Previously…

I held my eyes shut, breathing slowly and deeply in and out to imitate sleep, until I heard him leave. Then I breathed a sigh of relief and waited until I heard him make his way to the bathroom and then back to his own room. I rolled over and it was then that the enormity of what I had just done came crashing down on me. I had kissed Edward. He had kissed me back.

Just then, though, my phone buzzed with a text message. I reached over and grabbed it, flipping it open to read the message:

Are we ok? Still friends, right? –E

I sighed. Friends. Again. Was this his way of telling me that what had just happened had been weird for him? That he didn't want it and just wanted to stay friends?

Biting my lip, I opened reply and typed:

Yeah, we're ok. Goodnight –B

~FOM~

There she goes, there she goes again

Racing through my brain

And I just can't contain

This feeling that remains

-There She Goes, Sixpence None the Richer/ The Las (A/N: A pretty old song but, hey, I was a nineties kid :P)

Foundation of Memories

Chapter 12 – Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-dee

Edward POV

Well now I was confused as shit. She had kissed me, but then when I had asked if we were still just friends, all she had had to say was 'we're ok'. What the hell did that mean? Of course, I didn't get a wink of sleep that night.

The kiss had taught me something, though. It had taught me that, no matter how I had felt about her before the accident, I was head over heels in love with her now. I couldn't remember her or whether we had been friends or something more – though her kissing me sure gave me a lot to wonder about – but I knew now that I wanted her in my life and not just as a friend. Perhaps the clean break had been for the best after all. Perhaps it was because I had forgotten that I had realised this all-consuming love I had for my best friend.

But, then again, perhaps not.

Something else that was keeping me awake was the image of her that I now had ingrained on my memory. Lying there beside me in just a tank top and a pair of boy shorts, biting innocently on her lip and ducking her head to hide a shy but incredibly sexy little smile. Images like that of the girl you've just realised your in love with plus raging teenage hormones equals one uncomfortable and sleepless night.

By the time it got to five o'clock on Monday morning, I gave up on tracking down sleep and went and switched on my laptop, thinking that maybe I could find something interesting, or funny, or downright stupid on youtube to distract me.

I tapped my fingers against the plastic as I waited for it to warm up, shooting down the start-up windows as soon as they opened. Finally, the last one popped up before my eyes and I clicked to exit, but then I froze. MSN messenger. I quickly went back and pressed start, scrolling through the programs until I came to it again. I opened it, and signed in. None of my contacts were online; no surprise there. But that wasn't why I had come on anyway.

I clicked on my favourites category, and the drop-down list revealed one name. Bellaaa. I snorted; who knew that Bella could be so imaginative? Then, I opened up my documents and typed Bella's screen name into the search box. After a moment, our MSN history came up. I blinked in surprise when I read what the first thing I had said to her was.

Captain Underpants- Who knew that you could be so imaginative?

I guessed some things never did change. I wondered why the hell my screen name was 'Captain Underpants' but then shrugged it off and started to read through some of the endless history of conversation. There was so much of it that the scroll bar down the side was barely visible; I imagined that this would be a hell of a lot of talking. And that there would be a hell of a lot of secrets exchanged on MSN. And so I would get a hell of a lot of answers to my hell of a lot of questions.

This was like a goldmine.

I spent hours trawling through conversation after conversation full of banter, teasing and photos sent from one of us to the other. After scrolling past yet another exchanged photo, curiosity got the best of me and I opened my pictures file to see picture after picture of Bella. Some of them had captions, others didn't. But if the captions describing Bella as 'beautiful' and 'gorgeous' told me one thing, it was that I had liked Bella as more than a friend before all of this crap as well. It seemed that this was one of those emotions that just wouldn't go away.

I was still scrolling through the conversation when my alarm clock went off for school. I sighed and rubbed my eyes and dragged myself from my computer desk to get ready for school, my head filled with a few answers and even more questions.

~FOM~

The next few days were spent in the same way. When I got home from school I was sat at my computer reading through the emails. I had dropped in to see Bella a few times but she was barely ever in; always skating, skating, skating.

I did see her, though. I saw her all the time at school. School was getting better for the both of us. All because my 'always watching' had stopped just being watching.

When Bella unwillingly exiled herself to her solitary seat and then sat there taking notes with a look of pure concentration on her face, I no longer just watched her. I didn't feel comfortable with going over and sitting beside her yet, but I apparently wasn't so mature that I was beyond throwing paper aeroplanes with notes on. The notes weren't much, just a little something to make her smile; a throwaway comment about the teacher, a bad knock-know joke… that kind of thing. But she always ducked her head to hide a smile, her cheeks flushing a beautiful shade of red. People still called her 'Edward Cullen's friend' or 'that girl in the corner' but they had stopped whispering and giggling in the cafeteria.

