Oh my, it's been way too long! I'm so sorry. There is no dialogue in this chapter, until the very end, on purpose. It's all supposed to be about how Bella sees her surroundings, and dialogue gets in the way. It's been a hectic three weeks, from family vacations to illnesses to… well, just about anything that could keep me away from writing. I've been working on this for a while, and it just… never quite clicked.
But! I'll let you decide the overall worth of this chapter. I am so sorry that it took so long. I never wanted to wait this long, and I'm going to try extremely hard to never wait this long again.
-irishphoenix615

Rosalie was becoming a permanent fixture in the Cullen household. She was there for the Christmas party, something Bella found highly annoying. Esme seemed almost as bothered by her presence as Bella was. But, knowing that she couldn't say anything without seeming rude, she just sat around and sulked, examining the various couples who had showed up for the party.

Carlisle had invited a few of his colleagues from the hospital, and they were, naturally, very calm and very, very drunk. They were all slurring their words and laughing boisterously, giving Bella a slight headache. Jacob and Renesmee were such a cute couple, with the shy way that they were holding hands and smiling hesitantly at each other. He'd turned into quite a gentleman, despite her first impressions of him. He treated Ness how she deserved to be treated.

Jasper and Alice made Bella laugh. Jazz was completely caught up in the whirlwind that was Alice. She was hyper, bouncing from group to group, dazzling her uncle's colleagues, and Jasper just simply followed. It was a trait Bella wasn't used to seeing in her older brother; usually he had to be in the spot light. However, there he was, trailing the manic little pixie with a look of shear adoration in his eyes.

Edward wasn't with her, but he wasn't with Rosalie either. He was being introduced to some important people by his father; he was eager for his son to follow in his footsteps and become a doctor. Edward simply didn't have the heart to tell him that he just wasn't interested in medicine. He really wanted to go into the field of music. Bella often teased him that he loved his piano more than he liked her. He would always grumble in her direction and retort that his piano never made jokes about him.

Bella felt like a creepy stalker, just sitting there watching him, but he was absolutely breathtaking. She had never seen someone with his exact bronze hair, or his intense golden eyes. They were glittering in the dim light of the foyer, where the party was moved after the huge dinner, and every time he would glance over at her and smile, his eyes would shine. He often dazzled the male doctors' wives with his mind-blowing crooked smile. They would giggle and twitter, sipping their flukes of champagne and blinking their eyes at him in what they thought was a flirtatious way. He would smile charmingly at them and move on to the next group.

She couldn't understand it. He could have whatever he wanted in life with just a smile and a few choice words. All he had to do was unleash that infamous crooked grin, and everyone who was looking was turned to mush, even men. Bella had seen him use that devastating smile on a few of the male doctors around. Of course, he was naturally inclined to flash it at their wives, but occasionally the husbands were caught up in the glow as well. The only people who seemed to be immune to it were his family, and Jasper.

All of a sudden, she caught sight of Rosalie, chatting it up with one of the guys from the football team. Mike, Bella thought she remembered Edward calling him. He was big, with moderately muscular arms and the typical All-American looks: blonde hair, blue eyes, and a cute boyish grin. He was obviously dazzled by the beautiful blonde bombshell, but was pulling it off quite well, in Bella's opinion. He had her laughing at his undeniably lame jokes, at least.

The kids from school weren't so bad, actually. There were a few left, mainly a girl named Lauren and her little groupies, but everyone was pretty okay with her. Many people had automatically assumed that she was new, something that had amused Jasper immensely. Angela was a surprisingly sweet girl. It turned out that she had actually never been interested in dating Edward, and was really happy for the both of them. After a few weeks of being close acquaintances, Angela had confided in her that she was crushing on a sweet, shy boy named Ben. Both of them had come to the party, not together, but still remained in close proximity.

Ben was cute, and completely perfect for Angela, in Bella's opinion. He loved art, and was an amazing artist. He was very soft-spoken, and extremely intelligent. He and Angela had been speaking almost the entire evening. Bella had even managed to shuffle the place cards at the table very discreetly so that they were sitting next to each other. Angela seemed to notice, and shot her a grateful smile. Bella grinned back and nodded slightly at Ben, making Angela blush. Edward caught that small exchange and just chuckled.

