A/N: Here is chapter nine. It's about the same size as last chapter. Enjoy your respite because the next chapter is another monster. I should really learn how to write reasonably lengthed chapters, but occasionally I get utterly carried away.

Anyways, enough rambling.

Disclaimer: There once was a beautiful author named Stephenie Meyer who published a book called Twilight that changed a nine year old girl's life forever. And eight years later, that girl is still writing Twilight fanfiction. Her Edward character is a tad more believable, but it is with mixed feelings that I must report that she still doesn't actually own Twilight.

She does, oddly enough, have an apparent fondness for speaking of herself in the third person, though.

Chapter 9:

Sometimes Mondays suck.

It was the kind of thing that my Jake could probably preach a sermon on, but I was just beginning to appreciate the full weight of this particular cliché. In my life which could be split into three neat little sections (before Edward, Edward, and then universe flip), Mondays had at first been pointless. It was just another day I had to drag myself from my bed to face. It was meaningless. But when Edward became a permanent fixture in my life, it became almost exciting. It was the beginning of another week with him, after all.

But since the flip, it's been something of a misery.

Yes, Edward is now more of an ally than a foe. And that was definitely significant.

But I'm not spending time with Edward in English, am I? I'm just dying of boredom, wasting away and drooping with exhaustion and damp from the rain and heavens above I've got a headache…

I massaged my temples. The nightmares aren't helping. Two nights in a row, I'd been haunted by horrid visions of Jake either causing incredible pain or at the receiving end, and even in the dream I couldn't sort through my horror and loyalties. It should be simple to cut him off, and it's not like I'm truly faltering. But even as me, as Bella and not Izzy, he'd made a bloody mess of the small corner of my heart that I'd allowed him before pushing him away. And the nightmares capitalized on that horror, drawing it out in baffling, delirious storylines over and over throughout the night…

And if it wasn't Jake, it was James.

Strange how he'd come to mind after all this time. No, what's strange is why I'm not having dreams about Edward. Things have been going well enough to warrant it, right?

I'd actually been dreaming of James's venom searing my veins when Charlie finally tore me from the dream's embrace with a few rough shakes. When I'd finally awoken gasping from the nightmare, it was to hear that I was already late for school.

So of course I'd rushed around though my head felt full of cotton and hurried as fast as I could, even pushing my truck near its internal speed limit. And then my reward was titters from my classmates because, despite being late, I hadn't even used the extra time to look presentable. Apparently my hair was something of a joke at the moment.

"Bella?" A hand appeared in front of my face, and I started violently and looked up to see Miss Palmer leaning down over me with concerned eyes. "Are you alright?"

I looked around me surreptitiously, but everyone was still seated, though most were scribbling things down on notebook paper. Well, class wasn't over, but I'd missed the assignment. Crap. "Yeah," I said, sitting up. "Sorry for being late. I…overslept." I winced. For Izzy, a simple statement like that could be construed a million different horrible ways.

"You don't look well," Miss Palmer noted. "Make sure you get some rest, alright?"

If these nightmares hold up, not likely. "Sure," I said, somewhat awkwardly. It was all I could think to say.

"But I just wanted to hand this essay back to you," Miss Palmer said, and I noticed the near perfect score with mixed feelings of surprise and apathy. The first time around, Miss Palmer had only ever given me B's. But, if I'm being honest, I spend a lot more time studying now without Edward distracting me…which means my grades might go down again. "Have you considered English as a major, Bella?"

I blinked up at her in surprise. "Um…lately, yeah."

"If you keep up your performance, then I would highly recommend it," Miss Palmer smiled down at me, and I was struck by how pretty she was. At least one person has benefitted from this flip, I thought. The Miss Palmer of before had not smiled nearly so much. "It's rare to find someone who appreciates the classics."

I could only nod stupidly.

"Oh, and Bella?" Miss Palmer leaned down and murmured quietly, "Your shirt is inside out."

