Beta'd by my sis in spirit the lovely TwiDi

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

OMG I'm blown away by the response! Thank you all so much!

There has been some concern about Edward being in the story, trust me people a Bella/Edward romance story needs an Edward so he will be part of the story, just trust he will show up...when I can't tell you it would ruin the story ;0)

Here is a bit longer chapter for your Saturday afternoon...I'm off to visit with my own crazy relatives.

"Santa, baby, I want a yacht and really that's not a lot…" I sing along with the parts I know driving the two and half hours from Seattle to Forks. I might be off-key, but no one else can hear me, so hopefully the people in the cars around me think I sound like Mariah or Adele. Ok, I probably sound more like that William Hong that was on American idol, but dude had heart and so do I.

WELCOME TO FORKS

The familiar sign—that is now missing the population part—greats me and my butt is singing Halleluiah. Yes, ladies and gents, my ass is asleep, so asleep it almost hurts. You know that feeling when it feels like you're sitting on a rock and it's eaten down to the bone, yep that's where I am. A few streets more though and I'll be standing up again, wooohooo.

Waving hello at Mrs. Newton as I drive past her on main I can't help the wave of nostalgia that I'm overcome with. Her son was one of my besties in school. Our first day of kindergarten he offered to share his crayons since his box had more colors than mine. Mom had forgotten to get my supplies, she claims she was in denial that her baby was really starting school, Dad claims that Mom would forget her head if it wasn't attached to her body.

Anyways, on the way to school, Alice had had a moment of clarity and told Dad who was driving us in the cruiser, yep, I went to school many of days in the back seat of a popo car, and reminded him she needed paper and pens and all sorts of stuff. With a huff he pulled into the poorly-stocked drug store and grabbed us a couple of basics to hold us over with a promise to take us shopping for the other stuff later. We had cute clothes and sucky supplies. Dad made it up to us though with McDonalds for dinner and filling up our cute new backpacks. My butterfly covered light purple bag was da bomb, just saying.

Anyways Mike was always like that—giving and happy. I had a crush on him for all of five minutes in middle school till I realized he had a crush on Eric. I wasn't sure how that worked at that age, I just thought he was silly, but that didn't change my devotion to my bestie. When we graduated he went off to San Francisco for college, he claimed it was the mecca for his people and I went to community college and started my nursing studies.

Yep, you guessed it. Edward and I are a cliché, the nurse and the doctor. He was finishing up his internship at Seattle Mercy and until he did his mandatory ER rotation (SM requires all their doctors that are on staff to take turns do four weeks in the ER because they are so small) we had never met. Edward spent most of his time in obstetrics and pediatrics, my honey bunny loves the babies and I was in the ER hoping to get out of the hospital and into a private practice. I love nursing but the hours were hard on me. That and the ER is often the place you see the worst of humanity.

Anyways, over stitching up a seven year old boy's knee that he had busted open riding his bike I lost my heart to Edward. He was so sweet, so calm and to add another cliché to our list I could see my children and our future in his eyes. We worked most of the same hours during that time and we'd have coffee or exchange little chit chats together, nothing that could raise eyebrows. However, when his turn in the ER was over and he went back to the kids' ward he asked me out for dinner. I said yes, and I was proud of myself for not doing a happy dance right there in front of him.

Lots of dates, some deep conversations and a whole hell of a lot of groping and making out later we took the plunge and went at it like rabbits in heat all over my apartment. Six months of busy schedules, moments grabbed here and there, along with our fabulous sexual athletics and he asked me to be his girlfriend. At which point, I broke up with him, because I thought I had been his girlfriend and come to find out he thought we were just "having fun" up till that point. I might have been a little pissed, like 'thought-about-calling-my-Daddy-to-bring-his-gun' pissed. I had these visions of him dating other women after leaving my bed. A month after that and we were back together, I was weak and he swore that since the first time he saw me he hadn't been with another woman. Edward was slow on the relationship uptake, but he isn't a liar.

Taking a job at the much larger Seattle Grace where his Father was chief of staff upon his final graduation, Edward fell into a less hectic schedule, though he still was required to be on call when the hospital was short-staffed due to him being a newbie and all. Between flu outbreak and the holidays there were very few doctors to go around and that's how he got roped into working this holiday season. I was fortunate enough to land a job as a nurse at a small family run doctors' office. The pace suits me, as well as the hours. I'm still helping people, yet, I still feel like there is some of me to give to my own life and Edward at the end of the day. The hospital was draining my life away, I was trained for a lot but the actually doing it and dealing with the human cruelty and pain that we treated in the ER was slowly killing me inside. Now, I give shots, clean smaller scale wounds and assist Dr. McCarty when she needs it.

Rosalie McCarty—thirty-six, looks twenty four—has a wonderful husband, three kids and a big dog of unknown breed that was rescued from the pound. She's my hero. She really was living the dream—a satisfying career and home life. Her cousin Tanya Hale was her partner in the practice, and they kept the hours between nine and four everyday so they could be home with their kids. Tanya made me nervous when I first met her; she was a little abrasive and cold. I found out later that my predecessor was a bit of a bitch that had a problem with Tanya and her wife Irina; she made a lot of snide comments that got her fired about the couple's adoption of two children from Irina's native Russia. After we cleared the air that I could care less who she loved, that my parents raised me to believe that what two consenting adults have the right to love who they want, only perverts who messed with little kids and rapist were evil. I won't share Renee's story of college experimentation with some lady named Jane. Dad jokes he's happy it only last a week because he could fight another man, but he was missing the right parts to fight a woman for my Mom. Mom told me she found out that the pole was way better than the hole, at which I ground went in search of brain bleach, or tequila in this case.

So lost in my own inner monologue, I actually drove past the house and had to turn around to pull into the driveway.

Home, sweet, home.

Did you know every time someone reviews this story I do a little happy dance ;0) oh and it makes me want to update quicker hehe.