A/N: So, hope you like this chapter. And I'd really appreciate it if you'd leave a review and tell me what you think. Have a nice weekend! :)

4 – Just like me you don't do anything you're told

It was past nine o'clock and the party was in full swing. It was weird, being in a party where you knew basically no one. There were lots of people though, most of them about my age or a bit older. I grabbed another one of someone else's beers from the kitchen counter and looked around the living room, which was full of people. Everyone seemed to be having fun; four guys were passing a joint in the corner of the room, a couple was making out so passionately on the couch that it looked like it would be a miracle if they managed to keep their clothes on for much longer. Someone had put music on and few girls were dancing on the table, because there was no room anywhere else.

I was just finishing my beer when I heard my phone ringing in my pocket. I looked at the screen and sighed. After a few rings I decided that I'd better answer and walked to the balcony, because it was empty at the moment.

"Hi Mom," I said, after I had carefully closed the door.

"What the hell is this, Bella?" Mom sounded absolutely furious. Well, I guess I hadn't really expected anything else. "What makes you think that it's okay to just disappear and leave a note?"

"I told you yesterday," I said, realizing how weird it felt that it had happened such a short time ago. The day seemed to have lasted forever. "I said I was going on a road trip with Alice."

"And I said you were not," Mom almost yelled.

"Mom, I'm an adult now," I said, fed up with this. "I can do what I want."

There was a short silence on the other end of the phone. "That's ridiculous, Bella," Mom finally responded. "I never thought you would do something like that."

There was a small thump from the doorway and I turned around to see that Edward had stepped onto the balcony and closed the door behind him.

"I have to go now," I said to Mom. "I'll talk to you later."

"No, Bella!" Mom hissed. "You do not hang up on me."

"Honestly, I have to go and I don't know what there is to talk about this, anymore," I said, giving a sideways glance to Edward. He was lighting a cigarette, and smiled at me a little when he saw I was looking at him.

"Just tell me that you are coming home tomorrow," Mom commanded.

"Can't you see that I can't, Mom?" I said. "You can be as mad at me as you want to, but I'm not coming back. What would I even do in Forks?"

"You'd get a job," Mom said. "Spend your time doing something useful."

"Yeah, well I might as well get a job in Las Vegas or anywhere," I retorted.

"Bella," Mom said in a warning voice.

"I have to go now," I said. "I'll talk to you later. Good night."

I hung up the phone and rubbed my face tiredly. It was probably the long day combined with all that beer that suddenly made me feel exhausted.

"Want some?" Edward offered his cigarette to me. I was about to refuse but then I just thought, why not. I took the cigarette between my fingers and inhaled deeply. After a while I breathed out the smoke to the chilly evening air.

"Problems with your parents?" Edward asked.

I passed the cigarette back to him. "Aren't there always?"

"Guess you could say so." Edward chuckled. "At least mine are quite a pair."

"Is that why you ran away?" I found myself asking.

Edward held out the cigarette to me. "I'm nineteen, I didn't technically run away."

"Yeah, that's what I thought, too," I said. "Apparently my mom didn't see it quite like that."

"Anyway, it's just something I've done a couple of times, since I was sixteen," Edward explained. "Just wandered off for a while. Usually I go back eventually."

"And this time?"

Edward inhaled the smoke for the last time and put out the cigarette before he answered. "Maybe. I don't know."

"You don't seem to plan a lot," I noted.

"Says the girl who doesn't know where she's going after Seattle." Edward smiled, looking at me. For a while my eyes locked with his. It was a weird moment; I just found myself thinking that Alice was right – he was kind of hot. Then I realized that I was staring at his face, looking stupid and I turned my eyes away quickly. I'd obviously had too much beer.

"What am I doing?" I asked no one in particular.

"I thought you were going on a road trip." Edward touched my shoulder comfortingly and it startled me a bit. I realized that we were standing really close; I didn't know how that had happened.

"Let's go inside," I said after a few seconds of silence. "I need to find Alice."