The people around me heard anyway, and I heard Jessica snort in disgust. I smiled stiffly up at Miss Palmer even as I wanted to bang my head against the desk. I hate Mondays.

I emerged from the bathroom with my newly right-side-out shirt with a yawn when I felt my phone vibrate in my back pocket. It felt odd to have the expensive phone near me all the time, but even I had to admit that it had its uses. Particularly when I got texts from Edward (only a recent development, obviously; he'd given his number to me Saturday when I went to his house).

I read the text as I meandered towards my next class. Eat with us in the library? My phone vibrated again, and another message appeared. This way she can get used to you.

I bit my lip to keep from smiling goofily at my phone.

When I'd dropped Edward off at his house Friday night, we'd spoken only briefly about Alice.

"What are you going to tell Alice?"

Edward considered the question for a moment thoughtfully before answering slowly, "I'll have to think about it."

"I don't know what I'm going to do to make it up to her," I admitted quietly. "She doesn't seem to hate me as much as you did, but she also doesn't seem to care. I'm not sure telling her I'm not Izzy will make much of a difference."

"You want to be her friend?" Edward asked.

"Very badly," I confessed, barely audible. "She's very important to me."

For a moment we could hear nothing but the soft, comforting drizzle on the windshield of the car, and then Edward wrapped his hand around mine. I stared at him in surprise, but his smile was kind and understanding. "Don't worry," he urged softly. "We'll work something out."

I nodded slowly. "Thank you," I whispered.

He hadn't said anything to her yet, but he'd been thinking about it.

"Oh my gosh, is that a piece of toilet paper in her hair?" I stiffened, and I looked up to see Angela Weber laughing behind perfectly manicured fingers, and my blood ran cold. I shuddered and broke eye contact with her quickly. Somehow I felt more chilled looking at her than I had an entire coven of vampires.

But she made it quickly apparent that ignoring her wasn't an option after all. "Hey, Swan," Angela smirked, swaggering up to me, and I had to crane my neck to meet her eyes. Her height before had made her endearingly awkward. Now it was a tool of intimidation. "Your hair gives me some pretty great ideas about what we can do together instead of going to class." Angela reached forward with one of her hot pink claws, and a shudder ran the length of my spine. After invading my personal space, she retracted a delicate hand to reveal a piece of toilet paper. How…did that get there…? Well. That's embarrassing. "Can you guess what?"

Images of Angela forcing my head into a toilet bowl came to mind, and I gritted my teeth as I forced myself not to flinch. Poker face. Don't give anything away. "Clean the school bathrooms together?" I guessed.

Angela laughed, eyes flashing. "Oh, Iz. You're so cute." Angela smiled down at me. "We don't talk enough anymore, Iz. Why don't you answer your text messages?"

"Huh. I didn't know you were texting me," I said, not even having to feign the boredom in my tone. "Guess I blocked you on accident. Oops."

Angela smirked down at me. "Happens all the time," Angela agreed. "Maybe you should give them another look. Well, see you around, Izzy." With that she turned on her heel and her band of harpies receded with her, presumably to walk to their next class together.

After they were at least halfway down the walkway towards the next building, I unlocked my phone which had been resting limply in my hand for the duration of the encounter and texted Edward back, pointedly ignoring the hundreds of unread texts. Sure.

"Um…okay. This is weird."

I winced. "If you want, I can go."

"Well, that should be obvious." Alice frowned up at me as if I were a frustrating math equation. "Go, then."

"Alice," Edward said, touching her arm. Inwardly I sighed at the casual touch. He definitely does that to everyone. Get over it, Bella. You already suspected as much. "Tolerate it, please."

Alice twisted to let the full weight of her horrified stare rest on him. "Why on Earth would I? Edward, I wanted to talk about some of my research today with you! I thought that's why you wanted to eat with me."

Clearly I was intruding. "I'll see you in Biology, Edward," I said as I turned. She'd hardly come to like me more if I made myself a nuisance in her life.

