, giving me her sad eyes. But I wasn't going to put on a happy face just because she was giving me the eyes. I continued eating my toast, acting as if she was not attempting to retrieve any reaction at all from me. Noticing that she was having no effect on me, she decided to pull the Edward card on me. "Edward loves you so much. Why can't you just be happy about the wedding?"

"You know I love Edward, too. This whole thing is just ridiculous." I threw away the rest of my toast, no longer hungry now that Alice was bringing this terrifying shopping trip into reality.

"It's not to him. He loves you, and he knows you're the one for him. And asking for your hand in marriage is not that high of a price for what you're asking in return. Not to him at least. And, he's been waiting over 100 years for this, Bella," she said softly. "For you."

I knew all of this-I knew what he thought he was taking away from me because of what I was asking, and I knew he had lived over 100 years, lonely except for the fact that he had Carlisle and the rest of the Cullen family. But he was wrong about what I would lose. He was proof that there was life with a soul was possible even without a heartbeat. He was the most loving, generous person I had ever met.

"Well, anyway, let's get going. I know you want to be there and back by the time the crowds arrive. Shy, silly Bella," she said, smiling, knowing my argument-we had had the marriage discussion so many times before...

Right then it occurred to me that my wrist was missing its most prized possession. "Hold on a second," I said, and rushed upstairs. Alice followed me on my heels to make sure that I didn't climb out of my window when I got to my room. She had reason to worry, though I wasn't sure why she didn't just look into the future and see that I had decided to withstand the torture she had in store for me today.

I picked up my charm bracelet from my nightstand and put it on my wrist. It was my best symbol of both of the ones I loved...I touched the wooden wolf longingly. Edward, I would always have, but Jacob...It wasn't right to love them both, though, not in this way...I had to let one of them go, and it wasn't going to be Edward.

With the testaments of my love dangling on my wrist, I was ready to go, and Alice dragged me off to her yellow Porsche to purchase what I was certain would be the frilliest, most terrifyingly not me dress in the entire city of Seattle.

"Oooh! This one, Bella! This one!" Alice said excitedly, pulling a huge, lacy dress off of the rack.

I groaned. "Geez, Alice, couldn't you learn to be a little less...girly?"

"Oh, come on, Bella! This will look beautiful on you!" she insisted, holding the dress up to my body.

I don't know if it was more the hideousness of the lace, or if it was just the overall flashiness of it. But if I had to get married practically against my will, then couldn't I at least do it with some kind of subtlety? But this was Alice I was dealing with. She did nothing halfway.

"Alice, I know I gave you pretty much free-range with the wedding-" I started.

"But you wanted to pick out your dress," she completed for me. "You do still want to pick out your dress, don't you?" I knew that the only reason why she was asking me, and the only reason why she had agreed to my condition, was because she had always wanted to shop for a wedding dress with a little sister.

"I just don't want anything too lavish. You know-"

She giggled; the sound of bells emanated from her throat. "Oh, Bella..." she said, putting the dress back on the rack and beginning to hunt for another one. I knew what that meant-no holding back for her. I rolled my eyes and followed her through the aisle. None of these dresses appealed to me-and I knew that none of them would. We could search every store in Seattle-no, the entire state of Washington-and none of the dresses would appeal to me. It almost made me wonder if there was any point to me bothering to shop with her.

As Alice oohhed and aahhed over every last extravagant dress, I fumbled with the crystal heart Edward had added to the piece of jewelry Jacob had given me. "Silent as my heart, and equally yours," he had told me. And after being with him so often lately, I was beginning to regain my trust in him-not just that he would never leave me, but also that he really was genuinely here...It was true that I still believed that I didn't deserve him, but I was so in love with him that there was nothing I could have done to let him go. I knew I was being selfish. There was no stopping my insatiable love for him, though-I had discovered that when he left me.

"Bella? How about this one?" Alice interrupted my thoughts with yet another dress.

I rolled my eyes. "Alice..."

"Bella, come on! He gives you one condition, and you don't even want to follow through?"

Actually, there was more than one condition: I had also agreed that he could buy me two cars (which he claimed really only amounted to one because of the reason for the number), that I would attend one semester of college (our agreement had actually been at least one, but there was no way I was going to wait for more than a semester), and that I would be patient enough to wait for him until after we were married (the condition I was least happy about, despite my discomfort at the idea of turning nineteen before I turned, or my opposition towards marriage and him buying me expensive objects.) I didn't mention these technicalities, though I did think over that last one again. If there was anything that would make the frilliness worth it, that was it. I raised an eyebrow at the puff of white hanging on Alice's arm, but took the dresses from her.

"Where are the fitting rooms?" I grumbled.

