DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN TWILIGHT OR ITS CHARACTERS. I OWE ALL OF THAT GREATNESS TO THE ONE AND ONLY STEPHENIE MEYER, WHO I MUST REPEATEDLY BOW DOWN TO. BUT SERIOUSLY, IF I DID, WOULD I REALLY BE WRITING THIS STORY? DIDN'T THINK SO.

A/N

Just really quickly, The characters are Bella, Alice, Emmett, Carlisle, and Esme CULLEN. Edward Jr., Edward Sr., and Elizabeth MASEN. Rosalie, Jasper, Roger, and Daphne HALE. Just needed to clear that up for anyone that may have been confused, or skipped over the Background Info. Ok. Now on with Chapter Five!

-S.N.O.

CHAPTER FIVE: JOKES

I decided that I would get back at Emmett by tattling on him. Not the tattling where I go running up to my parents screaming, "Mommy, Daddy, Emmett had Edward prank call me!" No. Definitely not like that. Instead I would take a more casual route. If you could call it casual. But it would cause him more of a punishment if my mom heard about it and, I don't know, say… grounded him… than it would be if I were to come up with something on my own.

I walked back into the living room to find everyone where I had left them. But I was more concerned with Emmett. I stared at him the whole way back to my chair by the window.

"So, Emmett. Guess who just called to ask me out on a date," I said matter-of-factly.

"Shouldn't you be talking about this with Alice? Not me?" he asked.

"Maybe. But I thought you'd be more interested."

"Okay… but do I really have to guess?"

"You shouldn't have to." He stared at me dumfounded, along with the rest of the family.

"What are you talking about?"

"That was Edward. Edward MASEN," I told him.

"Yeah, right. Why would Edward, Edward MASEN, call to ask you out on a date?" He laughed, proud of himself for mocking me. Immature baby.

"You should know why."

"Bella! I have no idea what you're talking about! Stop saying that I should know things that I don't! Just tell me, dammit!"

"Emmett, language!" Mom yelled at him. He just looked back at her with an apologetic smile.

"Em, don't tell me you don't know what I'm talking about! You know EXACTLY what I'm talking about!"

"Gah! Bella! NO. I. DO. NOT!" He really seemed frustrated with me. We all sat there for a minute, Emmett and I staring at each other, everyone else staring at both of us.

"So… you really had no idea that Edward was going to ask me out?" I asked him quietly.

"Absolutely none."

"Then… it wasn't a practical joke?"

"What?" he seemed confused. More so than usual.

"Well… I thought that… that…"

"Oh, Bella. Did you really think that I told Edward to call you and ask you out?"

"Um… yes?"

"How could you possibly think that?! No matter how much I don't like you guys dating my best friends, I would never do that to you! Either of you!" he said, looking back to Alice as well. "I can't believe you, Bella. I can't believe you would think I would do something like that." He sounded really upset and hurt at what I thought about him. I felt terrible as I watched him sink back down into the couch. He was right. How could I possibly think that he would try to do something like that to me? Gosh, I was such a horrible person. Such a horrible sister! Ugh.

"Emmett, I am so sorry," I said to him, walking over to sit next to him on the couch. "You're so right. I should have never thought you would do something like that."

"Yeah, you shouldn't have," he responded dryly.

I sighed. "I know. And again, I'm really, really, REALLY sorry." He turned his head away from me to look out the window. "Em, come on. Forgive me?" I gave him my prize-winning puppy-dog pout as soon as he turned back to face me. I dropped it, though, as soon as I saw the corners of his mouth starting to turn up.

"Okay, fine. I forgive you."

"Yay!" I squealed, probably louder than Alice. I threw my arms around his wide neck and he returned it with one of his bone-crushing bear hugs. "Thanks, Em," I told him.

When we finally let go, I started to make my way back over to the recliner, but Alice clearing her throat made me stop and turn around. "Ahem. Bella, where do you think you're going?" She asked me with her eyebrows raised.

"Um… to sit down and finish my invites?"

"Bella, Bella, Bella. As much as I love your commitment—" she paused to glance at Emmett, "to this project, you have something else you should be doing right now."

