Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns it all, 'cept for Mel, Sky, Ryan, Sam and Porcelain (Bella's alter ego).
All song lyrics belong to Porcelain and the Tramps.

AN: Okay, I officially suck. I know. I'm super, super sorry for making you guys wait so long for new chapters. I have no excuse, except for my laziness and procrastination. Please forgive me. I hope you like this chapter & please continue to R&R!


Previously...

Neither Edward nor Alice showed up backstage after the show or at my house. I couldn't shake the nagging thoughts though and for some reason I felt disappointed when they didn't show. I planned to go shopping with Mel & Sam the next morning; I needed to get my mind off the Cullens somehow. I couldn't help but giggle when I thought about how Alice wouldn't believe that I was actually going to go shopping…willingly.


I spent the entire rest of the night beating Sky at xbox and playing wii sports bowling with Mel and Ryan, which I won twice. Ryan made excuses saying that the game disliked him for whatever reason and the ball never listened to him. Sure, Ryan, sure. When mid-morning finally came, Mel, Sam, and I started to get dressed. I decided to go a little punk rock with tuxedo stiletto boots to add some vintage edge with my outfit (Outfit on profile). I left my hair down and messy, not even touching it with a comb. About an hour later, the three of us were ready and I was heading out the door. Unfortunately, instead of being greeted with the sight of my fabulous car, I was greeted by the sight of a tiny black-haired pixie. I groaned inwardly, but put on an obviously fake smile.

"Hello Alice, what can I help you with," I asked in a perky voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Well, Bella. Since you don't want Edward to bother you anymore, as you made it perfectly clear last night, I'm here to bother you instead," she responded in her melodic voice and smiled.

So it appeared that my message had been received perfectly last night. That news made me smile for real, but my subconscious was yelling at me. I ignored the barely audible voice in my head.

"Hm, if that's all it takes, maybe I should write a song for you."

Alice smirked, "Sorry Bells. I'm not that easy."

Mel and Sam, who were already outside waiting, were staring daggers into Alice's back. For some reason the monstrous faces they were making toward Alice made me feel uneasy. I was mad at Alice, but for some reason, I felt sisterly protective of her. I tried to shake this feeling by walking past Alice and sending reassuring nods to Mel and Sam. Sam rolled her eyes and got into the passenger seat of the car, while Mel shook her head and got into the back.

"Will you be following us," I called behind my shoulder to Alice after spotting an unfamiliar yellow Porche parked in the driveway. I was answered by a growling of the Porche's engine, Alice already inside. I huffed and got into my car. Soon we were speeding down the roadway, Alice only a few feet behind us.


We arrived at the large mall within minutes. The place was bursting with people, then again, when is a mall not bursting with people? I quickly pulled my hair into a messy bun and put on a black cap and dark tinted sunglasses. It made us somewhat inconspicuous, but not to the extent that it was impossible to recognize us. Mel and Sam had done pretty much the same thing, and when we looked each other over, we couldn't help but laugh. When we got out of the car and Alice couldn't help but laugh either.

"Great disguises," she mumbled through her laughter.

I couldn't help but smile at her, but tried to cover it up quickly. We had parked on the roof of the mall's parking lot, so there weren't many people around. We made our way to the elevator and got in. As the elevator went down to the mall's main floor, I took a deep breath before the metal doors opened.

We were greeted by a bustle of people going every which way and loud chatter that was only intensified by our vampiric hearing. I closed my eyes trying to focus myself and ignore the voices. I felt a hand on my shoulder, and snapped my head to the side. It was Mel, I nodded at her and she let go. We began walking down the east side of the mall, no one screamed, so far so good. Then I heard Alice.

"Wow, a mall? I used to have to force you to go shopping."

"No, you used to have to force Bella to go shopping," I answered back quickly. She didn't respond.

We walked to my favorite store, Guess, and made our way inside. Everything in the store was what Bella would have considered insanely expensive, but to me, money wasn't an issue. I started looking through the racks, Mel and Sam going their own ways, looking around. Alice stayed behind me. I picked a black asymmetrical tank top off one rack and held it up to look at it better.

"That would look really nice on you."

I stood trying to decide if and how I should respond. I turned to Alice and looked at her for a second.

"Thanks, but I think it would look better on you," I said holding the top out toward her.

She smiled and took it. I couldn't help but smile back. Truth of the matter was that I had missed Alice, even through she had done nothing but annoy me and use me as a Barbie doll when I was human, she still was the sister I never had, and even though she had gone along with him and willingly left me, I couldn't shake that bond.

Mel must have overheard because she was standing behind Alice in a split second. Alice ignored her presence and walked toward the mirror to check the top out and leave us to speak.

"So you're being nice?"

I nodded slightly, "Yeah, I guess. Be nice to her Mel, kay? She's not like him."

Mel didn't respond, but I knew she had listened. She turned around and made her way over to Sam, whispering something in her ear. Sam quickly looked at me and nodded before looking back at the rack she was searching through.

"Hm, you're right. I like it, but I still think it'd look good on you," I heard Alice's voice from behind me.

I turned around to face her. I knew she had heard what I had said to Mel, but she didn't say anything to me.

"Nah, you take it. I'm going to go look at some jean shorts."


