Bella packed a few breakfast bars into her purse, and a bottle of water. She also attempted to eat, but it was a little hard to do with her eyes closing on her against her will. "Damn baseball." She muttered. She'd attempted to go to bed early, but every time she was about to fall asleep the men in the living room would cheer at something. It felt like it lasted forever.

"I hope she buzzes the damned doorbell." She muttered as she considered a little harmless vengeance on Charlie. Still, he'd get to go back to bed, but for one panicked moment his heart would be in his throat. Still, when she saw Rosalie's BMW stop in front of the house, Bella got up and put the bowl in the sink, before dragging herself out the door, before Alice had to come get her. It was daylight, somewhat, that was news. Bella didn't know the sun was up at six around here.

The air was cold, and Bella felt the chill, but it didn't manage to wake her up any more than she was. She felt disconnected and a little like her feet weren't actually hitting the ground as she made her way to the BMW. Rosalie shared her car almost half of the time as far as Bella could tell. "Hey." She managed as Alice stepped out of the car to greet her. Alice looked bright and cheerful and it didn't improve Bella's mood, because it just said that she wasn't going to get to fall asleep in the back seat.

"Oh, wow, you really are out of it." Alice studied her like she'd never seen a tired human before and Bella just sighed heavily and grabbed the door to the back seat.

"How long will this drive take?" She asked as she settled in. Alice slipped back into the passenger seat and turned to look back at her. "Oh, Hey Jasper."

Jasper chuckled. "Hey Darlin'. I'm planning on being there for the opening at 9am."

"Where we going?" Bella asked. She knew Portland, she spent a few years living just outside of it. It turned out the auto show was where she thought it might be.

…

Jasper Pov

Jasper glanced at the rearview mirror to confirm the quietness he was feeling and he smirked as he glanced over at his pouting wife. "Sleeping like a babe."

"I wanted you to get to know her." Alice sighed and glanced back at the little human. "I'd hoped that my vision was wrong, that she'd wake up more when we got moving."

"Well, now we know, she's not good with early trips." Jasper focused on Hwy 101 for a while, and considered the disappointment he could feel from Alice. He didn't care for that, but the human girl was sluggish at best until she fell asleep, and wasn't that something. The human fell asleep in the car with vampires. Perhaps Alice, he could see that, but no human had ever been that relaxed around him before unless he caused it. He looked back at her again, to see her head tilted back, and her eyes closed. Her body rocked gently with the soft rocking of the car. He could see the pulse in her neck and the slow steady beat of her heart was nearly visible to his vampire eyes. "She's definitely unusual." He managed, before he focused on the road again.

"She's special." Alice spoke softer, as if protecting her words from being overheard even with the human sleeping. "I've had visions of her, and she's meant to be my friend. I love her already." And he knew she did. He could feel the affection his wife had for the human, and he'd gone against his own instincts to vote that they should be allowed to be near Bella because of that.

"I think she is your friend Alice." Jasper told his wife. "She agreed to this trip, and missing sleep in her warm bed for you, even though you have no idea how irritated she was feeling when she did it."

Alice smiled for a moment, but then she looked back at Bella again. "I know she's my friend, but she's going to be much more than this. Our bond is going to grow, and I can't wait." Jasper could feel the happy anticipation in his wife and it couldn't help but make him smile.

"Bonds are more my business Darlin' and they take time, if you want it to be real, they take time." Jasper knew his wife wasn't the most patient person in the world, and how could she be? She knew where things were going long before anyone else did and she just wanted to skip steps and get to the good stuff. "If it helps any, when you smile at her, she feels happier. You bring a little sunshine into her." Even as he said that, he pondered how strange this little human was. She was actually making bonds with his family at an impossible rate. It was almost unnatural how fast some of his family was starting to love her, not just Alice, who always leapt into things with all she had. He didn't say anything and definitely didn't think anything near Edward, but he wondered if whatever it was that was keeping Edward out of her mind was also pushing her into the others hearts.

"I've never had a best friend." Alice spoke and he felt her longing. Jasper pushed a little love her way and she did give him a soft smile. "Well, you hardly count, you're my mate. I mean a real girlfriend, someone I can talk to about anything."

"Anything?" Jasper cut off his emotional link to Alice so she wouldn't be bothered by his apprehension.

"Well, anything I can." Alice frowned for just a moment and then shifted to lean against the door, her head resting on her hand. "Obviously there are limits. I want to trust her with what I can. I want the sleepovers, the shopping trips, and the late night talks. I want it all."

