Chapter 1: Meet the Parents

The first thing that Bella Swan noted when she stepped off of the plane was that the air was different. In Phoenix, even inside the hyper-controlled, air-conditioned airport terminals, she could feel the dryness of the air. Here, the air was more humid. Somehow, it felt dirtier to her—she don't know why. The air in Phoenix just felt so clean and crisp; she felt bogged down by the extra 50% humidity.

With the other passengers, she was herded out of the gates towards baggage claim. And she saw them.

Charlie was standing there holding her baby sister, Janelle's hand on his shoulder as she stood on her toes to locate Bella. They looked…perfect.

Charlie had shaved his beard since Bella had last seen him, and it looked like Janelle had bought him new shampoo—his normally frizzy curly hair was controlled, now. He also had on new clothes, the dirty fleeces and too-small light wash jeans a thing of the past, and he looked a bit trimmer. Janelle was blonde and perfect, her previously long golden-blonde hair styled in a short Mom-cut that framed her face nicely and made her look older, in a good way. She gazed upon Bella's sister Adalie as if she was the most precious thing in the entire universe, and when she located Bella amongst the crowd, Janelle looked at her with equally-loving eyes.

"Bella!" she yelled exuberantly, rushing over to give Bella a tight hug. Bella was a little shocked; she had met her at Charlie's wedding nine months ago, but before that Bella had hardly known she existed. And although they got along very well at the wedding, it wasn't like they bonded a whole lot—Janelle had other things going on, obviously.

"Hey, Janelle," Bella said warmly back to her. She had been worried about a very awkward arrival; Janelle had lessened it by being so open and loving. For that Bella was grateful.

"Hey, Bells," Charlie said, smiling at his daughter openly. He hugged Bella awkwardly, three-month-old Adalie in between them.

Bella looked down at her. She had never seen her before—this was the first time.

And she was in love. Adalie was the most precious thing in the entire world, with bright blue eyes and tiny, white-blonde hairs protruding from her scalp. She smiled when she looked at Bella.

"Isn't she precious?" Janelle asked. "Look at that smile. You started smiling early, didn't you, Adalie?" she cooed. "Oh yes you did!"

Bella tore her eyes away from the pair to look at Charlie, who was looking down at them with a soft smile on his face.

Maybe D.C. wouldn't be so bad after all.

The ride to the house was another thing that Bella was dreading. Charlie wasn't at all a talker, and while Bella had mastered the art of responding to things that other people said, she wasn't a good initiator.

They were saved from awkwardness again by Janelle, who questioned Bella kindly, openly.

"Missing Phoenix yet?" she asked with a smile.

"I'm not quite sure," Bella answered. "Saying goodbye to my Mom was tough. Really tough…yeah, I already miss her. And I miss the dryness of the air—it's so humid here."

"I know what you mean. I almost died when I came here from New York, and Phoenix is quite a bit drier."

"Yeah, definitely." There was a pause as the conversation lagged. "I don't know. I miss my friends, I guess."

"Ooh, your friends! Tell me about them!"

"Well, my best friends were Rory and Greg. They're smart, I guess, and fun to hang out with. They're cool."

"Well I'm sure you'll make new ones in no time. You know, I was just telling Charlie how I switched high schools after my freshman year…"

Logical fallacy! Mrs. Collins, Bella's old English teacher, would have interjected. It was what she would call a false analogy—Janelle and Bella were not comparable people when it came to anything social.

Making friends had never been particularly easy for Bella, but that was always okay because she didn't really need them to function. She had her mom and lots of books, and she was friendly with most of the school—friendly enough to eat a pleasant lunch with almost any of them. She didn't really feel the need to see her classmates outside of school. In fact, the thought of it always made her feel kind of tired—even just going out to the movies with Rory and Carlos wasn't nearly as good as eating dinner with her mom and Phil, watching the news, and falling asleep with a Jane Austen novel.

Janelle must have been the complete opposite. As she rambled about switching schools, Bella imagined her in high school. Blonde, beautiful, nice, outgoing, smart, perfect… Ten bucks says she was a cheerleader.

