Previously…

Our clammy palms parted just as Rose came round the corner. She took the seat beside Alice and sighed melodramatically. "God. What is with the morons in this town? Some senior just offered to 'let me' blow him. Dude, I'll blow you if I want to, not because you let me. What a dick." Then she looked between Alice and I, her big blue eyes taking in our moods. "What? What's going on?"

"Nothing," Alice and I replied at the same time.

Rose narrowed her eyes but let it go. She dug into her bag to find her cell phone and check her messages from her friends back in Chicago.

Alice sighed and went back to checking her make-up in her little mirror.

I bent down to carry on with my homework.

For a moment, just a moment, things went back to normal.

"Never regret something that once made you smile." - Amber Deckers

The Dash in Between

Chapter 7 – A Few Measly Sentences

Bella POV

I'll always remember my dad telling me "never regret something that once made you smile". They were some of his words that I knew would stick with me for the rest of my life, whether they were the right words to follow at the moment that I pulled them to the front of my mind, or not.

When I was younger, Mom had worked on the reservation in La Push for a man named Billy Black. Billy had been a good friend of my dad's so, when Mom had had me fresh out of high school, Billy had welcomed her onto his team to work full-time as a secretary for his company while Dad went to train to be a cop. The original plan had been for her to work there until Dad had a proper job and could keep the three of us afloat, but she had enjoyed it so much that she couldn't bring herself to stop. When Dad became chief of police they made sure to manage their shifts so that someone was always home to take care of me. Dad was a terrible cook so whenever Mom was working we dialled the number of the take-out that we both knew by heart and had pizza, or Chinese, or Indian every other day which I, being seven, was perfectly happy with. The yummy, crappy food wasn't the only advantage of Mom's working evenings, though, nor was it the best. The best thing that had come out of Mom's job; was Jacob.

Jacob Black was Billy's son, and he was a year older than me. From the day we first met, when I was four and he five, we had little kiddie crushes on each other. It didn't take long for us to become 'girlfriend and boyfriend', and even my father couldn't complain about me having a boyfriend when that boyfriend was Jake. He was a complete gentleman; when we went to the park he pushed me on the swings and let me go down the slide first, lying his jacket at the bottom so that I wouldn't fall on the wet grass; when we bought sweets he'd give me all of the orange ones because he knew that I liked them best; when we went to the little beach in La Push he bought me ice creams and let me use his special spade. It was cute. We were cute.

Mom loved our little relationship, thought it was adorable. We did the usual thing that little girlfriends and boyfriends did; we held hands occasionally (wearing gloves, though; we were always wary of the other person's cooties), and we sent little Valentines cards in the post; those cards were what had started the letters.

Every week, we traded letters via my Mom. At first, it was brilliant. Every week Jake would send me long letters in his wonky handwriting and bad spellings telling me about his week, and his school, and his friends. I'd do the same, but my handwriting was a little wonkier and my spelling a little worse.

When it was coming up to my eighth birthday, though, Jake's letters became more and more infrequent and there was less and less content, while I still sent detailed descriptions of my week. Eventually, his letters dropped to one a fortnight and even then there were only one or two sentences. Once he just sent the stickers that came free with his bubblegum, and that was it for a whole month.

I was crushed.

But then Mom had given me his phone number and I had nervously called him and asked what had happened to his letters. He had apologised and promised to send a proper letter that week. So there I was, sat on the living room floor with a plate of cold pizza on my lap because I was too hyped up to eat. Dad watched a baseball game on the TV from his usual armchair and I watched the clock, counting down the seconds until I would have my boyfriends' words in my hands.

When I heard the door click shut, I shot to the hallway and begged my mom to give me the letter. She did. I took it back through to the living room and sat cross-legged in front of the fire as I ripped it open. I had been expecting something brilliant. What I received was something completely different. A photo from a disposable camera of Jacob and a girl, and a little sheet of four bubblegum stickers. I turned the photo over and read the words on the back.

Hey Bella, it read, This is me and my girlfriend Leah. We had a cool week. We had ice cream. It was fun. What did you do? See ya. From Jake

That was it. And I could see that I had stopped being his girlfriend long ago, and had started being that irritating girl that bugged him all of the time with her childish letters. I made Mom drop her dinner on the floor in shock at my screams and shrieks of "I fucking hate Jacob fucking Black!" Then I had run up to my bedroom and recovered the box of all of the letters – or lack thereof – that he had sent me over the years and started ripping them up.