I didn't see Alice in the living room. I checked out Emmett's room; there was a group of guys and two girls playing cards. They asked me to join them, but I still wanted to find Alice and there was no sign of her there. That's when I started to get kind of worried. I think that was when it finally hit me, we were in a strange place full of people we didn't know and I couldn't find Alice anywhere. Suddenly it all started to feel more and more stupid; it was against everything we were ever taught about strangers. And even though Edward and his mates seemed like good guys, we didn't know them after only one day of hanging out together.

I was almost starting to panic when I thought to check Emmett's roommate's room, even though I didn't know why Alice would have gone there. I opened the door and stared into the room with my mouth open. Alice was on the bed – with Jasper. Well, they both seemed to have their clothes on, but that was about all I could say. Jasper's mouth was on Alice's and his hand was making its way up to her thigh under her dress.

I didn't have time to decide what to do before Alice noticed me. Quickly she pulled away from Jasper and blushed.

"Hi Bella," she said, grinning.

"I was looking for you," I said. "I got a little worried when I couldn't find you anywhere."

"Well, I was… um, with Jasper," Alice said. Jasper grinned at me apologetically.

I raised my eyebrows. "Yeah, I can see that."

"I'll come to the living room in a minute," Alice said and gave me her get-the-fuck-out-of-here look.

"Sure, nice that you're having fun." I grinned. "Just remember what you said earlier."

"Bella, you know I wouldn't," Alice exclaimed.

"I'm not so sure," I muttered to myself and closed the door behind me. Really, I wasn't that worried. I knew Alice was usually smart and it was time she had some fun again. It had taken her a long while to get over her last boyfriend. I just hoped she wouldn't get too attached to him; we were leaving soon, after all.

I sat on the living room couch next to Edward who was talking to some girl. Once he saw me sitting next to him he gave me a small smile. I tried to concentrate as he talked with the girl about some band I didn't know but all I wanted was to fall asleep.

xxx

It was raining the next morning. The first sound I heard was cozy rain pattering against the window, before I even realized I was awake. Then I opened my eyes, looking at the ceiling, I turned my eyes and was relieved to see Alice sleeping next to me.

I had slept through the rest of the party last night, which was surprising, because of all the noise. Right now Alice and I were sleeping on the double bed in Emmett's roommate's bedroom, since Emmett had said it was okay.

I sat up and walked to the window. I liked the rain, which I guess was kind of good, given that I had grown up in Forks. Of course, sometimes I did get fed up with it raining all the time and the sunny days were lovely, because there weren't many of them, but the rain was somehow comforting.

"Bella?" Alice mumbled from the bed.

"Yes?"'

"Nothing," Alice said and rolled around in the bed. "Did you have fun yesterday?"

"You at least seemed to have." I grinned.

Alice smiled, too, as she sat up and leaned against the wall. "I can't deny that."

"You like him," I said, and sat down on the bed.

"I don't know," Alice sighed. "We just had a bit of fun, that's all. I don't think Jasper would even want anything more."

"But you would." It wasn't a question, more like a statement. For a while Alice looked like she was going to deny it, but then she realized that I would have seen through her anyway.

"It doesn't matter," Alice said. "We'll be leaving soon, anyway. We could leave today already. I mean, it's probably going to rain the whole day. We might just as well spent it driving."

There was just a hint of sadness in her voice. But that's just the way Alice was; she was always quick to have crushes. Unlike me, I was just quick at getting over people. Which was better, if you asked me; that way you wouldn't get hurt when they would leave.

"Guess so," I said.

Then there was a knock and we both turned to look at the door. "Hey girls, time for breakfast," Emmett said.

"We're coming," I said. Since we had left almost all our stuff in the car, we just pulled on the same clothes as yesterday and went to the living room where the three guys already sat. Everyone else seemed to have finally gone home. The place was a mess, just like you would expect after a big party.

"What do we have for breakfast?" Alice asked brightly, but I saw that she was making sure to not look at Jasper who was trying to smile at her.

"Um," Emmett said. "We have some leftover pizza, beer and, well, more beer."