"And then I got elected cheer captain, so…"

Bella had never been to Charlie and Janelle's home before, and she wasn't exactly sure what to expect. She knew that Charlie could care less about interior design or organization or cleanliness, but she pegged Janelle as a person that valued a nice home.

She was extremely correct.

The new house was just outside of the city, located in a gorgeous neighborhood of high-priced renovated colonials. It was a picture-perfect New England street, with mature trees that provided shade and cast the neighborhood in a sort of greenish hue.

They pulled up—in a silver Lexus SUV—into the driveway of a beautiful brick colonial with black shutters and white trim.

"We're home!" said Janelle with a smile as Charlie stopped the car on the driveway.

Janelle took to getting Adalie out of her car seat while Charlie got Bella's enormous suitcase from the trunk.

Charlie led Bella to the house, opening the front door without flourish.

"Well," he said, almost self-consciously. "This is it!"

It was beautiful. The foyer was open and bright, and led into a pleasant, high-ceilinged living room on the left and small cozy dining room on the right.

Janelle was still occupied with Adalie, so Charlie led the tour. Down the hall was the kitchen, which was enormous and sported all of sorts of high-tech appliances, expensive-looking white cabinets, and black granite countertops. Attached was a breakfast nook, which was an octagonal room, the walls covered in windows that looked over the large backyard. The family room was painted soft golden brown, and the lighting in there was gold and warm. An enormous T.V. was the centerpiece of a wooden entertainment center that covered the far wall. There was an office with walls covered in books.

Upstairs, there was a recreation room which looked to house random furniture and work out equipment, a guest room, a nursery, Charlie and Janelle's room, and Bella's room. Everything was perfect: the nursery had a color scheme of lavender and soft yellow, whereas Charlie and Janelle's room had a color scheme of gold and red.

My room was enormous. A bed so large it would have taken up my entire room at home fit comfortably, with lots of room to spare. The walls were painted an incredibly light pink, and all furniture was white. There was a walk-in-closet and an attached bathroom. There was a wall of windows with a set of French doors that went onto a porch. There was an enormous desk with bookshelves and a study area and—¡ay dios mío!—a brand new laptop on the desk, set up with a printer and everything.

Where the hell did Charlie get all of this money?

Bella knew that he had a high-paying job dealing with some security division of the government, even more high-paying since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2003. And she knew that he, an only child, had inherited quite a bit of money when his upper-middle-class parents died. But this was ridiculous! The house alone, being in a high-priced D.C. neighborhood, must have cost at least one million dollars, if not two…Plus the car, and decorating it, and laptops, and over $30,000 a year for her school tuition…

Although Charlie was kind of old, she reasoned, and he basically spent no money at all for the past fifteen years of his existence while working jobs that paid about $150,000 a year. Couple this with his inheritance and ten years of Janelle's savings, and she thought she could see how it would work, but still…they were living in luxury over here in D.C. The last time Bella visited Charlie, she slept on the couch in his one-bedroom apartment and they ate cheap Chinese food. She had no idea he was so loaded. She had never really given it much thought.

Janelle appeared in the doorway of my new bedroom, baby-free.

"Do you like it? I've been so worried. I know it's a little girly for your tastes—I guess I just saw things that worked and got carried away, and…"

"I love it, Janelle. Really," Bella said, giving her stepmother a hug. She really did. It was more feminine than she was used to, but she thought that it was pleasant, and it wasn't like there would be a lot of people hanging out in my room. The look on Janelle's face was so heartwarming. She really was a very kind woman. Bella knew that she was lucky that her father had picked a woman like her…or really, that a woman like her would pick a guy like him…

Charlie's a reasonably attractive man, and he has money and is respectable and all, but he's kind of shy and awkward, and…she didn't know. She just didn't quite see how they would work together.

Bella would have to ask Janelle about it someday. She surprised herself to find that she was actually looking forward to the talk, and others like it.

Dinner was pleasant and uneventful. They ate in the breakfast nook – the dining room was only used on special occasions here – and ate chicken with rice and green beans. Adalie, still just an infant, was already asleep, and Janelle told horror stories of the past three months of raising a newborn. She sure didn't look as tired as she claimed to be—Bella figured it was her skills with makeup application.

