A/N Hey babes!
Thank you to:
The one hundred-eleven people in the USA, the seventeen people in the UK the ten people in Canada, the eight people in Australia, the five people in Estonia, the one person in Poland, the one person in the UAE, the two people in Peru, the one person in the Philippines, the one person in New Zealand, the one person in Denmark, the one person in Finland, and the one person in Mexico who read!
I'd also like to thank aredente farfalla, hayleyhoo, xTwilightForeverx, Twilight-Muffins, kiwifruit101, anonymous, A is for Angel, blondeshavemorefun, Pirncess of Darkness, redwinggurl, and hollie for reviewing!
I will try to update once a week, but because next week is finals (joy) I might not next week. Just so you know that the rabid potatoes we farm here in Idaho haven't gotten me. You have to watch out for those little buggers…
BPOV
The next day, I couldn't decide what to wear. I wanted something that would drive Jasper crazy, but wouldn't attract too much attention from gross underclassmen. Yuck… I eventually decided on a Prada tee shirt with necklace detailing, and a PRPS motorcycle jacket. I then paired that with a pair of red, True Religion skinny jeans, and I was ready to go.
I was running around trying to find my Speedy 30, when my phone began to ring.
"Hello?"
"It's on the dining room table." Jasper's lilting voice carried through the speaker. Not even the distortion from the phone could mar his voice.
"What…?"
"Just look!"
I listened to Jasper, and looked on the table. My bag was there, sitting amid the unpaid bills and books, thriving to be read, come the rainy day.
"Ok, how did you…"
"Turn around."
I spun, and Jasper was standing outside the huge window/wall that was in the dining room. I smiled, and waved.
"What are you doing out there?"
"Dome outside. I want to show you my birthday present."
"It's your birthday? I would've bought you something…"
"My birthday is in a couple of weeks, on the 25th, but my parents are going out of town, and gave me my gifts early."
"Oh. No offense, but why are you here?" I continued to talk into my phone, resting in the nook between my neck and shoulder, as I rounded up the last of my things.
"Do you not want me here?" I caught a trace of humor in his voice, and a heaping spoonful of arrogance.
"No, Jazzy Baby, I don't. Because my big, university student boyfriend might take offense if I snuck around behind his back. I really like you Jazzy, and I'm sorry it had to end this way..."
"Wait, what?"
I burst out laughing, my laughter muffled, as I clamped my hands across my mouth. I hung up my phone, and crept out the back door. As I crept along the back wall of the house, I heard Jasper's voice: he obviously didn't realize that I had hung up.
"Bella, that…I…whoa. I'm…shocked. I mean, university? Really? I can figure you sort of going for a macho man, but I don't think that huge helps. I mean…"
As he kept talking, I crept up behind him, and slid my hands over his eyes.
"Guess who…" I leaned up to whisper in his ear.
Jasper shivered, and reached back, lifting me up slightly by the tops of my arms, not unlike the way one would pick up a toddler.
"I think, that you just took ten years off of my life."
"Well," I replied, my snarkiness making a comeback, "That's too bad. I'm not into older men."
I turned, and began to walk out of the backyard, and toward the garage, with the driveway just past it. He jogged to catch up, and instead of a car, there was a motorcycle. Upon getting closer, I saw that it was a Ducati 848. Jasper stood by it, and looked at me. I whistled, and ran my hand down its length.
"Impressive."
"Want a ride to school?" he asked, his southern twang slightly masked from living in the north for the past few years.
I ran over to him, and nodded. He sat down, and I sat behind him, wrapping my arms around his waist, thankful I had worn jeans, and tangling our legs together. He started the bike, and off we went.
As we pulled up to the school, everyone in the parking lot stopped to stare. The minute my arms unwrapped from Jasper, and my black, Christian Louboutin's had touched the ground; Edward grabbed my arm, and yanked me to him.
"What are you thinking? You could've been killed! I mean, riding on a motorcycle without a helmet? Do you have a death wish?"
"Ugh, Edward, get off of me! Have some respect for my personal space!"
"Respect? Bella, you could've been killed!"
What the heck? Why did he care? Jasper was looking out for me, and although he had been speeding, it wasn't too far over the speed limit.
Edward hugged me to him, and asked me again if I was alright.
"Edward! I'm fine! Let me go, I need to talk to Jasper."
He slowly released the wrists he had been holding over his head.
"Sorry."
I strode over to where Jasper was leaning against his Ducati.
"What was that all about?" God, I loved his voice.
