The Twilight Twenty-Five
Prompt: Red
Pen name: LightStarDusting
Character POV: Bella
Rating: M

Chapter 8 - Yes It Is
1999

"Get me out of here."

"What the hell are they doing, Bella?"

I sat cross-legged on my bed in front of the window. The shade was still up and the darkness outside easily allowed Jasper full Peeping Tom privileges into our room.

I sighed and twirled the phone cord around my finger, looking at him while I spoke under my breath. "They're putting on an *NSYNC show with complete choreography."

"You wanna come over here before we--"

It was all the invitation I needed. I cut his question off with a swift, "Yes. How about now? Right now?"

He chuckled. "Anxious, are we? I'll let you in at the suite door."

Hanging up the phones simultaneously, I looked over and signaled I'd be there in a few minutes, before pulling the shade down.

Lucy and McKenna stopped dancing when they noticed me gathering my things and trying to make a quick escape. Lucy pulled her hair into a bun on the top of her head and made a generous offer. "Bella! You want to join in? You can be Lance."

"Ummmm, no thanks. I don't want to be Lance."

"Chris? Joey? We're JC and Justin, of course."

"Right. Of course." No idea. I politely declined, saying I already had plans for the evening that didn't include impersonating the members of a boyband. They both made faces at me before asking where I was going.

I felt the blush creeping up from my chest to my neck before I muttered out Jasper's name. The squeal that bounced around the room was sure to call all dogs in a ten mile radius.

"Ohhhh, Bella's hanging out with Nature Boy! Which house are you going to tonight? Maybe we'll see you there."

I was never more grateful for my lack of knowledge of the Greek system. I didn't have to feign ignorance; I had no clue where we were going. It was in Jasper's hands and I told them as much. Of course, that led to them saying suggestive comments about what else was in Jasper's hands.

I made my quick escape from our room and scampered across the courtyard. Not quickly enough though as Lucy and McKenna raised the shade and window to make catcall noises out the window. The crimson blush that had just started to fade returned once more as I cursed them under my breath and flipped them off. I probably blended in nicely with the red door before I entered the stairwell. Some might consider the blush a hindrance, I considered it camouflage. I just needed to stand by something red at all times.

Arriving at the landing of the second floor, I found Jasper waiting, holding the heavy metal suite door open with his back. While our room keys opened any of the outside doors to our own building, the suite doors were only opened by the keys of the people that lived in that particular suite.

My heart flip-flopped a bit when I saw him standing there, eating Salt and Vinegar potato chips.

"Chip?" He offered, tilting the bag toward me while we walked down the hall that mirrored my own.

"Oh, so you're the other person that buys these at the campus store." The cashier there always made it a point to tell me that they weren't a hot ticket item when I would get them. I dug into the bag and grabbed a handful of the chips. Hell, don't have to worry about kissing anyone.

It was a little past ten, which was considered still early in college time so we hung out for awhile in Jasper and his roommate, Peter's room. Peter's girlfriend, Charlotte, was visiting from a nearby college. It was a very chill atmosphere, listening to Pink Floyd and relaxing before going out. The four of us planned to go out together but Peter and Charlotte went down the hall to visit with Demetri before our plans to go out to the party Jasper heard about earlier.

However, things didn't exactly go as planned that night. Actually, besides the hanging out and keeping with our cleanse, they didn't go at all as planned. We ended up going out that night, but we never made it to that party.

Something I'll never understand about guys is their need for random tackling. It's one of those guy things, much like the need to jump and hit the top of a doorway as they pass through. And they have issues with ladies going to the bathroom together. At least we didn't call them out on it like they did with us.

That boyish propensity came to mind as I saw a blur rush at Jasper where he was standing near the dresser. Emmett came barreling through the doorway, heading toward Jasper. He had a huge grin on his face but Jasper was clearly not prepared to be the tacklee, since Emmett pushed him backward into the dresser behind him. The CD player came crashing down onto Jasper's head before bouncing off and hanging there by the cord.

"Oh shit, I'm sorry. FUCK. Dude, I'm so fucking sorry." Emmett was vacillating between cursing and apologizing.

Red.

All I saw was red.

The CD player did some serious damage to Jasper's head and I looked away quickly, but not before I saw a cut near his hairline streaming blood. I tried to look anywhere but him, even though I was worried about his well-being.

Instead of focusing on him, my brain decided to hone in on the CD player that was dangling from the wall by the cord, yet still playing as though nothing happened. I heard Roger Waters' voice singing about not needing an education and a giggle escaped from my mouth. Apparently, my mind finds other people's pain hysterical.