"Bella—"

"Since when is she Bella?" I winced and exited the library and made my way towards the bathrooms where I typically took my lunches since I couldn't eat in the cafeteria without being showered in lettuce.

I wonder what she's researching? I mused. Must not be something she'd mention in front of Izzy. Maybe…her visions?

Strange how things had ended up with Alice. Not only did fashion not matter to her (which I was so okay with) at all, but she'd taken to science with such enthusiasm. Isn't that a bit of a paradox? The vampire, psychic scientist?

Of course, I didn't know just how 'psychic' she was. I'd only guessed at the dinner party that she had some intuition, but upon further reflection, it had hardly been a scientific conclusion. She'd just said it was time for dinner without looking at a watch and just walked out of the room. Not exactly compelling evidence.

…Why is it that Alice got astronomically smarter in terms of book smarts, and my IQ dropped to that of a small child's?

Of course, there were more troubling alterations to this universe that I hadn't much dwelt on before: Jasper.

I'd never known Jasper very well, actually. Though I'd come to share a fair amount of time with Alice who for some unfathomable reason had sought me out and treated me like another sister from almost as soon as she got permission from Edward, I'd spent significantly less time with her husband and mate. I got the feeling that it wasn't so much as dislike on his part as caution on Edward's. At least at first, Jasper had always kept his distance.

But Jasper had unmistakably always been there, practically Alice's shadow. And especially towards the end of my time in my home universe, he'd started to interact with me more outside of his occasional tampering with my emotions.

Jasper was nice. Reserved, but unmistakably amusing especially when Emmett was able to draw him out of his shell. His devotion to Alice, his silent undertaking of the job of mediator in the home, and his place as a go between hand in hand with Alice that glued the Cullens together made him irreplaceable.

So where is he?

I shook my head as I settled on top of a toilet, setting my lunch on my lap. I wasn't likely to get an answer, at least until I knew just how psychic Alice was. Hopefully Alice at least had some idea of where her blonde haired soul mate was hiding.

Edward was waiting for me in Biology, and expression was all apology as I settled down next to him. "Bella, I'm so sorry. That was terribly rude of her. I should have checked with her first before bringing you all the way over there."

I shook my head. "It's not like I had anything better to do, so don't worry about it. It didn't bother me at all."

"Really," he said skeptically as he searched my expression for any falsehood, any sign of hurt feelings.

"I got to brush up on As You Like It," I said with a pointedly cheerful smile. "It was very productive."

Edward shook his head. "I cannot decide if you are terribly sensitive or incredibly thick skinned. I'm not sure if I should be attempting to shield you or admire your patience."

He's trying to gage how badly I need a hero, I thought. If reasonably good people are in pain, especially girls, he feels the need to help them. I am now in that coveted circle, and that's significant. But it's not exclusive, and I'll never be content with such a tenuous hold on his heart. Just the thought of him eying Alice or any other girl who needed help with those same soft eyes made my chest tighten painfully.

No. I needed much more than that from Edward to even come close to being content or happy. I needed to be more than the damsel in distress, something he felt the need to protect.

But do I really want to seem so strong that he won't feel the need to care for me at all?

What a horrid predicament! To have won his affection so easily only to find it just as easily lost or weakened! He needed to by some miracle actually fall in love me and somehow come to value me more than…what, his childhood best friends?

It was then, staring into his eyes and wracking my brains for the best way to answer him when a horrible thought occurred to me.

Jasper isn't here. What if that's because…he doesn't factor into the equation anymore?

What if Edward and Alice are a thing?

For a few seconds, I was unable to breathe from the horror. Edward and Alice had always been compatible in a way that I'd never felt threatened by before but had always observed to be very real. Especially here when they were each other's last piece of their friend group (in which naturally they must have been paired up by default because of Emmett and Rosalie), they must hold a unique place in each other's heart. Perhaps they were destined for each other, had been falling for each other for years. All the odds if I were being honest with myself were stacked in that direction.

They got along: check. They had a long, traumatic history together: check. They had had no other viable options (Jasper or me): check.

