Disclaimer: SM owns Twilight, but the plot to this story is all mine.

Summary: Bella moves to Forks to start fresh. There she meets Edward, a boy whom is the school loser and bullied on a daily basis. Bella sets out to save him from a life of living hell, but in the mean time Edward attempts to save her, too. BXE, AU, AH, OOCish.

Okay, well, read away and let me know if you think it should be continued!

My eyes roamed the cafeteria anxiously as I gripped the grey plastic food tray with shaking hands, the sweat forming on my palm making it dangerously possible for the item to slip from my grasp and cause my lunch to go tumbling to the ground. I recognized one of the girls who had spoken to me in English (Jessica, I think she said her name was) sitting at a table not too far away; I could approach her, however she seemed to be the gossipy, talkative type and I did not have the energy to properly engage myself in conversation today. A couple tables down from her sat another girl I had been partnered up with in Spanish named Angela Weber. Her nose was deep within a thick book and I decided at once that she would be safe. I had just begun to walk toward her when she suddenly stood and walked from the building, never glancing up from the pages of the novel. With a sigh, I sat down at the only empty table in the room and concluded that I would be spending my first lunch period at Forks High School pushing my pasta salad around the paper plate.

The clattering sound of another tray hitting the wood of the table across from me jerked my gaze upwards. Two crystal blue eyes observed my untouched lunch and warmed before meeting my gaze. The girl to whom they belonged spoke.

"How peculiar. They served rainbow pasta salad for lunch on my first day, too." Her pink lips curved up into a smile, showing off a set of flawless pearly white teeth. I allotted myself several seconds to take in the rest of her appearance.

She couldn't have been more than five feet tall and over a hundred pounds. All of her features matched her height and weight perfectly. A tiny nose, tiny mouth, tiny hands and fingers…even short, spiky black hair. The only exception was her eyes; big and wide, framed with thick, long dark lashes. Her nails were painted dark blue and matched her lacy blue top and blue sequined black belt that hugged her waist. I couldn't see what she wore for bottoms or shoes since she was seated, but I was sure they were just as stylish as the rest of her outfit.

"I'm Alice, by the way. Alice Cullen," she said cheerfully.

"Bella Swan," I offered, unable to stop a grin of my own. This was the first time I had smiled in months.

"Cool name. Where are you from?"

"Um…Phoenix," I responded quietly. I didn't want to think of that place right now. I concentrated on keeping my thoughts in the present moment. Don't think of it, don't think of it, don't think of it…

Alice seemed to sense that this was an unwelcome topic and casually changed the direction of conversation.

"Never been there. I'm from Chicago."

"Really?" I asked, my interest piqued. I had been there once in my life and never wanted to leave. Personally, I preferred places that had a little moisture in the air. The city itself had been beautiful, too, and I had often fantasized about moving there after I graduated. "I love it there," I continued. "When did you move?"

"Just last year in…November, I think? Anyway, I know how it feels to walk into the cafeteria and have no one to sit with."

"Is that why you sat with me?" Out of pity? Did I really look that pathetic?

"Yes and no. You look interesting. I wanted to talk to you and I had this feeling…" she trailed off, lost in thought for a few seconds. "Well, like I said, I wanted to talk to you and maybe become friends," she said matter-of-factly, backtracking.

"Well, thank you," I said genuinely. How I could appear to be interesting was beyond me, but it was nice to hear, just the same.

"So, no siblings at home?" Alice asked curiously.

I shook my head. "No, just me. How about you?"

"Two brothers, Emmett and Edward. No sisters," she sighed sadly.

"Are they younger than you?"

She smiled wryly and shook her head. "No, actually. We're all seniors. Triplets."

"That's so cool," I blurted. She laughed and shrugged.

"I guess so. My mom sometimes has a difficult time trying to feed three eighteen year olds eating her out of house and home." I believe that.

Something dawned on me then. "Where are they? Where are your friends?"

"I mostly hang out with my boyfriend, Jasper, and his sister Rosalie who happens to be Emmett's girlfriend. But all three are on some kind of science field trip."

"And Edward?" I asked, noticing that she seemed careful to keep him out of her explanation.

Just as I finished speaking, someone yelled, "Hey Dickward, I'm talking to you!"

"Oh no," Alice whispered, eyes frightfully wide as she stared across the cafeteria. A big guy with dark blond hair grabbed the back of another kid's leather jacket and slammed him against the wall forcefully. The boy's mass of bronze hair cast a shadow over his face, masking him, but I could still hear his groan of pain, even sitting all the way across the room. The blond asshole proceeded to grab the poor kid's soup and pour the scalding hot liquid over his head. He laughed when the boy jumped and cringed. Then he took his can of soda and threw it in his face.

I couldn't watch anymore. I just couldn't. This was far too familiar to me and I would not become one of those people who just sat back and enjoyed the show. Anger poured through every vein in my body and I stood up from the table and marched toward the scene determinedly.

