Test

BPOV

A sound like a foghorn wakes me up suddenly the next morning, making me jump out of my skin and setting my heart racing. I rub the sleep from my eyes and attempt to sit up, but I'm being pinned down by a rather muscled arm, an arm which when I follow upwards leads me to Edward's beautiful unconscious face.

I manoeuvre both my hands in under his arm and attempt to heave it off of me. Edward stirs, and for a second I think he's woken up, but then he just throws his arm further around me, tucking me in tighter and pulling my back flush against his body and oh my...

I feel my face burn a little even though he isn't even awake and I have absolutely no reason to feel embarrassed right now. The annoying buzzing continues.

I glance around the room, or at least as much as I can from my position, searching for the source of that god-awful noise.

Aha.

It's Edward's alarm clock, I can see just over his shoulder, ringing so loudly it could wake the dead, its red flashing numbers showing that it's 8am.

I try to work my way out from under Edward again so I can turn the offending alarm off. How the hell can he still be sleeping?

My second attempt is no more successful than my first. I hear a door slam at the end of the hall and panic rushes through me. I slap Edward's arm forcefully, the sting forcing him to wake up.

"Huh? What? What are you doing?" The sleepiness on his face fades to confusion as he watches me attempt to struggle out from under him.

"Move, Sleeping Beauty, Lily's coming!"

The confusion lingers on his face for another second before it's replaced by a look of horror. He finally shifts enough that I can move, and I jump up, bolting into his ensuite, shutting the door behind me just as I hear the door to Edward's room open.

"Good morning kiddo!" I hear Edward tell our daughter, in a voice that sounds just a little bit too cheerful.

I listen from behind the door until I hear him taking her downstairs before slipping back down the hall to the guest bedroom to get dressed. I hear exaggerated noise from the kitchen as Edward attempts to keep Lily distracted by letting her help him make pancakes. I slip carefully down the stairs and out the front door, closing it quietly behind me, and coming face to face with Alice and Jasper.

My eyes widen and I feel myself blush involuntarily.

"This is so not what it looks like," I say stupidly.

Alice's surprised expression turns smug. "Why Bella? What does it look like?" she asks innocently.

"We just fell asleep. That's all. Seriously!" I add when she fails to wipe the smug look from her face.

Alice says nothing, but continues to give me that know-it-all smile as she leans around me to ring the doorbell to Edward's house.

Edward opens the door a few seconds later, still wearing his pyjamas and his bronze hair sticking up in all directions.

"Hey, what took you so long? I thought I heard..." He trails off as he catches sight of my two companions, my face cherry red as I stand between Jasper who looks rather amused and Alice who looks like the cat that got the cream.

"Hello, dear brother," she singsongs as she sidesteps by him into the house. Jasper and I follow.

He gulps. "This isn't what it looks like."

"It looks like my dear friend Bella here was just doing the walk of shame out of your house, Eddie," she says slyly, loving every minute of our discomfort.

"Nothing happened," I insist.

Alice's smile only gets wider, and she leans over to smooth down my sleep-rumpled hair. "Whatever you say, B. Now where is my lovely niece?" she asks, wondering into the kitchen. "Do I smell pancakes?"

After that morning several weeks pass without much happening. Edward and I spend most evenings together with Lily just having dinner together and hanging out. On the weekends if Edward isn't working we make an effort to take Lily out for the day, even if it's just to the park. He and I have managed to have a few more dates too, just to dinner or a movie. It was an unspoken agreement after that morning that there would be no more impromptu sleepovers for quite a while.

I've just gotten my first pay check from the publishing house so I've started searching for an apartment for Lily and me to rent. The Forks and Port Angeles areas aren't particularly full of real estate but they aren't the most sought-after places to live either so I don't think I'll have a problem finding something nice and affordable.

In the spirit of it possibly being the last few weeks that Lily lives with her father, I've turned down Edward's invitation to join them at some indoor trampoline park. I want to spend some time with Rosalie anyway. She's been my best friend for the last six years and I feel a little guilty that between my new job and spending time with Lily and Edward I've been neglecting her a little bit lately.

On Friday night, while I look through the Forks gazette circling anything that seems promising, I call her up and we make plans to go do some window shopping tomorrow morning and have lunch and get facials afterwards.

I arrive at Rosalie and Emmett's new place a little after ten on Saturday morning. It's a relatively small but cosy looking two-story house, just on the edge of Forks and surrounded by greenery; exactly Rose's style.

I make sure to knock before I enter because no matter how many times Rose tells me it's not necessary, I made that mistake once before and even a car accident and amnesia hadn't cured my mind of the scarring images from that fateful day.

"Hey Bellsy," Emmett greets me with a big hug when I wonder into the kitchen. "How are you?"

"Good, Em," I smile. "How're things with you?"

"Fine," he gives me his dimpled grin. "Do you want some coffee? Rosie will be down in a minute, she had a bit of a lie in this morning."

"No thanks, I'm fine."

"So..." he begins, wiggling his eyebrows mischievously. "I heard you and our Eddie have started to have sleepovers."

I roll my eyes. "That was one time! Trust Alice to tell everyone! And nothing even happened!"

Emmett laughs. "Sure it didn't Bells, and Lily was dropped on your doorstep by the stork!"

I'm saved from any further embarrassment by Rose's entrance. She looks rather pale and tired, entirely not her usual flawless self.

"Hey Bella," she says yawning. "Don't let this oaf give you too much grief... but you will be telling me everything in full detail later."

"Are you feeling okay, Rose?" I ask, concerned.

"I'm fine," she says but her smile doesn't quite reach her eyes. "Just didn't sleep too well last night, that's all."

"We can do this another time if you're not feeling up to it?" I offer.