"Alice, what are you talking ab—" I paused when I saw her nod her head towards the kitchen. Actually, she was nodding more towards the phone in the kitchen than the kitchen itself.

"I believe you have a call to make. Rather, a call to return," she told me. As I realized what she meant, I sighed and started to head back to the kitchen.

"Wait… where is she going?" Emmett asked Alice.

"I'm going to go call Edward back and apologize, Em," and I started walking back to the phone.

"But the phone is in the kitchen…"

"No, the phone is up in my room."

"Wait!" I heard Emmett call after me. I slowly turned around with my eyebrows raised, a look that said 'Hurry up, Emmett' on my face. "You're not going to say yes are you?" That confused me.

"Say yes to what?" I asked him.

"You know… to a date?" And with that, I shook my head furiously, smiling as I practically ran up the stairs to my bedroom.

"Does that mean you're not?!" Emmett called again to me.

I started pacing around my room as I tried to figure out what I was going to do. Surely I wasn't going to agree to a date with Edward. No. Absolutely not. I mean, come on. The kid is my brother's best friend. Alice may be into that sort of thing, but not me. I knew I was going to turn him down, but how? Maybe I didn't even have to mention the date. Maybe I could just call, apologize for thinking it was a prank, and then hang up. Maybe he would forget… Unlikely. But oh well. That was my plan, and I was sticking to it.

I crabbed my cordless phone off of its charger and took it over to sit in my green chair. I folded my legs up under me to sit down, and started scrolling through the recent calls list. Unfortunately, it wasn't possible to call an unknown number back. But Edward's call from the other day was still listed, so I just called that number back instead.

I guess I should have 67ed it since he probably didn't want to talk to me after that last phone call. I wouldn't want to talk to me either. He didn't answer. So instead I just left a message.

"Hi, Edward. Um, it's Bella. Incase you didn't get that. Um, anyway I was just calling to say—"

"Bella? Hello?" He cut me off. I wondered how come my cell phone wasn't able to pick up during a message being left. I'd have to get whatever kind of phone he had. It was a pain to have to wait till the message was over, listen to it, and then call the person back.

"Uh, yeah. Hi," I said. I was starting to get nervous. Why was I getting so nervous? It's not like I was saying yes to his earlier proposal. I was just apologizing for being such a coo-coo banana head. (A/N- I LOVE Degrassi! If you watch it, you know that I got 'coo-coo bananas' from Manny.)

"Hi…" I couldn't tell if he was pleased for me to call back or something else.

"Um, Edward, listen," I started. "I am so sorry for assuming what I did. I had absolutely no right or reason to accuse you, and Emmett for that matter, of prank calling me. Again, I'm really sorry." I waited for his answer.

"It's cool, Bella. Don't worry about it," he replied, sounding oddly fine with it.

"Cool. Well, I guess I should get back to—"

"Hold on a sec, Bella." He cut me off again. Gosh, he seemed to have that tendency to interrupt people a lot, didn't he?

"Uh, yeah?" Oh, crap. I could see where this was going.

"Before you get back to whatever it is you were doing, can you do me a favor?"

"Um…" What kind of a favor? I thought to myself. "Yeah, sure… I, I guess so… What kind of a favor?"

"Could you please, uh, answer… my question?" Aw, man. He hadn't forgotten.

"What question?" I asked, trying to make it seem like I didn't remember.

"You know, the one I called you about in the first place?" I heard him chuckle slightly on the other end of the line. I didn't answer for a few seconds, trying to give the whole 'not remembering' thing a little more boost. "About a date?" he finally said.

"Oh, that question. Uh… I don't know Edward. I just got out of a relationship and I'm still getting over it." I could have sworn I heard him mumble something like "That's not what Emmett said" under his breath, but I couldn't be sure. "What was that?"

"Oh, um, nothing. I was just saying how I know about your break-up from Emmett. He told me a couple days ago." I laughed quietly.

"So that's how you knew it was safe to call me, huh?

"Well, yeah," he seemed embarrassed. I could almost see him blushing where ever he was.