Dinner wasn't nearly as awkward as she'd imagined. Bella sat next to Edward, with Alice on her other side. For the first time in her entire life, she felt surrounded by people who loved her. She and Alice had become almost like twins; they didn't even need to share words in order to communicate. Halfway through the main course, Jazz managed to drop his fork and make a loud clanging noise that silenced the entire room. Alice shot her a look, all raised eyebrows and rolling eyes. Bella instinctively raised her shoulders and pulled up the left side of her mouth in a kind of grimace to say, boys will be boys.

Always in the back of Bella's mind, however, was the nagging reminder that Edward had gotten her a Christmas present. Alice had confided secretly that she would love it, but she was instinctively afraid. If it were too flashy or pricey, she would feel obliged to return his thoughtfulness with some of her own. She had laid awake the night before, tossing and turning, trying to come up with something creative to show him exactly how much she cared without seeming like a whore.

Bella had found, after several tedious hours with Alice trying to unravel both boys, that Edward was no stranger to the female anatomy. She wouldn't say much, claiming that Edward had made her swear that she wouldn't say anything to Bella about his past, but she did warn her to be careful around him.

However, she managed to push it all aside and be the perfect, smiling girlfriend he often said she was as he began to introduce her to the doctors he had spoken to earlier in the night. After a full, delicious meal, she was feeling rather content to just stand next to him and be showcased. A few of them asked her questions about her schooling, and what field she was interested in, and several of the more intuitive ones had asked her to try and convince Edward to go into medicine. To those, she simply smiled and promised to try. She was having a much better time than she had before dinner by Edward's side, and she was almost able to fool herself into believing the daydreams that kept popping into her head about one day hosting their own dinner party in their own home, and instead of introducing her as his girlfriend, Edward would be introducing her as his wife.

Bella had excused herself to go and get another drink (nothing fancy, just Sprite) when she ran smack into Rosalie.

"Oh!" she exclaimed. She couldn't even bring herself to be hostile towards her; she was simply enjoying herself too much.

"Bella, we need to talk."

Somehow, even though those words weren't coming from Edward, they still stirred up that panicky feeling in her stomach and made her feet feel like hundred-pound weights as she let Rosalie lead her into a side room. She had mainly been avoiding any alone conversations with her, trying to keep her paper-thin illusion in place, but the world had taught Bella that when you were least expecting it, and when you were least prepared, things that she avoided like the plague came and bit her square in the ass. Knowing better than to fight it, she simply sat down in one of the two chairs in Rosalie's room of choice, the Cullen family library.

Good, bad, okay? Review and let me know. I'm going to try as hard as I can to get something else up by Monday night, because I have to go back to school Tuesday, and who knows how much time I'm going to have.
And yes, Emmett is in this story. Just… not for a little while. A few more chapters.
Also! If you're interested in The OC, or House, my sister published some things under them. Her penname is thunderrpunk, so if you're interested, check her out.
Thank you for reading!
-irishphoenix615Thanks to my reviewers:
mamato: I won't really be doing anything from Edward's point of view in this story, but if it's well-liked enough, and requested enough, I might write one from his point of view. And, next chapter, some of the more severe of Edward's secrets come out… Thanks for the review!
justjennie: Thank you for taking the time to review. Even if you don't have a lot of time, it's a nice way to let me know that continuing the story isn't pointless. Thanks for the review!
Girlz-Rule: I am so sorry it took me three weeks. Like I wrote in the Author's Note, I'm going to try to have the next chapter up within three days. Thanks for the review!
Blue-Eyed Chica: It really would suck for her, wouldn't it? I just liked the idea of a different twist to them. Thanks for the review!
DarkAngelRakell: Totally understand, I probably would have too. However, I am not Bella, and I couldn't make her ditch him that soon, so expect some drama in the next chapter. Thanks for the review!