So I know I said I would post before the week was up, but at least it didn't take two months! That for me brought happiness all on it's own. But I have nothing to say here, so yeah--read on!


Alice looked at Jacob over her shoulder. He looked out of place on her front lawn, he was too tall, too bulky, too shirtless to be there. His hands on his hips, and a slow easy smile on his face. She laughed lightly when she realized he was staring back at her too. Sliding the key into her lock and turning it over, it clicked and her pushed it opened silently.

Peering around the corner, she saw the couch empty, and could hear water running upstairs. Why would Charlie be showering, leaning in a little more she caught sight of the clock behind the stove, and gasped, spinning back around she looked at Jacob.

"Is it seriously five o'clock?"

He glanced at a watch she didn't know how she hadn't noticed he was wearing, she had been staring at him on and off for, apparently, the last two and a half hours.

"Five o'two." He corrected, and smiled back up at her.

She would have laughed if she hadn't realized this meant she would be going to school without having slept at all, rubbing her hand down her face, she sighed, "Well listen, I should probably go ahead and get ready for school."

He nodded, and she looked back inside the house.

"I'll she you around short stuff." He called, and back out of her driveway.

"Bye." She called to him, as he jogged off down the street.

She had just closed the door, locked it again and had managed to hop into the kitchen doorway as Bella came down the stairs, glancing at Alice she offered a small obviously forced smile at her, before entering the kitchen.

"Good morning." Alice said, as Bella pulled out cereal and turned away from her.

Bella nodded at her, and grabbed a spoon, after a long moment, Bella held out the box to her in a silent offering, and Alice smile brightly taking the box from her hand.

Plain corn flakes had never been a favorite of Alice's, she had always more enjoyed the sugar filled, rot your teeth cereals you see advertised on Disney Channel. But she poured herself a bowl and ate them happily anyway. Even Charlie noticed a shift in the atmosphere when he finally came down stairs, the tips of his hair still wet from his shower. It wasn't that things were happy, but at least now they weren't hostile.

"Mornin'" He offered through gritted teeth, as he gingerly rubbed at his neck, clearly regretting the night he had spent on the couch.

Bella nodded at him as her mouth was full of cereal, and she was in the mists of a book Alice hadn't seen the title of, Charlie reached the coffee maker as Alice bid him good morning, and he smiled over his shoulder at her.

"Sleep good?" He asked her, stirring in sugar to his drink, and taking a tentative sip.

Alice snatched her head up to look at him, and realized Bella had done the same, one look at her told Alice that she had said nothing to Charlie about her leaving that morning, and she realized that the question hung unanswered in the open air.

"Ah--fine." She answered uncertainly.

He nodded thoughtfully, as he took another sip, and looked at Bella, "How was the movie?"

"Good." She said, glancing at Alice and returning to her book.

"And the game?"

Now she understood, it was this moment she would be chewed out for going with Jasper, and returning with Edward, and she hadn't even gotten to sleep yet.

"Oh--you know me and baseball," She said sarcastically, curling one finger around the other, "We're like this."

Charlie laughed lightly, and shook his head, "So, who all was it you went with again, I don't remember whether you told me or not."

"Well, there was Rosalie, and Emmett," She took a big bite of cereal chewing it slowly, as Charlie nodded, and waved his hand in a 'go on' sort of motion, "And Edward and Jasper." She finished quickly, almost in a whisper.

Alice watched Bella cringe out of the corner of her eye, before Bella stood and dropped her empty bowl in the sink, pausing at she reached the doorway, and looking back Alice would have swore a look of pure sympathy etched into her face. But it was gone in a fleeting moment, and she shrugged, taking the steps two at a time, leaving Charlie and Alice alone in the kitchen.

"Edward, and Jasper?" He asked icily, and Alice knew he too was recalling their conversation, from the morning before, when he indirectly told her to have no contact whatsoever with those particular boys.

"That's right," She said offhandedly, "And Emmett and Rosalie." Alice added, setting her own bowl into the sink, and running water over it.

For a moment nothing was said, and the only sound that could be heard was running water filling inside of her bowl, and then water draining, before Charlie reached across her, and shut off the water. She blinked and stared down at her bowl, turning it over, and dumping out the water that had filled it, and reluctantly, when there was no other excuse to keep looking at the sink, turned to look at Charlie.

"I wasn't saying those things to you, to try and be mean and ruin your fun." He said, referring to when he had told her those Cullen boys were bad news, "I said them, because that boy Jasper has sat across from me at the station more times then I could count on all of my fingers and all of my toes, Edward isn't nearly as bad, but he is getting there. I know I didn't exactly say this last time, but I'm saying it now. Please--" For a moment Alice though Charlie was going to lay down the law as he did every morning when he left the house, but turning her eyes on him, she knew that he wouldn't, at the last possible moment he changed his game, "Please think twice, when you make choices about your friends."

Nodding, Alice turned away from him and trudged up the stairs, knocking twice on Bella's door it opened.

Side stepping Bella, the door was closed behind her, and Bella went back to stand in front of her mirror.

"You went to the ball game with Edward, and Jasper Cullen?" She asked pausing putting on her mascara to look at Alice.

"Yeah." She said, pulling her jacket off, and reaching for a different one, just then realizing that her other one was covered in twigs from the woods, and wondering absentmindedly if Charlie had noticed too.

Bella said nothing as she returned to her make-up, and Alice turned to face her.

"Has Jasper really been arrested?" Because for some odd reason, Alice couldn't picture it, those wrists belonged knocking against hers as they held hands, not clamped in metal, but Alice shook her head, in an attempt to dislodge that line of thought.

Watching Alice in the mirror, Bella reached for her lip gloss, and shrugged, "I've heard some rumors about him getting arrested, but nothing concrete. Except one time, him and his dad were leaving the station when I was bringing Charlie some lunch one Saturday. Carlisle looked pissed, but Jasper didn't seem too concerned, so I didn't think much of it. Why?"

Alice picked at imaginary fuzz on her jacket, as she nodded, "Just wondering. Charlie said he had been in there a lot."

"It's only because Charlie knew Jasper has his eye on you, he told me the same thing when Mike Newton asked me out a while back, and there is no way Mike's dad would let him live if he ever so much thought about breaking school rules much less the law."

Both laughed lightly at the thought, and after it subsided the rest of their getting ready, and ride to school was silent. They parted ways without saying goodbye, but it lacked the usual glare from Bella directed at Alice, so she was sure their conversation this morning, was a step in the right direction. She moved through the crowded halls gazing at her map of the school, determined to find her locker by herself, she knew it was near her English class, and that her lock was bright blue. One of the few things she had taken from Alaska, other than clothes.

But upon seeing her locker that morning, she found another discerning feature, one that she was sure few other students found their third morning walking into this school. This particular feature was in the form of a boy, a boy not face her, but she didn't need his face to know him, she could tell from the back of his head who was standing at her locker. For a moment Alice contemplated going to her first class without her books, because she was unsure if she would be able to face this boy first thing in the morning, without having slept the night before.

Sighing, she squared her shoulders and headed forward, because now the head had turned, and the face she didn't need to see, was smiling at her.


So who do you think should be leaning against her locker? Edward? Jasper, or maybe even Jacob? You decided! But of course I have the power to veto :) But seriously, I want to know who you think should be there.