Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight.

Author's Note: Hello! Hopefully there are still readers here. Sorry for the long delay of this chapter. I've been busy with VBS (Vaction Bible School; it's a thing that my church does every summer for the kids in the church) and then our computer got a virus. Anyway, I really hope you'll like this chapter.

On with the reading!

Chapter Five: Of Dresses …

Nathan Cullen

As I sat there, listening to Mr. Kirsch drone on about the importance of World War II and how it had affected Europe as well as America, I stared at the back of Mackenzie's head. She was writing stuff down in her notebook, looking incredibly … good looking.

Her hair was down today, curled a bit, and I could see one of her silver hoops dangle down from her ear.

She was so beautiful.

I snapped out of my daze when Mr. Kirsch called on me.

"Mr. Cullen!" He sounded a bit irritated.

"Yes, Mr. Kirsch?" I asked.

"What is so fascinating, Mr. Cullen, that you can't seem to pay any attention at all to my lecture about World War II?" he asked.

Ah, crap, I thought as everybody in the class turned their head to look at me. Zeke gave me a large grin. "Uh, nothing, Mr. Kirsch."

Mr. Kirsch gave me a suspicious looking glare and went back to his teaching. Deciding I might as well listen so that I could pass 11th grade and not get detention for staring at the love of my life's hair, I gave Mackenzie one last look and turned my attention to learning about World War II.

After class, I was putting my books in my locker and grabbing the ones I needed for the next class, English, when I heard someone say, "World War II is fascinating isn't it?"

I snapped my head to the left and saw Mackenzie Serra standing there, putting books in her locker. She smiled at me, and I felt my knees go weak.

I mentally slapped myself in the head when I realized that I had been staring at her for longer than thirty seconds. I cleared my throat and nodded my head. "Yeah. Fascinating stuff, it was."

Okay, this is it, Nathan. Buck up and be a man. Ask her out. "Hey, I was wondering –"

I didn't get to finish my sentence. A couple of girls who were passing us said, "Hey, Mackenzie!" She smiled at them and said hey back. Then she said, "Well, I'll, uh, I'll see you later, I guess."

She gave me a smile, a short wave, and then turned to walk down the hallway.

I waved after her and said softly, "Yeah, see ya."

That, ladies and gentlemen, is not how you ask a girl out on a date.

~~0~~

Elizabeth Cullen

"Oh, Elizabeth! Look at this one!" my Mom said. "Can't you just see yourself in this one?"

We had just walked into Suzie's Bridal Store in Port Angeles. Mom, Aunt Alice, Leah, and I were currently dress shopping. Aunt Alice knew a couple of wedding dress designers, one of them being Suzie. As Aunt Alice had told me earlier that day, "It's better if you know the designer, because that way you'll get a better discount."

I looked over at the dress Mom was holding out from the rack, and my eyes nearly popped.

The dress was long, white, puffy, and very frilly.

And utterly beautiful and quite nauseating (from the amount of frill and lace) to look at.

Laughing, I shook my head. "No."

Mom laughed and said, "I was only kidding."

"I designed that one," said a French-accented voice. "Along with every other dress in here. Of that one in particular I have made only a few."

We all turned our heads to see a woman with curly brown hair that was piled on the top of her head. She was wearing a skirt and a dress shirt along with high heels. She was very pretty – her big lips accented her cheekbones and face very nicely.

"Suzie!" Aunt Alice said.

"Alice, Alice, Alice!" the woman exclaimed as her and Aunt Alice embraced in a hug and gave each other a quick peck on the cheek.

Leah and I shared an amused smile.

"And I'm guessing this is the lovely bride-to-be!" Suzie said, coming over to me and placing her hands on my cheeks, examining my face. "Ah, oui, oui, you are very beautiful! Your looks are from your mother, no doubt." She gestured to Mom, and we both blushed.

Leah giggled.

"So, do you have anything in mind of what type of wedding dress? I have everything here, all handmade by me," Suzie said.

"Well, I was thinking white, obviously, but not really too, too frilly," I said. And then I added after a second, "Or lacey."

Suzie clapped her hands and exclaimed in a bubbly way, "Ah! Okay, that eliminates a lot of the dresses. Onward!"

For the next hour and a half, we looked at dresses. All of them were absolutely beautiful, but somehow I couldn't find the perfect dress. I wanted it to be white and simple, kind of like the dress that Anne wears at her wedding in Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story. I had always admired that dress, since it was so beautiful, but I doubted that they made those types of dresses anymore.

The first dress I tried on had a long train and tight sleeves that went to my elbows. There was also a large bow in the back and a lacey skirt. Aunt Alice, being the fashion person that she is, thought it was gorgeous, Mom couldn't help but grin at the bow and shake her head, and Leah snapped a picture on her phone.

The third dress that Suzie handed to me was a bit revealing. It looked kind of leathery, but wasn't, and it had a collar, believe it or not. As soon as I stepped out of the changing room, Leah shook her head quickly and made a cutting motion across her neck with her hand.

The tenth dress was really something. It looked fairly simple – it was a sleeveless white dress that went down to my knees. The skirt portion of it was flow-y, and the top part of it kind of … pushed upwards. There was also a slit down the back that Aunt Alice told me 'was in fashion now-a-days in shot gun weddings'.

I didn't even come out of the changing room in that dress.

"Okay, not to worry, I have the perfect dress, really beautiful. You will love it!" Suzie said after I said no to the thirteenth dress.

She went to the side of the store and came back with a dress in hand. She handed it to me and gently shoved me into the changing room.

When I came out, Mom, Aunt Alice, and Leah gasped.

"Oh, sweetie, you look beautiful!" Mom said.

I stood in front of the three way mirror to see what I looked like.

