Bella grabs her headphones and puts on last night's recording of Midnight Sun as soon as she wakes up.

It's early, and there's plenty of time for breakfast, so she heads to the kitchen to make herself something to eat before class.

While she listens to Edward's introductory words, she grabs the carton of eggs from the fridge and a frying pan. She sticks a slice of bread in the toaster and turns on the stove, letting a slab of butter sizzle in the pan as it heats up.

"Good evening. You're listening to Midnight Sun: Seattle's best music podcast. We stream live every Sunday night from 11 to 3. I'm your host, Edward Masen. It's 11:02 pm and raining. Tomorrow's forecast says it will still be raining, but I have a reliable source that says we'll be getting sun in the afternoon. Tonight I'm going to start us off with Scottish singer Travis's 1999 song, 'Why Does It Always Rain On Me?'"

Bella prods at the frying egg in the pan, testing its doneness, and grabs some salt off the counter. She sways to the beat as she grabs her toast and sets it on a plate.

Edward's voice comes back in as the music winds to a close.

"This next song has a bit of a story behind it. I had a terrible morning. A close friend betrayed my trust, and I became the victim of a poor match-making attempt. I had the displeasure of meeting quite possibly the most irritating person I've ever spoken with before. While I don't normally play or like country music, I can't think of a more appropriate time to feature it. I'd like to dedicate the next song to a girl that I never want to see again: 'I Will Forever Hate Roses' by Dolly Parton."

She feels her face go hot. If his friend tried to set him up on a date, that must mean that he's single.

She chews her lip and wonders what happened. Maybe Jessica was wrong and he does date.

The song lyrics sound more like they're meant for a lost lover than a one-time blind date. She feels like she's missing context.

Bella finishes her food, changes into a sweatshirt and jeans, and heads out for her first class. Her stomach flips over when she realizes she's going to have to see him in person soon.

Edward didn't say anything to her in their class last Wednesday. He acted like she wasn't even there.

It's not like he has to talk to her. They aren't friends.

She's the first one to arrive to the classroom. She sits in her usual spot at the edge of the room by the door and gets out her notebook and pen.

Her classmates steadily trickle in, and, ten minutes before they're scheduled to begin, Edward arrives.

Bella gives him a small smile as he makes eye contact with her. He looks away but sits in the same desk he did on the first day. The one next to hers.

"Have a good weekend?" she asks, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible. She doesn't want him knowing she binge listened to the past three months of his podcast over the weekend.

Edward grabs his copy of Wuthering Heights out of his backpack, still not looking at her. "It could have been better. Did you?"

"Yeah, my mom called me. She calls me all the time, but it's nice to hear from her. She's always doing some kind of new thing like macrame or rock painting," she says, feeling stupid because she's starting to ramble.

"That does sound nice," he says with a nod. "Do you...like the rain?"

Bella looks out the window at the gloomy day with distaste. "I still miss the weather in Arizona."

"I thought you're from Forks?"

"I am, um, I moved with my mom a couple times after she and Charlie—um, my dad—divorced."

"Why did you decide to come back here for college then?" he asks. "Seattle is nicknamed the Rainy City for a reason, you know."

"I moved back in with my dad during high school after my mom remarried," she replies. "I kind of got stuck out here. In-state tuition and all that..."

"Did you not like your mom's new husband?"

She shakes her head. "Phil? Oh, no, he's okay. He plays baseball."

Their conversation is cut short when Ms. Biers comes in. "Good morning, everyone! How was the reading? Did everyone have time to finish Wuthering Heights?" their professor greets. "I want to start today with a discussion on themes of social class and love. Does anyone have any thoughts they would like to share?"

Bella sighs, staring down at her worn copy of the book. She didn't manage to learn anything new about Edward. She spent her short, valuable time boring him with talk about herself.

...

"Okay, get out," Rosalie orders, slamming on the breaks as she pulls into the drop-off turnaround.

Jasper sighs and grabs his backpack off the floorboard. "This is my car, you know."

"And I'm borrowing it for work. Now, go." She shoos him out the passenger side. "I have to be back from my lunch in thirty minutes, and I still haven't had a chance to eat."

