Thank you to all those who reviewed the last chapter. A shout out to kArEnElIzAbEtH13. Her review made me LOL, and I also read fanfiction whilst I'm meant to be doing homework!

I was putting Charlie's dinner infront of him, when someone knocked on the door. The only possible person who lived near me was Jasper or Rosalie, so at least it wouldn't have been some stranger.

I opened the door and Jasper was standing there.

"Hey," I said to him. He didn't seem to notice. He was staring at my feet.

"Nice slippers." I looked at my feet as well. I was wearing my favourite pink fluffy boots with the pink fluffy pom-poms hanging off them.

"Thanks."

Charlie called from the living room.

"Bella? Who's at the door? It'd better not be one of those goddamned churchies trying to convert us." Jasper laughed out loud at Charlie's response. Charlie decided to come and investigate.

"Hi, I'm Bella's dad, Charlie."

Jasper followed with the I-don't-remember-my-old-next-door-neighbour charade.

"Nice to meet you. I'm Jasper Hale, I live next door." Charlie's eyes went wide with shock.

"Wow, Jasper Hale! I never thought I'd see you again? How's your father?"

"He's great. Being with Jen has worked out great for him. They both love their fishing."

A sudden smell of smoke came from the kitchen. My eyes widen in alarm.

"Dad, is something burning?" I asked quickly before I ran to the kitchen. I opened the oven and pulled out a packet dinner. Still in the packet.

"Dad, your meant to take the dinner out of the packet before you put it in the oven." Charlie just rolled his eyes and went to watch the game, while I started cleaning up the oven, where some suspicious goo had leaked out of the box.

Jaspe watched me while I cleaned. "I hope your not looking at my ass. Because that's not very nice." I stood up and turned around, whipping him with the teatowel like I always used to. But then again, I had never had much force. I must have gotten better, because Jasper cowered in pain and I was shocked at the bright red mark left on his forearm.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't know I'd gotten that strong. I used to practice on the door." Jasper smiled, but he was still rubbing at the mark.

"It's okay, don't stress about it. Rosalie's painfully sharp at that too. Sometimes, it breaks the skin." He held his arm out to me, and I was mortified to find dozens of markings, similar to the one I gave Jasper, but obviously they were more painful because they were still there. There were welts, and there were scars. From the ones where it broke the skin.

"Ow. They look painful."

"Yeah, they were. But I didn't come around here to look at your ass. I mean show you my scars. I came here to invite you to the Hale-Cullen-Brandon barbeque, which, if you say yes, will be the Hale-Cullen-Brandon-Swan barbeque."

"It sounds great. When is it?"

"Tomorrow night. But Edward, Emmett and Alice are going to stay over. It's a tradition of ours. We eat, we get drunk, we sing karaoke, we sleep. But, now that Edward and Alice are together, at the last one they weren't, it sounds like by that time, it might just be us singing karaoke. Which wouldn't be fun."

"Okay. I'll just ask Charlie if he wants to come."

I wandered into the living room where Charlie was watching the game avidly.

"Dad," I said, trying to get his attention. He payed no attention to me at all. His eyes were glued to the television, with only one hope of ungluing them.

I walked over and switched the TV off.

He diverted his attention to me, now that the TV was off.

"Yea Bells?"

"Do you wanna go to the barbeque at the Hale's tomorrow night? If not, I'll just go by myself, because I already told Jasper I was coming."

"Yeah, I'll go. It'll give me a chance to talk to Sam again. I haven't seen him in ages."

"Alright. You can go back to the game now dad." I switched the TV on again and his eyes were like instant dry glue.

Jasper was waiting for me in the kitchen, lounging lazily on a chair.

"Jasper Hale, Charlie and Isabella Swan would be glad to make your acquaintance tomorrow night." Jasper's head cocked to the side as he tried to make sense of what I was saying.

"Can you dumb it down a bit?"

I sighed. "We're coming."

He grinned. "Make sure you wear warm clothes. And don't forget to bring your sleepover stuff. I'll see you tomorrow." He waved goodbye, and walked out the door.

* * * * *

The smell of the barbeque was inviting. The smell of the citronella mosquito coil was familiar and felt like home. The scents of the steaks, sausages and chicken kebabs wafting to where us 'kids' sat was amazing. It felt like the barbeques we used to have back in Forks, at la Push with Jacob, Billy and their friends, plus Jasper and his parents.

"Wow, how much does this remind you of La Push?" I whispered to Jasper.

"It feels more like it now, with you and Charlie here." I nodded, my head concealed by the pink and charcoal hoodie I was wearing with my figure-hugging jeans. Emmett liked to call them my 'apple-bottom' jeans, which earned him prompt slaps from Rosalie. Which earnt laughter from the rest of us.

The food tasted as good as it smelt. Emmett ate at least two steaks, three sausages and he was forever scabbing bits of chicken off Rosalie. Not to mention he drank almost a whole 1.25L bottle of cola by himself.

"Just a warm-up for our games," he'd said after I asked him how he did it.

After we'd eaten, Jasper stood up suddenly.

"It's time," he announced to us. The closest to the door, Edward, crept over and opened it quietly. He gestured for the rest of us sneak in while none of the parents noticed. Charlie wouldn't have noticed for sure. He and Seargent Brandon were deep in a conversation about the amount of theft in this area.

Once inside, all the others sat on the couch infront of a big plasma screen TV. Jasper had snuck off.