When people tripped her in the corridors and then laughed at her for being a klutz, I no longer just watched. I went over and made them pick up all of her books for her, and made Bella stand by and watch, red-cheeked as usual.

When she wasn't picked for a team or fell over her own two feet in gym, I no longer just watched. I picked her first for my team and helped her up when she fell. Whenever I did this, she only flushed and muttered her thanks under her breath but I didn't fail to catch the dazzling smile that lit her face when she thought that no one was looking.

When she walked to her truck after school, weighed down by heavy books, I no longer watched. I went over and took her books from her, asking if she had had a good day and offering her a lift if she ever wanted one. She blushed, as I had come to expect, and politely declined but every day she opened up more and more, adding in little things that shouldn't matter to me, but did for some indecipherable reason.

I was pulling out all of the stops. I was desperately trying to spend as much time with her as I could. I was desperately hoping that she'd do something – like flick her hair, or say something, or smile in a certain way – and make me remember everything. But nothing. Occasionally, when reading our MSN conversations, I'd remember sitting at my computer desk and laughing at what she had said, or watching her through the window, but I never remembered anything that told me anything.

It was driving me mad.

But then, one day, everything changed.

I got in from school and Esme came out to greet me. "Edward?" she said, sounding slightly wary.

"Yeah?" I dropped my bag on the floor and went into the kitchen to grab an apple, sitting on the stool by the breakfast bar.

"Did you…?" She paused and then said, "This is going to sound crazy but… did you order a pair of ice skates?"

"Ah!" I hopped down from the stool. "Yeah, did they come?"

Mom's brow furrowed. "Yes," she said slowly. She gestured to an opened box sat on the worktop.

I went over and pulled them out. They were really nice. Well, they seemed nice; my knowledge of ice skates was pretty limited. I let out a low whistle.

"Edward?" Mom asked. "Are you… okay?"

I looked around at her, confused. "Yeah, why wouldn't I be?"

She smiled slightly. "It's just… honey…" She sighed and came over and sat on the stool I had just vacated. "Well, you see…"

"If you're going to ask if I'm gay, Mom, then my honest reply is an absolute categorical 'no'," I said before she could ask anything that could turn this awkward.

To my surprise, Esme neither sighed in relief or yelled at me. She laughed. "No, Edward, I was not going to ask you that. But it's nice to know all the same." She sighed again, but she was smiling now. "No. I just… do you remember much from before the accident sweetie?"

I shrugged and sat down beside her, gathering that this was serious. "Not much. I remember stuff I learnt at school and I remember going to some places but I don't remember how I felt, or what I ever thought."

She nodded. "So you don't remember that you absolutely hated ice skating?"

I stared at her. "What?"

She nodded her hair, her caramel curls shaking in front of her face. "You said it was boring, and that you hated it."

She had to be having me on. "Even though my best friend won like a million competitions?"

Esme nodded sadly. "You told her you hated it too. You… seemed to really hurt her feelings at first, but then she kind of got used to you never being there or supporting her."

I remembered Bella's reaction on Sunday night when I had asked her – well, begged her – to teach me how to skate and realised that this must have been why she had said no. Why had I felt so differently after one little accident? "Why didn't you tell me before?" I asked, knowing that I could have stopped myself from hurting Bella's feelings as I had on Sunday night.

Mom blushed guiltily. "I wanted to see if you'd come to watch for once in your life. I just know that it means so much to her." She sounded wistful. Then she drew her attention to the skates in my hand. "I guess your views have changed then?"

I nodded in reply.

She smiled slightly. "There's a public session on at the rink right now; I can drive you if you want?"

"No!" I said too fast. "No, thanks, I can drive myself."

A pained look came over her face; the same one that now appeared whenever I wanted to do anything that could be seen as dangerous in the slightest. That even included chewing on a piece of gum (apparently it could get stuck in my throat and I could die). But she was slowly realising that just because she almost lost me once before didn't mean that she could stop me from doing things like drive a car, and chew gum. She nodded this time. "Okay," she whispered, "as long as you're okay."

"I'm great." Then I went upstairs to change into something more suitable for skating.

While I was wandering round my bedroom, I noticed that I'd left my computer on standby. I went over to turn it off properly but just as the screen danced to life after I had keyed in my password, I heard loud music suddenly started to play from the next door bedroom. Bad Reputation by Joan Jett. One of Bella's guilty pleasures, I had learnt from reading the MSN conversation.

