DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN TWILIGHT.
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Edward was running late. He was late getting to the hospital but he had to drop off his first gift with the delivery service before ten in the morning or the gift wouldn't be delivered today and he wanted Bella to receive one gift a day leading up to Christmas Day. He had no idea what he wanted to get her for Christmas Day though. He just knew that it had to be extra special.
"You sir are cutting it close." The sales clerk said. "Is this all you need to send out?"
"For today yes," Edward replied. "I might be back tomorrow but I have no idea what I'm going to do."
"Just remember that it has to be in here by ten or it will not be delivered and make that six for Christmas Eve."
"Thanks," Edward replied.
"Your welcome now check over this copy and make sure the address you want it delivered to is correct as well as who has to sign for it."
Edward took the clipboard and looked at the form. He didn't see anything wrong and handed it back to the clerk. He paid for the delivery (even included a tip for the delivery person) and quickly left the shop heading for the hospital. He really hoped that he wasn't too late.
Edward burst through the locker room door and shucked off his coat, hat, and gloves as well as the rest of the clothes to change into a pair of clean scrubs before heading to the staging area for the blood drive. They were also offering a test to figure out what someone's blood type is if they didn't know for free even if they didn't plan on giving blood. Most chose this because they were planning on donating a kidney or some other organ that had to have a compatible blood type and quite a few were upset to discover that they were not.
"Edward Thank god you are here. We are an hour behind on set up." the blood-drive coordinator said. "Can you set up the registration table and get people started on filling out the paperwork."
"Paperwork?" Edward asked.
"Yes, it helps us narrow down who is able to donate and who isn't." the coordinator replied. "We even pre-screen in other areas as well."
"I knew about the pre-screen but I didn't know about the paperwork."
"Have you ever donated?"
"No, I have a pathological fear of needles and refuse to let them touch my skin unless I absolutely need them too," Edward replied.
"Then why become a doctor?"
"I want to help people. I have no problem handling needles myself but having someone poke me with one scares the living hell out of me." Edward said. "I have no idea why it does though."
"Well I hope you at least try to overcome that fear today." the coordinator replied. "You could save three lives."
"I know and that is always in the back of my head."
The coordinator patted Edward on the shoulder and went back to work setting up the blood draw areas. Edward turned his attention to the registration area to set it up. All he had to do was take a set of the paperwork and place it on a clipboard and place the clipboard on the table for the donators to take. There were ten people waiting when he finished. He got them going on the paperwork.
He was yawning from the lack of sleep several hours later when Bella, Jasper and Bella's roommate Jake showed up to donate blood.
"Have you donated?" Bella asked.
"No," Edward replied. "I have been helping people with their paperwork all day."
"Well, you should if you ever get a break."
"You are not the first person to tell me that," Edward said.
"Well, you and Alice made me go bungee jumping even though I am afraid of heights like you are needles and I won't be the one egging you on as you did."
"That was Alice's birthday not mine. I would have gladly stayed on the ground as well but I lost a bet."
"Guess you shouldn't be betting then," Jake said. "Bells, he has more people to help."
"See you guys later," Edward mumbled.
Edward turned away from Bella, Jasper, and Jake to help other donators that came in. He was quickly distracted from Bella attention. He didn't see her again the rest of his shift. He was in the locker room changing back into his street clothes when he finished dressing quickly as what he believed a great idea came to mind.
It took him a while to get it done but it would be one gift Bella would get with several other items within the next couple of day.
"Now do you want her to know this was you?"
"No, I want to keep that to myself for now."
"Okay. It will be sent out later this week."
"Thanks," Edward replied.
Edward then went back to the locker room and collected his things and left the hospital. he would spend the rest of the night getting the next few gifts ready. He had gone to a local dollar store and gotten some decent looking gift wrap. He was in the middle of placing the gifts inside his closet when Jasper got home.
"Hey, your home. I thought that you would be at the blood drive all day."
"No, I only had a six-hour shift," Edward replied.
"Do you want to go get some wings?" Jasper asked.
"No I have to work on my proposal for Professor Crossland's class," Edward replied.
"Dude I have that done already."
"How? There is a lot of work involved in creating it."
"Because I made the same thing for my Eagle Scout project. I just updated the information to reflect today's financial landscape and it allowed me to show that my charity would work."
Bella Swan left the hospital after giving blood without the two men that had come with her. In fact, she hadn't seen Jake since before they started to fill out the paperwork. She last saw Jasper as they were leaving he was heading home to call Alice. She missed Alice as well but would call her on her own.
Bella arrived at her place of work five minutes early but to her boss, it was like she was five hours late on the biggest shopping day of the year. Bella just shrugged the mans comments off and went about doing her job. She didn't need it since her small trust fund for her dad's parents paid her rent but she didn't like spending that money unless she absolutely had to. It was something she and her dad argued about every month when it came time to pay her bills and the money was left untouched.
"ISABELLA you are filling everything wrong." Mr. Witherdale snapped.
"I'm sorry sir but I am doing it the same way you showed me five months ago," Bella replied. "And I assure you I am quite organized."
"Apparently not. This filing cabinet is in horrendous condition."
"That's row a. I'm working row C. I believe Jessica is working on row A. Perhaps you can speak about at your daily two o'clock meeting." Bella replied. "But why you need to have daily meetings with a simple file clerk is beyond me."
"That's because she wants to improve her work unlike you."
"It's the alphabet. She knows the alphabet since she was five years old how in the hell could she improve on knowing her ABCs?"
"That is out of line Ms. Swan. I will be putting a note in your file. Two more and you will no longer be employed here."
"Yes, sir," Bella replied calmly.
Bella was really sheathing inside at the man's comments. She would slap him up the side of the head if she knew that she could get away with it. She counted to ten and turned her attention to the filing cabinet she had been working on.
