Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Twilight universe characters. Just this plot

Chapter 1

Isabella Swan stared up at her new school with a small amount of trepidation stirring up her insides. Okay, a lot of trepidation. It was so tiny! That meant that she, as the new kid, was pretty much undeniably going to be the center of attention for a while. Just great. Just what she needed, more attention. All the 'attention' she got at her last school had landed her a trip to the hospital and a move to Washington to stay with a dad that she barely even knew.

To be fair though, it wasn't Charlie's fault that he and his only daughter were practically strangers. Bella had been 6 months old when her selfish and irresponsible mother, Renee, angry because her husband had quit his dangerous job as an FBI agent and moved them to sleepy Forks, Washington, had packed her up in the middle of the night and disappeared while Charlie was working the graveyard shift down at Fork's meager police station. The poor guy had searched for them for nearly a year, and when he finally did find them, he was presented with a lovely set of divorce papers.

Charlie, who didn't want to put his baby girl through the trauma of family court for custody, bowed out and ended up losing contact with them for months at a time because the silly woman kept moving and wouldn't keep him up to date with phone numbers or addresses.

At 13 Bella began to wonder why she wasn't allowed much contact with her father, who seemed to be a decent man despite her mother's stories, and so she stole his information out of one of Renee's old address books. Their tentative relationship started then when she began to call him in secret and send him cards and small gifts on birthdays and Christmases.

Renee hadn't even known that she'd had her fathers phone number until she called him from the hospital, begging him to rescue her from her mother's neglectful care and absentee parenting. He'd caught the next available flight and was there in Renee's face bright and early the next morning, demanding to know how Renee could be so careless with the safety of their only child. He'd been even more furious when he saw how they were living.

The entire house was eclectically furnished with knick-knacks from their travels scattered all over, but Bella's room had no furniture at all. She'd been sleeping on a mattress and box spring on the floor with old, threadbare bedding. A short pile of books were stacked by the bed, and her clothes were folded and stored on the floor in one corner. Immediately he purchased a suitcase and they packed all of her belongings. After stopping for lunch and to pick up all of her personal records and paperwork she would need, they caught the next thing smoking and headed for Forks.

And now here she stood, staring up at the school building as her father drove off in his police cruiser and nervously fidgeting with her too-large glasses. She felt horribly insecure in her second hand clothing as other kids openly stared at her. "Because getting dropped off in a police car was sooooooo incognito" she groused to herself.

"Not to make you feel worse," A bright voice interrupted, "but they would have stared at you anyway. You're new, so it's kind of inevitable."

Bella turned to see a short girl with long dark hair holding her hand out to her for a handshake. "Hi! I'm Alice. And this is my twin Edward. You are?"

Though she couldn't seem to stop for the life of her, Bella simply gaped at them. God, they were both so...pretty. Alice laughed at her, a light and tinkling sound that made her snap out of her beauty induced stupor. "I'm sorry. It's just...gosh, you've got to be the most beautiful people I've ever seen!" She blushed then, and mentally slapped herself. "S-sorry, that was stupid of me. I ramble and say crazy stuff when I'm nervous. I'm Isabella. But you can call me Bella...um...that is, if you want?"

Alice grinned, even as her brother stared at Bella with an indiscernible look frozen on his face. Bella found herself unable to look away, both dazzled by his looks and confused at his expression. She hadn't even been here 10 minutes, hadn't even made it inside the building yet and she'd already offended someone's delicate eyesight with her appearance. It was probably a new record. Seriously, it was starting to make her stupid nervous. His lips now parted in shock, he just kept staring at her.

"Edward! Stop weirding her out!" Alice dug her elbow into her brother's ribs, bright smile never wavering. "Sorry Bella, he's house trained, I promise."

Edward sent his sister a dirty glare at that comment and then it was Bella's turn to stare and blush. She couldn't seem to help herself. Even scowling, he was gorgeous. She shook her head to clear it of thoughts that would lead nowhere good. Alice caught her looking and her grin widened until Bella thought it was a wonder that it didn't split the girl's face.

"You two are hilarious!" she laughed. Bella ducked her head, mortified that she'd been caught and called out. Again, Alice laughed. "Come on you two." she sang, dragging them both inside. by their wrists. "Time for class"

Bella gulped, again hit with a strong reluctance to join the mass of high school students. The butterflies returned, increased tenfold and the looks she was receiving from her new peers didn't do much to ease her shoddy nerves.

A handful of students were laughing at her, a few perfectly primped size 0's not even trying to hide it. A sparse few smiled kindly at her, but the majority of the looks that she'd noticed were simply curious. 'Oh well,' she thought. 'Could definitely be a lot worse.'

