Chapter Five

Alice had just arrived home and parked her Porsche in the Cullen's driveway. While she turned the ignition off she briefly considered bypassing the front door, and slipping around the side of the house, and finding her way into her room through the window. She envisioned being assailed by Emmett's relentless prods for details and Rosalie's disapproving scowl as soon as she walked in. She was in a good mood from her date with Bella and didn't feel like dealing with a family inquisition about it. At least not tonight.

For the moment she just wanted to keep it to herself. To hold onto those precious last few hours she spent with Bella and keep them someplace special and private. Once she decided she was just going to speed her way past the living room where they sat and dash up to her room, she opened the door and went inside. All Emmett and Rosalie saw of the smallest Cullen was her blurring figure as she ran up the stairs quickly saying, "I'm going up to my room for some alone time, good night" in quick vampire speed that wouldn't have been picked up by the human ear.

"Aww damn, I didn't get a chance to ask her how the date went," Emmett complained.

"I think that was the idea", replied Rosalie dryly as she turned her attention back to her TopGear magazine. Sometimes she wondered if Emmett was ever dropped on his soft spot when he was a baby.

"I guess she didn't get lucky if she's back home already", he whispered low enough for only them to hear.

The statuesque blonde raised a perfectly shaped eyebrow as she continued to peruse her magazine. "Or...she doesn't just want a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am with the human."

Emmett scratched his large head as he glanced up in the general direction of Alice's room. "Huh..."

Once in the privacy of her own room Alice sat on the edge of her bed as she took off her black leather designer shoes. She gingerly rolled her body to lay lengthwise and clasped her hands behind her head on the pillow. She was relieved she momentarily escaped all the endless jibes from her larger brother, and the occasional glances - with hints of worry and a touch of sadness in Rosalie's eyes since her fight with Edward. It felt good to be alone with her thoughts. She was more at ease being at home since Edward had taken off. He had ran off without a word to anybody, but it wasn't the first time he had done something like that. All the Cullens figured the moody vampire just wanted to be alone for a while, and he'd eventually come back as he always did. Alice realized he would be back by Monday. At least for the time being she could totally relax with her thoughts.

Alice usually enjoyed sharing herself with her family, she just wanted to keep whatever happened between Bella and her to herself for a while, although she knew it would be impossible to do so for long. It's bad enough she's had to fight Edward over it, and she knew he wasn't going to give up easily despite Esme's warning. Someone who has been acting that obsessively for weeks wasn't just going to give up without a fight. Certainly not another vampire stuck in the body of a hormonal teen male. Alice knew it would cause ripples within the usually peaceful Cullen household once she decided to pursue Bella. It was one of the reasons she held herself back from her for as long as she had. She just hoped it wouldn't be bad enough to cause irreversible damage to their family bond.

She's never known Edward to take such an intense interest over anybody in all the years she's known him. The thing is, she also felt pulled toward the sensitive brunette from the moment she first saw her. No...even before then. A month or so before Bella's arrival she had seen her in a vision. It was simply a momentary image of a girl's heart shaped face surrounded by long brown hair. She was mesmerized with how perfectly shaped her brown eyes were under straight eyebrows. She was simply beautiful. But what really struck Alice was the feeling of loneliness emanating from her. Alice felt a great empathy for this girl and could relate to her loneliness. This feeling was something she usually kept to herself. She was grateful to have a family with loving parental figures and a lovely home, it wasn't always that way for her. But she always felt something important was missing from her existence.

It was a brief vision but somehow she knew that she'd eventually cross paths with this human girl. She just didn't know when or in what form their relationship would be. It was mostly a feeling of protectiveness and a desire to get close to the girl she was left with.

Alice recalled the time she actually first laid eyes on Bella. She was with her three siblings in the school parking lot. They had arrived a few minutes early and were chatting between their parked cars, mostly about an upcoming family hiking trip they were planning for the next weekend. It was the unusual noises from an older model truck, in a shade of reddish-orange that you just don't see anymore on modern vehicles, as it lumbered into a parking space that first caught their attention. As the figure of a taller brunette stepped out of the truck Alice felt a tingling sense of familiarity. She hadn't seen her face yet as the girl's backside was to them. The girl had stepped into a pothole next to her truck and stumbled, barely managing not to fall over completely. The hole was filled with rainwater from the last storm, which turned mucky as it mixed with dirt and loose asphalt. She was now soaked in it up past her ankle. The girl quietly cursed and shook her leg trying to get the excess water and gunk off her. She leaned down to pick off a few bits of debris off her shoe and dropped her backpack on the ground. Lifting the bag and swinging it over her shoulder, she was then slightly turned in their direction. The girl froze as she unconsciously started to stare at them.

As soon as Alice got a clear look at the brunette's face she recognized her. So it was the new girl who's pending arrival the whole school had been buzzing about she had seen in her vision. This clumsy school girl, dressed in an androgynous casual fashion, who stood there gaping at them.

It was at this instant moment of recognition when Alice first felt that pull. If her heart still could beat she was sure that it would have been pounding at the sight.

Alice became vaguely aware of the other Cullens as they started to gather their school bags and brought her awareness back to them. She started walking with them in the brunette's direction, towards the building. She glanced at the new girl who was still standing as if frozen and looking at them. Alice smiled in amusement as the oddly attractive girl still wore that curious fish that's just been caught expression on her face. She took the moment to absorb all she could see of the clumsy girl, her amber eyes lightly dancing up and down her slender body before landing back up to chocolate brown eyes. The curious brunette suddenly seemed self conscious. She blushed and quickly turned towards the building as she headed for her first day at school.

Unfortunately it wasn't long afterward that Edward started to show unusual interest in the same girl. Alice never spoke of her vision to anyone as it happened when she was hunting alone in the forest. Also, she wasn't all too sure what to make of it at the time. She spent a lot of time during the first few weeks of Bella's arrival wondering what she should do, or whether or not she should do anything at all.

When she started having visions of Edward's secret nightly visits in Bella's bedroom as she slept she wanted to scream. The few times she experienced these visions it took all her self control not to track him down and drag her creepy brother out of the girl's bedroom and toss him out her window. Of course she couldn't do that without the risk of waking and scaring the poor girl. And there were times when she wondered if this girl was meant to be in her life only as her brother's girlfriend, once Edward would get past his bizarre behavior and just start courting her normally. Well, as normally as a vampire could with a human anyway.

She realized now that she was deluding herself with those thoughts. Whenever she now thought about Edward creeping into Bella's bedroom she felt her skin crawl and felt disgusted. An anger would begin to grow inside of her threatening to explode into a fit of rage. These feelings were so terrifying to Alice and she wasn't sure if it made sense to feel this strongly for someone she really didn't even know. So she let those few weeks pass as she struggled to come to terms with these strange emotions.

Now she's not sure how or why she let it go on for as long as it did, but she now knows that she would never let it happen again. She would do whatever it took to protect Bella, even if it was from her brother.

Thoughts about her evening with Bella made Alice start to feel better and she could feel a warmth growing inside of her. A soft smile grew on her lips as she recalled they had touched Bella's cheeks that night.