After about half an hour of trying pretty much everything in the store on, we left with five bags filled with cloths that together were worth about $2,000. By the time we made it out of the store, we were all laughing and talking, Alice included.

We walked around and found an Aldo accessories store. As we were making our way over to the store, I heard someone yell, "Holy shit!" I could tell the voice was directed toward us, but didn't turn around. I looked at the girls and we started to speed up. Next thing I knew, there were more voices. "Is that her?" "Oh my gosh, that's Porcelain!" "No way. Where?" "It's the girls from Porcelain!" "Oh yeah? Then who's that other short one?"

We practically ran into the store. I ran towards the sales clerk, took off my sunglasses and almost screamed at her, "Can you do me a favor?"

The clerk just stared at me, "Excuse me? Oh-oh my gosh. You're-"

"Yes, I'm me," I interrupted her, "Now could you please do me a favor and close the doors before there's a riot in here?"

Her eyes looked past me and at the small, but growing crowd of people that were in front of the store, looking inside and whispering to themselves. She then looked back at me.

"Um, yeah, sure," she said as she quickly made her way over to the doors, getting one of the other sales girls to help her.

In a short matter of minutes, the doors were being banged on and people were screaming. Thankfully, we were all safe within the confines of the small store. Of course, how we were going to get out was a whole other story. Mel and Sam decided to spend their time looking through the accessories, finding this whole situation incredibly humorous. The sales girls all asked for autographs and pictures, which, of course, we agreed to, after all, they had saved our skins. Alice was on the phone with someone, but before I could ask her who, she had shut her phone and turned to me.

"Does this store have some kind of emergency exit?"

I was about to remind her that we were in a store in a mall, but one of the sales girls stopped me.

"There's an emergency door in the back room. It doesn't lead outside, but it leads to the emergency staircase which should lead to some kind of exit."

Alice and I looked at each other, then back at the girl.

I smiled at her, "Perfect."

Mel ended up actually buying something before we left. "Might as well get something out of this ordeal," she had said. I laughed at her false annoyance, Sam just rolled her eyes.

We thanked the sales girls again after they showed us to the emergency door, and then made our way up the staircase. After a short while, the screaming crowd became only a slight hum. Not wanting this to take forever, we ran up the stairs, making it to the top in a matter of seconds. Turned out that the staircase lead to the roof of the parking lot, which was perfect for us, but I didn't understand how in a usual emergency situation, being on the roof of anything would be helpful.

As we made our way to my car, I spotted a familiar looking Volvo parked next to it. I turned to look at Alice, who had a guilt-ridden look on her face. I stopped walking and waited for her explanation.

"Well, I thought since all your fans would recognize your car, they'd know what car to swarm when they saw it," she explained in a small voice, "I tried calling Jasper first, but he's out hunting, Emmett and Rose too. Carlisle and Esme aren't around, so all that was left was…him," she pointed behind me.

I turned to see him leaning against his door; he had sunglasses on, concealing any emotion, Mel and Sam already loading our bags into his trunk. Traitors. I turned back to Alice.

"You don't really expect me to ride with him."

"Well," she began, "it wouldn't be just you, it'd be Mel and Sam too," she tried to reason.

I rolled my eyes at her, but a second later threw her my keys. I turned back around and, without looking at him again, I made my way to the passenger seat of his stupid silver Volvo, opened the door and climbed in. Before shutting the door, I called out to the girls, "Get in."

A second later he was in the driver seat, key in the ignition and Alice was driving down the parking lot in my gorgeous red baby. I rolled down the window and yelled out, "Don't you dare get a scratch on it, Pixie!" Sam burst out in laughter, while Mel tried to muffle hers.

Edward just ignored me, but I could see the tip of his mouth curving up. I huffed and plopped down in my seat, and then we were the ones racing down the lot.


Half way back to the mansion, we were riding in uncomfortable silence. Well, at least Edward and me were, Sam and Mel were talking about all the stuff we'd bought. Mel was talking about what she could pair her new accessories with and Sam about where she was planning to wear her new heels. I decided to break the silence between him and me.

"I can't believe your still driving this thing."

Suddenly, all went silent. He didn't say anything for a few minutes, then he chuckled, "Well, I love this thing."

The girls still remained silent, both looking out their side windows, but listening intently. I didn't say anything else for the rest of the ride though, and neither did he, but we did sit in a more comfortable silence.

When we finally arrived at the mansion, Sam and Mel quickly took the bags out of the trunk and made their way inside, us still in the car. When they were inside, I finally spoke again.

"Remember the first time we were in here together. We were driving out of Port Angeles."

He nodded, "After I saved you from those imbeciles, ditched Jessica and Angela, ate at La Bella Italia, and then had you questioning me on the ride back to Charlie."

I laughed at his detailed response, "Yeah. Remember how I freaked at how fast you were driving?"

He smiled, "Yeah."

"It's funny. Now I drive at pretty much the same speed."

After a second, he turned to look toward me, "I'm serious Bella. I'm not giving up."

"I know," I responded simply.

"I love you."

I turned to look at him, keeping my face void of emotion. "And," I questioned.

He opened his mouth to speak, but I cut him off.

"Maybe you love me," I paused, "and maybe I just don't care."

With that, I opened the door, stepped out, closed it hard and made my way into my home.