"I think I'll go for the leftover pizza then," I said and took a cold slice of pizza from Emmett. I was so hungry that it tasted pretty good, actually.

"So, Bella and I were thinking about leaving today," Alice said as we finished breakfast. "It's pretty crappy weather so there's not much to do anyway, so…"

"You're leaving already?" Emmett sounded disappointed. "But we haven't shown you almost anything yet. You still have a lot of Seattle to explore."

"If they're leaving, I might as well get going, too. No use hanging around here with you," Edward said.

"Some would think you don't love us anymore, Edward," Emmett said and pretended to wipe a tear from his cheek.

"You're such a drama queen, Emm," Jasper said.

"Don't call me Emm, Jazzie," Emmett said.

"Hey, don't call me that, it sounds like a girl," Jasper said.

"Exactly!"

Jasper sighed. "Well, anyway, while Emm here is being childish, I have an idea," Jasper said, looking at Alice and me. "You could come back on your return to Forks. We could show you the rest of Seattle."

"Sounds good," Alice said with a small, playful smile on her lips. "Maybe we will."

After breakfast we helped the guys clean up the apartment. Then we just sat in the living room, not really knowing what we were supposed to do now, but reluctant to leave just yet.

"So, I have about an hour before I have to be at work," Emmett said finally. "We could walk you to the car."

"Good idea," Jasper said. "You're never going to find it on your own anyway."

Alice and I would have liked to argue but it was probably true.

"So Edward," I said finally, when Alice and I picked up our bags. Edward had been kind of quiet all morning. I didn't know if he had a hangover or if it was something else. "You could come with us."

Edward turned to look at me, surprised. "I mean, if you don't really know where you're going and we don't really know where we want to go and you need a ride anyway. If you want to," I said nervously. I didn't quite know what made me say that. Maybe it was the feeling I'd had every now and then since yesterday, like I wanted to know more about him. I know maybe I shouldn't have suggested it or at least I should have asked Alice, but well, it was her fault we were with him in the first place.

Edward looked from me to Alice and back. "Well, if you don't mind...?"

Alice gave me a surprised glance. "It would be nice," she assured him then.

"Cool," Edward said.

"Cool," I answered.

"So will you come back? At the end of the road trip?" Jasper asked Alice as we walked back to the car. They were just a bit ahead of the rest of us, but close enough for me to hear what they were saying.

"Yeah, I guess we could. That would be nice," Alice said.

"It would," Jasper said and looked like he meant it. "I saved my number on your phone last night. So if you do come back, you know how to find me."

"Good." Alice looked pleased.

At the car, Alice threw me the car keys. "It's your turn to drive."

We gave slightly awkward goodbyes to Emmett and Jasper, Jasper kissed Alice on the cheek and made her smile widely, and then we were on the road again.

"So, what's our next location?" Edward asked.

That made me smile, because I realized that I was already driving and I still didn't have any idea what our destination was.

"Let's see. Edward, the map's on the back seat, can you give it to me?" Alice asked. Edward passed the map to Alice who spread it out.

"How about Portland?" Alice asked.

"I don't know. What's in there?"

"No idea," Edward said from the backseat.

"Me neither," Alice said.

"Well, let's go find out," Edward said.

"Fine by me," Alice agreed.

"Just tell me where I need to drive," I said.

Alice put the road trip CD on again. It was still raining but I didn't mind driving in rain; it made the atmosphere somehow restful.

I glanced at Alice, who looked thoughtful. Not actually sad, but maybe a bit longing. I wondered if she missed Jasper, even though they'd met less than twenty-four hours ago. Yesterday at this time she didn't even know him and now she missed him just a bit, even though she wouldn't have admitted it if I asked. I didn't know if it was possible to become fond of someone so fast. Maybe it was. After all, I had asked Edward to join us, too. I didn't know why I had done it; maybe I just liked his presence – his careless approach to life, his sense of humor and his weird, cute crooked smile.

I shook my head a little, feeling stupid finding myself thinking about that. I turned to smile at Alice.

"Hey, he gave you his phone number," I said positively.

"Yeah," Alice said and smiled a little.