After treating me to dinner at the only mildly nice restaurant in La Push, Seth and I arrived home and saw all the cars parked out front. The lights were on inside and I could see the Cullens and werewolves each seated on a chair or on the sofa. All of them—except Alice who was bouncing in her seat with a ridiculous smile on her face—looked confused. I stared down at my ring again with a large smile on my face. I was so glad Alice hadn't told them yet. I needed to break the marvelous, enormous news to my family. I stepped out of the car quickly instead of waiting for Seth to come around to open my door for me.

"Excited?" he chuckled when he saw my facial expression.

"Just a little," I smiled. I entwined my fingers with his and we started up the walk to the front door. I dug around in my bag for my key, but before I could find it, the door was swept open and revealed Alice smiling and jumping up and down. Her eyes fell on the ring that settled on my right hand and her smile never faltered. The eyes of the vampires and werewolves inside did the same. Rosalie, Bella, and Esme were the ones who spoke next.

"Oh…"

"My…"

"God…"

"Oh my God, I've got to tell mom," Leah breathed, shaking her head with an 'oh, wow, this is unbelievable' expression on her face. I smirked. This wasn't how I imagined they would find out, but it was sure a lot funnier.

Before I could blink, Esme was in front of me, taking my hand in hers and looking at the ring from all sides. Rosalie was ushering me in and Leah was shaking her head in disbelief.

"Engaged, are you?" Edward laughed once we were inside. "Congrats Jazzy, Seth." He nodded in our direction.

"Welcome to the family, bro," Emmett chuckled, punching Seth lightly on the shoulder.

"Congratulations to the both of you," Carlisle said, embracing us both at once. "I want you to know that we're all very happy for you."

"And would you look at that ring!" Alice squealed, picking my hand up and holding the ring to the light.

"It's simply stunning!" Rosalie chimed.

"Beautiful," Bella sighed.

"Mom, you'll never believe what just happened," Leah said into the receiver of her cell phone. I rolled my eyes. Typical Leah; such a gossip.

"Leah, let me talk to mom," Seth chuckled as he walked over to his sister and took the phone out of her hands. "Hey, Mom, guess whose advice I finally took."

"Jasmine, you're getting married?!" Nessie asked, galloping down the stairs. I could hear in her voice the true four year old in her.

"Oh, wow, nice," Jacob laughed, coming down the stairs after his imprint. "That's great for you guys."

"Jasmine," Seth said, walking over to me, "my mom wants to talk to you."

I smiled and gladly took the phone from his hands. Sue had come to love me like another daughter within the past years and she'd very recently started trying to push the subject of marriage on Seth and me.

"Hello?" I asked when the phone was at my ear.

"Jasmine!" Sue exclaimed loudly enough to momentarily cause the dysfunction of my right ear. "I've been waiting for you and Seth to announce this news to me since the day I met you! Congratulations!"
"Thank you so much, Sue," I sighed as Seth put one arm around me. "That means a lot."

"You'll have to show me that ring. I haven't seen it. I didn't even know this was coming! Oh, he should've told me."

"Don't worry," I joked. "I barely found out today, too."

Sue laughed. "Well, I'm sure the Cullens are all over you right now so I'll let you both be. Congratulations, again."

"And thanks again. Bye, now." I closed the phone and handed it back to Leah. I wrapped both my arms around Seth and rested the side of my head on his chest.

"Seth!" Leah whined. "You should've told me!"

"I wanted to surprise everyone," he chuckled.

"Where did you get the money for an eight carat diamond ring?" Alice asked, moving my hand gently from side to side to see the ring in different angles.

"Eight carat?" I gasped. "That's so much. You didn't have to, Seth, really—"

"I wish I could've gotten something bigger, actually," he said. "You deserve a ring and beautiful and flawless as you are, but I'm sure it doesn't exist. I just got the best one I could afford."

"But that's just it!" Rosalie exclaimed. "How on Earth could you afford this? It must have cost you a fortune! You should've told us! We could've helped pay it. Hell, we could've paid for it!"

"It's so pretty," Renesmee sighed. "Just like you, Jazzy!"

"Yeah, dude, how'd you work up the cash?" Emmett asked, raising his eyebrows as he studied the rock.

"I've been saving up money over the years," Seth shrugged.

"Oh no," I murmured. "Please, please, please tell me that money did not come out of your college fund, Seth."

"Well…" He let the sentence trail off.

"Seth!" I exclaimed, ripping my hand from the grasps of several vampires and two werewolves. "You shouldn't have!"

"But he did," Alice said. "And anyway, who needs a college fund when they have a full scholarship into Harvard?" She tossed a manila envelope at Seth. "I'd been meaning to give you this. Dug it out of your mail a few days ago. Hope you don't mind."