Alice clapped her hands softly but excitedly and led me to the back of the store, where I took the very last room.

I sifted through the dresses Alice had picked out before bothering to try them on. She had picked out about seven of them, and many of them were typical Alice-too frilly, too big. I ended up picking two from the fray, and tried those on. The first was not flattering at all, and the second, I felt was too revealing. Didn't Alice know me at all?

I couldn't say that any of these dresses committed the lesser crime of the bunch, but the least I could do-for Alice's sake-was pick out a random dress and-

"I wanna see you in each one!" Alice called out. Damn her visions-why did they have to occur the instant a decision was made?

I groaned and put on the dress that was on top of the pile. I didn't bother looking into the mirror-I knew I wouldn't like what I saw. I stepped out of the dressing room, preparing myself for Alice's yelps of joy.

"You look beautiful, Bella! Come here - look at yourself in the mirror!" she exclaimed.

"Alice..."

"Bella, if you didn't want to do this, then why did you offer?"

"Could you just..." I sighed. "Alice, you know I love you to death, but your taste in clothing..."

She cocked her head to the side, and immediately I felt guilty for criticizing her. I didn't want to hurt her feelings-that was the last thing I wanted to do. "Alice...you can buy me whatever clothing you want, any other time, but could you let me have a little more freedom with this?"

"I just want what's best, Bella."

"I know, but..." I felt so guilty for saying this. I had promised her that we could shop for a dress, and I had known the frilliness was coming. I sighed. "Okay, Alice, I'll give you a bit more freedom."

She gave me her happy clap again, and I tried to look a bit more content with her choice of dresses. I sulked into the fitting room, and made my way through each of the dresses, showing Alice each individual one.

We ended up not buying any of them. Of course, it took a lot of searching to find a dress that would please Alice.

"I have the perfect hair style for this dress, Bella! You're going to look absolutely incredible," Alice told me when we were walking out of the store with the dress that she had finally decided on, after searching all day through what must have been every bridal store ever built in the city.

"Wonderful," I said sarcastically.

"Aren't you the least bit excited about the wedding, Bella?"

I sighed. I loved Edward to death, but I felt no need to marry him. I knew that I was going to love him forever. I didn't need papers or a huge ceremony to erase any doubt about that, because there was no doubt. "Alice, we've talked about this before..."

"I know, Bella, but you're being silly. This wedding is going to be a dream come true!"

I didn't really have a response to that. I knew that she was going to make this possibly the most gorgeous event that I had ever seen; she would decorate the house (where we would be holding the ceremony) more gorgeous than even the richest man's wedding, but that wasn't the problem. My guess was that she was only trying to assure me of the beauty of the wedding because she had given up trying to convince me that marriage wasn't overrated.

I looked up into the faces of the crowd, losing myself in my thoughts again. Marrying Edward should not scare me. Maybe the thought of marrying him so young should; after all, my parents had gotten married when they were around my age, and ended up divorced. But there was no fear of that with Edward. So why was I so worried about getting married?

"You shouldn't let your parents' experiences ruin Edward's wish. He-"

Suddenly, I stopped short, gasping.

Alice looked alarmed. "What's wrong?"

I gulped and subtly pointed to a man standing in front of us. He was drop dead gorgeous, more beautiful than any model, and it was deathly obvious what he was. A couple of years ago, I probably would not have recognized him for what he was. But now that I had spent so much time around others like him, it could not have been more apparent. "Alice, he's-"

"That's odd...I've never seen him before," she said slowly. "He's not a part of any coven that we know."

"Are you sure?" I had never met anyone in any of the other covens that the Cullens knew, but his presence still alarmed me. Was it because he was alone? I wasn't sure.

"He doesn't seem to be thirsty..."

"Do you see anything bad happening?"

"No...that's what's puzzling me." She groaned. "I wish Edward was here-he could tell us what he was doing here."

"He looks like he's looking for something."

"Or someone." Alice seemed to be getting nervous.

"Are you sure you don't see anything bad happening?"

"Yes. That's what is puzzling me..."

That must have been why she was uncomfortable-the uncertainty of what would happen. If this was an untamed, thirsty vampire, then innocent people could get hurt. What if he just wasn't thirsty at the moment, and that was why Alice wasn't getting any visions? But why would he be here, amongst all of these humans, if he wasn't thirsty?

"I should call Carlisle..."

"Okay..." Maybe he would have some sort of answer to this-he seemed to have an answer to everything else.

Alice pulled out her cell phone and quickly dialed Carlisle's number; both of us made sure to keep our eyes on the out of place vampire. "Hello...Carlisle..."

The rest of the conversation was lost as my eyes locked with the vampire's.f