And even worse than this was the maddening question of whether I was so horribly selfish as to attempt to get in the way. I'm fairly certain it's impossible to force someone to love you, but I could still make a valiant effort.

If I decided to fight for him anyway…I could alienate Alice through threatening her place with Edward. I could lose Edward if things ended badly enough, awkwardly enough, or if my selfishness reminded him just a little bit too much of Izzy.

And more than that, I could potentially ruin whatever happiness they had that Izzy had been unable to smother.

I can't do it, I realized. If Alice loves him like that and he loves her…no matter the psychological cost to me, even if the idea feels like a knife in my heart…I couldn't try and get between them.

"Will you tell me what you're thinking before I go mad with curiosity?" Edward interrupted, and I realized with a start that I'd never answered his comment on my being sensitive or not.

I blinked at him in surprise, still reeling with the implications that flooded through my mind of such a scenario. I don't know anything yet, I told myself as I attempted to dam up the unnecessary insecurities and agonizing fears safely in the back of my mind. There's no point in panicking until I know more. I can grieve later.

"Sorry," I said, unable to keep a smile from my lips at the impatience in his voice. "Honestly, I'm not much bothered by pettiness anymore. I'm more worried about the long term implications of it. I don't think Alice will be as easily swayed towards me as anyone else might."

Edward sighed. "I know what you mean. Well, if nothing else, she's curious. That might be our greatest weapon against her," he mused before pausing. "And that wasn't what you were really thinking about, was it? Your expressions told quite a different story," he hinted.

Right. Why don't I just come right out and ask: hey, are you in love with your childhood friend Alice? Oh, and please be honest and ignore the fact that I already told you I'm in love with you. Right. Like that would go over well in the middle of class. "Just thinking," I said firmly.

Mr. Banner finally started class. "Alright, everyone! Judgment day! You all knew this was coming! Take out your reports and hand them to me as I walk by!"

Edward began to rifle through his backpack, but he murmured to me as he searched. "I was thinking that we could try to tell her this weekend, give her plenty of time to adjust to the idea. How does that sound?"

I considered it. Curiosity may be our greatest weapon against her… "Do you honestly think she'll care?" I asked doubtfully.

Edward laughed softly, a self deprecating sound as he handed the eight page report we'd worked on to Mr. Banner. "I'm sure you won't trust my judgment much after today's debacle, but she'll have plenty of time to back out of it. And she'll know the exact nature of the meaning long beforehand. I'll tell her there's a secret of yours that you would like to share, something that would change everything in how she views you."

"If you didn't believe me, this would probably be impossible," I noted. "She'll still probably ignore me."

"She won't do that," Edward disagreed with a shake of his head. "As I said before, she's a curious creature. She'll entertain it, even if just as a hypothetical, because she'll be deeply fascinated by your stories of the other universe."

"Is it that interesting?" I wondered.

"Maddeningly so," Edward admitted. "But the subject seems to pain you, so I'm trying not to press."

I blinked. "It's…well, sometimes it is. But generally, I was exceptionally happy there. But I thought you only bring it up to distract me or to be polite."

Edward laughed at that. "Bella, you're talking about," he lowered his voice for this, "time travel and alternate universes…what about that would not be fascinating?"

I shrugged. "I suppose part of it is the messenger. I'm not exactly the best story teller."

"Even the driest textbooks have their place," Edward said. "…Not that I would put you in the same league as a dry textbook. Bella, even if you spoke broken English and used a plethora of odd idioms we'd never heard before, I promise you that even that couldn't sabotage the entertainment and scholarly value of your knowledge."

"How comforting," I deadpanned.

Edward grinned at me. "That…probably sounded better in my head."

I laughed. "No, I get your point. Well, if you want to hear more, you can just ask. There are almost no sore spots." I realized too late that that was a lie. There were two enormous ones: my relationship to him, and the fact that he had been a vampire.

Edward appraised my expression carefully before dryly saying, "Really." He didn't sound convinced.

