A/N: Oh man, you guys are awesome! Seriously, I've got amazing readers! Thank you so much for all the reviews, and even just for reading! You guys broke all the previous records for my story! I'd love to see it happen again, haha. Anyway, I hope you guys love this chapter!

penguinopus- Hmm, well that's good to know that it worked for some people. Yeah, I figured it was time to get Alice in there a little more… and be her usual bold self. She wants to work on becoming more attuned to Bella, anyway, so I figured I'd have a little fun with her first step!

lover-of-all-fanfiction- Aw, I'm glad you like it! I won't answer your question about Bella here, but you should find out this chapter. I don't think I'd be much help for you since I've never read Maximum Ride. Haven't heard of it, honestly. I've been too busy reading for my classes!

leavingtown- Haha! Well I don't mind if it's painful as long as it's good and you're liking it! Just wait for when things really start taking off for them ;-)

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The morning after the blood typing, I had almost convinced myself that I'd been wrong about Edward. I had thought he knew that I had social anxiety disorder, but how could he have? It's not like SAD was a really common thing. I knew that I wouldn't have known what it was if it wasn't for the fact that I was recovering from it. SAD wasn't common like depression or as popular to the public as schizophrenia and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

There was no reason to believe that Edward knew about it. It was possible that he knew that I had been anxious, but that didn't mean he knew the extent of my problems. He couldn't have.

Angela went off to lunch without me, since my Spanish teacher had asked me to drop off her attendance sheet in the office. I made the quick detour to turn in the papers, and on my way from the office to the cafeteria I ran into Mike. He smiled and jogged over to meet me. It was nice to have someone who I could tell—without a doubt—was always glad to see me.

"Hey, Bella," he said as he fell into step next to me.

"Hey, Mike, how's it going?"

Mike shoved his hands in his pockets. "Good. So, uh, how are you feeling today?"

"Pretty good I guess," I said. I could feel a trace of pink light up in my face as I remembered what was going on the last time Mike had seen me.

"Good, because you were looking really pale yesterday in bio."

"Yeah," I said, trying to laugh it off. "Thanks for the reminder."

"So, what? Blood makes you feel sick, then?"

"Yeah. It always has. Good thing I don't want to be a doctor when I grow up."

Mike laughed. "Yeah, that might not be too good."

Once the cafeteria was within view, Mike slowed down his pace. I slowed down with him and turned to face him.

"What?" I asked, wondering if something was wrong or if he had forgotten something.

"How would you like to do something this weekend?" I could hear the hope in his voice, and that made me feel even worse for the fact that I suddenly wanted to leave him on the sidewalk.

"Mike I told you that—"

"I know, you don't want to date and you don't want me to try. I got it. It doesn't have to be a date."

My palms were starting to feel damp, so it was a good thing I was wearing gloves. "I don't know…"

"We can't even hang out as friends?"

He was making me feel guilty. I hated feeling guilty! To be perfectly honest the idea of spending a lot of alone time with any guy, even strictly as friends, was something I didn't even want to consider. Plus, I highly doubted that Mike truly wanted us to go down the friends path.

"Now's not the best time," I muttered, hating myself for lying. I picked up our pace so we could join the cafeteria crowd and leave this conversation behind. "Maybe some other time?"

I could tell by Mike's expression that he wasn't sure I was serious about trying again later. His face hardened ever so slightly. "Alright. Maybe later," he said, keeping his voice light.

I was very glad to reach the cafeteria, because I doubted Mike would keep trying in the cafeteria. He always approached me when we were somewhere more private.

Once I had gone through the line and bought my food, I took a seat next to Angela at our usual lunch table. Her eyes flickered back and forth between me and Mike. She had noticed us come into the cafeteria together, it seemed, and she probably noticed something different in his or my facial expression. I gave her a significant look, trying to communicate with her that I would tell her what had happened sometime when there weren't as many people around. She seemed to understand, because she turned to listen in on what the rest of the table was talking about.

My eyes roamed the cafeteria, landing on the Cullen table. It was getting to be such a habit, now. One of the first things I would do every lunch period was check to see if Edward was there. I wanted to know that I would see him in biology, but today I was looking for some sort of clue for what Edward would be like today. His mood seemed to change so much that it was hard for me to keep up with him. I wasn't sure if he would still be talking to me today, and I was hoping to find the answer.

Edward wasn't there. I wasn't sure why, because the rest of his family were in their usual seats. The blonde one, Rosalie, was watching me with hostile eyes. What was her problem?

I sighed to myself, accepting that I wouldn't be seeing Edward in biology. I would have to wait even longer to see how he was reacting to yesterday.

Angela tugged on a bit of my sleeve and pointed in the direction of the lunch line. "Why is Edward staring at you?"

My heart skipped a beat. My eyes followed Angela's line of sight until it landed on a table that was usually empty. Well, today it wasn't, because Edward sat there with his arms folded across his chest. No one else was sitting at the table. When he motioned me over to his table the thoughts in my head went into hyper drive. Was this about yesterday?

"Hang on… I'm going to see what he wants." Again I got a questioning look from Angela. I had no answers for her, so I shrugged my shoulders, grabbed my tray and backpack, and walked over to Edward's table.

"Hey, Edward." Edward choked back a laugh. "What?" I was suddenly afraid I had done something stupid without even realizing it.

"Nothing—it's Mike. I think he's a little jealous."

I turned to check behind me. Mike was staring pointedly at his pizza slice and focusing way too much on the layer of grease on top of the cheese. I wouldn't be surprised if he was upset when that I had just turned him down only to join Edward for lunch.

"Well, considering that he's already jealous you might as well join me for lunch today, right?" His grin was absolutely irresistible, showing off his perfectly white teeth.