A few minutes later, Mom and Dad came in. I crawled into Dad's lap and cried, and he rubbed soothing circles on my back while Mom explained that boys had problems committing and Jacob had just moved on and I should too. She had even said "there are plenty more fish in the sea" which was about as clichéd as you could get. Then the beeper for her second dinner had gone off, and she had gone downstairs to get it.

Dad had squeezed me tightly and then seen the letters that lay on the floor ripped into teeny tiny pieces.

"I fucking hate him," I mumbled moodily.

"Now, now, Bells, there's no need for that language," he had scolded softly.

My cheeks heated a little; I hated when my dad told me off. "I wish he had never bought me that stupid ice cream in the first place."

"Bella," he had said then, "you can never, ever regret something that once made you smile. If it made you happy, even for just the one minute, then it was worth it. Because life is so short that any happiness we can get out of it is to be valued, and never regretted. All of the heartache in the world is worth a little happiness."

I had looked up at him, confused. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I remember when a nice young girl and a nice young boy both got thrown out from their homes when their parents found out that they were having a baby. They were both very sad, and it was very difficult for them to find a new home and things for their baby. But their baby made them so very, very happy that all of the sadness in the world would have been worth it." Dad smiled and his eyes creased up in the corners.

"That's you and Mom," I whispered.

"Exactly," he whispered back. Then he gently lifted me off of his lap and put me on my bed. "Just remember that, sweetie. Life's too short not to be happy."

And he was so right.

I had seen Jacob only two more times since.

The first of which was at my dad's funeral just six months after that night. His words held a lot of meaning to me then, as my world fell to pieces: life's too short not to be happy. Jacob had tried to talk to me, but I wouldn't have it. I told him that he was a meanie and walked off.

The second time I saw him had been when I was twelve, at his mom, Sarah's, funeral. I was halfway through my first year of consolidation; the first time that the cancer had gone away. I said that I was sorry for his loss; he said that he was sorry about the cancer. We hugged a little. But saying sorry didn't bring his mom back, nor did it stop my leukaemia from returning.

Sarah's death did do one good thing, though. My mom spoke with Billy again and he had told her that her job was always open to her if she ever wanted it back. This had been at the stage when I had wanted to move away, leave the place that everyone knew that I was sick, so Mom had taken him up on it. Two months later we had moved back to Forks, and I had never looked back.

As I wandered toward the bike sheds from the library, I mulled Dad's words over in my head. "Never, ever regret something that once made you happy." I had been happy talking to Edward. I shouldn't regret it. But, oh I did. I knew why, too. Because I knew that deep down I had subconsciously been hoping that he would really be a pig to talk to, a complete bastard, and then I could get over him and his very lickable jaw and move on. But he wasn't. Talking with Edward was almost better than looking at him. He was smart, but still interesting, and funny without trying too hard; he had even made me smile and that was a pretty damn hard thing to do. Conversation with him, the little bits of it that we indulged in anyway, was so easy, natural; like breathing. That was why I was so scared. And that was why I regretted it.

I was becoming attached after a few measly sentences.

And if I became attached, there was the possibility that he would also become attached. And I just couldn't hurt anyone that way. I couldn't bear the thought of becoming really, really good friends with Edward – or anyone else, for that matter – and then letting them down by dying. It was something I just did not want to do. But it was also something that I had absolutely no control over.

I pushed those thoughts out of my head and fished my BlackBerry out of my bag so that I could glance at the time on the screen.

Oh God, I'd done it now.

I was five minutes late. The bell had rung five minutes ago. Em and Jazz knew that I had a free second period, so they'd wonder where I was. I was always there before either of them were, and now I'd arrive last. What the fuck was I going to tell them?

I still hadn't come up with an excuse when I rounded the corner and ditched my bag beside my upturned bucket, flopping down on it exhaustedly.

"Hey, Baby Bell, where were you?" Em asked instantly. He had two cigarettes in his mouth already. Yes, at the same time.

"God, just please pass me a smoke," I said because, hell, I needed it.

Jasper wordlessly tossed me his packet and lighter. He knew that I'd give him one of mine in return later on. I cupped my hand around the end as I lit it and then relaxed almost instantly as the smoke hit my lungs. I held back a cough – I had inhaled too fast – and leant back against the bit of the shed behind my bucket.

I didn't miss the glance Em and Jazz exchanged as I lit another cigarette to smoke at the same time a moment later.