"Honestly, I'm fine. We should get going," she insists.

By the time we've arrived in Port Angeles Rose has livened up a little bit and at her insistence I've told her all about my completely innocent sleepover at Edward's house. When I finish up telling her about slipping out the door and coming face to face with Alice and Jasper she's laughing so hard she can barely breathe.

"Oh my god, the situations that you get yourself into Bells!"

We stroll leisurely down the high street, occasionally stopping to look at a display in a shop window or wander into a boutique. Neither of us really wants to buy much today. We just wanted to spend some time together and there's not an awful lot to do round Forks.

"From the way Alice told it you'd have thought it like a scene from Pretty Woman or something," she laughs.

I laugh along with her. "Alice likes to exaggerate sometimes," I tell her. "Honestly I think she's just thrilled that Edward and I are getting along, that we're together."

"And are you together? Officially?" she asks with a small smile as we wander into a small boutique with a nice blouse in the window.

I frown. "I don't know," I tell her honestly. "It definitely feels official, and we've had plenty of conversations I guess where we've both pretty much assumed we're exclusive... but he hasn't actually asked me or anything."

"Well maybe you should ask him?" she suggests, sorting through hangers of a pale blue shirt with cap sleeves until she finds her size.

"I think I'm going to try this on." I follow her to the dressing rooms at the back of the shop.

"I don't know," I say doubtfully. "Can I really do that?"

"Please, Bella," her muffled voice comes from behind the curtain of the changing room. "It's the twenty-first century and you're an empowered young woman. Grab life by the balls and ask your baby daddy to be your boyfriend already!"

She steps out with her arms thrown wide to show off the blouse.

"Hear, hear," a voice calls. Both of us turn our heads to see a woman clearly well into her seventies poking her head out from the adjacent cubicle.

Rose high-fives the old lady and we leave the changing rooms laughing as Rose goes to buy her new shirt.

"What about you and Emmett?" I ask when the little bell tinkles overhead and we're once again walking down the crowded street. "What's new with you guys? How's the house? How's working for Jacob? How's living in Washington? I feel like it's been ages since we talked about you."

She laughs. "I guess almost dying and losing your memory kind of makes you the centre of attention. Emmett and I are fine, he's an idiot as usual... the other night I had a sore back after leaning over this awesome Audi all day... anyways, I asked him to give me a massage and of course he thought that meant other things."

I laugh. "I wouldn't think you'd have minded all that much."

The corner of her mouth twitches. "Normally, no, but I've just been feeling super tired lately."

"Do you miss Alaska?" I ask her.

"Not Alaska exactly. I miss my family sometimes but then I just skype them and it's all okay. I like living in Forks. I thought I'd always be a city girl but I like the slower pace, I like working in a small business, I like that I know my neighbors' names."

Rose and I find a quaint little restaurant down one of the side streets. It's Saturday so the place is fairly crowded but there's only the two of us so we manage to get a table almost right away.

We order some waters and peruse the menu.

A waitress walks by, delivering some type of chicken dish to the table directly beside ours and my mouth waters at the heavenly scent. I look back to the menu to figure out what it is.

"Oh god..." I glance up and Rose is looking positively green. She flies out of her seat and through the bathroom door and I follow just a couple steps behind her.

I hold her hair back as she leans over the toilet emptying the contents of her stomach. We haven't eaten yet so there can't be too much in her stomach to throw up, and once she's finished she leans back against the wall of the cubicle, breathing deeply.

I leave the bathroom and grab her water, returning within a few seconds.

"Thanks, B," she says, gratefully accepting the water glass.

"Take small sips," I advise her.

"I'll be fine in a minute," she says shakily. "I've been feeling sick on and off all week. I thought it had gone away but it was just the smell of that chicken turned my stomach. I must be coming down with something."

"Rose," I ask suspiciously, "When was your last period?"

"My last... what?" she asks, confused. "You're not suggesting that I... no, it was... shit I can't remember!" she exclaims, eyes wide.

"Come on," I say grinning, "Let's get you home and find out."

Rose is still shaky on her feet as we grab our things and leave the restaurant, apologising profusely to the waitress. Rose barely says more than two words during the time that we leave the restaurant, stop by a pharmacy to pick up a couple of home tests and make the drive back to Forks.

When we get inside the house is empty, Emmett having left to go play football with some new friends from his work. I sit her down on the sofa in the sitting room and root through their kitchen cupboards until I find her some saltine crackers and make her some peppermint tea.

"Do you want to wait 'til Emmett gets home?" I ask Rose once I've gotten her to eat a few of the crackers.

She takes a deep breath. "No. Let's get it over with now. I don't want to get his hopes up if it's nothing."

I wait patiently while Rose disappears into the bathroom.

She emerges after a couple of minutes and comes to rejoin me on the sofa, placing the little white stick on the coffee table in front of us.

"Everything's going to be okay, Rose," I tell her reassuringly when I catch sight of her worried face, and I remember the last time I sat in front of one of these little tests. No matter that she's older and more prepared, I remember exactly how nerve wracking it was to sit in front of that little piece of plastic and wonder if my life was about to change forever. I remember how utterly terrifying those few minutes were and I reach out to take Rose's hands in mine.

She gives them a little squeeze. "I'm glad you're here with me, Bella."

The two minutes are up. Rose stretches her hand out towards the test, her eyes tightly shut. Her hand trembles and she snatches her arm back.

"You do it, Bells. I can't, I'm too nervous," she says shakily.

"Are you sure?"

She nods her head. "Just tell me."

I let go with one hand and her grip tightens on my other. I pick up the piece of plastic to find two blue lines.

With tears in my eyes and a wide grin on my face I say, "Congratulations, Rosie. You're gonna be a mom."