A/N:

Hey lovely readers!

Here's a fun mini-series that I hope you'll enjoy. It takes place a few years after Breaking Dawn but there is no Nessie.

This is just fanfiction. If events are not logical regarding vampires, please don't read too much into it. It's meant to be enjoyable. Happy readings and Happy Holidays.

Disclaimer: I DON'T own the Twilight Characters. I'm just playing around with them. :))

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Chicago 2008

It all started with a wreath. Just a silly, insignificant Christmas wreath, that was given to Bella.

She graciously accepted it with a smile, though I wish she wouldn't have. She's kind, which is what drew me to her when we met in 11th grade biology. Along with her beauty and how she never sees herself clearly, not to mention her adorably clumsiness. But I wasn't the only male creature in the world who was drawn to her. Our thirty-five-year-old, two-time divorced neighbor, Frank was too. I despise the way he looked at her and wished I could pop his head like a grape.

He was in the marines, and recently moved in the neighborhood with his mother. Drove a motorcycle, had a beat-up Chevy truck, and was overly friendly with my wife. Though it wasn't his friendliness with her that irritated the hell out of me, presa. No. But that didn't defuse my anger towards him and neither did with his thoughts that I could hear. By his thoughts that he assumed were private, I knew exactly what he wanted from my Bella. Which is why I imagined, almost daily, that I could pulverize him.

Being a mind reading vampire could be a blessing and a curse.

It really was a curse that he lived right next door to our house in Chicago. It was also a curse that I could hear his thoughts, his nightly fantasies of Bella when he showered and unfortunately, I knew exactly what he was doing. His thoughts about my twenty-one-year-old wife was absurd. Just as his ridiculous Christmas wreath was.

I guess I was being a bit possessive.

That's what Bella was telling me as I drove out of our neighborhood, the same place where I lived as a human boy. Of course, a hundred years later, everything looked a lot different. Houses were remodeled and renovated, even my house was, though for the most part I kept the outside looking the same as it did when my biological parents owned it. However, some things were different, like the inflatable snow globe with Simpson inside of it that sat on our lawn. A rather strange gift from Emmett and Rosalie who were traveling in Japan.

Sitting in the driver's seat of Bella's black Mercedes with her in the passenger's seat, I put the car in reverse and backed out of our driveway. I shook my head at our crazy Christmas decoration and glared at the wreath that hung on our door as I drove down our street.

We were on our way to the next town to buy a Christmas tree. She and I had it all planned out, that on the first day of our winter break, we'd go to a little place called Santa's Village, where it was all decorated for Christmas and seemed magical this time of year. We would ice skate before we picked out our tree. Just a little something fun to get in the holiday spirit after the stress of college finals.

Going to Santa's Village, which was in the town about an hour away from our house, had become our yearly tradition. We began doing this when we moved on our own. It had always been enjoyable, something fun to look forward to.

Though at the moment, neither of us were feeling cherry. Both of us were not in much of a mood to go out.

All because of Frank and his stupid Christmas wreath.

"Edward!" Bella said. "You're being very possessive right now."

"No, I'm not." I said through clenched teeth.

"Yes, you are." She shot back. "You are pissed off because I was talking to our neighbor this morning! You're angry when I talk to any guy which I don't understand. This has to stop."

"My anger has nothing to do with guys talking to you." My foot stepped on the accelerator.

"Then what are you angry about?" She wondered.

"It's that horrible wreath." I spat out, not hiding my dislike of said wreath.

In the seat beside me, Bella sat there rubbing her forehead. "You mean to tell me this argument is over a Christmas wreath? I know you were frozen at seventeen, but this is very childish. This has to stop."

I scoffed. She muttered something under her breath.

Entering the town, I didn't try to hear what she had said. I focus on the road.

Pissed off and driving through town, I turned and looked at my wife. Her arms were now crossed over chest, her face was red from anger, her brow pulled together, making the V appear on her forehead. Her eyes never met mine. Quickly, I turned and glared at the road before me.

Bella was quiet and so was I.

Anger, fury, and jealousy swirled inside my head like an angry tornado. Everything that ran through my mind at that moment at lightning speed, was all the fuel I needed to keep the argument alive.

"We didn't even need that stupid wreath." I said bitterly.

"There you go again," She said angrily. She threw her hands in the air. "You just had to bring it up again. Can't you let it go?"

"No," I really couldn't forget about it either, no matter how hard I wanted to. "You are the one that accepted it and hung it on the front door." I gripped the steering wheel tighter. "There's no rule saying you have to take everything Frank gives you."

Even to my own ears, my words that were flowing hot and fast sounded very juvenile. Especially the way I spoke our neighbors name, like it was acid that burned my tongue.

"Honestly, Edward, why are you like this?" She questioned in a hard tone.

"I am what I am." I said in anger, with no real meaning behind the words I spoke.

"This is ridiculous." She groaned in irritation. "I can't stand this attitude of yours."

"What attitude?" My foot pressed on the accelerator, driving out of town now.

"Possessive. Childish. Maddeningly!" She said each word like an explanation. "Frank and his mother are our neighbors and my friends. There is no need for this."

"You're my wife! I'm not being possessive." I half yelled. "If only you could hear how he thinks about you. His thoughts are deplorable, and you shouldn't consider him a friend at all. I forbid you to call him your friend."

No sooner than the words rolled off my tongue, I began to feel the sting of regret. I wished so badly I could take my words back. But just like toothpaste being squeezed out of the tube and pouring into the sink with no hope of being pushed back into the tube, I knew I created a mess that would take a while to clean up.

"Even though we are married, that doesn't give you the right to tell me who I can and can't be friends with." Bella's voice was saturated with irritation. "I'm a grown woman, not a child! Stop trying to control me."

"That's not what I'm doing." My words came out as a growl.

As I approached a red light in a busy intersection, my foot stepped on the brake. That's when I heard Bella's heart rate increase and smelled her adrenaline tainted blood.

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Thanks for reading.

Hope you enjoyed the start to this little story.

Please leave a pleasant review.