BPOV

It was almost 11:00 when I awkwardly rolled out of bed and got ready for the day.

I was almost six months along. It was a little ironic that I could fall asleep almost anywhere, but whenever I got into bed sleep was evasive and spotty at best. I spent my nights Googling and trying to piece my life together. I usually sat at my desk until my back started aching searching for answers to questions that I theoretically should be able to ask my mom. I wasn't sure if she or I was to blame for my lack of faith in her, but I tried not to dwell on what she was up or if I even crossed her mind lately. Luckily, my doctor was a female doctor who had her own kids so she often offered me advice that I wouldn't otherwise have. Last visit she recommended one of those oversized body pillows to make sleeping on my side easier.

I felt a little bad about telling Edward that I didn't want to go out last night, but I looked ridiculous in these old raggedy basketball shorts. And there was no way I'd be caught going anywhere looking like this. It was unfortunate because I felt pretty good today. I took one of those prenatal vitamins after getting myself at least kind of together and went downstairs.

I was munching on a Pop-Tart when I heard the doorbell ring. After allowing myself a loud groan, I peeked through the window to see Edward and Alice with a sly smile on their faces. I cracked the door open slowly like some kind of hermit, kind of embarrassed at how I looked in comparison to them. "What are you guys doing here?"

"I brought you something," Edward announced proudly, walking through the door with a semi-large brown moving box.

"Edward," I sighed warily.

He waved dismissively. "My mom wanted you to have it. Said it was going to be given away if you didn't want it."

That made me feel a little bit better. "Are you going to tell me what it is?"

"I'll let Alice explain after I take it upstairs. It's too heavy for her to bring down and you can't be carrying things."

I watched as Edward carefully made his way up the stairs with Alice and I right behind him. This was uncomfortable for me, people just giving me things. Especially for no particular reason.

When he placed the box on my bed. I looked at him questioningly. "Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why are you giving me this? Whatever it is?"

He shrugged like it wasn't a big deal. "Because my mom and I thought it would help you. Make you more comfortable."

"Okay, but why?" I asked stupidly, trying to figure out what the motivation behind the perfectly nice gesture was. Because that is who I am. A person who can't be gifted something nice without wondering what the giver wanted in return.

He frowned. "I don't understand."

"But why? Like I don't- I'm not," I tried explaining, but the more I thought about it the harder it was to explain.

"Where's your bathroom?" Alice asked.

"Down the hall. To the left," I said absently, still trying to puzzle this whole gift thing together.

She nodded and left the room leaving Edward and I to finish this strange conversation.

"Bella, relax. It's just a gift."

"I understand that. But why?" I tried emphasizing, hoping my point came across. "Did-did you want something from me?"

"What? No! You don't need a reason to do something nice for someone. You just do the nice thing," Edward shrugged.

I shook my head. "There's no way that's a thing. No, when someone gives you something they want something back. That's the way the world works."

"You're not a business transaction, Bella. I just wanted to do something nice for you. Swear- there was no hidden agenda or ulterior motive."

"So, you're just giving me this?"

"Yes," he chuckled. "All you have to do is say 'thank you'."

"Thank you," I stammered, still feeling a little off-balance by Edward's kind gesture.

When Alice finally came back, Edward turned around and slowly backed out of the room. "Well I'll leave you and Alice to it."

"To what?" I asked, but he was already walking down the stairs.

"I'll pick you up at 4," he called as I heard the front door open and shut.

I looked at the clock by my bed. It was 12:30. Alice sat on my desk chair and was seemingly anxious to open the box. "What do you know?"

Alice raised her hands in innocence. "Only that I'm supposed to help you get dressed for your date."

"He's such a dork," I laughed.

"I promise you he's not. Not normally at least, he's usually the brooding, angsty type. You bring out that dorky side in him."

"Is that a good or bad thing?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. I've never seen him like this, well not in a very long time. He really likes you. Like a lot."

"I like him too."

She clapped her hands excitedly. I think Phoenix me would have hated Alice, I would have found her enthusiasm grating, insufferable. But right now, and maybe it was just because I was putting effort for Edward, but I found her vivaciousness invigorating. Her energy was contagious- I actually found myself getting butterflies thinking about this date with Edward. "Alright, my mom had a bunch of maternity clothes that was just sitting around. She thought it might be a good idea to see if you wanted to use any of it."