I stopped my hand on the mouse from shutting down the computer and read over a few lines of the bit I had it open at.

Captain Underpants: Joan Jett? Seriously?

Bellaaa: Huh?

Captain Underpants: Your personal message? :L

Bellaaa: Oh… *blushes* I just… I like that song.

Captain Underpants: Is that why you won't let me nose through your iPod?

Bellaaa: Partly…

And it went on. Banter. Me teasing her. It was easy. Simple. I wanted that back. No, I wanted more.

Without consciously thinking about it, I lifted the cursor and hit print. I printed off the first twenty pages of conversation, drumming my fingers impatiently on the desk as I waited. Then, when all of the sheets had been printed, I grabbed a stapler and stapled them all together before scribbling on a post-it-note sticking that to the front.

I climbed out of my window and peered round into Bella's room. When I saw inside I had to hold back a laugh. She was stood on her bed, her long brown waves cascading down her back and her eyes shut tight as she sang along into a hairbrush. She was even more beautiful when she was carefree.

When 'Bad Reputation' rolled into 'I Love Rock N Roll', Bella jumped down off of her bed and threw the hairbrush back on her desk before leaving the room. I didn't know where she had gone, but guessed that she'd be back soon since she had left the music on. So I gently eased the ajar window open wider and dropped the wad of paper through, making sure that the fluorescent yellow post-it-note was on top where she would see it.

I smiled briefly and then pushed the window shut again and went back through my own window, grabbing my new skates and shoving my wallet in my pocket before heading out to the ice rink, declining Esme's offer of a map on my way past; I knew the route better than the back of my hand after all of my incessant Bella-stalking.

~FOM~

A while later, I was stumbling around on the ice feeling incredibly stupid. Ice skating apparently looked a hell of a lot easier than it actually was. A bunch of kids who looked about five or six years old skated round me in circles all watching as I fell on my ass for the millionth time.

"Hey, mister," one of them said, coming to my side. He was the biggest of the bunch and had dark hair and big grey eyes. I looked over at the gaggle of kids to see that they were all watching from a distance; obviously this kid had volunteered to come and speak to me.

"Yes?" I asked through gritted teeth as I struggled to get back to my feet.

"Don't you know how to stay up?" he asked innocently. Irritating kid.

"Yeah, of course I do; that's why I spend most of my time on my ass," I snapped sarcastically, already exhausted and fed up of my lame attempt at skating; and I had only been here for half an hour. I was beginning to understand how I had hated the sport so much.

The little boy stared at me blankly and I realised that my sarcasm had been wasted on him.

I rolled my eyes. "Don't worry."

"Do you want some help?" the kid persisted.

"No, thanks. I can get up myself."

"Okay," he said, but he didn't leave me alone. He stood right next to me and watched as I got shakily on to my feet and promptly slipped over again. Thankfully, I had still been crouching over so there was a smaller impact this time.

"Ouch," I muttered. "I think I broke my ass."

The little boy howled with laughter. "Hey, Felix, get over here!" he called out to one of his equally annoying little buddies.

Another little boy skated over expertly, making me scowl. "Yeah?"

"He said 'ass'!" the first little boy squeaked and they both dissolved into a fit of childish giggles. That only irked me more. I mean, for starters, if I laughed like that while stood on a block of frozen water I would have been on my rear end in seconds. Plus, any guy who still laughed at the word 'ass' was way too immature to hang with me.

"Whatever tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum," I said with a pout, wiping my cold hands off on my sweat pants before attempting to get up again.

"We're not tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum," the second kid corrected me naively. "My name's Felix and this is my friend Marcus."

I sighed, wondering why I bothered wasting my breath.

"What's your name mister?" Tweedle-dee – or Marcus – asked.

I debated saying something stupid just to wind them up a little more but decided that attempting to explain it would cost me more time than was necessary. And, as soon as I managed to get myself vertical again, I wanted to go home and mope about what a crap investment the skates had been. "Edward," I replied as I pushed up onto my knees.

"Cool, did you come with your Mom?" Tweedle-dee piped up.

I rolled my eyes again and was about to tell him that no, I did not come with my mother because I was a big boy who could do whatever he wanted… but someone else spoke before me. "Hey Marcus, Felix, are you guys bothering my friend?"

I fell from my knees back on to my ass when I whipped my head around to see if I was hearing things. I wasn't.

