AN: So I have re-read my stories to brush up on them before updating and with this one wrapping up I'm going to go back once it's complete and fix all the errors I saw that made me ask myself, "Now how did I miss that?" Now I'm no grammar queen so sorry most the bad , and such will remain. There were a lot of HE when it should be HER or SHE and a few fudge ups on names, as well as back stories that changed. Without further adieu, here we go
One Night Stands: Chapter 37
Coffee: POV: Bella
Getting coffee with Edward was not just weird but plain, no , no, it was just strange. Sitting across from the man you gave yourself too, and thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with and it'd been 3 months since you even spoke.
"So how was Chicago?" I finally asked, it seemed Edward, who had asked me to coffee was at a loss for words.
"Great" he said and I felt a stab of hurt, he said that with such enthusiasm, he truly meant it. Chicago was great, without me, and then I thought about it, of course it was great, he was an attractive, single doctor in a new city, the Edward before me must have had a field day with all the fresh meat around. "I learned a lot"
"Well that's great" I said though I doubt it was really that convincing. "I thought you were going to be gone longer" I added and he shrugged.
"No, I decided cardio wasn't for me" he said and I couldn't help but beg to differ, had working for this cardio god really changed his mind.
"So what next?" I asked. "Neuro?" and I assumed this because of how Edward was, he loved to talk all about what awesome surgery he had been a part of today, or yesterday depending on how long after the surgery he got to come home.
He shook his head and took a sip of his coffee. "Ortho" he said simply and I raised an eyebrow, I knew what Ortho was before I met him, I'd broken and dislocated enough parts of myself to know that one without having to reference ER or Grey's Anatomy. "Maybe Peds" he added and I wondered what was going on with him, this was not the same Edward who went speeding off to Chicago without much consideration of us, ready to become the next great Cardiologist.
"You hate kids" I said and Edward gave me a look.
"I don't hate kids" he said and I must have said something wrong but Edward just sighed and then he floored me, "You don't like kids, not me"
My jaw dropped. When did I say I didn't like kids? I don't think I'd ever said that. I mean I was excited for Rose and Emmett, I just never wanted to have kids. "I don't hate kids" I shot back and he laughed, it was a short, dry laugh but he laughed.
"I didn't say hate, but you sure don't act like you like them. I believe you said you never wanted kids" he added and I crossed my arms. Was this it? He wanted kids and I didn't. Is this why he ran away to Chicago and just let me end it without a fight?
"Personally no, I don't, I have my reasons" I said irritated with him.
"Well what made you think I hated kids? Don't forget Bella, you insinuated that little factoid first" he said and I flushed, how was he turning this around on me?
"You said you hated working in Peds" I said exasperated.
"You never asked me why?" he said and I growled.
"This isn't going to work. Thanks for coffee, see you at the wedding I'm sure" and with that I got up and left Edward sitting there. I didn't want to look back but I did and he was just sipping his coffee and then I saw Alice plop down across from him and the two had a stare down.
Need Sleep?
I don't know why but I avoided Emmett, Rosalie and the twins like the plague. It'd been a week and Rose was getting more and more curt with me during our phone calls. I wasn't sure if it was the lack of sleep or just Rose like irritation in general.
So after a week I finally showed up at the McCarty abode. The place was still spotless when a tired looking Emmett let me in so at least the maid was still coming.
"You look like you could use a nap" I said to him and he gave me his huge dopey grin, oh he was exhausted yet still on cloud 9, so sweet.
"Did you come to baby-sit for a few hours?" he asked hopeful and I laughed nervously. "Kidding" he said and with an arm around my shoulders he lead me down the hall the nursery where Rose was changing a diaper, it smelt like poop, a vile poop.
"Oh my god" I scrunched up my nose and tried to breath through my mouth. "What are you feeding it?" I asked since the baby was currently naked on the table so I couldn't tell which one it was and then I saw his little wee wee and corrected myself. "Damn Travis"
"Funny" Rose said using one hand to hold a breast, oh right, this young it was just the milk.