I licked my lips and smiled. "That's really nice of her. She really didn't have to do that."

"Oh please, she wanted to. It's been in the basement just sitting there. Beside the 90's are back, so there might be some good stuff in here," she said as opened the box and started rifling through it's contents.

Alice held up a floral sundress. It looked like it had a stretchy waistband or something. "Oh, this would be perfect for you tonight." I hesitantly took it. "Go on. Go try it on."

I nodded and walked down to the bathroom. I slid off my shorts and t-shirt and slid on the dress. It was the first time in months that I'd worn something that actually fit me properly. It felt pretty good. I walked back to my bedroom where Alice was waiting. "What do you think?"

She squealed. Loudly. "You look so nice, Bella!"

"I think I have a jacket that'll go with this. Doubt it will close though," I chuckled and opened my closet door. I pulled my old jean jacket off of the hanger and showed it to Alice.

She nodded. "I approve wholeheartedly."

"Do you know where Edward's taking me?" I asked as I shrugged the jacket on. It still fit pretty well, but I was right in assuming that it wouldn't close anymore.

"He wouldn't tell me, he thought I'd tell you and ruin the date."

I laughed. Alice didn't seem like a malicious gossiper to me. I mean, maybe I should be upset that she was the one who told Edward about me based off of rumors, but I wasn't. I understood and even admired her loyalty to her twin. It's not like he wouldn't have found out anyone- it was good that he found out from someone who cared about him. Besides, she seemed like the kind of person that got so excited that they accidentally let things slip, and even though I knew that she was the type of person that you couldn't help but tell your secrets to.

"I could do your hair?"

I nodded. "Thanks, Alice."

"Can I tell you something?" I nodded hesitantly, looking at her through the mirror. "I wanted to come here today because, well- I know we keep getting off on the wrong foot, but I do actually want to be your friend."

I shook my head, feeling slightly guilty that Alice blamed herself for that. I was a guarded person, I purposely made it difficult for peopler to get to know me. "It's mostly my fault. As you could probably tell from earlier, I'm not an easy person to befriend typically."

I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to get to know Alice. The more I got to know her, the more I realized that my first impression of her had been wrong. She was my complete opposite, in that I was correct. But I always assumed it would be in an annoying way, but it was so easy to be Alice's friend. She balanced my harsher traits- kind of like Edward did. She also cared a lot, about everyone- everything. I always thought people like that were disingenuous or deceitful like they were only being nice to your face. Alice didn't strike me as either.

We spent the rest of the time talking about Edward and the baby. She actually helped me realize that I really did want to keep this baby. It didn't change that I didn't know if I had the capability to do so, but at least I knew what I wanted. Even if I wasn't ready to actually admit that.

Before I knew it, Edward and I were on our way to an undisclosed location. Sitting in the car I was anxious to find out where we were headed. I trusted Edward enough to let him keep his surprises, but unlike our normal days there was a bit of nervousness. It wasn't a bad nervousness, more like the butterflies- it was what I always imagined first-date nervousness would always feel like.

Edward let the music play softly in the background as he asked me seemingly random questions. First date questions. It was almost silly thinking about it. Edward knew all about my past. A lot of the ugly stories that almost no one knew about. And yet he didn't know what my favorite color was.

"What's your favorite flower?"

"Sunflowers."

"Favorite color?"

"Brown."

"Brown?"

I shrugged. "It's a warm color. Earthy, soft."

"Favorite gemstone?"

"Gemstone?" I asked with an eyebrow raised. He took his eyes off the wheel for a second and nodded excitedly.

"Emerald," I blurted out. My face got really warm hoping he didn't call me out on that.

"What? What's with that look?"

"It's nothing," I blushed furiously.

"Come on. Tell me?"

I rolled my eyes and tried to pretend to be unaffected by him. It didn't work. "It matches your eyes."

The smile on his face grew tenfold which was worth the tinge of embarrassment.

We were going back and forth fairly quickly by the time we were sat down at the restaurant. I didn't know how Edward found this place, but it had that first date vibe. Between the twinkle lights and soft music playing in the background, I didn't know how to act. It was rare that I found myself in completely new territory but this was all brand new. The excitement, the anxiety, actually wanting to get to know someone, it was all new to me. I didn't really know how to do the wine and dine kind of thing, but I was willing to try.