"Miss Bella!" the kids exclaimed dashing over to the beautiful girl sliding toward me, a little smirk all over her pretty face.

She patted their heads briefly but then skidded to a halt by my side and held out a hand. "Need a little help, huh?"

I reluctantly took her outstretched hand and let her help me back to my feet. This time I managed to get up properly and Bella pulled me over to the edge. "Thanks," I muttered.

"He's your friend, Miss Bella?" Marcus asked in disbelief, his eyes wide.

Bella glanced awkwardly at me, but then nodded at the little boys.

"But he's rubbish!" Felix exclaimed. "He fell over seven times already!"

"It wasn't that many," I objected automatically.

"We counted." Marcus backed his friend up.

Bella laughed. "Well, he needs a little training up."

I scowled at her.

Just then a woman called for Felix and Marcus from the edge. They both moaned simultaneously.

"Go on kiddies," I said a little condescendingly… okay, a lot condescendingly. "Go back home with Mommy."

They glared at me but their Mom called again and they said goodbye to Bella before skating off.

I breathed a sigh of relief when they left and turned to Bella. "How the heck do you know tweedle-dum and tweedle-dee?"

She raised an eyebrow. "You nicknamed them after the little fat men in a Disney film?"

"Actually, it's a book."

She scoffed. "Whatever, you were thinking of the film and we both know it."

I didn't even try to deny it this time. "So how do you know them?"

She shrugged, skating a backwards circle around me. "Jake and I help out with the Sunday kiddie classes so that we can have more rink time."

"Oh." I ignored the way that my skin bristled when she said his name. Then my brow furrowed. "Why are you even here? I thought tonight was your night off?"

Bella ducked her head and smiled slightly. Then she looked back up at me. "I… I found your… can you call it a note?"

"Oh." I bit back the shit-eating grin that threatened to erupt all over my face. "I guess so." I shrugged nonchalantly, not wanting to show how happy I was that she had decided to come because of me.

Bella smiled shyly at me before pushing off from the edge. I watched appreciatively as she skated around and around the almost-empty rink a few times, adding spirals and jumps here and there, before coming to a halt beside me. "So you want some help?"

"Uh…" I looked hesitantly at the thick sheet of ice underfoot. "I think I'll just watch."

Bella threw her head back and laughed – that wonderful, wonderful laugh. "C'mon chicken." And then she reached out and took my hand. The usual spark shot up my arm and shook my body from head to toe, and I beamed at her.

We stayed on the rink for ages, only getting off when the staff ordered everyone off so that they could smooth the surface. We took a break for a drink and then got right back on it. I had the best time that I could ever remember. Bella helped me along giving me tips and telling me what I was doing wrong, and laughing at me when I fell over. I tried to push her over in return but she was too damn good at staying on her feet. As the hours passed and we went round and round in circles we exchanged polite conversation about school and lightly teased each other about various stuff. If someone watched us, they'd have thought that we were old friends, or perhaps even a couple. Only the two of us could feel the tension in the air.

As it got closer to seven o'clock – the time that I demanded we leave by if I didn't want Emmett to eat my dinner – the tension was easing off and I was really enjoying myself.

"Once more?" Bella suggested, referring to a race around the circular rink.

"Sure," I replied and then took off, careful to not watch my feet too closely as Bella had advised. Just as I was approaching the pole that marked our makeshift finishing line, a few inches ahead of Bella, my toe-pick got caught in the ice and I went flying, knocking my head against the ice.

"Edward!" Bella was at my side in a second, which made me sure that she had been letting me win if she could move that fast.

I sat up, holding my hand to my forehead. "I'm fine," I said, though I was pretty sure that there should have only been one Bella.

She looked doubtful. "Yeah. Sure. Your head's already swelling up you idiot. Come on." She bent down and hauled me to my feet just as the ice attendant came over to check that I was okay.

I assured the first aid guy that I felt fine as he held a bag of ice to my head a few moments later and he reluctantly left me alone with Bella.

She smirked at me. "Karma's a bitch, huh?"

I raised my brows. "What? I didn't do anything wrong."

"You nicknamed two of my students after fat guys from a Disney film," she reminded me.

"Oh, like that warrants a huge bump on the head," I said sarcastically.

Bella laughed and then opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted by her phone ringing. She glanced down at caller ID and her brow furrowed in confusion before she answered it. "Hey, Jake, what's up?" She paused for a second, listening to his response, and then her eyes went wide. "Oh shit! Oh my God, I'm so sorry! I completely forgot! Yeah, yeah, I'll be there as soon as I can." Then she hung up, biting her lip.