"I'm not sure. I mean, one minute I had my arms and legs wrapped around you, and the next, Mr. Psycho-Over-Protective's testosterone kicks in, and he goes all caveman. I think there is medication we can get him, if this seems to happen often…"
Jasper laughed, and wrapped his arm around my shoulders, and we walked to first period.
On Tuesday, Jasper was waiting for me outside of my house.
"Hey!"
"Hey, Bella, are you ready to go to school?"
"Yeah. Where's your bike?"
"Since its actually sunny today, I was thinking that maybe we could walk. If that's okay with you…"
"Of course!"
I grabbed Jasper's left hand, and swung it between us as we walked to the school, only about a mile away from my house.
"Jasper...?"
"Yes?"
"Can you tell me a story?"
I saw him smile in my peripheral, and look upward, deep in thought.
"Sure. If we play popcorn."
"Popcorn?"
"I'll start, and then I'll stop. Once I stop, you pick up, and we create a story like that. Good idea?"
"Sure. You first…"
"Ok. Once upon a time…" he began in a mocking voice. I swiped at his chest, and he dodged back, laughing.
"Jasper!"
"Sorry, sorry. In a town called F-Sporks…Sporks… a town called Sporks, there was a boy named Hale. Every day, Hale would go to his school in his home state of Texas, but there was something missing. Day after day, nothing changed, and Hale began to wish for something new. At home, his parents fought almost nightly, and his father slowly began to fade into the background, as he began to frequent bars more than his house.
His mother was a flashy woman, always driving the fastest cars, and wearing jewelry so large and flashy, that she had frequent backaches. It was not a secret to their small town that his mother had many boyfriends on the side, and enjoyed playing them off of each other to get the most out of each relationship. She did not date for looks, she dated for money. And then, one day, one of her boyfriends offered her a proposal. If she left her husband, they could go away to his house in a prime real estate hot spot.
She took her son with her, and went with her boyfriend, to his home. It turned out, that his 'prime real estate' was a small house in the town of Sporks, and that he barely had any money. But for the first time in her life, Hale's mother was actually in love for the first time in her life. Never mind the fact that she had been married multiple times. First, to a rich banker, he died a few years later. Then, to one of those millionaires that nobody quite knows how they became famous. Then, to Hale's dad. They got divorced a few years later, when Hale was a baby. She married the founder of one of the largest medicinal companies in the world. After that went bottoms up, she had a fling with his brother. Then, after remarrying Hale's father, she married her last husband, Peter Whitlock.
In Sporks, many of the people at his high school took an automatic liking to Hale, and he quickly made new friends. But Hale also got unwanted attention from the girls at Sporks, for his light blond hair and light tan stuck out among the pale faced children of the Olympic peninsula, and their hair, dark, to trap any body heat. The children had actually adapted to be somewhat warm, in this cold, dreary place.
But he didn't want their attention. He wanted to be noticed by a certain girl. The girl with the bottomless brown eyes, and the long, mahogany, hair, her shyness coming off as conceited and standoff-ish to some, but to him, it was just a defense mechanism. So, imagine his surprise, when their eleventh year of school begins, and she comes in, with her hair razor edged, and dyed a rather particular shade of burgundy, that would look so odd on anyone else, but on her, was very becoming. And Hale found himself so intrigued by the brown eyed beauty, that he found himself falling for her, before he even knew her name."
I looked up at Jasper, and he looked down at me. Noticing our surroundings, I saw that we were only half the way to the school.
"Your turn, Bella."
"Once, in the town of Sporks, there was a girl named Izzy…"
On Wednesday, the dreary weather was back, and we drove my car to school.
When I thought about my relationship with Jasper, I always realized, that although we had only actually begun to talk to each other, from careful examination from afar, we knew all of the little mannerisms, the body language, insignificant little twitches about each other.
During lunch, as we were all sitting at the table, Emmett with carrots up his nose, Rose looking on in disgust, Alice reading a Teen Vogue, Edward tapping a beat out on his thighs, Jasper drawing an apple, and I was singing under my breath.
"She held the world upon a string
But she didn't ever hold me
She spun the stars on her fingernails
But it never made her happy
'Cause she couldn't ever have me
She said she'd won the world at a carnival
But she couldn't ever win me
'Cause she couldn't ever catch me"
Jasper stopped drawing, and looked at me.
"I, I know why
Because when I look in her eyes
I just see the sky
When I look in her eyes
Well I, just see the sky…"
I looked at him. He's hot, and he listens to Panic at the Disco? What's the catch?
"I don't love you I'm just passing the time
You could love me if I knew how to lie
But who could love me?