"Look, Edward I—"

"Bella, I know I'm your brother's best friend and you're newly single and all, but…" He interrupted me again. Goodness, that boy REALLY needed to stop doing that or I was going to lose my mind.

"Edward, stop. First of all, you REALLY need to stop doing that."

"Stop doing what?"

"Interrupting me. Cutting me off every time I start to say something."

"Oh, sorry. I didn't really realize I was doing it."

"It's okay. Now second of all, yes. You ARE my brother's best friend, and I AM newly single. But that really doesn't have anything to do with it."

"I… don't… understand…" I heard him say.

"Look, Edward, you're a nice guy and I'm sure you'd be a fun guy to date, but… you're just… not my type. I'm sorry." To my surprise, he responded with a somewhat cheery attitude.

"Okay, fair enough. No date."

"Okay, cool. Well I'm gonna—"

"Hold on here. I'm sorry for interrupting, but I wasn't finished. So it was really like you were interrupting me this time, yeah? Anyway, like I was saying. We don't have to go on a date. That's fine. But, I do still want to get to know you a little bit more. I mean, really Bella. I've known you and your family for, what, almost ten years now? And I still hardly know anything about you." I just sat there on my couch contemplating what he had just said. Everything that I just heard was correct. We really didn't know anything about each other, even after knowing one another for like he said, almost ten years. I gave that a little thought before answering.

"I… guess that seems fair," I finally said.

"Really? Good. Cool. Okay. So, do you want to maybe do something tonight? Maybe go to City Plaza and just walk and talk, or get something to eat?" I thought it was cute how excited he sounded. I guess he really did like me. Oh well. That was NOT happening.

"Calm down, Edward. You're talking a little too fast for me."

"Oh, sorry." I giggled into the receiver.

"It's okay. But yeah, City Plaza sounds good. I guess I can just meet you there. No reason to give Emmett a heart attack and make him think we're…" I let the sentence fade as I realized something. Even though Emmett hadn't played a joke on me, it didn't mean that I couldn't play one on him…

"Actually, Edward, why don't you come pick me up here?"

"Bella, is there a specific reason why you suddenly just changed your mind?"

I explained to him about how I wanted to trick Emmett. He seemed to want to participate as well.

He was laughing on the other end of the line. "Yes! That would be hysterical. Oh man, he's gonna, like, die. Both of his sisters going out with both of his best friends? Whew. Sounds good to me." I couldn't believe how excited he was to play this joke on Emmett. If anything, I would have thought that he'd be against it, since he really did want to go out on a date with me. Whatever.

"Awesome. Okay, so Jasper is picking Alice up at 6, so why don't you come at around 6:30?"

"'Kay. Sounds good. I'll see you later, Bella."

"Hold on, Edward," I said before he could hang up.

"Yeah?"

"Well, just to be clear… this is not a date. In any way, shape or form. We're just going to go talk and maybe get food. Okay?"

"Yeah, Bella. I know. I'll see you at 6:30. Bye."

Click.

"Bye." Click.

Okay, so now it was time to put the plan in motion.

As soon as my phone was back on its stand, I bounded out of my room and down the first flight of stairs, nearly tripping over my super-long gray American Eagle sweats I had on. I had a huge, goofy, Emmett-style grin plastered as my face as I came back down into the living room. Alice was already done with her invitations and it was only 3:15. That little pixie can work fast. I still had about thirty more to go, and as if she read my mind, Alice picked up a few from my pile and started working on them. Emmett only had about fifteen, and Mom and Dad were nearly done.

"Why do you look so happy?" Dad asked me as I skipped back to my chair. Yes, skipped. I simply smiled a toothy smile and shrugged as I sat down Indian-style on the chair.

"Oh God, Bella what did you do?" Emmett asked me, fear in his voice.

I scolded him and replied, "I didn't do anything, dear brother."

"DID YOU AGREE TO GO OUT WITH HIM?!" he boomed, jumping right off of the couch.

"I guess you'll find out tonight at 6:30." I was torturing him.

And I loved it.

Alice squealed and ran over to where I was sitting, throwing her arms around me.

"Awe, Bella you have a date! You have a DATE! Ah!" she screamed into my ear as Emmett stood up and burst his way into the kitchen.

