Next chapter will be a lot, lot, lot sooner. Be excited!!

I push open the door to the kitchen and step inside. Emmett told me that Esme might be in here. She's not. I turn on my heel to leave… and walk right into her.

"Esme!" I cry.

"Oh, Bella," she says, giving me a hug. She doesn't look a bit different. She has the same feathery caramel hair, same heart-shaped face, same compassionate features, and wide understanding eyes. I realize how much I've missed everyone here. With the exception of him. Some people never change, I guess. Seriously though, everyone here still looks like they're 18.

"Guess who's coming to dinner, Esme?" I smile.

"You?" she guesses. Oh, well, yeah.

"Besides me," I wait. Esme waits. I sigh, "I was talking to Alice and she seemed really, tense I guess, about this Jasper guy. I was just wondering what that's about…?" I trail off.

"You'll see," Esme says, shaking her head. "You will see."

---------

Dinner was horrible. Not the food of course, since Esme's an amazing chef, but the atmosphere. It was just horrible. And not just any kind of horrible, an intense, awkward, aggravated kind of horrible.

At first I thought it was because of how Edward was strenuously ignoring me. Or how Tanya kept trying to "accidently" dump her food all over me. Or how Emmett kept bringing up awkward things about Edward and I. Or how something weird was going on between Esme and Carlisle. But then I realized that it was because…. Jasper Hale came to dinner.

Alice was bent over her plate, her head tilted so far down that you couldn't see her face. The same face that had been agonizingly covered with make-up. She looked absolutely gorgeous. But it made no sense. If the person she was trying to impress was Jasper then why was she being so…. Well, mean?

I mean, honestly, if you want someone to like you, you shouldn't yell at them, and be nasty, and… make them fall accidently into a fountain. Are we talking about Jasper and Alice or Me and Edward?

"Edward and I," Carlisle corrects.

"Gah?!" I am completely aghast. Did I say that out loud?

"Yes," Edward smirks. Do I have no filter?

"Apparently not," Esme remarks.

My jaw is practically on the table when Tanya says, "Isabella, are you quite alright?" in this puzzled tone.

"No, I'm not alright!" I practically shout. "Everyone just heard me talking about me and Edward!"

"Edward and I," Carlisle corrects.

"Same thing!"

Carlisle trails off, "Not really…"

All around the table confused looks are exchanged. I can no longer tell if it's about grammar or my private thoughts.

Esme says, in a much needed effort to clear the air, "Well, Carlisle was saying that him and Edward--"

"Hence the Edward and I," Carlisle interjects.

Esme pauses and continues, "went out to Riley's house. I was wondering if they had a race with those stupid expensive cars of theirs. And then Carlisle asked if Riley won for once and then I said 'apparently not' because of the smirk on Edward's face and---why am I explaining this to you?"

I opened my mouth to say something then shrugged my shoulders.

"Anyways," says Jasper. There's an awkward pause.

Alice drops her knife on the wood floor with a loud clatter. She bends down to get it and Jasper looks over her. She straightens back up and bangs the back of her head on his chin.

"Ow!"

"God!"

Jasper's hand leaps to his chin in annoyance and Alice rubs the back of her head, glaring at him.

"What?!" He says in outright confusion. "You're the one who dropped it on the ground and then insisted on breaking my face in a failed attempt to retrieve it." Alice's jaw drops and I look across the table to see Emmett sniggering behind a napkin.

"God, Bella," Emmett whispers to me. "Watching them is just hilarious. This one time, during Christmas dinner Jasper said something about Alice's hair and she threw a dinner roll at him. And then he threw broccoli at her. So then I threw a carrot at Edward because, I mean, well, why not? And then there was this whole food fight for like 10 seconds before Esme broke it up but Alice and Jasper kept at it for a while afterward."

Carlisle overheard us and chuckled lightly to himself. "Don't tell Esme but it actually was pretty funny. Alice jumped on his head and Jasper was sent reeling backwards. They wrestled for a good 5 min---"

Esme had swung her head around and glared at Carlisle with the full force of her deep brown eyes.

"A-a-aaaand how is the weather in Tokyo?" Carlisle spit out.

An intense silence befalls the room with the exception of Alice and Jasper who are having some sort of heated argument. Whose idea was it for them to sit together?

Tanya attempts to make conversation. "So, Belle, what have you been up to this whole long time you were away?" She widens her blue eyes at me innocently. I want to stab her with a fork. But that would be too good for her. And Esme might be mad if I got blood on her tablecloth.

"Well… I actually went to--" I catch a glimpse of Edward. He's ignoring me very strenuously but I know him well enough to understand that he's listening. "I went to this…place. With these people. You know… the place?" I have no idea what I'm talking about. Why can't I just tell them that it doesn't matter where I went or what I did, that it only matters that I came back?

I look to Emmett for help. "Oh, yeah…" he says slowly. "The place… with the… thing. I know what you're talking about…"

Tanya bounces on her seat. "I don't get it. I'm confused!"

"You're not used to being stupid? What? Haven't you already been alive for, like twelve years or something?" I have no idea where that came from. Honestly.

"I. Am. Not. Twelve." She grits out.

"Oh," I say. Shut up, Bella. "My bad."

"Anyways, Belle," Tanya continues angrily. "You wouldn't know would you? Since you haven't BEEN HERE."

Before I even realize what's going on a bread roll sails through the air and hits her square in the face. Her expression is priceless.

I continue eating when a piece of asparagus hits my neck and slides down into my shirt. I look up slowly and dangerously pulling it out and grabbing a bowl of cranberry sauce. This is war. I fling it over the table---

Where it hits not Tanya, but… Edward. It falls out and lands on the table but there's still a bit in his hair. Oh, dear. Maybe I should start running now…

The silence is deafening. No one moves a muscle except for Jasper who continues sipping his soup like nothing's wrong.

Alice elbows him.

He throws a roll at her. "What we aren't still doing that?"

She leaps up in a fury, tipping back her chair and launching herself at his head. His hands go up to try and catch her. Which he does, but then his chair tips over and she lands on top of him. She starts screaming random things at him that I don't understand.

Jasper stretches his arm up to the table grabbing a napkin from underneath his plate. It tips his soup which spills on Tanya's satin heels causing her to jump up knocking her plate into Edward's lap which was absolutely no reason for him to throw a dinner roll at me.

I retaliate throwing the same one back.

Esme dives across the table knocking all the plates towards Carlisle. "NOO!!!! NOT THE BREAD ROLLS!!" she screams. Carlisle stands up pushing the table cloth back in my direction. Emmett gathers all the rolls he can find chucking them with incredible speed at everyone in sight. Jasper's gagged Alice with the napkin and is now on top of her screaming for her to calm down. I look around. Oh dear.

"EVERYONE STOP!!!" I scream at the top of my lungs. Everyone freezes like they were Ice Sculptures. Alice knees Jasper in the balls causing him to collapse on top of her. She beats him with her tiny fists. There's a muffled 'get off me you freak.'

I sit calmly back down on my haywire chair. "It is stormy in Tokyo today."