Disclaimer: All things regarding the Twilight Saga belongs to the awesome Stephenie Meyer. All additional characters and the storyline belong to me
Here we go again you guys, Thank you so much for actually giving it a chance!, and of course to Vane… who actually reads everything I sent her at her, te quiero naneee. This time you'll get to see how they met and movie-night, enjoy!, and as one of my favorite ff writers would say… "On with it":
Every now and then we got together for a movie-night, especially when we had a meeting close by, and this time we were gathering at the Brandon household. So that's why we were currently at Alice's kitchen preparing the snacks while waiting for the guys to come back from practice
_ Flashback _
I met Alice on my first day at Port Angeles Swim Club, my mom Renee took me there one Monday afternoon after she and dad agreed it would be a good way to spend my summer when I was thirteen. Once I got to the locker room, the first thing I saw was this bubbly little girl bouncing towards me
"Hi!, I'm Alice, who's going to be your coach?, omg, I hope we're in the same lane"
"Hi Alice!, I'm Bella… I'm not sure who's going to be yet"
"I'm soooo excited!, this year will be epic!. And I can just feel we'll be good friends, after practice I'll introduce you to the gang, pleeeease tell me you'll stay for after snacks!" she said jumping up and down, I swear I've never seen such a petite girl bouncing as much
That first day I fell in love with the sport and begged my parents to let me go even after the summer ended. Even though I could feel every single muscle in my body, even a few I never knew existed, the adrenaline running through my body felt amazing, I've never felt this way before, I knew my life would never be the same
After practice I went with Alice to the club's cafeteria, just when were sitting at the table, we saw the rest of the 'gang' coming our way
Ali introduced me to Rose right before leaving the locker room since she was coming in as we were leaving, she's this tall leggy curvy blonde, pretty much every man's fantasy with an amazing personality, she's the most loyal friend you could ever imagine, and one of the smartest girls I've ever met, we instantly bonded with our love for numbers. Next were Emmett and Jasper, Emmett is this bulky teddy bear like guy who looked like a twenty year-old with a five year-old brain, he's always in a good mood
Rose and Emmett lived just two blocks away their entire lives and have been inseparables since they were eight. Jasper is actually Rose's younger cousin; the three of them did pretty much everything together so it just made sense that the other two came along when Emmett started swimming. A couple of years later, Alice transferred from Phoenix and with just a look at her, Jasper was completely gone. Even after years and years together, you could still see the love for one another
After that first afternoon at the cafeteria, we started going to the movies every other Wednesday after practice until school started, and that's when movie-nights began, each Saturday night we take turns to host it, and after a couple of failed snacks (courtesy of Emmett mind you) the girls decided to take charge of that particularly aspect of the night while all Jasper and him had to do was bring the two selected movies, since they always wanted an action or scary one we put our foot down demanding at least one comedy per week. Every now and then we invited someone else, but it was usually just the five of us, and then Ali came up with the idea that on the week of a meeting, we make an even bigger deal of our movie-nights with a sleepover at Jasper's or Rose's the day before to 'calm our nerves'
And so, they easily became my family away from home, I mean, we actually spent more time together than at home, especially when we had out-of-town meetings, even our parents started joking that it would probably save all of us a lot of money if we just lived close by to each other, although actually it was just me and Alice who lived farther from them
_ End of Flashback _
"Hey B, you ok?, you seemed like you just went miles away" asked Alice
"Oh, sorry, just thinking… anyway, how are we?!"
"Ok, nachos are ready and popcorn's on the making; let's see if we have everything we need just in case… Rose!"
"Everything's ready at the rec room and Emmet just called, they're heading here already and they invited Edward so… do we have enough or we need to prep more?"
