Renesmee's POV-
We soon made our way out of the castle. It was around three in the afternoon, so the sun was still beaming in the sky. Jane and Alec lead the way to the garage, while I hung back a little and talked to Rosalie and Alice about what types of gowns we were looking for. Then Rosalie and Emmett started bickering over the color that she should be looking for. Rose insists that her best color is red, while Emmett said that black is much more appealing, earning himself a slap and a silent treatment that lasted all of thirty seconds.
Since there were seven of us, and Jane insisted that we all ride together, we all piled in to Demetri's 2016 Cadillac Escalade. I'm sure he wouldn't mind. It was about a thirty minute drive to the mall with Alec's driving—consistently thirty over the speed limit. It would have been less, but I insisted that we travel farther away to a larger mall that I knew had a much bigger and better selection of dresses to choose from.
When we got to the mall, Rosalie and Alice sent their spouses away on a mission and us girls (plus Alec and Jane) made our way to the dress shop. I had been here on multiple occasions, and it was pleasant to hear the sound of excitement from Alice and Rose rather than the typical dread from my mother when we walked in. We immediately set off, grabbing all the gowns we thought were pretty. By the time we got to the dressing room, we each easily had at least nine gowns to try on—not to mention the multiple gowns that Alice had picked out for me.
I stared at myself in the dressing room mirror. The dress I currently had on was grey with white lace layered over it. I pulled my hair out of my face and held it above my head, trying to imagine how the dress would look with my hair in a bun. I heard an impatient sigh outside the dressing room door and smiled to myself.
"Are you ready yet, Renesmee? It's been like three whole minutes." I heard Alice's voice say. I let my hair drop onto my shoulders again and unlocked the door, walking out into the little runway style hallway the store had set up. I heard Alice gasp. "I love it!" I walked toward her and looked at myself in the threeway mirror that was set up. I scrunched up my nose.
"You've said that about all of them." I remarked. Rose nodded her head in agreement. Alice crossed her arms.
"Well all of them have looked gorgeous." I could feel the blood rushing to my cheeks and looked down, letting my hair fall over my cheeks.
"I like the green one better. It went better with your hair." Rosalie said. Alice and Rosalie had already tried on all their dresses, and made a decision. I had already gone through most of mine too, but every time I came out, there seemed to be another dress handed to me.
"I liked that one too." I responded and turned around.
"Green is too overdone with reddish hair like yours. Literally any color would look fantastic on you. Mix it up, girl! Try on the blue one next." I jokingly sighed heavily and stomped my way back into the dressing room. I quickly put on the blue dress and took a minute to look myself over in the mirror. The dress was a deep blue, one of my mom's favorite colors. It was low cut and the silver straps rested nicely off the edges of my shoulders. It was cute. I put my hair up in a ponytail to avoid it from getting stuck in the silver sequins from the straps and walked out of the dressing room stall once again.
I walked until I was right in front of everyone, waiting for a response. When I looked at everyone, Alice and Rosalie looked in awe, but…sad at the same time. Alec was giving me his typical 'pretending to be interested' look, and Jane looked concerned.
"What is it? You don't like it?" I asked everyone.
"I think it's a little…mature for you." Jane said. I rolled my eyes. She chuckled. "-I'm just saying. Maybe something less revealing would suit you better." I looked in the mirror and agreed.
"What about you guys? You haven't said anything yet." I looked at Alice and Rosalie.
"It's pretty." Alice said. I raised my eyebrows.
"That's it? It's pretty?" I asked.
"Yeah, it looks really nice on you." She responded, sadness dripping from her voice. I looked to Rosalie.
"You…look a lot like a girl we used to know. She wore that same color blue to our high school prom a long time ago. She was breathtaking…" She stopped momentarily. "-As are you, of course. We just miss her a lot." Okay, then. I guess it's a no-go on this blue dress. I wouldn't want to show up and make people sad. That would be awful. Next dress.