"Bella, no!" Alice gasped, leaping up and well. She grabbed onto me and I tried to shake her off. Damn, she was strong for such a little thing. "Bella, listen to me!" she hissed in a whisper. "You'll only make it worse! He'll get hurt even more if everyone sees a girl defending him!"

I glared at her. "A girl?"

"I don't like it anymore than you do!" she said with a frown. "But that's what the guys see it as." I hesitated. "Please, Bella, don't." Before I could make my decision, the boy was walking swiftly from the cafeteria and the blond guy was being spoken to by a teacher. I sat back down, still shaking slightly with anger, and closed my eyes to calm down. After a few minutes, I opened them again and found Alice looking at me with sad, watery eyes. Neither of us spoke for a while.

"Does this happen often?" I finally whispered.

Alice hesitated before meeting my eyes. "Edward's had a bit of a more difficult time fitting in than I have," she whispered with a small sniffle.

My eyes widened and asked an unspoken question. Alice seemed to understand as she nodded and said softly, "Yes, that's my brother."

The warning bell rang and we both stood, neither of us speaking a word to the other as we walked from the cafeteria.

*

*

Biology AP was my first class after lunch. The teacher, Mr. Banner, assigned me to sit at the empty table at the back of the room. I sat in a daze the entire time, my mind stuck on thoughts of Edward. I tried to concentrate on the work that was due next class, but eventually I just gave up, deciding I would do it after school.

My blood boiled when I thought of that guy with the blond hair in the ponytail. I had to repeatedly talk myself out of finding him and giving him a piece of my mind. I knew it wouldn't do anything but piss him off further and make me a future target, but at the same time it would feel so fucking good. I must have come up with literally hundreds of ways to get back at him without his knowledge that it was me that period.

Thankfully the bell rang before I could change my mind about keeping quiet. The last class of the day was gym. It would be a good distraction, I hoped.

Walking into the change room, I discovered that Alice and I shared this class. She smiled at me when I came in and asked, "Partners?" I nodded and her smile grew. Since I didn't have my badminton racket yet, Coach Clapp leant me one that belonged to the school. It was a piece of shit, quite honestly, but I'd make do. Alice and I rallied back and forth for warm-up.

After a couple minutes, she asked, "How was Edward in Bio?"

I frowned as I ran to the side to hit the birdie. "I didn't see him. Are you sure he's in the same class?"

"Two-oh-two, right?"

I nodded, running backward and hitting the birdie to Alice's front left.

"Then yes, I'm positive," she said as she did a drop pass. I ran forward and managed to fire the birdie to the back of the court.

"He wasn't there. I'm sure."

A few more minutes went by in silence. Finally, I had to ask the question that had been burning in my mind.

"Alice, why don't you help him?" I demanded, almost furiously. The tone of my voice surprised me. Alice didn't seem shocked, however.

"It's complicated," she muttered. I let the birdie drop beside me and crossed my arms.

"Complicated? It seems pretty black and white to me."

"Well, it's not."

"How so?"

She lowered her voice and walked forward to meet me. We stood just a foot apart with the net in between us. "Come over to my house after school and we'll talk, alright?" she asked. I stared at her for several seconds.

"Alright," I finally said.

"Cullen! New kid!" Coach Clapp yelled.

"It's Swan!" I yelled back.

"Whatever! Move your lazy asses and get going!"

With a sigh, I picked up the birdie and served it back over the net.

*

*

"Want something to drink?" Alice asked, looking through the fridge. "We have soda, juice, water, milk, V8, cocon—"

"Water is fine," I said, looking around the room. The kitchen was just as big as the rest of the house. All the rich kids I had known were snooty, spoiled and mean. Alice seemed to almost be embarrassed by the amount of money she had. Sorry, I mean the amount of money her parents had. She was quick to correct me on that the moment I made the observation.

"Would you like a snack, too?" she asked as she set down the water glass beside me. "We have, well, just about everything. Esme likes to keep the pantry well stocked."

"No thanks."

"Suit yourself," she mumbled, pulling out a box of Twinkies. I watched as she took a big bite out of the soft, luscious, thousand-calorie cake. With a sigh, I shook my head and worked on concentrating on something else other than food.

"So spill," I blurted the moment she sat down.

"You don't waste a second, do you?"

I only shrugged. She sighed and picked at her nail polish worriedly as she organized her thoughts. I waited patiently.

"Okay, well we moved here almost exactly one year ago, as I told you at lunch. I made friends with Rosalie pretty quickly, which was odd considering it takes her forever to warm up to new people. For the first week or so all five of us hung out together. Rosalie and Jasper were really our only friends."

"Didn't they have friends before you?"

"Well, they hung out with different people every day. They didn't have certain people they always were with. Anyway, we were all really happy and everything. Then Rosalie's parents left town about two weeks later and she threw a party and invited us all. It was crazy—I mean, it was the sort of party that you saw in movies. Music blared, people were pouring from the windows, a good portion of kids were already completely wasted and every bedroom was…er, occupied.