"Okay, bye," Jasper says as he gets out of the car.

His skull feels like it's going to implode.

The effects of four hours of sleep and drinking the night before have him wishing he was still in bed.

He would have missed his philosophy class for the second Monday in a row if it weren't for Rosalie barging in his room and demanding that he get up.

It's thoughtful of her, he supposes, that she gave him a ride after she took his car again without asking.

Jasper isn't aware until he's already sitting in the lecture hall that there's a paper due.

The class is a blur. The professor assigns four chapters of reading from the textbook and informs everyone that there will be a quiz on Friday before dismissing them.

Instead of starting on the reading, he wanders the campus aimlessly. The weather outside is decently sunny, with the occasional cloud drifting by.

Walking does nothing to help with the prolonged hangover he's dealing with, but he continues wandering anyway. After weaving through the quad and around a hill, he sees a sign out in front of one of the libraries advertising a cafe inside and decides he needs coffee.

Thankfully, he doesn't have to search too hard for it, because the cafe is tucked away in a nook just on the other side of the door. He gets into the overly long line of patiently students and professors, his head pounding from all the ambient noise and chatter.

"Hi, what can I get for you?" A mousy brunette barista asks when it's finally his turn.

"An Americano, please," Jasper requests, handing her a five-dollar bill.

She punches some buttons on the register before handing back his change, which he proceeds to drop in the tip jar with a yawn.

Rosalie won't be off work for another three hours. He can find a quiet corner of the library to nap in until then.

He takes a sip of his coffee and sits in one of the patio chairs out in front of the building. Struggling to keep his eyes open, he starts to lean over the table drowsily.

The sun feels good.

Someone taps him on the shoulder from behind.

"Hi, Jasper," a small, high-pitched voice says.

It's her.

"Alice," he says, picking his head up from its resting place on the table.

She smiles and sits down across from him, propping up the large, black art portfolio she's carrying down on the ground beside her. "Are you done with your classes?"

"Yeah, I only had the one today. Philosophy," he answers.

"I had French and Italian Art History this morning, but I just got out of my Apparel Technical Design course," Alice tells him, stirring her green smoothie with a metal straw. Her nails are the same pale shade of blue as her winged eyeliner. "I'm excited about my midterm project. I started drafting it today."

She grabs her phone, taps the screen a few times, and hands it to him. "Here, I forgot last time."

The new contact screen is pulled up.

He types his number and name into it before handing the phone back to her. She calls his phone and hangs up after one ring, effectively giving him her phone number as well.

He wonders if she found him through a vision again.

"What are you majoring in?" she asks.

"Psychology with a minor in history. How about you?"

"I'm double majoring in French and Design," Alice says, smoothing out the skirt of her cream-colored dress and re-rolling one of the cuffs on her denim jacket. "Were you out late again?"

"Yeah, how'd you guess?"

She smiles wider, her lips seemingly resisting the urge to laugh. "You look very tired. And your shirt's on inside out."

Jasper looks down and realizes she's right. He laughs, prompting her to join in.

"I got ready in ten minutes this morning. My sister's borrowing my car for work because hers is still in New York," he explains.

"New York? That's so fun! I've always wanted to go. Did you live there too?"

"Nah, my parents moved out there with Rosalie, and I got sent to a boarding school in Texas."

He starts to take a sip of coffee, but his phone rings. He's getting a call from Peter.

Jasper looks up at Alice to ask if she minds, but he sees her already typing away on her phone. He answers the call.

"Hey, Jazz. Are you still at campus?" Peter asks. "I'm going to head up there in a bit if you're free. I have some people to see."

Alice looks up from her phone and nods at him.

"Okay, sure," Jasper replies.

"Awesome. See you in a few," Peter says before ending the call.

"It's about time for me to head home, too," Alice says, not seeming the least bit surprised by their interruption. She gathers up her smoothie, backpack, and portfolio. "I'm glad you came to class today. I'll text you!"

Jasper waves to her as she skips back into the library. "I'm glad I got to see you again!"

...

Edward sits in the library's silent reading room, thumbing through the pages of Don Quixote.

He was supposed to meet up with Alice to study, but she ran off on her own after only a few minutes. Her excuse was that she had to make sure destiny has a phone number to call.