The next dress I actually picked out for myself. I found it in the bridal section, but I didn't really care. It was gorgeous. I quickly got dressed once again and this time when I looked in the mirror, I was actually in awe. The dress was all white and full of lace. It had long sleeves and the front of the dress covered up to my collarbone, so there was no "inappropriate" skin showing (as Jane would probably say). The back was cut out all the way down to the small of my back. I twirled, smiling.
I eagerly exited the dressing room and made my way, smiling, down to where everyone sat. Alice squealed as soon as she saw me.
"Oh my goodness, Renesmee! You look stunning!" She placed her right hand over her chest as if her heart was hurting.
"That's the one. It looks perfect on you." Rosalie commented. I smiled and turned to Jane. As always, she looked apprehensive. I twirled again, smiling at her.
"Is that a wedding dress?" She asked. I chuckled.
"Maybe. What does it matter? I think it's beautiful." I told her.
"Well then you have your answer. Get it." She told me. God, she sounded like my mother. I looked in the mirror again. It did look distinctly like a wedding dress.
"Maybe I could get it tailored so that it fades into a deep blue around my waist. That would be pretty." I told myself. I turned and went back into the dressing room. I changed into my normal clothes again and carried out the several gowns that I had taken in with me. I gave most of them to the attendant and walked to the cash register to pay for my wedding gown.
"We've been in here for over two hours." Alice commented, checking her phone.
"It'll be worth it when Emmett and Jasper get to see how beautiful you two look in your dresses." I smiled at them and Alice gave me a side hug. In a matter of hours, I already felt like she was one of my best friends. It was weird to know that she was there throughout my parents' whole relationship. She had once been my mother's best friend. I was lost in my thoughts when the cashier told me how much the gown costed.
"Sorry. I missed that. How much?" I asked.
"One thousand two hundred and nineteen dollars" The saleswoman said. Oh shoot. I was thinking the dress was three, maybe four hundred dollars. One thousand two hundred dollars?
"I got it." Alice stepped in front of me and pulled out her credit card. I began to shake my head.
"Alice…" I began. She held up a finger to me.
"Nope. This is part of my birthday present to you." She told me. Part? She was planning on getting more?
"No, that's way too much Alice." I told her.
"Stop your fussing. It'll be just as much a gift to me to see you glowing in your beautiful gown at the ball." My heart soared at her words. The cashier handed Alice my gown in a zipped up black bag, and Alice turned and handed it to Jasper, who I hadn't even realized had been standing behind me. She then turned and paid for hers and Rosalie's dresses before heading toward the door. I was still speechless.
"It's about 5:45. Are you hungry, Renesmee?" Jane asked. Everyone looked at me for my response.
"Yeah, but I can wait until we are done shopping to eat if it's easier." I said.
"Don't be silly. It'll be nine by the time Rose and Alice are done shopping." Emmett commented. I smiled.
"We really don't mind, Renesmee. It'll be a good break." Rose said. We all walked toward the food court, which was swarming with people. I ordered a burger and we all sat down at a circular table in one of the corners of the food court.
"That's not very nutritional, Renesmee." Jane told me. I stopped eating and tilted my head at her.
"You're not my mother, Jane." I told her.
"No, but it's my job to watch over you. You should be eating a salad or something." She told me. I looked up. I could tell by her face that she was uncomfortable—not from our conversation, rather by the fact that she was surrounded by humans. She was always antsy when she was around actual people.
"Well, I'll tell you what. I'll change my diet when you change yours." She sighed. I could see the contacts she had just recently put in her eyes were starting to dissolve. I resumed eating my burger.
"You don't drink human blood?" Jasper asked me. I looked up at him. All of the Cullens were staring at me.
"Uhh, no. My mom and I prefer to stick to animal blood. It's less… atrocious." I said looking Jane in the eyes. She rolled her eyes.
"You know we've tried, Renesmee." Alec told me. I was well aware of this. Multiple times over the years, they had attempted to give up human blood. It never lasted more than a week or so.
"That doesn't mean much to me. I'm half-human. Half of who I am is what you feast on. It's sickening." I told them. The Cullens were looking amongst eachother, deciding whether or not to say something. Nobody spoke.
