Hello my dear readers!

I apologise severely for not updating; I have been extremely busy with school (assignments, exams, the usual) and I hope that you can understand. :( I really enjoy being in my little fanfiction world, and I'm back! So hopefully there'll be regular updates... and perhaps some new stories! :)

Anyway, I'm done with the confessions... read on! You know the usual - the characters do not belong to me, however I dream that they did... don't all Twilight fans?

I hope you like it :)

CHAPTER 4 - INVITATION

"Hello Alice," A new voice said. I turned to see who it was, but I couldn't recognise the face. It was a boy, I was sure of that. He had messy hair, like Edward, yet it was blond. He was muscular, and he had dark eyes too. He looked at me and smiled. We stopped walking in the corridor, but the corridor was still bustling of activity. A few people bumped into us and shook their heads in pity, then kept walking. It felt bizarre but kind of nice to be surrounded by pretty people.

"You must be Bella," he said. He had a slight British accent too, yet it wasn't as nice as Edwards'. He held out his hand for me to shake. It must be a British thing to do, yet I was quite impressed by their politeness.

"Yes," I shook his hand. He was cold too. Maybe it was another British thing; cold skin.

"We've heard a lot about you," he said, his eyes flickered towards Edward. I looked at Edward as his eyes drifted towards the floor. Alice giggled.

"So, I don't mean to be rude or anything, but you haven't told me your name. I don't know who you are," I looked at the boy in the eyes.

"Jasper. Jasper Cullen. If you like; Alice and Edward's brother," he gave me a smile and wrapped his arms around Alice's waist and she gave him a hug back.

"How many kids are in your family?" I asked Jasper.

"Five," Edward answered me.

"Wow, and I thought our household was crowded," I said.

They laughed at my comment and I looked away, hoping none of them would notice the blush that was implanted on my face.

"You're good, Bella." Jasper laughed.

"You think so? Maybe I should become a comedian, earn some money," I replied.

Jasper and his family continued to laugh. "Maybe you should."

"I'm just so funny; I'll be a millionaire in no time!" I added sarcastically.

"That actually was quite funny, Bella." Edward looked at me. He smiled the crooked smile.

"If you say so." Our eyes locked and wouldn't let go. It felt like he had me imprisoned into his own little fantasy. Only it wasn't imprisonment, just invitation.

"Well, I'd better go and get my lunch before the canteen run out of food. It was nice meeting you, Jasper. I'll see you around," I smiled at Jasper and turned to keep walking.

"See you later, Bella!" Alice called over to me as I walked away.

"Oh, okay." Jasper still had his arms wrapped tightly around Alice's waist, so I guessed she was staying with Jasper for morning tea.

The menu was the usual; juice and toast with a piece of fruit. I scanned the daily specials board and noticed that hot chocolate was also available.

"Maybe you should have the hot cocoa, Bella," Edward whispered in my ear. I turned and looked up at him. I had never actually noticed what Edward looked like in the school uniform, but it suited him nicely. He looked masculine and posh. Edward's gorgeous crooked smile appeared. It seemed like his trademark.

"Actually, I was thinking of going for the hot chocolate. It might warm me up on a day like this. What are you going to have?" I asked Edward.

"Same as you," he purred. "Two hot chocolates please miss," he ordered from the canteen woman.

I dug out my five-dollar note from my pocket but was interrupted by Edward's whisper; "On me."

"No, it's all right," I told him as I continued to dig in my pocket for my note.

"Bella, please," He whispered.

"Fine," I growled.

"Let's go," he said, the tray with the two hot chocolates in his arms. He led the way towards a table.

"Aren't we going to go and sit with the others?" I asked Edward as we were walking.

"I thought we could just have a day to ourselves," He purred, looking over his shoulder and into my eyes. "If that's all right with you," The crooked smile appeared again.

"Ah, sure." What would Jonathan and Josie think? Maybe I should go and tell them that I was going to spend the day with Edward. Maybe they'd get suspicious too.

Edward sat at a table that was deserted. All the tables around were empty. He looked up at me and smiled.

"You really don't care that everyone's going to talk, do you?" I asked him.

"Nope," He replied, taking one hot chocolate off the tray and handing it over to me. I sat opposite him and took a sip of the hot chocolate. It was quite nice, but very sweet.

Edward took a sip of his too. "It's nowhere near as good as yours," He said as he placed the cup on the table.

"It's very sweet," I commented.

"Yes, but it doesn't come with a marshmallow," he said, frowning.

"I thought that was part of the deal," I said, recounting what Edward had said when he had come to my house yesterday afternoon.