Coffee starts to sound good as he nears the middle of the novel. He needs the added focus. It's taking him longer than usual to read because he keeps losing his concentration.

He thought that conversing with Bella would diminish his interest in her by revealing potentially unredeeming qualities, but it did exactly the opposite. He's now intensely curious about every aspect of his classmate's life.

He wants to know about her family and friends, everywhere she's been, everywhere she wants to go, her favorite films, what she likes to eat for lunch...

It's truly worrisome.

He slings his backpack over his shoulder and walks with his book down the library stairs to the cafe.

Continuing to read as he waits in line, Edward steadily makes his way to the register as people place their orders.

"Next in line, please," the barista calls out.

Edward looks up. His stomach flips.

It's Bella. Bella the barista.

"Oh, hey, Edward," she says with a small smile.

To say that he's surprised would be an understatement.

"You work here?" he asks.

"Yeah, I started this past weekend," she replies. "What can I get you?"

"I'll have a cold brew."

"Okay, that will be...$4.50." She presses some buttons on the register. "You're reading Don Quixote?"

Edward taps his phone on the mobile payment reader. "Yeah, it's for my Spanish class tomorrow," he explains. "I should, uh, go. I don't want to hold up the line..."

He looks behind him to gesture and sees that there's no one there. He feels the blood drain from his face.

Bella bites back a smile and nods. "You're right. They're practically on the verge of rioting."

He tries to recover, changing the topic. "Do you live on campus?"

"No, I live in an apartment with a couple of my high school friends over in Eastlake," she says as she pours cold brew into a cup and snaps on a straw-less sip-top lid. "I kind of regret not doing dorms, but I also heard the communal showers are super gross."

He's heard the same thing. Emmett's mentioned seeing three-foot hairballs in the drains before.

"I think you made the right decision," he agrees. "Things are a lot easier when you already know your roommates."

"Yeah, and here's always someone around to binge-watch Netflix with," Bella adds. "It makes the move a little less lonely."

She doesn't wear much—if any—makeup, he notices. Her nails are cut short and are polish-less. Her hair has a somewhat messy look to it, her long, brown locks seemingly unbrushed like she just rolled out of bed.

"We're going downtown to look for Halloween costumes Thursday," she continues. "I'm not really into dressing up, but Angela and Jessica love it."

He's suddenly finding it difficult to maintain eye contact, so he keeps unintentionally shifting his gaze up from her eyes down to her full, slightly chapped lips.

It's then that Alice decides to make her triumphant return, bumping into Edward's elbow as she zooms in like a rocket.

"Hi, Bella!" she chirps. "It's so nice to finally meet you!"

Bella looks at her with a mystified expression.

Edward scowls down at the pint-sized annoyance. "This is one of my friends Alice. She's extremely nosy and has bad timing."

"Hm, no, I think I have excellent timing," Alice retorts, seemingly unaware of how unwelcome her presence is at the moment. "Bella and I are going to be best friends!"

Edward internally cringes, wishing he could disappear. Now Bella's going to think that he's been talking about her with Alice.

"She's weird. Ignore her," Edward tells her before Alice's psychic quirks can ruin his life any further. He shoots his friend a cold glare, leading her to silently pout her way back out into the library.

"She seems...energetic?" Bella comments.

"That's not even the half of it. I don't think I've ever seen her tired or untalkative the entire time I've known her," Edward complains. "Carlisle—an old family friend of mine—took her in shortly after he took me in."

"He adopted you both?" Bella asks.

"Kind of, yes. Carlisle is only nine years my senior, but he let me live with him after my parents passed. I was sixteen at the time, and I don't have any other family nearby, so he was concerned about me having to start over in a new city," Edward clarifies. "Alice showed up about two years later. It was shortly after Carlisle married his wife Esme. We had all recently moved into a house out in Bellevue. She knocked on the door and introduced herself as our new housemate, but none of us knew her. We thought she maybe had the wrong address."

"Did she?"

"No, and the weird thing was that she also knew our names and the layout of the house," he explains. "She didn't seem to have sinister intentions, though, and Esme took a liking to her, so she was allowed to stay a week while she figured out where she would go. Needless to say, that week was extended"

"Oh, wow. That's really nice of them."