"What's up Bell?" Em spoke up first. "You never do double."

"Well, I am today," I muttered. "Thanks." I tossed Jazz his lighter and smokes back.

Jasper shuffled his bucket closer to me. "What's up B? Really, you can tell us anything."

"Totally," Em agreed. "If you're a lesbian – or even bi – just let it out. Honestly we won't feel any differently about you."

I stared at him. "What?"

Jasper pulled his shoe off of his foot and threw it at Em's head. "You moron!" he hissed.

"Ouch!" Emmett rubbed his head where the impact was.

I looked between the two of them; Jasper was red-faced mortification, and Em was encouraging. Then I burst out laughing. "Oh God," I managed to get out between completely unflattering giggle-snorts. "You think I'm gay?" My stomach was heaving painfully and my eyes were streaming. I hadn't laughed like this in ages, and it hurt, but the hurt was so fucking good. It wasn't real laughing, it was kind of hysterical; like I had just snapped.

Jazz rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly and that made me stop laughing abruptly because that action reminded me of Edward. The same Edward who scared the shit out of me. I pushed him out of my head before I started crying. Or shaking. Or maybe even hyperventilating. I looked at Jazz. "Was this your idea?"

"No, Emmett's," he answered. "All Emmett's."

"You pisshead, it was your idea!" Em said, leaning across to shove Jasper's arm.

"Relax, guys, I don't mind." I settled the peace before this could turn into a brawl. "But I am absolutely, definitely not a lesbian. Or bisexual for that matter."

"Right, because you were totally checking out Cullen's ass the other day, right, Bell?" Emmett reminded me, in a lame-ass attempt to prove that he had never been wrong.

I glared at him. "Come on. That boy is hot enough to turn either one of you gay; you can't blame me for sparing a little glance here and there."

Jazz and Em exchanged another look. After a moment, Jazz shrugged. "Beauty's in the eye of the beholder, I guess," he said eventually.

I rolled my eyes. "Come on. He is hot."

"We don't check out guys, Bell." Em snickered. "Me and Jazz are into the ladies." He stretched out the word 'ladies', probably thinking that it sounded smooth.

"What a shame that the 'ladies' aren't into you," I quipped, after blowing out a stream of smoke.

"Come on," Emmett mimicked me. "The ladies who aren't clinically insane totally dig this-" he gestured to his muscles "-over weedy kids with stupid hair and OCD tendencies any day."

"I'll have you know that his hair is awesome, and… well, yeah, he seems to have OCD but whatever it's probably some kind of weird-ass anxiety thing about moving to a new place; it'll go with time."

Jasper cocked an eyebrow at me.

"What?" I asked defensively. "I saw a program about OCD on a health channel once." Or rather, I had caught the end of it before some stupid thing about leukaemia that my mom had wanted to watch with me.

The bell rang as Jasper and Emmett snorted disbelievingly and we all stubbed out our cigarettes. I shared out some minty gum, and Jasper got his shoe back from where he had thrown it, and then we headed to class.

Jasper and I took our usual seats at the back; him slouching against the wall and me right beside him. The two seats to my left were always left empty; no one wanted to chance sitting with the freaks. That was more than fine with Jasper and I.

Today, though, was different.

"So," Jazz said, propping his feet on the desk and leaning back in his seat, "I was thinking. It's Em's birthday soon and we should totally do something. We didn't really do anything on yours. At all."

I frowned. "When's Em's birthday?"

Jasper rolled his eyes, knowing about my inability to remember these kinds of things. "Tuesday."

"Right. Yeah. I remember."

"Liar." Jazz poked out his tongue.

I poked mine right back.

Jazz opened his mouth to speak again, but another voice beat him to the punch. One that didn't belong to me.

"Excuse me?" The voice was light, and bright, and very, very feminine.

Jazz and I turned simultaneously to look up – but only very slightly – at the tiny frame of the girl before us. It was Alice Cullen. Jasper drew his feet off of the desk to see her better.

She bit her lip and looked to me. "Is it okay if I sit here?" she asked, gesturing to the empty seat beside me.

I was about to respond when Jasper did it for me.

"Sure, doll," he said easily, placing emphasis on his Texan twang which he only did when he was flirting.

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes and kicked his black-converse-clad foot under the desk.

As Alice settled herself in the seat beside me, I turned back to Jazz though I lowered my voice now that we had a neighbour. "What do you suggest we do, then?"