"What's up?" I asked.

"You so cannot drive in that state," she observed, mostly to herself.

"I'm fine," I repeated blandly.

Bella rolled her eyes but otherwise ignored me. She was silent for a moment, but then she said, "Okay, can you walk?"

I stood up to try it out and then nodded.

"I'll drive you home now," she told me, grabbing up both my and her own skate bag. "Come on."

I followed her, confused, thanking the first aider on my way past. He said something about going to the hospital if I felt dizzy but that would hardly be necessary with Carlisle around so I just nodded and continued to follow Bella.

She opened the passenger door of her truck and dumped the skate bags on the floor before holding the door open for me. "Okay, get in."

"In that crap heap?" I snorted, but obliging anyway.

She shot me a filthy glare. "Don't hate on the truck," she commanded before slamming the door shut.

I snickered into my hand as she went around the truck and got into the drivers side.

"Why such a rush White Rabbit?" I asked with a wink as she started the engine.

She raised an eyebrow at me. "I'm the White Rabbit? Not Alice?"

"Well, Alice has to be Alice," I pointed out. "Not only do they share a name but our Alice is a titch as well."

Bella snorted. "Okay then, but why am I the White Rabbit?"

"Because you're late for a very important date," I replied in a sing-song voice.

She laughed again. "Right. So who are you?"

"The charming Cheshire cat, of course," I answered simply.

"More like the Mad Hatter."

I suppose I had been asking for that. I shrugged. "Johnny Depp's a good lookin' guy."

"Uh uh." Bella shook her head. "We were talking about the Disney movie remember?"

"Oh, yeah. Well crap, I'm doomed."

Bella laughed again.

"You didn't answer my question," I said after a pause.

"What question?" She stopped the truck at a red light and turned to face me, a strand of her hair falling in her face.

Automatically, I reached over and brushed it aside, my fingertip tingling when it brushed her skin. I smiled slightly at her. "Why are you in such a hurry?"

"Oh." Bella blushed and ducked her head. "I'm going to Jake's house for dinner… with his Dad…"

My heart dropped into my stomach in disappointment. "'Meet the parents' kind of thing?" I struggled to keep my tone light.

Bella hesitated for a moment, as though unsure of what to say. Eventually she sighed and said, "Something like that."

I just nodded and pursed my lips, turning to look out of the window as the red light turned green so that she wouldn't see the devastation that was evident on my face.

Neither of us spoke another word until we said our goodbyes – and I my thank you – outside of my home. Then, Bella smiled slightly at me and drove off for her date without a backward glance.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

*Note of Relative Importance* Again, I have only read this through once so there are probably a lot of mistakes at the moment. I will go through and rehash them later but I thought I'd post it before I throw my internet connect USB thing across the room… loooong story…

Awww :( It'll get better though guys! It's already getting better really :) I mean, they're laughing aren't they? And Bella's teaching Edward how to ice skate ;)

I would like to add here that I do not own any version of Alice in Wonderland, whether that be the Disney version, the Lewis Carroll book or the one with Johnny Depp in which I am yet to see :L

This is a mega long chapter for me so hopefully it's made up for the not updating for a few weeks :S And to some people *cough*ZOE*cough* hopefully it's made up for the whole not-being-able-to-read-until-tomorrow thing. And, actually Zoe, I can wish you a very merry unbirthday because that fits in with what has apparently become the theme of this chapter :L So have a very merry unbirthday ;)

Pffft… um… I can't remember if there was anything I was supposed to be telling you in this A/N or not… There was probably something but I've forgotten it :L

Oh, I'm twittering again :) If you want to follow me, the link's on my profile or I'm StephaniiieJo :) This recent un-failing at Twitter is probably because I can go on it on my new BlackBerry which is totally awesome! :D If you tweet me then I'll probably end up following you back because I need to find some more fanfiction-obsessed people to follow… :L

Uh… I think that's it :S Oh, if you were wondering, you'll find out what Edward put in his list of things about Bella and what he wrote in his note in the next chapter when we go back to BPOV :)

I'm probably not going to do previews this chapter for a few reasons. Firstly, I don't have any of the next chapter that I can send you, and secondly I want to get the next chapter of VTN done :S

So I'm back to begging on my knees for reviews because, honestly, they are my drug and I need a little fix. Plus, every time I get a new email my phone vibrates obnoxiously loudly and drives my brother mad and I'm pretending that I don't know how to turn it off just to annoy him ;)

Can we maybe get to 750 reviews? Thank you all! :D

Right here ;)

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