"How did you get that?" Edward lightly traced the scar in my eyebrow.

I took his hand and moved it away from the scar. He knew, but he didn't know- if that made sense. He had a sense of what happened, but the stories were heavy, difficult to hear. They weren't pretty and I was genuinely worried about being a buzzkill. "That's not really a date kind of story, Edward."

"What's a 'date kind of story'?"

I shrugged, honestly unsure of what kind of story I was willing to share with Edward.

He took my silence as a cue to continue, "Well I think of a date as a chance to get to know someone. And I plan on getting to know you," he leaned in slowly and kissed my palm, sending a pleasant chill down my spine. "To know you better than anyone else."

"You already do," I confessed, slightly flustered by Edward's boldness.

"Tell me about this," his finger lightly traced the scar in my eyebrow again. I'd been told it looked badass, but the story behind it was anything but. The thing was the more removed from Phoenix I was, the more I found myself changing, the more I realized how bad things had gotten- how desensitized I'd become to what happened to me.

I swallowed my fears and nodded, hoping the story wouldn't dampen the mood. "Alright...this one was actually from his wedding ring. It was one of the few times I was almost successful in fighting back. I know this because there were very few times that he'd leave marks for my mother to see. Like almost never. Thinking about it now though, he probably could have and she wouldn't have even noticed," I laughed sadly. Edward's eye contact never wavered as I continued. "Anyway, like I said that was from his wedding ring. He, uh, punched me in the eye, and I think it must've scratched it or something."

"You think?" He asked, a look of concern growing on his face.

I started anxiously chipping away the polish on my nails, trying to suppress the fragmented memory of that night. "After he, uh, hit me, I was in and out of it. It's hard to remember."

"And this one?" He finger traced the corner of my mouth.

"It's not very interesting. Just a split lip. It was one of the more common injuries, he stopped doing that when Renee threatened to send me away for the first time," I casually explained.

His eyebrows pulled together as he tried to figure out more of my story. "She threatened to send you away for a split lip?"

I chuckled at the memory, though it wasn't really funny, it was actually pretty fucked up. "She assumed I was getting into fights at school. That was always her go-to: figuring out how to blame me instead of asking me what happened. It wasn't unusual for her to threaten to send me away."

"Alright, one last question. Do you actually have a tattoo? Because you've had me wondering about that for a while now."

I laughed, remembering when Alice asked me that. "Maybe I do...maybe I don't."

By the time we were leaving the restaurant, Edward and I had both eaten our weight in pasta. I offered to pay, but Edward insisted that Esme had raised a gentleman and he would be covering it tonight.

The entire drive back to Forks was spent laughing with me acutely aware of Edward's hand resting on my thigh. It wasn't uncomfortable, I liked Edward's hand resting on my leg, but it was flustering. I couldn't think straight with him this close to me.

I couldn't have imagined a better night myself.

When Edward was pulling up in front of my house, his face dropped a little. He looked nervous. "Bella? Can I ask you something?"

"Shoot."

He licked his lips and took a deep breath. "What are we?"

Now, I did trust Edward, but I was not about to give him the upper hand on this one. "What do you want us to be?" I responded coyly.

His eyes narrowed as he realized how I just turned the question back on him. "I'm not interested in anyone else, Bella. I want to be official. Boyfriend, girlfriend thing- if you're okay with that or-"

"You're overthinking again," I interrupted. "But I'm not interested in anyone else either."

"And that means...yes?"

I rolled my eyes and nodded. "That means yes, Edward."

"Great because I was getting kind of worried there-" I silenced him with a kiss before getting out of the car. I felt his eyes on me as I walked up the path and to the door. As I walked up the front steps, I turned around and shyly waved, the smile on my face never once fading that entire night.

As I dozed off I didn't have a single nightmare, not one all night. All dreams that night were replaced with dreams of the baby and Edward.

Hello, friends! Here's a fluffy little chapter for you guys. The story pace is going to pick up just a smidge in the next chapter, just to keep the pacing and plot interesting. I finished the epilogue and I'm really excited about it!

Hope you guys enjoyed.

As always, please, please, please let me know what you're thinking! I love getting to read your reviews and ideas on where the story is going!

I'll see you guys very soon.