"You still shouldn't have," I muttered as he opened the letter.

"Well what do you know," he gasped. "Looks like I don't need the remainder of that college fund anymore."

"Remainder?" Edward asked. "You had some left over after buying that ring? How much did you have to begin with?"

Seth shrugged. "I had about nine grand in there."

"How the hell…?" Emmett asked, bemused.

"Yeah, Seth, jeez," Leah said, surprised. "How the hell did you get nine grand?"

"Remember how you got paid thirty bucks every two hours by Mom to babysit me when I was a kid?"

"Yeah."

"Well, mom paid me sixty to put up with it."

"What the… ugh! You got sixty?! Dammit!"

"Leah!" Bella snapped, covering Nessie's ears. "You're language!"

"Right, right, sorry, sorry," Leah apologized.

"That's still not enough to get that much money, though," Alice said, probably having done the math in her head.

"A few part time jobs helped. Mom did, too. You'd be surprised at how much money I can get for doing things she doesn't want to. And remember, Leah, when that ridiculously rich family lived across the street from us? I babysat for them. Fifty dollars an hour, eight hours a day, seven days a week started to add up. When they moved away after three months of living there, I don't even remember how much money I'd earned."

"Wow," Emmett gasped.

"So what are you thinking for the wedding?" Alice asked. "I saw a lovely little church on a wide cliff overlooking the ocean the other day in Bellingham the other day. It was such a cute little thing, so quaint, like something out of a movie…"

Alice's voice became faster and faster. I couldn't even guess her words and I thought no one else could, either, until Bella, Nessie, and Rosalie started talking at the same speed—if not faster—with her. Not long after did Leah join them, not talking as fast but still impossible to recognize. How could they even understand each other?

As I was swarmed with questions that were in need of answering, my eyes searched the room. Jasper was standing by the stairs, looking down at his feet and shaking his head. His lips parted slightly for half a second before he flew up the stairs.

"Excuse me," Alice whispered, excusing herself from the room and conversation—which had only faltered for a millisecond before starting up again.

"We'll need to get you a dress," Bella said, slow enough for me to comprehend.

"Something beautiful!" Nessie giggled.

"Something extravagant!" Rosalie chimed.

"It has to be elegant," Leah decided. Emmett, Edward, and Jacob rolled their eyes at them before walking over to the couch and turning on a football game.

I heard something break upstairs. It sounded like a glass vase being thrown on the ground. Oh my gosh, what was going on?

The girls' eyes fluttered to the stairs for a moment before returning to their rambling. I looked up at Seth and he looked down at me. He looked as confused as I felt.

"Excuse me," I murmured. I stretched up and gave Seth a short but passionate kiss before making my way upstairs as silently as I could manage, ignoring the ignorant and immature whoops and cheers of Edward, Emmett, and Jacob.

I tiptoed down the hallway and covered my ears when I heard something else break loudly again. It was coming from Alice and Jasper's room. I stood with my back to the door, listening to their voices through the small crack that was left open.

"Jasper, please calm down," Alice was saying. "Please, don't break anything else. And also, please stop trying to mess with my emotions right now, you can't make me angry. This moment is a really happy one for me and for my daughter. The least you could do is congratulate them."

"How can you possible expect me to be happy here, Alice? How? Tell me, how? How can I be happy that my eighteen year old adoptive daughter is getting married?!" Another glass item hit the ground with such force; I could've sworn I felt the ground move. I tried to hold back the gasp that was threatening to come out. Jasper and Alice hadn't fought once in all the years I'd lived here and suddenly they were fighting because of me?! Oh my gosh… I had never heard Jasper this upset. Tears came to my eyes like they always did when I was faced with such an unpleasant situation.

"Jasper, Jasper, quiet! She is right outside…"

"I don't care, Alice! She is eighteen years old! You cannot possibly let her go through with this! Do you want her to end up like Bella? Do you want Jasmine to be pregnant at eighteen? Is that what you want, Alice? Is it?" A low growl floated up the stairs at his words, but I ignored it. Was he really worried that I would…? Oh, Dad…

"Of course not, Jasper, you know that. And anyway, we both know this is different. Seth said he would wait. She can go to college, Jasper, she can graduate. Tell me, Jasper, are you really not happy that your daughter—adoptive or not—is going to get married? Is that the truth?"

Jasper sighed heavily. "Jasmine?" he called. "Can you come in here, please?"

"Careful with the broken glass," Alice warned as I stepped inside the room. The floor was splattered with a pattern made up of clear, red, and blue glass. My hand covered my mouth in astonishment as I stepped over the shards. As soon as I was close enough, Jasper took me into a large hug.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered. "I'm happy for you, I swear it, I am. I can't say how glad I am that you have Seth in your life and that he makes you happy. I just can't bear to give my little girl away yet. Not yet, not now." The tears spilled over, he was sounding just like I knew a real dad would because he cared for me like a real daughter. And I loved him like a real dad, so I said what I would've said to my real dad.