"Or so I've heard." Jane muttered. I ignored her and went back to my perfectly unhealthy burger.
"So, Nessie. Tell us more about you." Emmett said. I looked up, not sure what he was saying. He was looking at me. I was sincerely confused.
"What?" I asked him. He laughed his booming laugh that I'd already grown so fond of.
"I hope you don't mind. Renesmee's kind of a mouth full." Rosalie attempted to smack his sides discreetly, secretly telling him to knock it off. I laughed.
"Nessie? Like the Loch Ness monster?" I asked him, jokingly. I took a sip of my soda. He grinned widely again.
"Didn't think of it that way, but I suppose. Some would say your kind of mysterious and enchanting." I starting choking on my soda and his booming laugh echoed around the food court. I could see people staring. Once I could properly breathe again, I smiled at him.
"Okay. Nessie it is."
After I had finished eating, all seven of us wandered the mall, not really ready to head back to the castle yet. All except Jane that is. Alice, Rose, and I shopped for shoes and accessories for the ball while Jasper and Emmett would look in the sports and men's apparel stores. While we were shopping, I'd learned a lot about everyone. Dare I say that we…bonded. It was fantastic! If only my father was here too. And in a good mood I should add.
So we had basically trekked the whole mall, and we were heading back to the car when Alice suggested that we look down a smaller wing of the mall. It was just a very small wing that lead out to another parking lot, but it had a few stores in it. I knew of it, as I'd been to this mall a thousand times before, but I'd never bothered to wander that way.
There were a few cute stores that sold little knick knacks, and there was a little playland for small children. My favorite, however, was the music store. It wasn't the kind that sold cd's, although they did have a few. It was the kind that had instruments, equipment, and sheet music all around.
As soon as I saw it, I insisted that we check it out. Jasper and Rosalie were drawn to the guitar section, while Emmett was drawn to the drums, and Alice was drawn to the woodwind section. I wandered around, looking for something specific. As I walked around more, I grew increasingly frustrated. Finally, I found it though! The piano and keyboard section. To my surprise, they actually had a full size grand piano in the middle of the section. Most of the stores I'd come across had a few keyboards set up but nothing more.
I slowly glided over to the piano and took a seat, placing my hands lightly over the keys. I'd always wanted a piano of my own at the castle, but my mother had insisted on no pianos of any sort. She did agree to let me get lessons though. She always arranged them on days or at times that she was busy, so Aro, Jane, or Alec would end up taking me. I didn't know what my mother's problem with pianos was, but I hoped she'd get over it. Playing the piano was one of my favorite things in the world.
I began playing what I remembered of a song I had written the last time I had come across a piano. I didn't have a name for it yet. I closed my eyes and felt myself drift into the melody. When I finished playing my song, I opened my eyes once again. I knew Alec and Jane had been watching, but when I turned around all of the Cullens were staring at me in awe.
"That was lovely. Did you write that yourself?" Jasper asked. I nodded, standing up from the piano.
"I think you could teach Ed a thing or two." Emmett commented.
"Edward plays the piano?" I asked.
"Absolutely. He's extraordinary." Rose answered me. That made sense. I had always wondered how it was possible that my mother could hate the piano so much when I was so in love with it.
"You have the same concentration and focus that he does when he plays. It's delightful to watch. I think he'd be ecstatic to know that you're just as drawn to the piano as he is." Alice chipped in. I smiled. I resembled my dad.
We headed home after that. When we arrived home it was about 8:30, so I still had like thirty minutes before my mom would be calling. The Cullens had gone back to their rooms to put all of their things away. After that, they said they'd be watching some movie that Emmett had found. I was relieved to know that I wouldn't have to worry about one of them accidentally overhearing my conversation with my mom by simply wandering around.
I made my way toward the north wing where Aro's office was located. It was around the corner from our library. I was thinking about all of the great things that had gone on today. I couldn't wait to tell Aro.