I sighed. "Okay, there are things I won't necessarily want to tell you. But I just won't answer them if that's the case. To definitively answer your question earlier, so long I know that you don't hate me, I'm not in danger of wounded feelings, alright?"

Edward regarded me quietly for a moment before asking quietly, "Is it that hatred from any source distresses you, or just from me?"

My emotions were immediately in chaos at the question, and for a moment I was too flustered and scattered to give an answer.

"I…" With his eyes burning into me like that, I couldn't think much more coherent thoughts than I love him, so I averted my eyes to my lap and my fidgeting fingers. "Do you actually want to know the answer?"

When I peeked at Edward, he was frowning. "Would you tell me if I really wanted to? Even though the question clearly makes you uncomfortable?"

"Yes?" It came out like a question, and I almost slapped a palm to my forehead in frustration with myself. I couldn't even answer a straightforward question with something like intelligence or confidence.

Edward's eyes seared into mine, and breathing became once more impossible. "I suppose that's answer enough for me then, isn't it?"

My breath caught in my throat before nodding. It was the only thing to do.

Too late, I remembered the possibility of his being possibly involved with Alice romantically or on the road there, and I wanted to claw at my face in frustration. Too late I'd remembered! If he feels that way for Alice, or she feels that way for him, regardless I would have just become a massive burden to him…never mind that since he almost certainly doesn't feel the same way about me it's going to be a burden.

Isabella Swan, do you ever think?

Part of me wanted to throw down the gauntlet and let Edward do with it what he would. These feelings would only fester if I attempted to lock them away. And another, much more rational side of me that focused on self preservation recognized that while my love for him might destroy my peace if unexpressed, it would destroy me if unrequited.

"I'm passing around worksheets for review. These will be due before the end of the period, so don't just blow them off," Mr. Banner instructed. "You can work in groups if you're struggling. Which none of you should be at this point, but I suppose that's why the test is tomorrow, not today…"

"He seems quite tired of us," Edward noted. "A shame. We're only barely into the second semester."

I cracked a smile at that. "Better than defeated divorcee. I think this flippant, ironic side of him is more interesting personally."

Edward sighed. "Unfortunately, I agree with you. But it's a shame when a teacher wins favor for his unique variety of laziness instead of any actual skill."

"Your standards are too high," I said with a critical shake of my head.

Edward shook his head. "Not when you're applying to MIT. This school doesn't even have advanced science courses!" He scoffed in disgust. "Much less AP or IB courses. I have to drive nearly an hour to take the exams!"

"…Your commitment to your academics is frightening to say the least," I admitted. "I'll be lucky to graduate, you know. College will be a joke."

"You can just transfer once you've started somewhere," Edward said thoughtfully. "Your high school transcript won't be nearly as important then. And besides, with Charlie's income, you can afford the tuition of any school that accepts you. You can go basically wherever you want that has a high acceptance rate."

But I can't follow you to MIT or Dartmouth. But out loud I admitted, "It's true. Though my GPA has dropped quite a bit, I think I have more options as to where I'm going than ever before." I frowned. "Actually, that's probably not true. I think you would have paid anything for me to go to college."

Edward glanced at me in surprise. "…I'm confused. Explain, please."

I shrugged. "We weren't necessarily going to college," I said vaguely. "That upset you a great deal that I was missing out. Oh, and you were the absurdly rich one. You weren't nearly as ostentatious as Charlie, though."

Edward quirked a brow at me as he handed me the worksheets that Mr. Banner had finally passed around. There were three pages of repetitive review. "That's right. I almost forgot. You were poor before, weren't you?"

I only nodded in response.

"…I don't suppose you'll tell me why we weren't going to college?" He paused to eye me wearily. "I wasn't a moron there, was I?"

I laughed at the idea. "Didn't I already tell you that you're exceptionally talented and intelligent whichever universe I find you in? No, you were brilliant before too."

"Then why not go to college?" He asked, looking puzzled.

I bit my lip. "Pass," I finally said.