"No, I don't," I whispered. When I said that, she pulled away and looked me in the eye, confusion everywhere on her face.

"What do you mean 'no, you don't'? You just told Emmett—"

"Alice. I know what I just told Emmett. But I will tell you later. Everything. Once we're done with all of this." I motioned to the pile of invitations at my feet. That only got her working even quicker. And I thought that was an impossibility.

We were all completely finished by around 4:00, after Emmett had decided to come back and finish helping us. Every once in a while, he would mutter something under his breath along the lines of:

"Both sisters going out with my best friends." Or, "Traitors. All of them." It was actually very funny to see that my plan was working so well, but also got me kind of annoyed. None of us could understand why he hated the idea of his sisters dating his best friends so much. He had been dating Rosalie for a little over a year now, and we were always extremely supportive of their relationship, even when they first got together. He was being immensely hypocritical. Finally, Mom had had enough of his muttering.

"Emmett, stop being such a baby! There's absolutely no reason for you to be against your sisters going on dates with Edward and Jasper. I understand that they're your best friends and that it's weird and awkward. But look at you and Rosalie. She has been Alice's and Bella's best friend for as long as Jasper's been yours. They never had any problem with you two. None of us did. We've all supported your relationship since the day it started, so quit your whining and let it go."

We all sat there stunned for a few moments. Mom was never one to really yell, no matter how softly. So we all knew that as soon as that little lecture was over that she meant business. The only other thing I thought about was how right she was.

Alice and I got ready for our dates together, even though mine wasn't really a date. As soon as we had finished cleaning everything up in the living room, Alice had pulled me by the wrist up the stairs and to her room, which was right across the hall from mine.

The only similarity between our rooms was the bedroom and bathroom sizes. Everything else was completely different. Alice didn't have a wall that was entirely made out of glass, like I did. So all of her walls were painted a deep, navy blue color. The crown molding around the room was painted a hot pink color, which complemented the blue walls nicely. She had a large, king-sized bed in the center of the back wall, and it was made out of the most deliciously scented cherry wood on Earth. It had tall posts on all four corners that held a hot pink mesh canopy above the navy blue-and-hot-pink-plaid bed comforter. Her carpet was as lush and soft as mine, only it was as white as you could get. She never let anyone come in with food, drinks, or their shoes on so as not to get it dirty. All of her other bedroom furniture- nightstand, dresser, vanity, bookshelf- were the same kind of wood as the bed. Even though the entire south wall wasn't glass, she had a huge window in the center. Next to it was a white leather loveseat. If you thought her bedroom was amazing, you haven't seen her closet and bathroom. Yes, closet, too. It was almost the size of her room. She had so many clothes and shoes and accessories and they were all perfectly kept and organized. We had to have the walls pushed back just to fit everything. Her bathroom was the same layout as mine, only different colors. Where my cabinets were green with purple lining, hers were navy with hot pink lining. Where my tub and walls were purple and green splatter-painted, hers were hot pink and navy splatter-painted. And she had a hot pink shower curtain.

Once we were in her room, she had sat me down onto the bed and then sat down next to me. I had told her all about my conversation with Edward and then how we were playing the practical joke on Emmett. She thought it was complete genius and was mad for not thinking of it herself. Of course, she didn't need to because she was already going on a real date with Jasper.

Alice had insisted that I get ready as if for an actual date "…just so we give Em the full effect that you actually are." I didn't bother arguing with her. She would eventually win, anyway.

We were all set and ready to go at promptly 5:50, ten minutes before Jasper was supposed to come and pick Alice up. She had dressed me in a light pink halter top that had a thick elastic band right under the bust, then flowed out and down to a few inches below my hips. She also put me in the tightest and lowest jeans I've ever even seen before. I had no idea how those had gotten in my closet. Sneaky little pixie. I was wearing inch-and-a-half high white slip-on heels. Even though they weren't that high, combined with the jeans and flattering top I looked at least three inches taller.