"Well-" he softened his voice, too "-I thought that we should get as much alcohol as we can and go to the den and get shitfaced. Emmett would like that."

I furrowed my brow. "Isn't that pretty much exactly what we did for my birthday?"

"Nah. We'll leave the weed this time; that shit's expensive."

"'kay," I muttered as Mrs Goff came into the room.

As she started talking, my mind – predictably – started drifting back to Edward Cullen. I wondered what his sister would tell him about us after sitting next to us in Spanish. I wondered if she'd tell him that we had virtually ignored her when she sat down. I wondered whether he was the protective type of big brother. What if she did tell him and he hated me?

He should hate me. It would be much better – both for him and for me – if he hated me and didn't get attached. But, of course, following the developments in our… acquaintanceship (I didn't feel like I could really call it a relationship yet) that morning, I was becoming attached.

I looked over at Alice. I took in her childlike expression and pointed features that reminded me of magical creatures that sat on toadstools all doe-eyed and pretty; just like Alice. Her black hair stuck out from her head like a wild ink spatter and her thin lips naturally curved upwards even when she looked impassive as she did now. Her eyes were big and a very light shade of blue; almost grey.

My brow furrowed as I was hit for the second time for that day of the differences in all of the Cullens' appearances. Rosalie, Alice and Edward all looked nothing alike; they all had different bone structure, hair colour, eye colour… you name it. They were all completely and utterly different. And Carlisle… none of them really looked like Carlisle. Rosalie could have inherited her hair from him, I supposed, but it wasn't that similar. And he had hazel eyes while she had bright blue. Plus, that would have to mean that Edward and Alice looked like their mom and those two were the least alike of all of them.

There was something odd about the Cullen family; that much was obvious.

I thought back to my earlier conversation with Edward, and the cryptic remarks he had made. He seemed to only speak in totally indecipherable phrases. I supposed that I wasn't much better.

God, I had said the word 'orgasm' in front of him.

I felt my cheeks flush with embarrassment at the memory. Why was I worried about Jasper and I scaring Alice off when I'd clearly already scared Edward off myself?

But then why would he ask if we could sit together every day? And, even more confusing than that, why had I said yes? I knew the answer to that without even having to think about it; because I had wanted to. Edward Cullen had this strange effect on me that no one had ever had on me before and I would have been lying if I said that it didn't scare the hell out of me. He made me feel… lighter. Happier. He almost made me forget everything and just want to be. When I was with him, I no longer felt obligated to live for other people like my mom and Phil; I actually wanted to stay alive for me. Because I had found something that I wanted; I wanted to know more about Edward. And not just the big things. In fact, the big things weren't the most important to me. What I wanted to know most about him were tiny, trivial, pathetic little things. Things like whether he slept on his stomach or his back, what his little mannerisms were, whether he was a morning person or not… I had never wanted to know such pointless things about anyone before.

And then there was the other thing about him; he wasn't at all what I had been expecting. Not in the slightest. He was gorgeous, smart and funny – I had known that – yet he didn't try to be any of those things. He was so modest – almost naive – and he wasn't the cliché that I had wrongly suspected that he would be. He didn't want the girls hanging off of his arms, or to be prom king or captain of the football team. Hell, he did Home Economics for fucks sake! The worst thing about him, though, was that he was far, far too perceptive. He noticed the things that I didn't say as well as the things that I did, and that didn't bode well for someone with a shitload of secrets.

I sighed and let my head fall into my hands; what on earth was I getting myself into?

#x#

I didn't even look Edward's way at lunchtime, as much as it pained me not to do so; I couldn't appear too eager. But, though I never would have admitted it, I was keyed up throughout the lunch hour as I waited for Biology. I wondered whether he would speak to me again, or whether I would get the guts up to speak to him.

So, when the bell rang for fourth period, I said a nervous goodbye to Emmett and Jasper after we had all agreed to ditch fifth in favour of smoking it up. Then I headed off to Biology feeling like a skittish colt.

I was late today. Edward was already sat at our desk and Mr Banner had already started the lesson. He glanced my way when I came in but said nothing, so I blushed and scurried quickly and quietly to the back of the room to take my place beside Edward. He was taking notes on what Mr Banner was saying, a small crease set deep between his dark brows as he thought. When I pulled my chair out, he looked up and shot me a small smile before ducking his head back down again.