"So did I," He agreed. We continued sipping at our hot chocolates and looked at each other in the eyes. It was peaceful in the canteen, something that happened only rarely. All of a sudden, Edward looked at the ground and fake coughed.

"What?" I asked him. He looked at me in the eyes, but then I realised that he wasn't looking at me. Edward was looking past me, behind me. I heard footsteps then, coming towards me.

"Bella?" A familiar boys' voice asked. I heard this voice many times before, but I couldn't put a face to it. I turned around in my seat and saw Jonathan looking down at me.

"Yes Jonathan?" I asked him. So this was what Edward was bothered about, but why?

"I was wondering if you'd like to come with me to the disco on Saturday." He looked at the ground, and blushed.

"What disco?" I asked him.

"There's a disco on Saturday. Everyone's been talking about it for the past week. We all think you're going together," Jonathan's eyes flickered between Edward and I. Edward chuckled slyly.

"No, I didn't even know there was a disco on this weekend," I tried to ignore Edward.

"So would you like to come with me?"

I took a deep breath and looked at Edward. He shrugged and looked away. "Jonathan. I'm not the disco type. I don't really like the doof-doof music they have and I can't dance. Sorry."

"Okay, I guess that's cool," Jonathan looked at the ground. I could tell he was upset.

"Maybe you should go with Josie though. She's been talking about you a lot lately," I suggested. I wanted to cheer up Jonathan, but not cheer him up in the way that I would be involved in dancing to loud music.

"Hey, that's a good idea!" Jonathan had a smile on his face now. This was a good sign. "I like your advice, Bella. You're a great person to talk to. Thanks again," Jonathan said before turning around and running away to find Josephine.

"Let's see if anyone else asks you to the disco, hey?" Edward told me.

"Why would anyone else ask me to the disco? They all think that we're together."

"No, they don't think we're together. They're just jealous of me."

"Why would they be jealous of you? And how do you know that that's what they are? For all I know, it could be that they just wanted to annoy me; to make me upset."

"They're jealous that I spend my time with a beautiful person, a person that's beautiful on the inside and out. How do I know this? Don't I know everything?"

"Ha ha," I was not used to using sarcasm, but these days, I needed it a lot.

"It's true," He raised his eyebrows and smiled.

"The bell's going to ring anytime now." A few seconds later, the bell for second period rang. I rose out of my seat, grabbed my empty cup and made my way to the exit of the canteen.

"By the way, this hot chocolate tasted like dirt compared to the one you made me." Edward's crooked smiles made me feel happy. "So, would you like to join me for lunch?"

"Yes," I answered as I threw my empty cup into the rubbish bin on the way to my second class. Second period was quite boring, apart from the fact that Josephine was in my class. She wasn't the talkative type, yet today she had a lot to talk about.

"Guess what happened at morning tea, Bella?" She asked me, excitedly. There was a massive grin on her face; one that only appeared occasionally.

"What happened?" I asked.

"Jonathan asked me out to the disco! Isn't that brilliant?" She was nearly jumping out of her seat now.

"That's great, Josie!" I said. Jonathan had followed my advice.

"Who are you going with Bella?" Josie asked me.

"I'm not going," I answered.

"Why not?" She seemed disappointed.

"I'm going into the city on Saturday, to go shopping for all sorts of things. I can't dance either," I explained, shrugging. I needed to go shopping by myself, as I hadn't been for a while. I immediately thought that going on Saturday might be a good idea.

"Oh well, that's nice. Are you going with anyone?" She asked me.

"Jacob will probably take me into the city and drive me home, but I'll be shopping by myself."

"It's good to have an older brother to drive you around, isn't it?"

"Yes, but then again, I think it'd be nice to have my own car so that I could drive myself to school and around the place."

"I know what you mean. I have that dream all the time."

"Anyway, let's focus on our work," I said, not that I felt like working right now.

"Okay," Josie agreed. We worked for about twenty minutes until Josie turned to me and started talking to me again.

"So you're not upset that Jonathan's going with me to the disco?" She asked me.

"No, no at all. I'm glad for you that you're going together," I answered honestly.

"Oh, because Jonathan was a bit upset that you let him down-"

"Did he tell you that?" I interrupted, angrily.

"No, but I could tell."

"I was going to say!"

"I could tell that you'd let him down."

"Oh, right."

"Miss Carter, Miss Swan; concentrating please. This is your first warning, second warning and you'll receive detention at lunch," Mrs Walkers' voice boomed across the now silent classroom.