"I'll always be your little girl," I said. "But even little girls have to grow up sometime. Unless, of course, you're Alice." I smirked at Alice and she smiled at me before walking closer to us. Jasper put one of his arms around her and she wrapped her arms around us both.

"That's what I keep thinking," Jasper sighed. "A fact that depresses me."

"I'm not getting married tomorrow," I reminded him. "But even if I was, we'll always be eternally close, like a family should be, only more literally. I promise you both; I'll wait until we graduate from college to take this step. It will be hard for Seth and me, I can guarantee that, but if he loves me like I think he does, he'll wait, too. Please, just let me know that you'll support me now, because I need it. I've never been so happy, but I've never been so stressed either. Graduation, college, wedding, it's enough to put anyone in a frenzy."

"We'll always support you, Jasmine," Jasper whispered. "Every moment of every day, we'll support you."

"I love you, Dad," I said.

"I love you, too," he answered.

"I love you, Mom."

"Love you, too," Alice smiled. They both kissed the top of my head before exiting the room to get a broom to clean up the mess. I was instructed to stay where I was so I wasn't at risk of cutting my feet. So there I stood, inspecting the blank walls of Alice and Jasper's room. I really hoped Alice had gone all out to decorate so I'd have something to study, but no. White bed, white carpet, white desk, white walls, nothing interesting. My eyes stopped on a picture frame hanging on the wall. I squinted to get a better look at it.

It was a picture from out vacation last year. We'd all gone to a private island that the Cullens owned so that they could go out in the sun and enjoy the summer like anyone else would. All of us were in it, all of us caught off guard, all except for Esme who'd set up the camera in the first place. The Cullens were all sparkling brightly in the sun of the island, outshining the rest of us in the most literal sense of the word.

Rosalie was leaning away from Emmett who was shaking his hair out after a swim. Bella, Edward, Jacob, and Renesmee were turned away from the camera. Half of Nessie's face was visible as she tossed a blue shell to Bella who had her hand held out for it to put it inside Nessie's 'shell bag.' Leah was throwing a handful of sand at Jasper and Alice, who by the look of it had thrown some at her first. And behind everyone else were Seth and I. I had my arms wrapped around his neck while his arms pulled me close to him. I blushed and smiled up at him as he smiled down at me. From the look in our eyes, anyone could tell that we were madly in love.

Without thinking what I was doing, I stepped toward the picture. Stupid me, I forgot about the broken glass. The pain shot through my foot, up my leg, and pierced every inch of my spine. I bit my lip so hard; I tasted blood, as if I needed more of that in a house of vampires. I looked down at the pool of blood at my feet and cursed. I heard several snarls rip from the throats of thirsty Cullens downstairs. It wasn't long before Seth came bursting through the door. Alice was right behind him, holding back thirsty yet guilty looking Jasper. Seth rushed over to me—not worrying about the glass—and pushing my body behind his.

"Alice," Jasper growled through his teeth. "Don't let me get near her." Despite his own words, he fought to get out of Alice's grasp. He inhaled deeply once and my first thought was 'oh crap, I'm dead,' but that one breath seemed to calm him. He stopped struggling and let himself go limp against his wife. She released her iron hold on him and he straightened up.

"Jasmine," he sighed. "I am… so sorry about that. I promise it won't happen again."

I sucked in a strained breath. "S'ok," I said through clenched teeth, trying not to scream. The pain was becoming unbearable.

"Rosalie!" Alice screamed. "Come clean up the mess, please!"
Before I could blink, Rosalie was sweeping up the mess at my feet and—holding her breath—wiping up my blood.

"Sorry, Rose," I whispered to her.

"It's okay," she said, biting down on her lip. "I got it."

When the muddle was cleaned up, Carlisle came into the room with a first aid kit. I slipped my shoe off very carefully before removing my sock of my injured foot. He examined the wound very carefully as I bit down on my lip and squeezed Seth's hand, both to keep from screaming.

"Breath," Seth whispered several times, each time after he kissed my cheek.

"You were very lucky," Carlisle said, pulling the single piece of glass out of my foot and putting a thick towel to the gash to clot the bleeding. "It's a clean, side injury. It could've been a lot worse." He removed the now red towel after a minute. And oh and behold, the blood had stopped rushing out. Carlisle took a roll of gauze out of the kit and proceeded to wrap the appropriate amount around the cut, which had by then stopped stinging.

"There we go," he said with a smile in my direction. "All better."

"Thank you, Carlisle," I said, smiling back at him.

"Not a problem," he said. "Just try not to walk on it too much, okay? We don't want it swelling."