"Emmett and I got pretty trashed pretty quickly as well. Edward didn't drink a thing, though. He was a lot more responsible. He went outside at some point in the night to get some fresh air; like I said, the house was packed. He walked out into the trees and heard a girl crying."

Alice's voice became very quiet. Her eyes filled with tears and she paused for several seconds before continuing. "He found two men sexually abusing a woman. He called the police right away. The men heard him talking on his cell and beat him up pretty badly. Thank god the police got there quickly."

A tear dropped from her eye. I was shaking in my seat, as rigid as a board. This story hit much to close to home for my liking. My hands gripped the table tightly and my nails screamed in pain. I closed my eyes and tried to get myself under control. Alice had paused again for which I was thankful. Slowly, I felt my pulse slow and my grip relaxed. I took a deep breath and focused on Alice's bright blue eyes.

"That guy you saw in the cafeteria, James? That's the son of one of the men. The two guys were arrested, and James has been making Edward's life an absolute living hell ever since. I want to do something, but the boy has connections. Your dad researched the family and found out that the father has a horrible history. He murdered, Bella, murdered. I can't risk anyone else. Edward even agrees."

"Why don't you move?" I demanded sharply. Alice seemed surprised by my tone.

"Both my parents have a five year contract here, and besides, Edward refuses to go to a boarding school by himself or be home-schooled."

"Why?" I asked incredulously.

She shrugged sadly. "I really don't know. My parents, Emmett and I have asked him several times, but all he ever says is, 'I have my reasons'," she said, making air quotes. I shook my head and focused on a dent in the wood of the table. I was feeling so many emotions at once. Fear, sadness, wistfulness…but anger dominated them all.

The door to the kitchen flew open suddenly and he walked in. He went straight to the pantry and bent down, ruffling through the contents. His back muscles flexed and I found myself looking over his body. His muscles were well defined and he had a medium build. My gaze travelled to his ass, covered by his dark jeans.

"Did we run out of Twinkies, Alice?" he asked in a silky smooth voice that made my heart stutter. What the hell was wrong with me?

"They're right here," she said quietly. He spun around and I gasped. I had never seen a more beautiful face in my life; strong jaw, straight nose, full pink lips, creamy pale skin, perfect eyebrows, beautiful copper colored hair and his eyes. Piercing green eyes that turned my insides to jelly.

He looked over to me in surprise and I knew he hadn't realized I was there. When his eyes met mine, my heart beat sped to the speed of a hummingbird. My lips parted and my feet suddenly felt like they weighed a hundred pounds. My body began to shake again, but this time it was a good feeling. His gaze seemed to become more and more intense the longer our eyes held. A gentle tug appeared somewhere in my stomach and tried to pull me toward him. It was difficult not to stand up. It became more and more persistent and I actually had to grab either side of the stool to keep from moving. He must have felt it, too, because slowly, hesitantly, his feet walked toward me. It felt as though electricity had begun to serge through my veins. My skin burned, but it was not unpleasant. In fact, it was one of the most surreal experiences of my life. The closer he got to me, the more powerful the electricity became. Finally, he took one last step and was standing just inches away. I vaguely heard Alice's voice but my mind was in too much of a mush to register what she was saying. Suddenly the intensity in Edward's eyes turned into fire. My own eyes widened, and without warning, his lips were suddenly on mine.

Just like that, my mind cleared and my eyes opened wider than they had ever been before. Alice's screech registered immediately, and though his lips felt like cold, crystal clear water on a hot summer day, the intensity and raw…whatever it was scared me to death. I pushed against his chest, trying to get him to break the kiss, but his only response was to wrap his arms around me tightly. Alice tugged on his arm but he didn't move an inch. She looked at him in astonishment for a second before reaching around us and grabbing my water glass, dumping it over our heads.

He pulled away and I sighed in relief, breathing heavily and dripping.

"Edward, what the hell?" Alice screeched. I continued to stare at him with wide eyes as I panted for air. He met my eyes, seeming shocked by his own actions, and his cheeks became tinged with red.

"I, um, just—pools of chocolate—couldn't think," he stuttered, not making any sense at all. Finally he just looked at me and said, "Sorry," before walking swiftly from the room. Both Alice and I stared after him. Finally she spoke.

"God, Bella, I don't even know what to say! You both just looked so weird, and then he kissed you…I promise that he's never done anything like that before! God, I am just so, so sorry!"

"Alice," I said calmly, still breathing a little quicker than normal. "It's fine."

But really, it wasn't. My reaction to him had scared the life out of me. I had never felt that insistent tug and connection to another person before, and certainly not just by looking at them. Obviously, Edward had felt it, too.

What the hell was it?

Yes? No? Review and let me know what you think please!

Monnica