He snorted. "We're not playing twenty questions, Bella. But I'll honor the sentiment…even if I am going mad with curiosity…" I didn't rise to the bait though, and he sighed. "Alright, alright. Why don't we split up? I'll do the first worksheet, you do the last, and whoever gets finished with theirs first and tackle the third, and then we'll consolidate our answers."

"You mean we should cheat?" I asked, teasing.

Edward cast me a withering look. "As if you don't already know everything on here! No, Bella, I'm saying we should be efficient."

I laughed. "Sure, sure." I rifled through to the last worksheet and began to work through the questions as a comfortable silence settled over us, only the sound of pencil on paper and the quiet chatter of the classroom in our ears.

Inwardly I sighed in contentment. Maybe Mondays aren't so awful after all.

A few fresh bruises later (playing badminton with Mike Newton had an entirely different result from last time; I believe he actually thought the object of the game was to cause physical pain to his partner), I found myself driving home, deep in thought.

Mostly, of course, I just thought about Edward.

Part of it was habit, and part of it was thinking about the fact that he'd walked me all the way to gym. He hadn't caressed my cheek with searing fingers as he had in the past, but he'd laughed at something I'd said. That was almost as good to me now. It's certainly all I'm going to get.

I shoved that voice away with the rest of my unpleasant thoughts. Nope. Today had been a good day, and I wasn't going to sour what good mood I'd mustered up thinking about how improbable it was that this happiness would last.

My hand was halfway to the doorknob of my house when I saw it.

A dead squirrel, its brown nose just barely brushing the knob of the door.

My stomach turned in disgust at the sight, and I bit my fist to keep from screaming or throwing up.

I'd seen my fair share of violence and pain; I'd barely escaped a vampire serial killer (to be fair, though, almost all vampires are serial killers) with my life intact.

But vampires didn't pin dead animals to my door. At least, if they did, Edward had removed the evidence before I came upon it. And even then, it probably would have been a poorly contrived joke from Emmett.

It's just an animal, I thought as I stared. It's just an animal… But it was also a symbol, a threat. It was intended to frighten.

Whoever did this did their homework, I thought grimly, hands tightening over my backpack. Charlie used the garage whereas I just preferred to park my truck in the driveway. He rarely if ever used the front door.

My thoughts went back to Angela Weber. She'd warned me to check my text messages…could this possibly be her, getting back at me for ignoring her so studiously?

But a dead squirrel? It didn't exactly seem like Angela's style. Maybe Mike, maybe any number of people at Forks High. In fact, based just on a dead rodent pinned to my door, I had no way of knowing anything. Maybe this was a reference to a bullying technique I'd supposedly used on someone else. Maybe just who had done this would have been clear as day to Izzy

Charlie did say she was vegetarian, I thought. Maybe that was a well known fact that she didn't approve of cruelty to animals?

Too many directions this could be going in. But if it was a message to Izzy, an emulation of an earlier bullying game played by Izzy, then it meant it would definitely have to be girls responsible. Nobody ever acknowledged Izzy's apparent attraction to Edward, but if anyone knew, it wouldn't be anyone friends with Jake (meaning most of the guys at Forks High) seeing as it never got back to him.

Though the squirrel grew more and more horrifying to me the more I looked at it, I found myself caring less and less about who left it there. There were too many people who hated Izzy, and the vast majority of them were irrelevant. If it was a group of girls headed by Angela, they'd hardly try to rape me. I found it difficult to fear much more.

A voice in my head whispered, You don't care, or you don't want to risk investigating and have Edward find out?

A bitter smile spread over my lips as I turned away from the squirrel, making my way towards the garage door. I'd always hated it when Edward hid things from me, but this was different. For one thing, it was just another threat, another attempt at intimidation. Those were hardly new. Even if he was inclined to be worried, I wasn't, so why rile him up at all? And for another…what, was I supposed to ask him: hey, did I ever pin a dead squirrel to your door?

Nope. Not going to happen.