Unsurprisingly, I got lost in my thoughts and wasn't paying attention to where I was going. As I went to round the corner by Aro's office, I ran into something I could have sworn was a brick wall and began to fall backward. I braced myself for the fall, but it never came. Rather, a pair of cold hands had caught me by the waist. I looked up into the face that I quickly recognized as that of my father and stood upright, brushing his hand in the process. One I was upright, I studied his facial expression again. It had gone from fear when I had fallen to complete and utter surprise when I stood up.
"I'm sorry. I wasn't watching where I was walking." I told him quickly. I could feel the blood rushing to my face as I went to walk around him. He quickly stopped me though.
"Hold on." He requested. He grabbed my arm lightly and let it fall again. "Weird." He mumbled.
"What's weird?" I asked, not really sure I wanted to know.
"I-I could've sworn…that I read your mind." He finished. I grew nervous. In the second that my hand brushed his while I was standing up, I must have transferred what I had been thinking to him. I'm pretty sure I was just thinking about all that I had done today, but who knows. I hope I didn't show him anything containing my mom. "-But it was different. I could see everything so vividly in my mind. It seemed almost real." I wasn't sure if he was talking to himself or to me. He was speaking so low.
"What exactly did you see?" I struggled to ask. He looked up at me. I could feel my knees almost buckle under me as his perfectly golden eyes locked with my light brown ones. I was so nervous. I knew he could tell.
"I saw you guys at the mall." He smiled a little bit. "You had been playing the piano, and then you turned around and everybody was smiling." As he explained, his expression changed from happy to sad. I wasn't sure what to say. "I can't remember the last time I saw my family so completely and sincerely happy." He told me.
"Well, I have many more memories like that if you'd ever like to see them." What the hell was I even saying? I sound like an idiot. "I'm- uh. I can show other people what I'm thinking through touch." I could see he was going to inquire about why it hadn't worked when he grabbed my arm the second time. "It didn't work the second time because I wasn't trying to show you anything. I suppose the first time, I just slipped." I told him. He nodded. "I'm sorry for running into you. Thanks for catching me." I told him. Before I turned I could have sworn I'd seen him smile a bit.
I walked away, heart racing, toward Aro's office to tell him all about my day, which had surprisingly just grown exponentially better.
Edward's POV-
I looked down into the fearful eyes of Renesmee. I had been searching for the library, which I thought was just around the corner from Aro's office, when we ran into each other. My hands had automatically reached out and caught her. My heart ached as I remembered all the times I had saved Bella from falling. When Renesmee had realized what happened, she quickly stood up, brushing my hand in the process.
As her warm skin brushed against mine, a vision filled my head. I could see Renesmee's small, dainty fingers dancing across the keys of a piano. I could hear the sound coming from it. It was beautiful. She finished and turned to face my family, who gazed at her although she was a precious jewel in a museum. Smiles filled their faces and I could almost feel the emotions that Renesmee had been feeling in that moment. She was undeniably happy. As she gazed at them, she felt a feeling that I swore I could never experience again…love. I could feel it through this vision. I had no idea how. This had never happened before. She withdrew her hand from mine and eagerly rushed around me.
I stopped her, testing to see if I could see the vision again by touching her again. Nothing. She explained her gift and I relayed to her what I had seen. Following that, she quickly scurried away toward Aro's office.
I was astonished. I thought back to the vision I had seen/felt/heard. It was as if for a second, I was her. In that time, I recalled feeling no negative emotions whatsoever. All day, I had been thinking she had been up to something. Nobody could be as perfect as she appeared to be…Right?
Author's Note:
So Edward's doubting his original thoughts about Renesmee…Hmm.
Thank you all so much for your feedback on how you think Bella should find out about the Nessie and the Cullens!
Since it went over so well last time, I figured I'd do another little poll.
How should Edward and Renesmee interact from here on out?
1. He progressively loosens up to her and the rest of his family.
2. He loosens up to Nessie, but not the rest of his family.
3. He is rude to everyone.
Once again, thank you to everyone who has favorited, alerted, and reviewed! I appreciate your feedback more than you could understand.
With that being said, go ahead and tell me what you want to see happen, whether that would be this chapter or later in the story. Until next time, Taylor.