"Yeah, they're good people."

Alice pokes her head out from around the corner of the cafe entrance, and Edward immediately catches her spying on them. He tries to shoo her away with his eyes, but she's persistent.

Bella notices. "Is she waiting for you to go home? I don't want to keep you two. It's getting pretty late."

"She is, but she's being obnoxious," he grumbles. "I'll see you on Thursday, then."

Edward hurries out into the hallway and looks at Alice with reproach. She's pretending like she wasn't just eavesdropping on him as she taps away at a text to Esme.

"Sorry, but you were taking too long. I was getting impatient," she confesses.

"You need to not do that."

"We're going to be best friends, so I got excited!" she defends. "I love her, too!"

Edward feels his blood pressure skyrocket. "You WHAT?"

Love? LOVE? He does not love Bella.

"I do not love Bella," he insists.

Alice's eyes go big, but her expression stays blank. She starts walking in the direction of the parking garage.

"What do you mean?" Edward demands. "Did you have a vision about this?"

"I told you I did last week," Alice answers. "I said you'd have to wait and find out, remember?"

"What did you see?" he questions. "Bella and I? Dating?"

Alice stays silent, walking faster.

"Your visions are lying. There's no way," he insists. "You're wrong."

"I'm not," she denies softly, and it's then that Edward knows deep down that she's telling the truth.

A small part of him is elated, but another much larger part feels an overwhelming sense of impending doom. With love comes heartbreak, and he's still skeptical of how good of a match they seem to be.

...

Jasper sets his drink down on the glass table in front of him and slumps back into the old, dingy couch next to Peter.

After Peter picked him up from campus, they found their way to a house party on the west side that's overrun with scantily-clad twenty-somethings shouting and swaying to EDM.

Peter's in the middle of selling Adderall to a group of frat boys all wearing snapbacks and Nikes. A couple of girls cut lines on the tabletop across from them.

Jasper's only half paying attention to the revelry around him, though, because his phone is lighting up with a slew of missed calls and texts.

His brow furrows as he opens the messages.

I miss you

Are you up?

Besos xx

Jasper sighs and takes a drink of his beer. The buzz he had been enjoying is suddenly making him nauseous.

He hasn't heard from Maria since he left Texas last May.

"What's your problem?" Peter asks. "You look like you saw a ghost."

He shakes his head and the room turns and tilts more than expected from the movement. "Nothing."

"Who are you texting?" His friend leans over and his face instantly drops when he sees the name on the screen. "What the fuck, Jazz. You're not talking to her again, are you?"

"No, she texted me out of nowhere."

Peter groans. "Block her then! She almost ruined your life!"

"I know," he says, but it doesn't feel that way. Everything that happened was ultimately his own fault.

"Then why is she still in your phone contacts?" Peter demands exasperatedly. "I swear to god if you start hooking up with her again, I'll run you over with a car myself. She wasn't the girl you were with the other night, was she?"

Jasper finishes his drink. His chest feels tight and his throat is burning. "No, I haven't seen her in months."

"She's probably low on cash and needs someone to help her with distribution. You know how she is," Peter says sympathetically, pushing his silvery hair out of his face. "It's all business."

Jasper feels irritable and tired, and he hates that Peter's still watching him like he's trying to pull answers out of his silence.

Peter reaches his hand out to Jasper. "Come on. This party sucks, let's go."

Jasper lets his friend pull him back onto his feet.

They get to the car and Peter starts the engine but doesn't put the car into drive right away.

"Are you okay?" Peter asks sincerely. "I know you've always liked parties and stuff, but you didn't used to have trouble making it to class...or work...or back home ever. I thought that maybe getting out of Texas would help, but that doesn't seem to be the case."

"I'm fine," he replies.

It's not rational to get upset over a handful of text messages. He tries to push them, along with the accompanying memories of his life before Seattle, out of his mind.

"'Kay. Just know I'm here if you need to talk about it. I wouldn't have asked you to move out here after all that shit went down if we weren't best friends," Peter says, pulling out of the foggy residential side street and getting onto 99-South.

For the first time in months, they head back home before midnight.