Bella planned to see the essential D.C. sights with Charlie and Janelle tomorrow and then go shopping with Janelle the next day for back-to-school clothes that would be more appropriate for the weather in D.C.

Charlie talked little, but Bella heard him tell a funny story.

She saw that he was a little more open, a little more secure in himself, since his marriage to Janelle. And he adored Adalie in that quiet, adorable way that he had always adored Bella.

After dinner, Charlie watched sports while Janelle read chick lit on the coach next to him, her feet in his lap. Bella came downstairs with my book and sat in a chair next to them. When they noticed her presence, they both looked at her with smiles, obviously happy to see her downstairs again.

She could see herself as a member of this family.

Bella stood in front of the mirror later that night, studying her reflection as she brushed her teeth. Her face was very regular—symmetrical, with blemish-free skin and no outstanding features. Her eyes were brown.

They were also, at the moment, wet. Try as she might to hold them in, tears were leaking down onto her cheeks.

Bella really, really liked it in D.C. She liked Janelle, and she liked Charlie, and she liked the house. It wasn't her beloved home in Phoenix, with Salsa music always coming from the antique radio on the counter, echoing off the cold tile through the archways to the outdoors, where she could sit for hours on the uncomfortable dirt under the uncomfortably hot sun and read. But it was nice. And no, she couldn't crawl into bed with her mother when Phil was gone and talk to her for an hour before falling asleep, but she could sit on the sofa and read while Charlie watched TV. Bella really did like how things were going here.

But she loved Phoenix. She loved her house, and she loved her environment, and she loved her mother.

And sure, the quality of education was ten thousand times better, here. And yes, She wanted so badly for my mother to be able to travel with Phil and be happy.

But she liked a life that she had loved yesterday, and that was a bigger sacrifice that she had ever suspected it would be.

Two weeks is a very poor form of measurement. It changes—sometimes it's an eon, other times but a second.

When Bella was told that she would be arriving in D.C. two weeks before school started, she was thinking two weeks as in the two weeks that she spent with her Grandma Marie when Marie was 88. That two week period would have been long enough for Bella to get ready for school, sit bored in her room for days, and hike around the world twice.

The two weeks that she got unfortunately passed faster than she could ever have imagined, until she was lying awake at 1:00 in the morning the night before school started, unable to fall asleep. She would have to get up at 6:30 to be at school by 8:00.

"Come on, Bella," she whispered quietly. "You have to sleep. The last thing you need is to be overtired on your first day at this insipid school."

She took deep breaths. She counted all the way up to 2,348. She tried lying on the floor, her bed suddenly too comfortable for her liking.

At about 3:00, lying in her bed again, she somehow slipped into a shaky sleep.

"Hello, Bella. I'll be teaching your English class this year," President Cullen said from his position at the front of the room. Bella sat in a desk at the back.

"But why? I mean, aren't you a little busy, Mr. President?" she asked.

"Oh yes, I'm quite busy. But I figure a little teaching job on the side can't hurt. Besides, my Alice and my Edward are here, and I'll want to keep an eye on them, you know."

Just then, Alice Cullen and Edward Masen walked into the classroom, looking stunningly beautiful. Edward walked closer and closer to me. He was so attractive. Really, she hadn't completely appreciated before…beautiful bronze hair, stunning green eyes…he was leaning in…oh God, was he going to…?

President Cullen started yelling from the front of the classroom, "See?!? This is why I need to teach here! To think! My son associating with worthless Western girls like you…It's disgusting! You're pathetic! Little Arizona girl, think you're so smart, but you can't compare to anyone here!"

The President of the United States charged at me, a full-on, animalistic attack. He snarled and growled before sinking his razor-sharp teeth into my neck.

I jolted awake to Janelle standing at the door, a tray filled with what must have been my breakfast in her hands and a wide smile on her face.

A/N: This story is and will remain All Human. The dream was simply a way to illustrate Bella's anxiety about starting school and a little tribute to the original series. Thanks for reading and review if you'd like to make an author smile, or tell her how to improve!