I set my stuff down and took a seat, "I guess you're right," I agreed, only I wasn't nearly as amused by Mike's jealousy as Edward seemed to be.

"I wanted to apologize to you," he said, his expression suddenly unreadable.

"What for? You didn't do anything wrong."

His deep butterscotch eyes jumped away from mine and then back. It was all the proof I needed that Edward knew exactly what was wrong with me. "I feel like I stumbled in somewhere private. I'm not sure I'm welcome."

Damn right he wasn't welcome. I didn't want someone knowing that sort of thing. Until yesterday, the only person who had known anything about my anxieties in Forks was my dad. It wasn't the sort of thing I wanted people to know. I much preferred that people would come to know me by what they noticed themselves, rather than what they had heard about my past.

I couldn't blame Edward for it, though, so I said nothing and instead imitated Mike, looking down at my food. It was more my fault than anything, and he certainly hadn't done anything out of malice. I just wasn't ready for people to know that about me, and I wouldn't be until my social anxiety disorder was well behind me. The effect Edward had on me was all the proof I needed that I still had a ways to go.

"When did you find out?" he asked me when I didn't respond.

"I was diagnosed a year ago," I said, picking up a fork and poking at my mashed potatoes. When I looked back up, his eyes were still focused on me. "How did you know?"

Edward didn't answer right away. He was thinking. "I've studied a bit of psychology," he said, being delicate with his wording.

"But that's not a class here."

"You're right, it isn't."

What did he mean by that? Did he just roam the internet and randomly decide to read all he could find about social anxiety disorder? Last year, his sophomore year, had been his first year at Forks which meant that if he had taken a high school psychology class he would have had to have taken it as a freshman. I was pretty sure that most high schools didn't allow freshmen to take psychology. Wasn't it an AP course? Maybe I was thinking of a different subject.

I dropped the subject moving onto something I cared more about. "So you don't think I'm some freak, then?" I asked. Some people thought so. They were entirely focused on the fact that people who kept to themselves were different, unnatural, strange… I might not be at that point anymore, but I couldn't deny that it was part of my past.

"Why would I think that?"

"It's not normal."

"Bella, compared to me you are blissfully normal."

"This is where you tell me I shouldn't hang out with you, isn't it?"

Edward chuckled. "That sounds about right." I could have sworn his eyes were sparkling.

"Then why did you have me come over here if you were going to tell me off for it?" I was getting frustrated with him.

"Because I wanted you to," he answered simply. "As long as you don't object, I won't try to stay away again."

Something clicked in my head. Edward had been staying away because he thought I had been afraid of him. He had been trying to help me. That was, in some weird way, the nicest thing a guy had ever done for me.

"Well, I don't."

Edward smiled.

I took a bite of my mashed potatoes, looking over at Edward's untouched tray of food. Come to think of it, I had never seen him eat before. Did this also have to do with the reason he was convinced he was dangerous?

"You don't ever eat, do you?"

"No. I don't." Edward picked up his fork and stirred around his vegetable medley, perhaps to make it look like he was at least thinking about eating to everyone else.

"You don't eat anything? Do you have any needs at all?" I asked, only half seriously.

"I do, just none that you have." I knit my eyebrows together, confused. Edward sighed out. "Ah, it seems you get me admitting things I shouldn't."

"I don't get it," I said, my fork of mashed potatoes halting in midair. "Are you saying you don't have to sleep?"

"I can't sleep," he corrected.

"Then what do you do? I mean, what do you actually need?"

"Please, Bella," Edward said, pleadingly. His hand shot forward, contemplating grabbing mine to emphasize his need, but he retracted it. "Just leave it." His voice sounded so lovely and silky, and with him looking at me with such soft, stunning eyes like that I found I couldn't deny him.

"Okay," I agreed.

Edward looked pleased for a moment, but within moments it melted into a frown. "Alice," he stated, frustrated. It almost sounded like a warning. Where had that come from?

I wasn't sure what he meant until a couple seconds later when Alice set her own tray of untouched food next to Edward.

"Bella, how are you?" she asked enthusiastically. I still couldn't get over how she acted as though I'd been her friend for years.

"Good," I answered, then hesitated. "You?"

"Yes, Alice, how are you?" Edward asked sarcastically. He looked mildly irritated. I couldn't help but feel like I was missing something.

"Oh hush, Edward. Don't be rude. I just wanted join you and Bella."

I decided to busy myself with my food, taking a large bite of pizza and letting them talk it out. They didn't, though. They seemed to be talking with their eyes. Alice looked at Edward with a simple smile on her face, and Edward's demeanor changed smoothly from one of annoyance to one of reluctant acceptance.

"So you feeling better today?" Alice asked. "I heard you got sick in biology yesterday."

I groaned. Edward laughed.

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A/N: That's the end of this chapter. I know, its back to a normal length... I wish I could make them all as long as the last one was. I've got some stuff I'm really excited about writing planned for next chapter.

Hey guys! More info about the RP. The original site has been kind of messing up… so I'm trying to do this again on a new site. The two are essentially the same, the only difference being the name of the site and the fact that this one actually works!

Oh yeah… and my friend who was playing Bella had to bow out due to some family issues… but that means that Bella is available! More than one person can apply to be the same character, but only one person will be able to play each one. I have had a few people say they wanted to join, and some people visited the first site, it seems, but either due to the malfunctions of the first site or uncertainty, none of you guys applied… so if you guys want to join, you kind of just have to do it. Again, let me know if you've got questions. I've updated the link on this chapter and on my profile page.

The new url is: thecoldonesrp .probo ards.co m (remove the spaces!)

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