XXX

"Hi Bella! Are you coming to lunch?"

I shut my locker door and look about in confusion for the source of all this cheerfulness. Alice, petite and dark haired, is bouncing around next to me. I mean this quite literally, she's sort of hopping from one foot to the other. It's as if there were an inaudible soundtrack somewhere and she's keeping time. If I were to do this I would look plainly ridiculous but Alice just gives the impression that she has far too much energy and a million things to do which she will no doubt do in a beautifully co-ordinated and far too energetic fashion.

"Hi Alice" I reply, trying to match her cheer. "Yes, just throwing some stuff in my locker". "Great!" she enthuses immediately, "Edward wanted me to let you know that he'll be a little late." She leans over in conspiratorial fashion "The great detective is tracking down Victoria" she stage whispers and pulls a frightened face as she moves away. "He's going to report back to us as soon as he finds her – assuming that he can find her" she adds.

I'm a little disappointed not to see Edward, but on the other hand, I can't help being pleased that Alice has come for me. I'd like to ask her if Edward suggested it or if she just decided to do it herself but I just can't bring myself to ask the question.

We make our way down to the cafeteria, Alice chattering away next to me. It's impossible not to like her. She cracks some funny comments about her classes this morning, pointed, but never mean-spirited. She's obviously a sharp observer. We make our way to the cafeteria line and find ourselves right behind Irina and Lauren. Alice turns her back to them and faces me in the queue. With wide-open eyes, she makes weird nodding motions with her head. What on Earth is she doing? I'm obviously bemused. Rolling her eyes she pops up on tiptoe in her elegant purple suede pointed toe boots and whispers "Did you ask Irina?"

Crap. Here's the moment where I have to decide whether I'm going to lie about it or not but it's actually too late because one look at my mouth pulled into a straight line and Alice seems to know that I haven't. I really need to work on that.

Alice falls back next to me and is silent for a few moments. Irina half turns towards us and I blunder forward, catching her eye before she can pretend she hasn't seen me.

"Hi Irina" I say nervously. Irina gives a noncommittal 'hi' in return with a quick glance at Alice, who falls back a little, obviously giving me room.

I take a deep breath. I've no strategy here. "How're things?" I ask brashly "I haven't seen you guys". Irina regards me coolly from behind her long blond hair. "Well, you wouldn't, would you while you've been sucking up to Edward" she says unpleasantly. "Enjoy a ride in his car, did you?" she continues. "How did that happen, I wonder". I grimace. This is worse than I thought. Really, I should just walk away but I have a mission to complete. "Has Jess forgiven me yet?" I ask, screwing up my face in a mask of desperate contrition that I have to admit I don't really feel. "I don't think that's going to be happening – ever" Irina says.

"You were really calm when it happened" I gush. "Have you ever thought of nursing as a career?" I sound like a complete idiot but amazingly she seems a little mollified and tells me that she's been told before that she has a 'soothing touch' but that she doesn't want to waste her life with old, sick people. This is so ridiculous, I'm tempted to get sidetracked into talking about all the different types of nursing available and how it's not all just 'old, sick people' and even if it were that could still be enormously rewarding because who needs help more than the old and the sick but I take a deep breath and stick to my purpose "Did you go with Jess to the school Nurse?" I know she did but I can't work out how to bring up the subject of her lunchtime activities any other way. "Of course I did" she says. "And did you stay with her? All lunchtime?" This is so unsubtle. "Lauren was there. She didn't need me. Only one person could stay." No luck. I'll try one more time. "What did you do then?" Irina looks at me as if I'm mad and I can't blame her "Stuff" she says "Why are you so interested? What did you do after you finished causing devastation?" Shit. I really don't want to go into that. "Nothing much. I felt bad. I ran into Angela near the library". Irina looks bored and we've almost reached the food. I let her start picking her way through the offerings. I dawdle over choosing a salad so that she gets a bit ahead and then I wait for Alice. It looks like Irina won't be inviting me to sit with her for lunch any time soon. "Total fail" I say to Alice but she merely shrugs. "It's not that easy to casually ask someone exactly what they were doing two lunchtimes ago" she says with a grin. "That's alright. Irina's still on the list".

As we sit down, I can't help asking Alice "What do you think of all this?" Alice gives me one of her sharpest looks. "I think it's been good for my brother" she says slowly. "He's been so focused on college and what he wants to do and the future generally that he's just been ignoring everything in the present. He's been so disparaging about teenage relationships and high school and Forks. This girl has really thrown him. And it's made him step out of his little comfortable shell a bit. I mean, look, he hadn't spoken to you all term right, even though you were sitting together in Biology? Well, that's got to be a good thing".

I'm comforted by the fact that Alice doesn't start raging about the bitch who did this to her brother. I can't be sure but maybe when this is all over Alice and I can still be friends. I'd like that.

Oh my gosh, such writer's block! This tiny chapter cost me blood compared to the first 20,000 words. I had zero inspiration for it. None. Also appendicitis. Anyway, now things should move a little more smoothly although I'm going on holiday for a few weeks.