With clear intentions to return to the front door with rubber gloves and a trash bag to dispose of the squirrel, I made my way inside from the garage. But Charlie quickly derailed me.

"Hey, Bells!" Charlie called from the kitchen. "Come check this out, will you?"

I blinked before sighing and reluctantly making my way towards him. He sounded so excited, and I'd lost much of my own good mood in confronting the stupid squirrel.

When I got to the kitchen, I took in with some confusion the large blueprint laid out in front of him. "Um…what's that?" I asked as I peered closer. It was utterly unintelligible to me.

"A helicopter pad!" Charlie said with a boyish, delighted grin up at me. He was seated at the table where the plan was spread out, nearly filling it up. In his right hand was a cup of steaming tea. Well, that's good. He's moved recently.

"Um…" A helicopter pad? "Do we have a helicopter?" The question slipped out before I could stop myself. Darn it! He doesn't need another reason to think you're crazy!

"Not yet," Charlie said cheerfully. "Thought I'd do this responsibly and build the pad first. It'll go on top of the garage."

"Ah," I said, scratching my head in mystification. After a month of living with him, I could hardly say my father as a millionaire was eccentric. But building a helicopter pad…? "Why?"

Thankfully, Charlie didn't seem offended. "Cause it's fun!" Charlie said brightly, sipping his tea. "I visited the elementary school last Friday, and the kids were united in wishing they could ride a helicopter. Well, they mostly just wanted to fly, but helicopters were especially popular among the boys," Charlie said. "And I don't know. It sounds like fun! Think of it, Bells. If I learned how to pilot one, I could give the kids rides all the time. Maybe I could even teach them."

My bewilderment softened into something like hesitant acceptance. It was eccentric. Part of me doubted he'd ever learn to fly. But if he just wanted to make some fun for the local kids, how could I fault that? "Sounds like fun, Dad."

Charlie regarded the plan thoughtfully before laughing. "If we're being honest with each other, though, I just really want to fly a helicopter. This gives me a pretty good excuse, huh?"

He looked so happy, so boyish and playful, that I wondered if the old adage "money can't buy happiness" ought to be revised. I'd never seen him so animated since the switch. Well…since ever, actually. "Definitely."

"Construction will be rushed," Charlie said, somewhat apologetically now. "It may be hard to sleep for a few nights."

"That's fine," I said immediately. If I didn't have to sleep as much, maybe I'd have less miserable nights.

Charlie grinned up at me. "You're being awfully easygoing about this. What, you're not going to whine about how I should be building you your own private mall on the roof of our garage instead?"

I snorted. "Somehow, I think I'll survive."

"You've gotten a lot less materialistic," Charlie commented. "I'm impressed. A year ago, I would have laughed myself silly if someone had predicted that."

I shrugged before vaguely saying, "I guess." It's amazing how much I don't say to my father.

"Alright, alright," Charlie said, shooing me with his hand. "You'll be eating dinner with me, so I'm content to let you escape my clutches for now."

With a start, I remembered the stupid squirrel. "Thanks, Dad," I said as I moved towards the drawer with trash bags in them.

Charlie glanced after me. "What's that for?"

I smiled grimly. "Just going to do a bit of cleaning."

A/N: Pretty creepy stuff, right? Ugh. I hope I don't inspire any sickos.

I'd love to hear your thoughts! One or two reviewers expression curiosity over how things would play out with Bella and Edward once they get to school. And while nobody actually seems to notice a change just yet, um...well, at least they were at school? (Don't worry. There will be SOME reaction. Just not this chapter.)

By the way, I'd just like to express my gratitude in those of you who have continued to read this. Sometimes I think I'm fairly good at writing, but as I'm sure you've all noticed, I'm still a novice at it and learning a lot. Every time a reviewer chooses to see the positive instead of the flaws that this story is riddled with, I'm both amazed and thankful. Your patience and positivity truly means a lot to me.

So, if you want to give me a heart attack by proving that you stuck around long enough to read this chapter, leave a review~