The dress had a bell shaped skirt that was sparkly and frilly, and had a lot of ruffles on it that kind of reminded me of a sheep. There was also – my worst nightmare – a corset. And, as an added bonus, there was also a very large bow in the back. Suzie came over and tightened the strings to the corset, and I nearly got the wind knocked out of me.

"You are so beautiful, Elizabeth. You should totally get that one!" Leah said.

Mom, Aunt Alice, Leah, and Suzie thought the dress was beautiful.

… And I would have, too, had the dress not been cutting off my air supply or disabling me from walking.

"You're kind of turning purple," Leah giggled.

"Oh, dear, you're right!" Suzie exclaimed. "Here, let me get that untied."

When I could breathe again, Suzie stepped back and looked me up and down, tapping her finger on her chin. "Hmm, you know what. I have this one dress that I think would look perfect on you."

She nodded and went into a back room, continuing, "It's simple, yet, at the same time, elegant."

Suzie emerged a few seconds later, holding a wedding dress across her arms.

A couple of moments later, I stood once again in front of the three way mirror. This time, what I saw was beautiful. The dress, as Suzie said, was perfectly simple. It was elegant.

The dress fit perfectly. It flowed down to my feet, fitting perfectly around my hips. It wasn't tight nor loose around my chest or stomach. The top was stitched elegantly with tiny, tiny diamonds and there was a bit of lace. The neck made a V-shape, but didn't expose any cleavage. The sleeves stopped at the shoulders.

And it was kind of like Anne's dress in Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story, only this dress didn't have sleeves. I also kind of looked like the dress that Anne Hathaway wore during the not-wedding in Princess Diaries 2.

It was perfect.

~~0~~

Two days later, on a cloudy, late Saturday morning, I was sitting on the couch in the living room, reading Heidi. Mom was down in the bookstore and Dad was at work. Nathan was on the other end of the couch, doing his Algebra 2 homework and listening to a baseball game on T.V. Every now and then, he would let out a frustrated groan and furiously erase something in his notebook.

"Would you like some help there, Nathan?" I once asked.

He had furiously shook his head and said in a very "I'm very annoyed at this Algebra" tone of voice, "No. Mr. Boone noticed that you've been helping me and he wants me to do it on my own, even though he knows that I have no freaking clue what this is about!"

I went back to my reading after that.

"Hey, Elizabeth?"

I looked up from my book to see Mom opening the door that led down to the bookshop and poking her head around it.

"Yeah?"

"I'm going to make some chicken noodle soup for supper tonight and I just now realized that I'm out of the noodles and the chicken bouillon cubes. Would you be able to go to the store for me and get them?" she asked.

I nodded. "Sure," I said, marking my spot in the book and closing it. "Nathan, want to come along?"

Nathan just shook his head and said, "Nope. I want to get the twenty problems done tonight and I'm only on number 5."

As I walked down the pasta aisle of the supermarket after I grabbed the bouillon cubes, my phone rang and I pulled it out of my jeans pocket. I smiled when I saw Ethan's name flash across the screen. I flipped it open and put it to my ear. "Hello?"

"Hey," Ethan greeted.

"What's up?" I asked as I grabbed a box of swirly pasta.

"Well, I just wanted to see how you were and tell you that I have to cancel our date tonight," he said. His voice seemed a little unsure towards the end.

I paused putting the box of pasta in my hand basket. "I was perfectly fine up until five seconds ago when you said you have to cancel our date tonight. Why?"

"Oh, just some stuff came up with my parents and I need to stay with them. And I'm really busy," he replied.

"That's what you said last night," I said, placing the first box into my hand basket. "And the night before."

"I know and I'm really sorry, baby, but I really need to do this something and I actually need to prepare for the interview tomorrow. How about we plan on dinner and a movie tomorrow night, and I can tell you all about the interview then, alright?"

I sighed and put the second into the basket. "Fine. But you have to promise tomorrow night."

"I promise. Listen, I got to go," he said.

"Alright. I'll you later?" I asked, hoping for him to say yes.

"I'll call you later tonight. Alright? I love you," he said.

I sighed and smiled. "Alright. Bye."

I flipped shut my phone and placed it back in my pocket. Was it just my imagination, or did I hear a voice in the background? I thought about it for a second, and then shrugged it off. He's probably in a place with a lot of people.

As a result of not looking where I was going as I turned the corner of the aisle, I accidently ran into someone. My basket dropped out of my hands as I heard an 'ow' and felt something hard and heavy drop onto my toe.

"Oh, my gosh, I am so sorry!" I said, bending down to pick up the loaf of bread, a package of yellow cheese singles, and two medium sized cans of tomato soup – the object that fell onto my toe along with my basket –, ignoring the pain in my toe.

As I picking up the cheese, a very familiar voice said, "It's quite alright."

I straightened up, bread, cheese, and soup in hand. "Oh, please, it was my fault, I wasn't looking where I was -."

I stopped mid-sentence as I looked into the face of the man I thought I'd never see again. "—Going."

"Elizabeth?"

Author's Note: I'm cruel, aren't I? You'll find out who the person is in the next chapter. Meanwhile, please tell me in a review of who you think the person is, and please choose only one of these choices: her real father (James) OR her real uncle (Phillip) OR an old friend of the family (i.e., like Jacob Black), OR an old boyfriend. Only I know who it is, and I will give the people who get it correct a virtual pot of my homemade, to-die-for, "I would murder for it" (as said by my best friend, Lennon Drop, earlier today) chicken noodle soup.

Also, does anybody think something fishy is goin' on with Ethan Barr? - scratches chin studiously -

So, Review, and I'll put up the next chapter. Until the next time, Lemonade Ninja.