By the time 4th period rolled around, she was definitely holding strong to that theory. For the most part, she sat in the back of all of her classes and everyone ignored her. In 2nd period she sat with Alice. Every time the tiny girl passed her in the hallway, she made sure to either speak, or smile and wave if she was busy talking to someone, so that was a plus. 4th period however, was the 'highlight' of the day thus far.

She walked in the class fairly confident that, based on how the rest of her day had gone, no one was going to waste their time harassing the new girl. Yeah, not so much. The only empty seat in the room was in front of the two girls she'd seen laughing at her earlier.

"God, Jess, I feel so sorry for her." the first whisper came while the entire class was pouring over their worksheets. "She looks like she borrowed her outfit from my blind Grandma Katie" Bella flushed red, but kept her gaze on her math problems.

"I've met your Grandma Katie," the second girl stage-whispered back. "and I think she has better taste!"

Bella desperately wished the floor would open up and eat her when she heard other classmates laughing softly.

"It wouldn't be so bad if she was a little cute."

"Yeah but she's so plain."

"Plain would be an upgrade!"

The words played in Bella's head over and over until she could feel tears gathering behind her eyes. It wasn't the worst insult she'd ever gotten, and while she knew that she wasn't much to look at, with her hair yanked back into a tight knot to control the tight unruly curls, and her weird lips and plain brown eyes, it still sucked to hear people call her ugly. Blessedly the bell rang then, and she quickly gathered her things and was the first one out of the door.

She decided to keep her head down for the rest of the day, which hopefully, would pass without further incident. Robotic like, she made her way to her locker, putting in the combination and retrieving her lunch before heading to where she remembered the lunch room to be.

Darn, now where was she going to sit? Most of the tables were full, and out of the ones with empty seats, one was full of what looked like jocks, one was full of cheerleaders and one had the two girls who'd been "whispering" about her in her last class. All 3 options were bad. She'd decided to go see if she could find the library when she saw Alice making a beeline across the cafeteria, towards her.

"Hey, why are you just standing there silly?" Her voice, bright and cheerful as ever. "I saved you a seat."

"Sorry Alice. I didn't see you."

"Well come on, I'll introduce you to everybody." And just like that, Bella found herself being dragged by the tiny girl for the second time that day. When they reached a lunch table way in the back corner, she recognized a blonde girl and boy, that had each been in one of her morning classes, and Edward, whose copper colored hair and deep green eyes caused a funny feeling in her stomach. None of them sneered at her, thankfully, as Alice showed up with Bella in tow and pointed around the table introducing everyone.

"You've met my brother Edward this morning. This is his best friend Jasper Whitlock, and this is Rosalie Hale, my brother Emmett's girlfriend."

"Does he go here too?"

Alice shook her head, taking the empty seat next to Edward, leaving her to sit across the table by Rosalie, which made her nervous and fidgety. "No, he's older than us. He goes to the community college in PA. That's Port Angeles, have you been there? You should go with me some time. Chief Swan is your dad, right? Would he let you go with me?"

"Jesus Alice," Edward tossed a fry at his motor-mouthed twin. "Breathe, why don't you?"

She chuckled, glancing sheepishly at her new friend. "Sorry Bella. I'm just excited. I don't have many friends here."

Bella glanced at her, happy that Alice had implied that they were friends, but curious. "Why not?" Then she realized that the question was probably a bit nosey. "I'm sorry Alice, that was rude. It's just...you're so nice. I don't get it."

Alice smiled. "It's alright Bella. I don't mind. I was super sick when I was younger. I had really bad headaches and sometimes it made me see things. Turned out, I had a brain tumor."

Bella gasped, horrified. "Oh no! Are you okay? Now, I mean?" The other girl laughed and waved a delicate hand dismissively. "Oh yeah, it was removed and it's gone now. But everyone still remembers that I used to see things, and even though it was because I was sick they think I'm...odd."

"But that's stupid!" Bella was slightly loud in her indignation, making Edward and Alice smile. "It is," Alice agreed. "But it doesn't bother me. I wouldn't want to be friends with people like that, so it worked out for me. And anyhow, I'm pretty much 100 percent fine now. I have a shunt in and I just have to go to a hospital if I get hit in the head or have bad headaches. It makes my brothers crazy over protective."

"Speaking of," Edward interrupted, that scowl that Bella found so hot back in place. "You need to eat or I'm telling Dad that you're skipping lunch again."

Alice glared right back at him, surprising Bella, who was sure that her face didn't even have that function. "How many times do I have to tell you that I hate cafeteria food. I'm not eating it."

"Then bring a lunch from home, stupid."

"I don't have time to make one, I already get up at 5 just to get ready on time."