"Yeah, they can drop some toxic loads" Emmett grinned, proud. Were he and Rose really smiling like dopes about shit?
"Can you dress Jarris?" Rose asked Emmett and he nodded and opened the closet, the twins were in no need of clothes, that was for damn sure.
"My choice?" he asked and she laughed and nodded her head. Emmett pulled out a little pink and black football onesie and Rose giggled. "We're gonna watch football with daddy" he said picking up his daughter and holding her like a football before handing Rose another UGA onesie for Travis, this one was red, black and white though.
"You do that" Rose said and I watched as they both snapped the onsies onto the twins as if they'd done it their whole life only I laughed when Emmett screwed up a snap and had to start over while Jarris kicked her little feet a mile a minute.
"So what's up?" I asked Rose, this was too Twilight Zone for my taste, she'd been insistent I come over and she'd yet to say much to me.
"My brain can't multi-task right now" she said to me and I laughed, point taken, Rose looked tired like Emmett but happy, she hadn't even made one comment about her weight, I was shocked really. Rose was always going to be a little vain.
"Hold" Emmett said simply and I couldn't help it, I felt extremely nervous that he was handing me Jarris. "Support the head" he said and I did just like he had held her before only with both arms.
My heart was racing. I'm going to drop her, I'm going to break her.
"No you're not" Rose said pointedly and Emmett grinned, yes I'd said that out loud.
"If I haven't you won't" he said and he went about taking the soiled diaper and pushing it into a hole before turning it and then he removed the lid and tied off the string of dirty diapers in another bag before replacing the bag swiftly.
"That's not too bad for a week" I said and Emmett gave me an amused look as he closed the top of the strange trashcan.
"Oh no, that's just last night through now" Rose said smirking.
"Shit" I said and Emmett laughed.
"Exactly" before walking past me and then I heard the tell-tale beeping of the security system, it did that whenever a door or window for that matter opened, it gave Rose piece of mind after the whole ordeal.
"So tell me the truth. Why did you leave the hospital so abruptly? This is the first time you are holding one of my kids, my best friend and it took a week and me chewing you out over the phone" Rose said picking up Travis and dropping the old onesie he'd been wearing before his diaper change into the wicker laundry basket.
"I wanted to give you guys alone time, there were enough people there" I said lamely and she rolled her eyes as she lead the way towards the living room. I followed, with Jarris firmly holding a chunk of my hair in her hand and tugging happily as she cooed and giggled.
"Bullshit" Rose sing-songed and Travis gurgled and she smiled. "And having coffee with Edward had nothing to do with it?" she asked and I must have made a face because Rose smirked. "Yeah I thought so"
"How did you know?" I asked.
"How does one know anything? Alice" she said and I rolled my eyes.
"She talked to him after I left, that's all I know" I said and Rose laughed.
"So you broke up with him" Rose said and I looked away. "You lead all of us to believe he ended it"
"He did" I said and she gave me her signature bullshit face this time instead of saying the words. "He fricking ran off to Chicago"
"He didn't just run off, he has a career, he was always coming back" she said and I laughed.
"You say this now, because he is back" I said sitting down before I dropped Jarris.
"No, I say this because he can't leave the hospital unless he's fired, let go for budget cuts or fails his boards next year" she said.
"You can quit Rose" I pointed out.
"Yes but that would be a shit career move, jumping from hospital to hospital before your boards is career suicide" she said and I wanted to ask her how the hell she knew but I remembered that Edward and Emmett were thick as thieves. "It's common sense, who wants a flighty surgeon operating on them?"
"He didn't even discuss it with me" I said and Rose huffed.
"That was a stupid thing to do but he couldn't say let me talk about it with my girlfriend and get back to you, it was a take it now or someone else will thing, didn't he explain that to you" she said.
"I guess" I said because while he had said that in more words than that I hadn't believed him, he was just too excited about it.