And that was why Jasper was doing this, putting himself in a small car with a human that smelled better than normal and hunting more regularly so he didn't disappoint Alice with a mistake she might not ever fully forgive. Ever since they'd learned about Bella Swan, Alice had been having visions of the girl, visions that made Alice happy, almost giddy at times. This girl filled the part of Alice's heart that Jasper didn't and that was fine with him. Anything to make Alice happy, she was his sanity, and the happier she was the better she was able to help him control himself. She was his salvation, after all.

"She'll wake up when we fill up with gas." Alice said after a moment. "If I want her to have any energy for our big day out I apparently have to wait for her to wake up on her own." Jasper smirked as he realized his little darlin' had been considering waking Bella up so she would talk to her. He glanced at the gas gauge and guessed they might be keeping quiet for another hour.

After ten minutes he cracked the windows, to get some fresh air in the car with them.

It was forty minutes after that they heard Bella's heart start racing, and he gripped the steering wheel a little more firmly at the flash of fear he felt before the girl jerked awake. Her fear got stronger, enough to smell, just for a moment as she noticed her surroundings, but then she let out a breath and woke up completely. Jasper wasn't willing to let her dwell on that fear, it felt like she was thinking she was about to die. He pushed peace and calm at her. The scent of fear faded and she blushed a little. "Sorry, didn't mean to fall asleep."

"It's alright darlin." He answered her softly and she gave him an odd smile, a little too thankful for the pardon, he thought. "Though Alice was going to paint your face in your sleep if you didn't wake up soon." He teased and glanced over at his wife, who was just now managing to get that concerned look off of her face.

"I was not!" Alice protested his teasing, and she looked amused, but he could sense she was still concerned.

He spoke super quiet. "It was a nightmare." He explained, even as he kept an eye on the human in the rearview mirror. Alice didn't remember sleeping, but he'd had his fair share of nightmares when he was in the army, before he was turned. "She's fine, a little unsettled, but she's fine."

"Where are we?" Bella was glancing around outside the windows.

"The car needs gas, we pulled off." Alice explained gently, even as he found the station they needed. When he stopped the car Bella got out, and Alice followed her. Jasper stood at the pump, but his attention was on the two ladies. Alice had grabbed Bella's arm, and he could feel happiness and excitement in his wife, as well as the tender affection growing in Bella as she grinned at Alice, who was talking about all sorts of unhealthy car riding snacks she was willing to buy the girl.

They went into the store for food and a bathroom break, and he just studied them through the window as they made their way to the back of the place and the bathroom, where Alice was going to have to fake using the facilities. He smirked, thinking of the performance she was probably starting right now. The things they all did to keep that human around.

…..

Bella Pov

Bella slid into the backseat again, and Alice stood, holding that door opened for a moment. "You don't mind, do you Jazzy?"

"No, go ahead, I'll play chauffer." He said and then Alice followed her into the backseat. It was a little odd, but Bella just slid over more to make room for Alice. She set the bag she couldn't convince Alice she didn't have to buy on the floor. It held sugary treats and Alice handed over the diet pepsi she'd bought Bella. Apparently Bella needed to be loaded up with sugar and caffeine, and Bella almost laughed in the store when she'd realized Alice was trying to keep her awake. Bella wasn't sure that was necessary, she felt better, more awake this time.

"I didn't want you getting lonely back here." Alice explained with a smile, as they started out of the gas station to find their way back to the highway.

Drinking would just mean her next bathroom break would be sooner than she'd like, but she was pretty sure she'd make it to Portland before then. She didn't want to be the reason vampires had to pull the car over, so she paid attention to these things. The drink was cold and felt way better going down her throat than she'd expected, she must have been thirsty. Bella did what she could to not noticed how Alice stared at her using a straw. The Cullens 'ate' in the lunchroom, but apparently they never looked around, because Alice liked to watch her do the simplest things at times, as if it were novel and cute.

After some chatting about school and the art assignment they had, Bella learned that Jasper wasn't in photography, he was in video production. "We make all sorts of videos in that class, short movies, music videos, I tend to do nature videos."

"You don't need actors for nature videos." Bella said, she bet that was one of the draws for Jasper.

"No, no you don't." He looked up into the rearview mirror and gave her a small nod, as if she guessed right.

Bella glanced over at Alice but saw she was in a vision, so quickly moved her attention back to Jasper so she could pretend she didn't notice. His eyes, even in the mirror, were looking at her more thoughtfully.

"It's a less known symptom of ADHD." Jasper spoke quietly. "Alice 'zones out' a few times a day." Bella just nodded a little, since her ploy to not notice the visions didn't work.