She had straightened my hair to perfection, leaving no frizz or static whatsoever. I was wearing light make-up that highlighted my natural features nicely, and the matching necklace and bracelet set that I had gotten from my parents, along with my Volvo, for my sixteenth birthday earlier this year. They both had white gold chains or links. The necklace had a single heart-shaped sapphire hanging from the chain, and the bracelet had several hanging as tiny little charms from its links. It was the absolute most gorgeous jewelry set I had ever seen in my life, and I wore it nearly every day.

I had to admit, I looked really good. The figure in the mirror didn't even look like me. Oh, we were going to get Emmett good.

Alice didn't look half bad either. She was dressed in a form-fitting deep purple shirt-dress that had thick shoulder straps, over dark wash skinny jeans. The bottoms of the jeans fell over her lavender three-and-a-half inch heels beautifully. Her short hair was spiked to perfection and she was sporting smokey eyes.

While we were doing last minute touch-ups, we heard the doorbell ring. Alice jumped and I could almost feel her heart start racing. Was she actually nervous about her date with Jasper? She never got nervous before dates. That was strange. We both walked downstairs together, seeing as I would be leaving soon anyway. I went into the living room and plopped myself down in the recliner with this month's Seventeen magazine. (A/N- I get Seventeen every single month. I absolutely love it. So I decided that Bella does too.) I heard Jasper tell Alice how beautiful she looked as she opened the door to let him in. All she did in response was giggle flirtatiously. The door shut and they both made their way into the living room.

"Hey, Jasper," I said to him.

"Hey, Bella. Nice to see you," he responded politely.

"You too." We both gave a simple and polite smile.

"Hey, Bell we're gonna go. I have my phone if anyone needs me. And have fun with Edward," Alice told me with a wink, as she turned on her heel leading Jasper to the door.

"Wait, what about having fun with Edward?" Jasper asked her. She giggled again.

"I'll tell you on the way over. Bye, Mom! Bye, Dad!" and with that, they were out the door on their way to their dinner date. No doubt Alice would tell Jasper everything I had told her, leaving out absolutely no details.

I read the entire magazine before Edward came to pick me up. I kept glancing at the clock next to our 63" plasma television every two minutes. Why was I so nervous? It wasn't even a date. All we were doing was going out for dinner to talk and get to know each other. That was it.

I jumped when the doorbell rang at precisely 6:30. Wow, he sure was punctual. I sprang up and went to get the door. When I opened it, I had to try extremely hard to keep my mouth from hitting the floor. Edward looked incredible. He was dressed in a simple royal blue, short-sleeved polo shirt that showed off his not-too-huge muscles nicely. He was wearing light wash faded jeans and clean white K-Swiss sneakers. His hair was tussled into a perfect mess, and his emerald eyes looked as beautiful as ever. Why had I said no to a date with him? Not my type? Please, what was I thinking? Oh yeah, I was thinking that he's my brother's best friend and Jacob and I just broke up.

"Hey, Bella. You look great," he greeted me with a beautiful crooked grin.

"Thanks. You do, too." I smiled back.

"You ready to go?" he asked.

"Um, yeah hold on. Let me just get my purse then we can go." I took off towards the kitchen, leaving the door wide open so he would know that it was okay to come in. Mom was at the stove cooking dinner. I grabbed my purse from the counter and gave her a quick kiss goodbye. "Bye, Mom. I'll be home by eleven."

"Okay honey, have fun," she told me with a wink.

When I came back out into the living room, I found Edward and Emmett talking on the sofa. I think I heard Emmett saying something like, "You better not hurt her, dude. She's my little sister." And Edward was just sitting there like, 'yeah, I know, I know.'

"Okay, you ready Edward?" I asked.

"Yep. Later, Emmett," he said with a wave. Once we were outside, I thought to myself, Okay, fun's over. Now time to get to know Edward Masen.

A/N

Yeah, I know that was long. And I'm so proud of myself! 7 and a half pages! YAY!! There's something about this chapter that I really like. It just makes me smile every time I read it. I'm pretty sure I'm going to do the next chapter, the date chapter, in Edward's POV. I think the guy just needs his thoughts to be heard, don't you?

Again, I'm going to thank all of my awesome reviewers!!

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Thank you all again!!

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-S.N.O.