"Sorry," Josephine mouthed to me. I didn't want to cop a detention so I just smiled and shrugged. The rest of the lesson was quite slow. Next period was music - one of my favourite classes. Today we were singing Jazz, the best thing we've ever done in music. "The girl from Ipanema" was the first song we sung. I had no friends in my music class, which I was sometimes thankful for, as my singing wasn't exactly great. The time in Music seemed to just drift out the window, and lunchtime was soon here. I strolled towards my locker, my shoes were still full of water and the rain continued to fall. I unzipped the uniform pocket, reached into my pocket and grabbed my locker key. I turned the key in the lock and saw a little note resting on my pile of books. Its elegant writing read;

Meet me at the music class, Edward

I smiled at myself, but wondered how Edward managed to put this note in my locker. He must have passed it through the chicken wire in the door. I replaced the books I had just used for those classes with my books for my next classes, turned the key in the lock, placed the key into my pocket and went on my way to find Edward. I walked back to where I'd just come from; the corridors were full of people. They were sitting down, as there was nowhere to sit outside due to the wet weather. I finally reached the music class and I opened the door. There was Edward, his back to me, playing the piano. I didn't want to be rude and barge in the room, so I decided I'd knock. Edward turned to see me, smiled and went back to his piano playing. My hand gripped the door handle, pushed it down and placed my bag inside the room, beside the door. I walked towards him and stopped when I was just standing behind Edward. The music on the piano stand looked like an ant had accidentally walked in ink and then decided to wipe its feet on the page. Edward stopped his virtuoso playing and turned to face me.

"So, I see you got my note,"

"I did indeed, but what brings you here?"

"I thought we'd try something. Something different."

"Okay…"

"Something new," he said.

"Do I know it?" I asked him.

"Probably, but I guess you wouldn't know it very well." He smiled. His fingers started to caress the keys on the piano and a beautiful four bar intro sang out of the piano. It wasn't jazz, but it was something nice. I tried to match the introduction of the song to all the songs I knew. I wasn't sure if I had heard this song before. Edward stopped massaging the piano keys and he turned to face me, his eyes were still dark from the contact lenses.

"Ring a bell, yet?"

"Not at all," I answered, sitting on the other half of the piano stool beside him.

"Let's try again," he said. His fingers moved across the piano keys like magic. He looked like a professional; his fingers gliding across the keys, no music - it was all in his head. He replayed the four bar intro and begun to sing. "Living in my own world, didn't understand…"

I shook my head. This was the famous song that Troy and Gabriella from High School Musical sung when they first met at the New Year's party. This was very different to what I was used to listening to and there was absolutely no way I was going to sing Gabriella's part in front of Edward.

"Oh come on Bella," Edward said. Could he read my mind?! "Just try it, please?" By now he had stopped playing and he gave me the puppy face. Man, could he do the puppy face!

"I can't sing, Edward," I told him, honestly. I lowered my head in disgust.

"I don't agree. I heard you singing in music class," I jerked my head up and looked him in the eyes.

"What? You heard me sing?" I asked him. I was angry now, and he was going to have to explain himself.

"Yes, I did. I was on my way to the bathroom," I just loved the way he said bathroom instead of toilet; such a gentleman, "when I heard your class singing. I had a peek in the window and scanned the class to see if there were any familiar faces. I saw you and you were really into it. 'Girl from Ipanema', wasn't it? Just…give it a try. Please Bella, for me?" His eyes looked at me; he really wanted to try this. I didn't want to hurt him by saying no but I didn't want to sing either. His white fingers went over the keys as he played the introduction once more.

"Living in my own world

didn't understand

that anything can happen

when you take a chance…" He looked at me, wanting to continue playing.

I closed my eyes. It was my way of concentrating.

"I never believed in

what I couldn't see

I never opened my heart…"

He smiled his crooked smile; my favourite smile. "Oohh."

"To all the possibilities…ooh" I continued to sing.

It felt like magic; singing with Edward Cullen was a once in a lifetime experience; a memory I would never forget.

"I know…" We sung together, our voices in perfect harmony.

"That something has changed…" His fingers continued to motion like a professional.

"Never felt this way…" He looked at me and smiled, again.

"And right here today…" I looked deep into his eyes as I sang.

"This could be the start

of something new

it feels so right to be here with you…ooh," We sang together. It felt like this was meant to be for us, like we supposed to be the Gabriella and Troy.

"And now, looking in your eyes

I feel in my heart…" The lyrics were perfect.

"Feel in my heart..." Edward chorused.

We sung together now, "The start of something new…"

I know, I know! Kinda corny, isn't it? It's just a filler for the following chapters... :)