"You know, there are a few classes the school offers during the summer." Alice spoke up, but Bella could see she looked just a little embarrassed. She kind of wished Jasper hadn't said anything in trying to cover the visions up. It wasn't like Alice was doing vampire things in front of her, she was just zoning out. Bella reached out a hand and rested it over Alice's, and that earned her another smile. "They normally save them for the students that failed classes and need to catch up to graduate, but we might be able to talk them into letting us take Video Production together."

"Earn credits faster." Bella smiled a little at that idea. She had wanted to work full time in the summer and earn money, but a few trips around the parts of town she could walk to, the areas she could even look for a job in, made it clear she wasn't finding full time work for the summer until she had a car, and she wasn't getting a car until she had a job, so this summer was going to be like the ones she had in her own life as a teenager, begging for hours and endless boredom when she didn't get them. "How many classes do you think they'd let us do?" Bella felt Alice squeeze her hand gently, and then noticed Alice wasn't letting go.

The little vampire gave her a smile that seemed so tender and so grateful and Bella didn't even know what she'd done to earn that one, but she gave an awkward blushing smile back. "If we do enough work in video production over the summer we can take advanced with Jasper in the fall."

"That's an awful lot of credits. I want to go to college, I'm not sure I can do that." Bella started to feel disappointed, even though she didn't know Jasper enough to really want to spend time with him, she would have liked being partners with Alice in a class like that. Alice was a director, naturally, the photo shoot showed Bella that, and Bella had ideas, just listening to Jasper talk about his class, she got so many ideas.

"You can test out of Spanish one and go right into second year. That's all the colleges want after all, second year, so if you don't do first and pass that they will be happy." Alice told her.

"How did you?" Bella found herself stunned enough to start asking and then she clammed up as quickly as she could once she realized Alice's vision must have included that as well. She froze, her mind not quite awake enough to get them out of this one.

"I thought Jasper could tutor you, but you already know Spanish?" Alice frowned at her. Bella was just stunned she'd been wrong, but now she was stuck with a lie.

"I did live in Phoenix." She mentioned, but as far as she knew that other Bella didn't pick up Spanish there. No, this Bella learned from babysitters in the neighborhood she grew up in and then later co-workers while in high school. They used to laugh at her accent, and she made a few embarrassing mistakes regularly, but she'd flew through high school Spanish with that background. Apparently she was going to get to do that again. She'd thought she might have to dumb herself down or take a different language, because the other Bella wouldn't have ever picked this up, but if she could claim it was the summer tutoring she could use what she already knew to get out of a high school class. It started to make her wish she could claim all sorts of tutoring in the summer and skip a few more classes, but all she'd get would be other classes, not an automatic credit. "I could use some tutoring though, if I'm going to ask to be skipped up."

"I wouldn't mind teaching ya darlin'" Jasper spoke up. "But in the Summer I travel a bit. It might be phone calls and homework for the most part."

"Oh, I can make that work" Bella just needed to claim she had help, she didn't really need help. She did look over at Alice, though, at the reminder of vacations. Alice would be giving up some, undoubtedly, amazing vacations.

"There is still plenty of time off for summer even if we take summer classes. We'll still be able to go on our shopping trip." Alice smiled at her. "I was actually surprised when Rosalie told me you agreed to that." Alice looked so happy and Jasper's smile was a bit wide for his face, since he normally seemed stoic and stand offish. Perhaps Alice's happy was leaking out. "I'll get to have you all summer!" It was an odd comment, but Bella just went with it.

"We do go camping quite a bit in the summer." Jasper spoke up. "There are sometimes a few nice days in a row where we can manage it."

"Oh, yes." Alice frowned a little. "I might miss class a bit more in the summer."

"We'll catch up." Bella said, not even asking the normal question of whether Alice really HAD to go with her family. They still hadn't gotten permission, but with Alice this positive, Bella thought they'd get it. "We can work harder on the days you're around and I want to try some night scenes." Night scenes would give them times when Alice wouldn't have to cancel, so Bella decided she wanted those. She had no idea how or what for yet, but they'd make it work.

They spent the last hour of their drive talking about video production and potential video ideas. Jasper explained quite a bit about what they could and couldn't do with the school's computers or the software they could get for their own computers. It was a sad reminder that Bella needed a computer before she needed a car. If they were going to work on this from home, well, it was going to have to be Bella's home. She still wasn't being invited to the Cullens and Edward was likely going to be a wrench in a lot of future plans.

Bella was so distracted by the conversation and planning assignments that sounded as fun as they sounded cool, that when they came close to the familiar exit she spoke without thinking, "If you skip this exit and catch the next you'll miss the worst of the traffic."

…