"Don't forget he applied for this way before you two even met" Emmett supplied returning and taking Jarris from me and Rose handed him Travis before he walked off into his sanctuary, his sports room.
"Yep" Rose sighed. "So I guess I'll just out with it then"
"What?" I asked.
"Mike's going with you to the wedding right?" she asked and I nodded, of course he was, he was my boyfriend, why wouldn't I. "Alice said Edward's bringing one too"
Alice
I erased the names again. I'd moved on to a huge dry erase board for my seating chart, my eyes were starting to hurt from fussing with my laptop for so long that I needed a bigger picture.
"Ok can't touch, can't touch" I mumbled to myself as I put x's through the tables I couldn't re-organize, certain problem areas in my family tree and Jasper's, people I couldn't seat with anyone other then the people they were with.
"I thought the chart was done months ago" Jasper said coming to stand beside me and look at the board.
"It was, but now Bella's bringing Mike and Edward is bringing someone named Lisa and I can't seat them at the same table, I'm not going to have that at the same table" I said shaking my head at the idea. Rose and Emmett would be fine with it but Jacob and Nessa with Edward and Lisa wouldn't work and I didn't want to split up my friends.
"So Emmett and Rose with Bella and Mike and Jacob and Nessa with Edward and Lisa" he said and I shook my head.
"Jacob is Bella's best friend and I can't sit them with Bella and Mike because Nessa is still angry at Bella, it'll cause friction between those two" I explained.
"They won't even be at the same table" Jasper said and I shook my head and pointed.
"No I meant Jacob and Nessa, if I seat them with Bella then she and Nessa will go at it and cause trouble with Jacob, if I seat them with Edward than Jacob will go at him and cause issues with Nessa" I said annoyed and Jasper sighed, he was finally getting it.
"Then there is only one thing we can do" he said.
"Un-invite Mike and Lisa and go back to the chart before?" I said smiling because then my wedding would be perfect again.
"Put them all at different tables" Jasper said and I frowned, our wedding wasn't big enough for that, they'd still be side-by-side, I wanted my bridal party and friends closer to the action, not to be the action.
"If only" I sighed.
"Then just seat them all at the same table and tell the girls to behave and I'll tell the boys to behave, or have Rose do it" Jasper said and I sighed. This still meant adding 2 more chairs to the table.
"Did you know Bella broke it off with Edward?" I asked Jasper.
"No" he said stopping and turning to look at me, he was wearing his bow tie around his neck, he'd been practicing tying it since I banned clip ons.
"Yeah, apparently when he got the Chicago gig, she broke up with him"
"Why?" Jasper asked.
"Because he was leaving her, I don't know she made it sound like he dumped her before he left, I left it alone" I said. I'd thought leaving it alone would be easier for Bella so when she started dating Mike I encouraged it because he would make a good rebound.
"But she ended it?" he said and I nodded. "Yeah Rose was floored too"
"Did Emmett know?" he asked and I nodded. "Huh" Jasper said.
"Exactly" I said back before going back to my chart. "Oh to hell with it" I said and arranged the seating assignment to be cruel. Bella had lied to me and I wasn't happy about it, she made her bed, she could lie in it and Jacob and Nessa would just have to keep their mouths shut.
"What?" Jasper asked and he approached the boards and watched as I wrote from left to right: Rose, Emmett, Lisa, Edward, Bella, Mike, Nessa, Jacob, Emmy, Corey (her date). "Really?" he asked and I nodded and filled in the next table: Carlisle, Esme, Jasper's parents, Rose's dad and his girlfriend, my mom and Bella's dad, this was a set up.
"I'll just say I shoved two more chairs into my original chart and put Angela and Ben with the safe people since Rose and Emmett can handle it better" I smirked and Jasper just laughed.
"Our wedding is almost certain to be memorable now" Jasper joked as I grinned because he was right. For such a thrown together affair it was definitely going to be some of my best work.
AN: next chapter is Alice and Jasper's reception, not their wedding.