"Where's Jasper?" I whispered to Alice.

"He's gone to get the shot glasses and the JD," she explained in hushed tones. Jasper arrived then, with two bottles of Jack Daniels and some plastic shot glasses.

"Why two bottles?" Emmett asked.

"Well, now that Edward and Alice are together, and Bella is here, we may need more." Jasper had set a shot glass infront of us all and filled them all with straight alcohol.

I looked warily at my shot glass. "How are we meant to drink this?" I asked.

"I Never," They all replied in unison.

"Your going to have to demonstrate."

Jasper cleared his throat to explain the rules. "Someone says something like 'I never slept wearing nothing' and then anyone who has slept while wearing nothing, has to take a shot. You get it?"

I nodded. "I think so. Who starts off?"

"Emmett can. He always starts it off good. Oh and for the record guys, Bella and I don't count as dating."

Emmett grinned before starting. "I never walked in on my parents having sex." I thought that was a weird one to start off with, but oddly, Edward took a shot. Obviously Emmett was trying to make Edward as drunk as possible.

"Well here's one for you Emmett. I never had my parents walk in on me and my partner having sex." Emmett turned white and took a shot, as well as Rosalie.

"Jasper's turn now. I can tell he's got a killer up his sleeve."

Jasper's grin looked almost evil. "I never had a sibling walk in on me and my partner having sex." All four of them took a drink. I was astounded. How much sex did they have?

"Your turn Bella."

"Oh, ok. I never fantasised about having kinky sex with my partner." The same four took another drink. I was starting to feel scared, and I must have been showing it, because they all started laughing. Alice opened her mouth.

"Okay, here's one that hopefully will get our 'designated drivers'. I never fantasised about having sex with a person I'm not dating." I was embarrassed to take a drink, but I looked next to me and saw Jasper's head was tipped back, his glass to his mouth. So was Emmett's. Everyone stared at him.

"You know that camping trip a few months back, and I got really drunk, and I thought Jasper was Rosalie..." he trailed off. Everyone laughed at that one, even Emmett. "He had nice curves when he was lying down," he admitted. That made everyone laugh more.

"I never played sport naked," Rosalie stated. I looked around. No one was taking a drink, so I quickly picked it up and sculled it. Everyone looked at me, agape with horror.

"What? I was six. Remember the rain soccer in La Push?" I asked Jasper.

"Oh yeah!" he exclaimed and quickly sculled his drink. I started to feel a bit airy. It was back to Emmett again.

"I never been on a date that was crappy," he said, his words slurred, and he leaned over to kiss Rosalie very sloppily. By this stage, Edward and Alice were also getting PG13, Jasper looked like he was falling asleep. I drank my next drink. That was easy, the date with Mike was enough to make anyone puke.

"I never had sex with anyone I wasn't dating." I cringed as my next drink slid down my throat. Jasper raised an eyebrow at me. I shuddered theatrically. Jacob wasn't that bad, but it wasn't what I wanted.

"I never been to a party and didn't get wasted." That was easy enough. No one in Forks had parties. The next drink went down. My head started to spin as the next question was asked.

"I never been raped." I didn't count sex with Jacob as rape, but the drinking part of this game was fun.

We played another round until Jasper stopped the game.

"This is starting to get pointless. Bella's just drinking everytime someone says 'I never'. I think we should stop." This was true. One of the bottles was empty, and the other had about half left. I agreed with him.

Emmett's grin got wider. "It's karaoke time for Bella." I groaned and went to stand up. The floor found my face and I just rolled over.

"I don't think she can stand up, let alone sing. I think we should give it a rest." No one was listening to him. Edward was kissing a half-asleep Alice, Rosalie and Emmett looked almost ready for 'The Full Monty', but on each other, and I was looking for somewhere to sleep.

For some absurd reason, I ended up finding myself at the Hale garage. In the middle was a red '53 Chevy truck. It looked as if it's engine was almost in pieces, but the bed of the truck was intact, which was my object.

I didn't notice that Jasper had followed me. I stroked the truck and walked all the way around it.

"It's the exact same, isn't it?" He asked, intrigued by my gaze.

"Where did you find it?" I asked, slightly ignoring his question.

"I found it rusting away in the garage a few months ago. Rosalie's restoring the engine, but I'm doing the exterior design."

I fiddled with the latches, trying to undo the tray. Jasper moved my finger's away and undid it. I crawled up and sat down, patting the space beside me. Jasper crawled up with me. I sat in silence for a minute.

"Wow, this brings back the memories. Do you remember asking Charlie to bring his inside when it was storming?"

"No."

"Oh. I must had just dreamt that then. But I know that La Push happened. When we tried to set the tent up in it, but we couldn't."

"Yeah, and ever since then, we haven't sat in the truck without a sheet hanging over it." We were silent for a bit more until I began to feel sleepy and lay down in the truck. Jasper lay down next to me. The truck had ridges in it. I was going to have a major headache the next morning.

I wrapped my arms around Jasper, not sure if my mind was protesting against my body. Jasper's mind must've been in the same place as mine, because he wrapped his arms around me as well.

"Love you Jazz." My mind immediately regretted saying this, my mouth didn't have control on what it was saying right now.

"Love you too Bells." I knew he wasn't kidding around or not knowing what he was meant to say, because he said it with so much definitity that I knew he was pretty much sober.

I fell asleep, instantly warmed by his touch.