I am out of my mind
Throwing a line out to sea
To see if I can catch a dream."
We could sing really well together. At that point, Rosalie, Alice, and Edward had noticed that we were off in our own little world, and were watching.
"The sun was always in her eyes
She didn't even see me
But that girl had-"
Emmett's booming voice popped out at us.
"Guys! C'mon, stop with the sissy stuff. If you're going to sing, do it right. Newton!"
Mike Newton, who was walking past, stopped, and turned back.
"Yeah?"
"Hey there
I like your hair
Who does your hair?
I wanna go there…"
Emmett, who had been caressing the tope of Mike's head, just had his hand slapped away.
"What the heck, McCarty? That is messed up on so many levels, man…"
After the rest of the week flew by with Jasper and I going to school together, and spending most of our spare time together, and I couldn't wait for Friday, which was slowly arriving.
On Friday I had Alice come over to my house to help me get ready for when Jasper would come to get me at six.
"Bella, do you know what you are going to wear?"
She had been attacking my hair with multiple types of mousse, a curling iron, a blow dryer, and hairpins. She had taken the front part on either side of my head, and pulled them back, securing them with a hairpin. She had then curled all of my hair, the loose waves cascading over my shoulders.
I shook my head no, and she gasped.
"Bella, we have only an hour lets go!"
I stood, and led her to the guest bedroom, where I kept my clothing that I almost never wore, or was still in the original bag.
In all honesty, that wasn't something that I had thought of. I wonder what Alice the Amazing will decide to pour me in tonight?
Alice reached into the abyss that is the guest room closet, and pulled out my Dolce & Gabbana, hand painted short dress.
"Where did you get this?!"
"Seattle?"
"Oh…my…God! It's beautiful! It must've cost tons!"
I didn't have the heart to tell her that I bought it for $200 from a young woman who was selling a lot of her clothes, because she didn't have enough money.
It was a pretty dress though. It was multi colored, with paint splashes scattered over a white background. Its wide straps led into a straight neckline, and a black popper-fastening belt sat high on the waist. A classic bubble hemline fell just above the knee.
"But what could I wear with it? You know, accessories…"
Alice raised her right eyebrow at me.
"Honestly, Bella? You have a rocking shoe collection that I would kill for! I pray the Rosalie never comes to your house, because she will go down!!!!! Sorry. Now, show me where all of your shoes are."
I blushed, and walked into the hall.
"But…"
"Patience…Alice."
I reached up above me, and pulled down the ladder to the attic. I climbed up, and into the meticulously cleaned attic. After my mom had left last year, I had decided that I no longer wanted to live in the bedroom that she had decorated ''for me''. It looked more like someplace she would sleep, as opposed to myself. I had cleaned out the attic, putting anything unneeded into the garage, and bought a new bed, dresser, desk, loveseat, and rocking entertainment system. As for the lack of closet? I begged and pleaded for my dad's friend's son, who lives in Portland, and is a builder, to come and add a wall 3/4 of the way into the room. I now had a large walk in closet, outfitted with shoe racks, jewelry hooks, and shelf after shelf of color-coordinated clothes.
"This is your room?"
"Yeah, that other room was the guest room. I keep my special clothing in there. Shoes are over there."
Alice gasped, and ran over.
"Christian Louboutin… Jimmy Choo… Manolo Blahnik… Prada…Steve Madden…Vivienne Westwood…Maud Frizon… Jessica Bennett… André Courrèges… Good God, woman. You have a little bit of everything!"
I grinned, and gestured around me.
"See anything that will match?"
Alice smiled back, and held up a pair of Jimmy Choo Imelda leather sandals.
"Perfect!" She squealed, tossing the shoes at me. I snagged them from the air, and placed them down on one of the chairs in the closet.
"A bag! You'll need a clutch!"
She ran over to the shelves on the other side of my closet.
After rifling through the clutch section, she pulled out a Yves Saint Laurent Y-Mail clutch.
"Criminy, Bella! Is there anything you don't have?"
"A motorcycle. I want to learn how to ride one…"
Alice snorted, and handed me the clutch.
"Do you have any earrings?"
I spun her around, and she gasped.
"Bella, I want to come back as you in my next life."
She skimmed over the selection, before pulling out a pair of Bottega Veneta black diamond earrings.
"I like. Now, Bella, try all of this on."
I stripped, and put on the clothes, careful not to muss my hair.
"You…look…FABULOUS!"
I took one look at Alice, arms spread wide, and burst out laughing.
Alice grinned at me, and began to walk around me…
"Perfect. Jasper should be here any minute."
The doorbell rang.