"I can take care of that," Seth smiled, swooping me up into his arms and carrying me bridal style to the door.

"G'night everyone!" I called, laughing.

I heard Jasper—of course—start to say something, but Alice cut him off.

"Jasper!" she snapped. I giggled.

"Whoa, where are we going?" Leah chuckled when we ran into her in the hallway.

"None of your business," I joked. "Anyway, how was the kiss?"

Leah glared at me—the death glare—and I cringed into Seth.

"Well… well… ugh! Well, at least I'm not the one who's engaged!"

"Oh come on," Seth pressed jokingly. "You've gotta tell us. You and Jacob? Come on, how can you expect us to not be curious?"

"Yeah, Leah, spill!" I said.

Leah gave an exasperated sigh. "I am not good with girl talk!" Then she stormed off. I broke into a huge round of laughter.

"She's so funny sometimes," I laughed.

"Only when she doesn't try," Seth chuckled.

We were in my room by then. The wall in front of my bed was decorated with a large canopy of flowers and ribbons. In large red letters, the word 'Congratulations!' was written.

"Alice," I groaned.

"You're welcome!" she called from somewhere in the house. I rolled my eyes.

Seth and I stood at the edge of my bed, staring into each others eyes. Slowly, he leaned down to kiss my lips. My hands wove into his hair and I pulled myself up, crushing my mouth to his. Eventually, he pulled away. Both of us were breathless.

"Jasmine, it's midnight. Are you tired at all?" he chuckled as he laid me down lightly on my back.

"Not at all," I laughed. "I'm too happy to be tired."

Seth laughed. "Try saying that tomorrow."

I cocked my head to the side.

"You do realize what next Friday is, right?"

"Friday, Friday," I repeated the name of the day, trying to figure out what could happen. "Oh crap. Graduation, Alice, shopping, crap."

He laughed at me as he started walking toward the door. "I knew you'd figure it out. Anyway, I don't think Alice is planning to let you stay home the weekend before graduation when there are so many malls in the world."

"Oh, how I wish you weren't right," I grumbled. "And where are you going?"

He turned around. "I figured I'd give you some privacy so you could get changed."

"No, stay!" I called, my voice desperate. I didn't want to be so far apart from him. "I'll just change in the closet."

"As you wish," he said, bowing to me as if I was a queen.

I laughed. "Be right back," I called behind my shoulder as I slipped into my humongous closet. No matter how many times I walked inside it, I never got used to how unnecessarily and unnaturally huge it was.

My hands pulled on the knob of one of the many drawers to open it. I slipped on the first pain of pajamas I saw—blue spaghetti strap shirt, long pants, decorated with cherries. Since I didn't feel like going through the killer task of brushing out all the insane tangles in my hair the next morning, I tugged on it with a hairbrush and put it up in a high ponytail before walking back into my room. Seth was sitting on the edge of my bed in a pair of grey sweatpants. He smiled at me. I tried to smile back, but an arising yawn was faster.

"So, talking about Alice and shopping made you tired, did it?" he laughed

"Sure," I yawned. "Let's go with that."

I sat down in his lap and he cradled me against him.

"You knew they were going to make me sing, didn't you?" I asked accusingly.

"Well, of course I did," he admitted shamelessly.

"Well, you should've told me," I countered.

"Didn't want to."

"And why not?"

"It would ruin the surprise."

"You're so evil sometimes."

"Yes, Jasmine, I'm the evil one. But the girl who enjoys running off to meet a clan of non-vegetarian vampires and leaving me behind isn't." Drat, he was never going to let me forget that. "Yes, yes, that makes perfect sense."

"Thanks for seeing the logic."

He chuckled and ruffled my hair. With his arm around me, we laid down on the bed and turned to face the large window-slash-back wall. The stars were bright over the dark forest and Seth pointed at a familiar group of stars.

The Archer.

"Remember that?" he asked me.

"How could I forget," I answered, smiling slightly and putting my hand over the pink shell at my throat.

I followed the Archer's arrow, expecting to find the lonely star. But no, not this time. There was another star next to it. They were so close together, they might've been one. I smiled, knowing exactly what these stars reminded me of. Instinctively, I snuggled into Seth.

"You should sleep," he said, adjusting his arms to make me more comfortable. "You've got a long day ahead of you."

I groaned. "Don't remind me." I pulled the covers over my head, then back down when they started to suffocate me.

"I love you," I whispered before I closed my eyes.

"And, as always, I love you, too."

I closed my eyes then, preparing myself for what was probably the best sleep of my life. But, sadly, it also felt like the shortest. It seemed that seconds later, I was being dragged out of bed by an over enthusiastic vampire who seemed to only know three words.

"We're going shopping!" she squealed.

I groaned.