"Um, no, mom left some cookies and cheese and we can make some fajitas as well"
"That's ok, I think we're good then, let's take the food down there before they get here" said Rose, grabbing the guacamole and a bowl with popcorns leading towards the rec room
Alice's parents redecorated their basement into a rec room a few years ago, actually she convinced them into it, arguing that it would be better for them since every time we came here Emmett's 'loudness' (her exact words) would prevent them from falling asleep… even though their room was two stories above where we were
They painted the basement within the mustard color palette and a beige rug, adding a built-in four-door armoire since we started our very own DVD collection, and some glass shelves for Ali's trophies, an 100" EliteSCREENS Spectrum Series motorized projector screen connected to a SageTV HD extender STX-HD 100 media center and three brown Leather Match Power Motion recliner loveseats
"So, what exactly are we watching today?" I asked them as I was arranging a few of each snack in three matching brown square snack tables with wood top we found in one of our holiday shopping days
"Ugh… don't even remind me, Emm's going through his 'animated features' stage again and I seriously think he might have been trying to convince Jasper" groaned Rose, see… us girls are not exactly action films biggest fans, but at least we can 'delight our eyes' as Rose puts it, watching incredibly hot actors while the guys focus on the 'action' part of them
Once we got everything down there settled, we went upstairs to wait for the guys to arrive, thanks heaven we just had to wait around ten minutes before we heard the unmistakable sounds of Emmett's jeep's tires, along with the sound of what we deduced was Edward's car before we heard their voices right at the door
"How are my girls today?!, are you ready for the most hi-tech awesome m-night EVER?" boomed Emmett
"Jeeeeesh, lower your voice you idiot, we're not deaf!" Said Alice. "Let's head downstairs, everything's ready" she added before looking adoringly at Jasper
"Hello darling, I missed you today, ladies" greeted as usual Jasper
"Hi babe, Belly, squirt… listen, this over here's our homie Edward, I don't think you've met officially yet" said Emmett hugging Rose
"Ladies… since it was a last minute thing, I brought some pizza, you know, maybe we can pass it as 'pasta' 1 to Carmen" said Edward chuckling
"Oh, that wasn't necessary Edward!, come in you guys!, let's head downstairs" said Alice, already bouncing towards the basement
"Here, let me take it" I told him reaching for the box in his hand and really looking at him for the first time
Since we've never actually trained in the same group, and at the meetings he always just stayed by himself, I never had the chance of truly see him. He has brown hair, with hints of red, a strong angular jaw, and straight white teeth. A well defined body, not over muscular, which I'm sure he used as an advantage since extremely buffed ones can create resistance in a swimming race
By the beginning of the second movie, the couples were either falling asleep or making out, and soon enough even Edward and I grew a bit bored so it truly wasn't a complete shocker when he suddenly turned to face me
"Hey, do they do this every night?"
"Nah, it's just 'cause you're here, when it's the five of us they restrain pretty well" I chuckled. "So, how did Em convinced you to come, I mean, you're usually by yourself every time we see you"
"Oh, yeah, actually I'm pretty much hiding most of the time, I'm sure you've seen how… intense?... can some people be"
"And by 'some people' I assume you mean certain blondies?"
"You assume correctly. I just don't really know how can I make them understand it's not cool for them to practically stalk me, so I just stay on one side trying to not bring so much attention towards me"
"Are you kidding me?, I don't think they would get it even if you put a sign around your neck. Heck, even Jasper couldn't get rid of them until Rose gave them the bitch face"
"Huh… maybe then you can ask her to do it for me too" he said half joking. "Anyway, today Lauren cornered me as I was leaving the locker room and Emmett actually saved me, it was pretty funny actually and we started talking and by the time we reached the parking lot I was already agreeing to come. Hey, by the way, are you sure it was ok for me to just show up here at the last minute?"
"That totally sounded like Em, he's a master convincing people, and of course it was more than ok, you actually saved me from boredom, can you imagine what would have been for me if you hadn't come? I asked him nodding to the TV
"In that case, you can use me any time you need to be saved from boredom"
"I'll take you up on that… I swear!, and hey, you can totally use us too whenever you want to escape from the blondies" i chuckled trying to restrain the nickname we gave them from coming out of my mouth
"Then I guess we better stick close to each other don't you think?" he said giving me the most breathtaking crooked smile I've ever seen
I think that was the moment I suspected it was going to be extra difficult to be near him, with that single smile I started to feel something I've never felt before, and I swear it took everything within me to reign my feelings, first of all because we needed to focus like never before on practice, second of all because I wasn't sure if he wasn't just being nice and I was only reading too much into it and last but not the least, he was fast becoming in a really good friend
That first night we got to know each other pretty well, playing 20 questions to learn every little thing, from our favorite color to what we wanted to do after school. When it was time for him to go home we'd already exchanged phone numbers and since we lived close to one another, he suggested we could carpool to and from practice since we already waited for the guys every day, so that meant two whole hours alone with him, and let me tell you, it wasn't easy but I wouldn't change it for the world
With every passing day we got closer to each other, and it wasn't difficult at all, sure it helped to be in a group with two couples, of course we would naturally be one another's company. And surely him being the nicest, more loyal guy I've met in a really long time didn't help my crush, but even though Alice and Rose encouraged me to hint it to him I couldn't do it, if he didn't reciprocated I would lose his friendship and that definitely wasn't an option