Emmett and Jasper both looked at me with wide eyes like I had lost my ever-loving mind. I giggled harder. Jasper, who was losing major amounts of blood, was looking at me questioningly, wondering if I was okay. The whole situation was ridiculous.

"I'm sorry. I'm not laughing at you. You're bleeding. There's blood. There's a lot of blood. And yet the band plays on."

Jasper looked concerned as he grabbed an extra t-shirt out of the dresser. He pressed it to his head and it quickly turned red as well, his blonde hair looking brown in the front where his blood was saturating it.

I sat down on his bed, trying to breathe and not let it be quite so obvious exactly how much blood and I disagreed with each other.

"Man, you should probably go to the hospital. I think you need stitches." Emmett moved closer and tried to examine Jasper's head.

My mind returned to working mode at the mention of the hospital. "Do you think we should call the RA on duty? Maybe they can tell us what to do?"

Jasper and Emmett started to chuckle. Now they're finding humor in this situation? Emmett thrust his large hand toward me and I shook it, looking at him questioningly.

"Emmett McCarty, RA on duty. Breaker of heads. I'll call over to the student health center and let them know that we'll need the ambulance to come on over to the dorm."

Jasper closed his eyes for a second and took a breath. "Maybe Bella can walk me over to the health center and we can catch a ride there?"

They both looked at me expectantly. Time to 'fess up, Bella. Tell them your aversion to blood.

"Sure. That wouldn't be a problem." My mouth and brain were often incongruous.

Emmett walked us outside to the courtyard, apologizing once again. After Jasper assured him that he wasn't planning on suing him, he waved him off and we trekked across the campus to the health center, his arm slung around my shoulders. I tried to not think about the blood that was slowly seeping through the second t-shirt he was holding to his head.

The ride in the back of the ambulance was dizzying. I never realized that riding in a vehicle that had no windows on the sides would feel that way; perhaps the blood didn't help matters. The volunteer workers took Jasper's blood pressure and looked at the wound while I sat across from him, trying my damndest not to throw up or pass out. They turned on the lights and I watched the red bouncing off of street signs through the small windows on the back doors as we sped through the quiet streets of the town that surrounded the college.

Once they had finished getting his vitals, we were close to the hospital, so they called ahead to let them know we'd be coming in soon. Friday nights were usually busy ones in the emergency room (I came to find this out through my college experience, as this was not my last visit to the emergency room) yet, it was pretty quiet when we got there and Jasper found himself seated on a gurney quickly.

I stood there as the attending physician came around the pulled curtain and introduced herself. She moved closer to the gurney to look at the wound and he winced in pain as her fingers touched his head. Jasper's kept his eyes closed as he sat there, trying not to move. I was leaning on the gurney next to him and although his eyes were shut, his hand found mine and he squeezed my fingers as she cleaned the cuts and prepared to stitch his head.

I stared at our entwined fingers so I wouldn't see the blood.

"Bella?" His voice questioned lowly. I hummed in response. "Will you tell me what she's doing? I can't really see and I sort of want to brace myself before she's doing it."

Can I do this?

"Uhhhh, okay." My answer wasn't exactly a confident one, but I figured I could give it a go. I wanted to be strong and I wanted to help him. I reasoned with myself, thinking his head was no longer bleeding much and I would just have to tell him what she was doing with the needle.

That would have been all well and good, except that I have an aversion to needles as well. I started to open my mouth to tell him what she was doing but my head felt like it was underwater while I was trying to speak. My jaw moved slowly and my ears roared with white noise.

Closing my eyes, red flashed inside my lids. I slowly opened them and saw that the physician had laid down the instruments she was using. I could see Jasper attempting to speak to me but I couldn't make out what he was saying. The room spun around me and I felt myself sliding toward the ground.

When I woke, I was on the gurney next to him. Smelling salts waved under my nose as the room sharply came back into focus.

"Shit, Bella! Are you okay?" Jasper asked from his gurney. He tried to prop himself up on his elbows to look at me but fell back from dizziness.

A nurse came back with graham crackers and juice and handed them to me. The absurdity of the situation hit me and I let out an embarrassed laugh. I heard a low laugh coming from his gurney. I looked over at him and I could see him peering at me from under his stained hair and the sleeves of his doctor who was finishing the stitches.

He smiled and reached his hand over once more to clasp mine. I squeezed his hand while once more averting my eyes from the bloodied mess.

"Never better."

KrisBCullen betas this job. We have a date March 12th.

TheHeartofLife and LoreliD – ILY. I think it's our 6 month-aversary soon. That's paper or a paperweight or something?

ElleCC and Miztrezboo are pre-readers AND they are both taking part in the Twi25 as well!

How am I doing with the prompts? How am I doing with the story? How YOU doing? ;)

For red is the color that will make me blue – The Beatles