Alice and I watched them take off and then climbed back into the car ready for our trip home. It was almost dark out and I had a feeling we'd need as much clarity with the state my directions were in.

"OK so we just follow the directions in reverse, right?" Alice said, grabbing the paper and reading over it. "So we go turn on Charleston and then go straight on Grant …" she read out loud.

"I'm impressed, Alice," I said, looking at the paper over her shoulders, "even I couldn't tell what that word was and I wrote the thing."

She just shook her head and chuckled, "Why don't we switch. You drive and I'll read? It'll be night soon and I'd hate to have you try to decipher that in the dark."

I stuck my tongue out at her, laughed and nodded, climbing out of the car and into the driver's seat while Alice switched seats without getting out of the car. We buckled our seatbelts, turned the radio to a good station and began our journey back.

But, of course, half an hour later we were completely lost.

"OK, so make left on this street and it should take you back to the main road," Alice said.

"Are you sure? That's what you said the last time."

"Positive."

I followed her instructions and found myself at another dead end. "Okay, so when you said 'positive' what you really meant was 'I have no idea', right?"

Alice brought one hand up to scratch her head as she looked around at the street signs. "I could've sworn ... oh well. We're going to have to get out and ask someone, I think."

"Where? We're on residential streets and I don't see anyone outside."

"It's so dark here. You'd think they'd never heard of streetlights."

"This place is a little creepy at night…" I said as I looked around at the very rural surroundings. The town was old and the homes were all made of stone with vast yards that went into the woods. There were trees everywhere. It was very pretty during the day but at night …

"Alright, well we can't let our fears get the better of us. Why don't we try to follow our path backwards. That should lead us somewhere…" but she didn't sound too sure of that either.

A few minutes later we were at a seemingly deserted gas station. "Is it open?" I whispered to Alice.

"I don't know…" she whispered back. "Should I go check?"

"No… what if there are people in there?"

She turned and looked at me like I was insane, "Then we ask for directions, dummy!"

I couldn't help but give a little snort of laughter, "No! Not normal people, I mean what if there are weird people in there?"

"What like MOLE PEOPLE?!" She screeched and looked back at the gas station in sheer fascination.

I threw my head back and laughed, "Never mind, silly, let's just both go in and ask."

We climbed out of the car and went inside to find a weird older man with a balding head and a gas station uniform staring at a magazine. He threw it aside quickly when he heard the bell attached to the door jingle and stood up, ready to serve. "Whacanna do fer ya lehdies?" He spoke at lighting speed in the weirdest accent I had ever heard. It was almost indecipherable.

"Actually, sir, we were wondering if you could tell us how to get back onto the main road?" I asked as politely and slowly as I could, not knowing if this guy really knew how to speak english.

He smiled a very friendly, toothy grin and nodded, "Sherthing therra gals, yajustake defirsstree rawght thir n' din turn innaBlassahroad n' gotilyagettatooafork…" he kept babbling but my mind couldn't keep track of what he was saying. I turned to Alice to see if she could understand a word of it. She was just nodding along, eyes wide and her mouth half open in confusion. I turned back to him to see that he was still talking a mile a minute. When he finally got to the end of his explanation he smiled again at us, "Got dat lehdies?"

Alice and I looked at each other, bit our lips to stop from laughing and turned back to him with kind smiles. "Yep. Thank you sir!"

Once we waved goodbye and got back in the car, Alice turned to me as I started the ignition. "Did you get any of that?"

"Nope."

"Okay, just checking."

"I told you there would be weird people in there!"

"Well at least he wasn't a mole person!"

"Are you sure? What do mole people look like? And what language do they speak becausethat definitely wasn't english."

"Nah mole-people-eese must have a lot of grunting involved since they live underground." Alice said chuckling, "He sounded more like he was speaking in tongues, didn't he?"

"Tongues? What tongues? He sounded like he didn't have a tongue!"

Alice started giggling and I joined soon after. In seconds we were both cracking up loudly in the car and wiping tears from our eyes.

"Oh crap, Bella! He's looking out the window!" She said suddenly controlling her laughter and staring at the window of the gas station. "I think he's coming out here!"

"Oh no! What do I do?"

"Go, go, go!"

I forced the car into the right gear and stomped on the gas, not taking my foot off of it until the gas station disappeared behind us. Minutes later we were stopped at an intersection, somewhere miles away from our destination. I sighed and looked at Alice. "There's only one thing left to do now, I think."

She sighed too in defeat. "I guess. Okay then, here goes nothing." She pulled out her pink sparkly cell phone, dialed quickly and put the phone to her ear while waiting for the other person to pick up. "Hey Jasper … we have a problem …"

--

Forty-five minutes later we saw Jasper's car pull up behind us. Alice jumped out and ran to him while my attention went directly to the gorgeous guy coming out of the passenger side. I hopped out and went happily into Edward's arms. "Thank you for rescuing us."

He laughed and hugged me tight, "Not a problem. May I ask how on earth the two of you wound up out here? You couldn't be farther away from campus."

I rolled my eyes. "How about we tell you that story on the way home?"

"I have a better idea," Jasper said, "There's a really good sushi place on the way back. How about you tell us all about your little adventure over dinner?"

"Sounds good!" Alice squealed as she bounced into the passenger seat of his car.

Edward took my keys from me and kissed my cheek. "How about you let me drive?"

I'd had more than enough driving by that point. "Gladly."

An hour later we were all seated around a large table at a Japanese steakhouse where the chef had just finished cooking for us right at our table and performing really cool tricks. Jasper and Edward were laughing uncontrollably when we told them about the mole person at the gas station.

"Why didn't you just tell him you didn't understand what he said?" asked Jasper.

"Because he looked so friendly and we didn't want to seem ungrateful!"

"And," Alice interjected, "what if he began with that whole speech again? If I'd had to listen to that a second time, I'd have gone nuts!"

Edward shook his head and put his arm around me. "Well, nevertheless, I'm glad you girls are alright." I kissed his cheek.

"I'm getting you a navigational system for your birthday," Jasper said to Alice.

"In pink?!" She squealed.

"Of course."

The night turned out to be incredibly enjoyable. We spent a long time talking and laughing about the most random things. The food was delicious and I was so stuffed to the brim that I couldn't take another bite, but the boys insisted on getting a bunch few different desserts anyway.

"This one is way better than chocolate one," I said, feeding a spoonful to Edward.

He shook his head, smiling, "I still say the mousse thing is best."

Once we finished our dessert and tea, Edward and Jasper left a few large bills on the table and we left. I must've fallen asleep on the ride back because the next thing I knew, I was being gently woken up by Edward's soft lips on my own. "Bella," he said between kisses, "We're back."

Sleepily, I made my way into my dorm and immediately went to the bathroom to change into my pajamas. By the time I had climbed back into bed, Edward had come back down from his room in his PJs also and he got into bed with me. "Thank you again for the rescue," I murmured.

"Anytime."

I put my arms around him, pulling myself closer into him. "I love you."

I felt his lips turn into a smile against the skin below my ear, where he then placed a soft kiss. "I love you too."

--