"Then too bad, looks like you have to eat cafeteria food."

"Too bad I don't want it."

"Too bad I don't care."

Jasper and Rosalie rolled their eyes, used to the daily lunch time battle of wills. Quietly, Bella pulled two brown paper sacks from her bag and slid one across the table toward Alice, and blushed when everyone turned to stare at her.

"It's lasagna." she explained shyly. "I always bring extra." Alice beamed at her. "Thanks Bella! You saved me from the Food Nazi."

Jasper gained her attention, speaking for the first time. "Um, Bella?" The slow drawl in his voice surprised her a bit. "Why did you bring two lunches?"

She shrugged, uncomfortable when, again, everyone's attention was focused on her, even as Alice shoved a forkful of lasagna into her mouth with a moan and a "Damn, that's good."

"At my school in Phoenix, sometimes they used to knock my lunch on the floor, so I learned to bring two, just to be on the safe side."

"They bullied you?" Edward asked, an odd sort of angry look on his face, which threw Bella off. What reason did he have to be angry? But again, she shrugged. "Have you seen the way I look?" She whispered, digging into her own food.

"Well, no offense, but your clothes are kind of ugly." Rosalie pointed out. Edward glared at her and she ignored it. "But that's no reason for people to treat you that way."

"Damn Rose, tell her how you really feel." Jasper snorted. "Don't hold back next time." But she ignored him too and continued to address the new girl. "Why do you dress like that anyway?"

Bella surprised them all by smiling a bit. Nobody had ever bothered to ask her that before. Everyone just assumed that she had really bad taste.

"I wasn't allowed to shop, and my mom was pretty bad with money." she hedged, not wanting to admit that she'd had to resort to collecting and saving change to shop at thrift stores because her mother wouldn't allow her any money or new things.

Rosalie and Alice gaped at her, mouths open. "That fucking sucks!" Rosalie shrieked. "Oh my God, I would have died. Is that why you live with your dad now?"

"No, he came to get me because the bullying had gotten pretty bad." She answered, truthfully. "I don't even think he knows my mom never had any money."

"You should tell him." Alice interjected, tucking her long hair behind her ears. Bella thought that she looked like a little elf when she did this. "Maybe he would give you money and you can go shopping with us."

"Totally," Rose agreed. "Last year, Chief Swan chaperoned a field trip to Seattle and when we were eating lunch at the mall, Jessica Stanley squirted soy sauce all over my dress. It was my favorite one because my mom had worn it in her last photo shoot before she died. I was so mad I didn't even fight Jess, I just cried. Your dad got me up and wiped my face and bought me an outfit to wear home so I could try and get the stain out, but it was ruined. Two days later, her brought a dress just like it to my house. It was a 300 dollar dress, and I'm not even his kid."

Bella smiled, glad to hear others speaking kindly of the father she was still getting to know. She opened her mouth to speak, but was cut off when Alice squealed loudly.

"Ohmigod! Edward, you have to try this!" She had opened the second Tupperware container in the bag and taken a bite out of the dessert inside. "This tiramisu is freaking awesome!"

She gave her brother a small bite and he moaned, causing Bella's face to flush a deep scarlet red. "Jesus," he breathed. "That tastes like...tears of an angel." He tried to get another forkful but Alice slapped his hand away. "Come on Allie, you know it's my favorite."

"Tough noogies!" Alice horded the dish close to her chest. "It's my favorite too and my friend gave it to me, so it's mine!"

His answering pout was just so cute that Bella blushed again, and slid her own unopened dessert dish towards him. "I have plenty at home." She said, her head ducked low as she basically talked to the table. "You can have this one."

He smiled his thanks and barely got the lid off before he shoveled a huge chunk into his mouth. Jasper and Rosalie laughed at the blissful expression on the twins' faces. "Damn Bella," Jasper chortled. "It must be really damn good. Edward over there is a food snob and I don't think I've ever seen Alice this quiet. If I didn't think they'd attack, I'd try some."

Neither of the twins bothered to defend themselves. They were enjoying their food with their eyes closed. Just then, the dismissal bell rang.

"Where did you get this Bella? I've never had any this good before." Edward's voice was low, sultry and ridiculously satisfied. It did thing to Bella's insides.

"Yeah Bella," Alice chimed in. "That was positively orgasmic."

Bella laughed at that, smiling and blushing at her choice of words, but modestly pleased. "No ones ever enjoyed my cooking that much before."

Both Cullens stared at her. "You made this?" they sputtered, simultaneous in their shock. Edward stepped forward then and grabbed both of her hands in one of his.

"You are the most perfect woman I've ever met in my entire existence." He blurted out.

"Marry me."