Obviously, they didn't listen me and made jokes every chance they could get that it seemed that 'now we're all coupled up', and that 'you two would make a sweet couple' and each and every time they did it I could feel myself blushing from head to toe
And don't even get me started with the blond patrol, though that one was pretty funny actually, because since we started to come and go together pretty much every day (unless one of us was sick), they started to bitching about me more than usual, and I swear they went ballistic after they overheard Rose joke about the coupled up thing, and since every time they joked Edward just went along with it surely not catching up the real meaning behind it (thank God for that), they totally believed it and the next day they cornered me as I was heading towards the cafeteria
"Hey you!, who the hell do you think you are, trying to steal Edward from us, he's ours, do you understand me?!" started Jessica
"Yeah, don't you DARE even talking to him again, do you hear me?, he's going to be mine" screeched Lauren. "I mean, like, who do you think you are to try to go out with him, you are absolutely delusional to even think he would want you over me"… see?, bitch extraordinaire I tell ya
I tried, I swear to you I really tried to hold my laughter, but you should've seen their faces all red and practically screeching their teeth that I couldn't hold it any longer and I started laughing… hard. And then to make things worst (for them), I saw Edward coming our way, frowning as he saw me laughing my ass of, and as understanding hit him when I lifted an eyebrow as to say I was laughing at the bitch patrol, he quicken the pace to reach me
"Hey honey, I thought you were already at the cafeteria, were you waiting for me?" he said putting an arm around my shoulders and I swear I almost lost it again at the sight of their faces
"Hi, Edward" they said at the same time, batting their eyelashes
"Oh, hi there, isn't it sweet of her to wait for me?, I swear I don't know what I did to deserve her" he said giving me the crooked smile that could've melted me even without him saying that… if only it were true *sigh*
"Of course I would wait for you hon" I winked at him going along with it
As we were walking away from them, he asked what happened and I promised I'd give him a play by play on the way home
To say that he was furious, it was putting it light, and from that day on he barely left my side even though I told him I didn't care about what they hinted, although I didn't mind at all having him near me
Days passed by, every single one of us seemed right on edge as the qualification meeting got closer and closer, and each and every day I realized it was harder and harder to maintain my crush at bay and that I was in serious danger of starting to fall for him, but I really thought I could handle it… I just had to go by one day at a time
When the D-day arrived we left Rose's about four hours early, even Edward stayed for the sleepover so we could all go together and since we were all so nervous we asked our parents not to go, we arrived to PA's swim club at three and started our relaxation right away. By six everyone had already arrived and Eleazar gave us 45 minutes to do a few warming up laps before we started
Everyone got four qualifying races; we had to choose two from our best style and two from our second one. Rose, Emmett and Edward chose 100 and 200 meters butterfly; Alice, Jasper 400 and 800 meters freestyle; Alice, Rose and Jasper 200 and 400 meters medley; Edward and I went for the 100 and 200 meters breastroke and Emmett went with the 1500 meters freestyle and 400 medley as I chose 100 and 200 backstroke
That night we decided to stay again at Rose's since the list was coming out that Sunday around noon and surely we weren't going to be able to sleep from all the adrenalin, so we just went home to dine with our families and meet again at 10, and of course Edward offered to take me. Thank God dad kind of liked him too; though I think what he liked was the fact that I didn't have to drive alone all the way to Port Angeles
I think we stayed up till around three playing board games and catching up and just relaxing now that the hardest part was over, we've done everything we could and by twelve we'd know if it was enough, but we tried not to think much about it since it wasn't in our hands anymore, and by the time we got up it took every little strength we had not to rush to see the list, but we made it, and by two we were already celebrating the fact that we made it!. Alice's parents threw us a lovely dinner to celebrate it properly with our parents and to meet Edward's parents as well. It felt absolutely amazing the way they were looking at us, as if they've never been prouder, and to be honest we felt that way too
The next three months passed by in a blur, arranging our passports, focusing on our races, making lists and getting every single thing we'll need ready. Since there were 30 of us going, along with Carmen and Eleazar as coaches and a couple of parents as delegates, we all went to practice at the same hours now so it was better in one way since we spent more time together, and it was kind of bad since I started to really fall for Edward with every passing day
Anyway… That's how it is that we're here on December 14th at four a.m. on our way to Sea-Tac to board our 6:10 a.m. flight with two stops, to Sao Paulo Brazil. We would be on the road, to put it some way, for about 24 hours, our flight went from Seattle to Ohare, and then wait a little more than two hours before boarding again to go from Ohare to Miami, and two hours later, from Miami to the Aeropuerto Guarulhos in Sao Paulo, and two hours later, we were to board our last flight from Sao Paulo to Porto Alegre, a city 24 miles away from Novo Hamburgo, the city where the event took place. We decided this route since the other option was for us to take the bus we rented to be able to move around and go from Sao Paulo to Novo Hamburgo, but that trip took around 11 hours, so that was a big no, instead since we were landing in Porto Alegre, that road trip would take less than 40 minutes from the airport to the club where we had to go get our credentials before going to the hotel to relax before the craziness began
Thanks again for sticking with me, this Bella doesn't really put herself down as much as in some stories I've read, I hope you're still with me after this… thank you so much again and I'll try not to take as long to publish the next chapter… oh!, and I'm happy to say I'm going to be an aunt again!, my wonderful V's having a girl!, wooohoooo… we needed a girl after five nephews!, love you V!, you rock!