I beamed as I sat down and opened my bag. I pulled my Biology folder out of my bag, accidentally sending my packet of cigarettes sliding toward Edward. He caught the packet in his hand without looking up, and then glanced at it. He just raised his eyebrows and then slid them back to me without a comment or sideways glance.

As if the tampon incident wasn't bad enough. Oh, and the orgasm thing. Fabulous.

We worked steadily in silence all lesson, not once acknowledging each other despite the time that we had spent together that morning. When the bell rang at the end of the lesson, though, Edward turned to me. "You know smoking is bad for you, right?"

I raised my eyes to his face, feigning nonchalance when really, inside, I was happy that he cared. "Of course I do." I ducked my head again and muttered, so that only I could hear, "That is kind of the point."

"So why'd you do it?"

I shrugged. "It's relaxing?"

"Huh."

Once all of my stuff was in my bag I turned my whole body to face him. "I guess I'll see you in English tomorrow."

"I was going to walk to gym with you," he said, brushing an awkward hand through his hair. I noticed that light bronze hairs adorned the backs of his wrists, and his fingers were really long. I felt a strange, sudden urge to suck on them. And then my mind wandered a little, as I thought about what he could do with fingers that long.

I cleared my throat a little in an attempt to rid my head of the thoughts that were currently invading it. "I'm not going to gym," I said, finally managing to divert my eyes from his wonderful fingers. I turned around and headed for the door, knowing that he would follow me.

"Oh." He sounded kind of disappointed. He walked through the door that I held open for him. "Why not?"

I shrugged. "It's unnecessary. And I don't do it, anyway."

"I noticed. Why don't you do it?"

I hugged my ring binder to my chest. "Uh…"

"Sorry. You don't have to say if you don't want to."

I looked up at him, surprised. No one ever said that. People always wanted to know the 'how's, 'why's and 'where's of everything. "Um… thanks."

We both drew to a stop as we reached the corner that we had to part at.

"I guess I'll see you tomorrow then?" Edward asked half-heartedly.

"Yeah." I was suddenly overcome with the urge to kiss him. I shut my eyes and shook my head, trying to shake the urge away. Then I sighed and opened my eyes. "See ya."

Edward smiled slightly and then turned and headed down the empty corridor.

"Edward?" I called after him.

"Yeah?" He looked back.

"I… I have a medical condition." I smiled shyly at him. "See you tomorrow." And then I turned round and headed out to my truck before he could respond and ask me any questions; just because I had wanted to let Edward in a little bit and tell him a half-truth didn't mean that I wanted to tell him everything.

But, as Jasper's mom would have said, it was a start.

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

Pfft, long time no speak huh? I'm so sorry about the lack of updates for the last few weeks; I've been working my bum off editing THWTLAL since it's being read by publishers soon. It's NOT being actually published, just read. I don't want to explain all of this again because it makes me blush but just see my profile if you want to know :)

I've actually had most of this chapter since before I last updated. I just hadn't written the last Biology bit and I felt that that had to be in this chapter so I had to wait until I had a moment to put it in :)

Before you all start panicking, no, Jacob will not be coming back and declaring his love for her or whatever. You all know that I cannot write him without making him evil or gay so we'll leave that out lol.

BTW if you know any people that read this and are unaware of the title change then please let them know for me since the review count was considerably lower last chapter and I'm worried that people are still waiting for updates on 'Taking Chances' which this is no longer called :/

REC OF THE WEEK: Hydraulic Level 5 by Gondolier. I'm pretty sure that I'm the last person to read this but, if I'm not, then you should go and read it! This story is so popular that it has its own clothing range (sorta) and its own famous slogans (cliff-hucking floozy is my favourite ;)) but don't let that intimidate you. It deserves all of the praise that it has gotten and it is deliciously angsty with enough fluff and humour dotted here and there to make the angst not be too overbearing. It's superb!

AND I'm currently reading Just Wait by InstantKarmaGirl. I'm not too far in yet but what I have read is excellent and I'm looking forward to reading the rest. I would rec it later on but the author is going to pull it for publishing on the 1ST OCTOBER so if you want to read it, I'd get round to it sooner rather than later.

Thank you so much for all of the reviews so far and I would really, really love more because I am greedy ;) Do you think we can hit 325 reviews with this chapter? We're at 281 at the moment so that's… 44 :/ Hmm, I'm not sure. Maybe we can try?

Thank you all so much :)

-Steph