After about an hour and twenty minutes, she took a bathroom break. She was about to leave the stall when two coworkers walked in. They were talking about the boss and how hot he was compared to his counterparts in the other departments.
"Oh god, Jessica you are so lucky he chooses you."
"I know. He said he's going to leave his wife for me."
"You know that is a lie."
"Of course I do," Jessica said. "But that doesn't mean I can't get as much as possible out of him before the relationship ends."
"True. You know I still can't believe he was ever interested in Ms. Swan."
"I know right," Jessica replied. "We come from the same town. She's three years ahead of me."
"I never realized that."
"We better get back. It's almost two." Jessica replied.
Bella had remained still in the stall as Jessica and her friend talked. It angered her even more. She continued to listen and let out a great big sigh when the two women finally left the bathroom. She started to put a plan together.
She knew that Mrs. Witherdale liked to drop in on her husband for 'random' visits but were almost always scheduled and Bella decided to schedule one of those without Mr. Witherdale's knowledge and she knew just who could help her do it.
"Hey Angela, how would you like getting back at Mr. Witherdale?" Bella asked.
"Very much so," Angela replied. "How would we go about doing that?"
"Well, first we would call on Mrs. Witherdale and let her know that her dear husband would like to have a 'random' drop in."
"But we would have to put it into his appointment book."
"Yes, and Mr. Witherdale will see that he has an appointment with Jessica."
"Okay that is so simple I feel like an idiot for not seeing it," Angela replied. "When do you want the meeting to take place?"
"How about tomorrow?" Bella replied. "We will both be here and Jessica is always here at two even if she doesn't have to work because of those 'job improvement' meetings."
Bella sat next to Angela while she made the call to Mrs. Witherdale with a stack of files as cover. She could hear the woman on the other end of the line and she didn't sound too happy about being called in to visit him but told Angela that she would come in.
"Done," Angela said after hanging up the phone. "I just hope she doesn't say anything about it to him when he gets home tonight."
"Crap I didn't think about that. Good call on the fake name."
"I know right."
"I better get back to my filing cabinets," Bella replied. "Will I see you at the bar tonight?"
"Not planning on it, Ben's taking me out for our two year anniversary but we might stop by later."
"It's you're anniversary so I don't blame you," Bella replied.
Bella made her way back to the filling room and finished out the last three hours of her shift. She had to deal with Jessica making snide comments about her the whole time but it hadn't been for what she and Angela had planned tomorrow Bella would have quit. She rushed out of the office once the end of her shift came and hopped on the subway and headed for home to change her clothes before going to the bar.
"Hey, Bells you got a package today," Jake called from his room after hearing the front door open. "It's on the breakfast table."
Bella looked around the kitchen and spotted the small package wrapped in brown packaging paper and picked it up. There was only her address on the box. She ripped the paper off and found a shiny Christmas paper underneath the brown paper. She ripped the fancy paper off as well and opened the box using her keys. Inside the brown box were a deluxe label maker and several spools of label maker tape. Bella didn't remember ordering the tape but she remembered the label maker.
"So what is it?" Jake asked.
"The label maker I ordered a couple of weeks ago," Bella replied. "I didn't realize I would get it this soon. I think they got my order mixed up with someone else's."
"Call them tomorrow and see what is going on," Jake said. "Do you want to head out to the bar or are you going to stay in?"
"I'm going. I'm just going to change first." Bella replied.
The subway walk to the bar was a quiet one. Jake had kept asking Bella questions and was beginning to annoy her more than Mr. Witherdale did earlier. She was about to snap when they finally arrived at the bar. She took one of the shots that they were doing a taste test for and downed it before taking another and walking to the booth she and her friends usually sat in. Edward was already there with Jasper and one of Jasper's frat buddies and a blonde woman Bell had yet to meet.
"Bella you made it," Jasper said. "This is Emmet and his girlfriend and my sister Rosalie."
"She looks far too pretty to be related to you Jasper."
"Half sister," Rosalie said. "Same father different mothers. In fact, Jasper goes by his mother's maiden name."
"Well I didn't meet him until I was fourteen," Jasper replied.
"Not my fault," Rosalie said. "I didn't know about you until I was eighteen but my mother was a right witch when it came to you and your mother and she didn't even meet him until a year after you were born and long after your mom and our dad split."
"Enough talk about family drama," Edward said. "All that matters is you two know each other and you care so what If your moms don't get along with each other or your father."
"They almost never do," Bella said. "My dad has never liked any of my mom's boyfriends but I think he might like this latest one."
"Oh, why is that?" Edward asked.
"He an assistant manager for a minor league baseball team." Bella sliding into the booth by Rosalie.
"Oh, what team?" Emmet asked. "My coach told me I had some scouts at a few games last year."
"I honestly don't remember. They are based somewhere in Florida though." Bella replied. "His name is Phillip Dwyer I believe. I couldn't be sure my mom calls him her Philly when she talks about him."
"Sounds nauseating," Rosalie said.
"It is."
"Hello, I'm Wendy I will be your server this evening what can I get you all."
Edward took over and ordered a pitcher of beer and two platters of various fried food. Bella ate some of the food and had only one glass of beer because it tasted off to her. She switched to soda after she finished the beer.
The rest of the group was on a second pitcher of beer when Angela arrived with Ben. Angela was vibrating with so much excitement that she reminded Bella of Alice. Angela had dragged Ben over to the group.
"We are engaged," Angela announced before turning to Ben and kissing him on the cheek.
Everyone that heard her announcement congratulated them and clapped. Once the excitement calmed down everyone shuffled around in the booth making room for them. Jake grabbed two chairs from a nearby table for himself and Jasper.