Sorry so much for the delay, I know this is months late! I've been in a mood to go back to my creative roots lately, so here it finally is! This was written on time, I just never ever got to type it up!

I've started my second year of university, and the workload is a lot more than the first. I'm still hoping to update often, but for now, I'd like to do well in school too!

Thank you guys so much for your support for Across the Ocean these past two years! Across the Ocean has been nominated so many times, but thanks to you guys it won Most Original Storyline at the Twilight Twins Awards. It also won runner up for Best Edward and Bella on the TCFanfic Awards.

So, as promised, here is our little look into Christopher and Marie's future.

"Daddy!" my little girl's voice cried out as she flung herself into my arms. I scooped her up onto my hip and kissed her soft baby cheeks.

"Hello sweetheart, how were you today?" I asked her, walking up the steps to see my beautiful wife standing in the doorway, our young son on her hip sucking on his thumb.

"Really great! We got to paint today with our fingers!" she exclaimed, wiggling them in front of me.

"Then how did you get it in your hair?" I set her down and rubbed at the blue stuck to her hairline.

"That mean Jacob got paint on me," she huffed. "Nessie threw paint at him, though." She grinned widely and I smiled, looking up at Bella.

"Ah, kindergarten." She leaned in and gave me a sweet kiss, one I'd been looking forward to since leaving for work.

"Hello, dear," I grinned when she pulled away.

"Your son has missed you," she said with a small smile, angling Charlie toward me. The corners of his lips lit up in a smile from behind his soother and he reached out his little arms to me.

I scooped him up and blew raspberries all over his cheek making him and Bella laugh.

"Come on," she said, patting my backside. "We haven't got much more time before they all get here." I put Charlie down in front of all his toys and followed Bella into our room. The smells from the kitchen were divine and from the quick look I'd taken she'd outdone herself again on Emmett's birthday cake.

"I missed you," I murmured into Bella's ear, earning a smile from her as she turned to kiss me again.

"I missed you, too, but we have to get ready now," she said quietly, trying to push me away. I pouted at her but acquiesced, watching with rapt attention as she slipped off her apron and jeans and pulled on a beautiful blue dress.

"Get changed!" she laughed when she caught me staring.

After I'd pulled on the dress clothes laid out for me, Marie danced into the room wearing a cute dress, blue hair still intact.

"You look very pretty, angel," I told her, picking her up. She chatted away as we walked into the kitchen where Charlie sat quietly on the countertop, watching Bella decorate the cake.

"She wouldn't sit still long enough for a bath," Bella told me when I tried taking off the better part of the blue paint with a paper towel.

"You, missy, are getting in the bath promptly after the party." Bella was a little flustered when our daughter agreed so easily. The doorbell rang and Marie ran to answer it while I struggled to my feet to chase after her.

"Hi Christopher!" She yelled when she threw open the door. Alice and Jasper stood behind Christopher and his twin sisters, smiling at my daughter. I spotted a very pregnant Rosalie standing behind them and after the kids ran inside I reached out to help her in.

"Bella's in the kitchen finishing the cake," I instructed Alice and Jasper.

"She better have something for me to sit on," Rosalie grumbled. "And something for me to eat, now." She shook me off and waddled into the kitchen while Jasper lightly pushed his son into the living room with the other kids. The boy was so shy sometimes it was nearly sad.

"What is wrong with your hair?" I asked, leaning down to get a better look at the green in his hair. Chris blushed and looked down, kicking his feet.

"Christopher helped Nessie get Jacob," Marie whispered, hiding behind my leg. "Nessie missed and hit him instead." Jasper and I just laughed and shook our heads, shooing the kids to play with their siblings.

It was then I noticed how much the kids looked like their parents. Marie was the spitting image of Bella- which made me unbelievably happy, and lucky, to have two beautiful girls. Charlie, however, had inherited my thick, unruly shock of reddish brown hair. His eyes were bright greens and alight with curiosity. His lips, however, were his mothers. Plumped and pouty and Bella swore high and low he'd be a heartbreaker someday.

We weren't sure if his size would be hindered by his prematurity, or if he was just going to be lean like his father, but Christopher was a healthy boy, even if a bit on the skinny side. He looked just like his father, right down to the curly blonde hair. The twins both had long, curly black hair which Alice refused to cut short like her own. Lacey was loud and vibrant like her mother, while Amelia took after her father and brother in her quietness.

"Bella, I apologise in advance if my water breaks and ruins any furniture," Rosalie sighed, lowering herself into a chair, happily taking a cupcake passed to her.

"So, Christopher was two months early, now this guy is going to be two weeks late?" Bella laughed, placing a hand on Rosalie's belly. "Our kids are troublemakers." Rosalie smiled between the cupcake and Alice and Bella laughed.

"We bought a plot of land," Jasper said, standing next to me and watching the kids.

"Yeah? You're going to build on it?" He nodded.

"It was a bit late going through, but with the bakery closing while Rosalie's on maternity, I thought I'd get the building done. Alice can decorate when we move in."

"Where is it?" I asked, watching Marie hand a disgusted looking Christopher a doll.

"Next door." My head shot to look at him in surprise.

"Are you joking?" Jasper laughed and shook his head. "That's wonderful!"

"It'll be nice having the kids grow up together," he said with a smile.

"Hello?" a loud voice rumbled from the entrance. "Edward? You guys home? You better still need my help. As much as I don't want you and Bella to crush under serving trays, I really want to go home before my wife pops out a child."

"Surprise!" Marie shouted, jumping from the living room in excitement. Emmett looked at her utterly confused until the rest of us yelled out 'surprise!' and Bella pulled out the cake, candles lit already.

It took a moment to clarify that we did not, in fact, need his help with catering trays, but that it was his birthday party.

That night was the first night I noticed how Christopher acted differently around Marie. He gave her his second piece of cake, he let her play dolls with him, and when she fell and hit her knee he rubbed her back until she stopped crying.

It was the first time I noticed it, but it definitely wasn't the last.

Marie was beautiful like her mother, but also inherited her clumsiness and poor immune system. When she was fifteen she broke her arm after falling out of a tree in the front yard that we all loved sitting in.

She had gotten the flu that day and stayed home from school while I'd been at work and Bella was at a catering event. Her ears and nose were plugged, her head and throat hurt and she just felt genuinely miserable. The fact that her ears were bad was a contributing factor to her fall, but she thought fresh air would be good so she went out and got in the tree to read.

We were lucky that Christopher had decided to skip off school to bring her chicken soup and found her. I rushed home to help and I'd never been more thankful that my family was surrounded by such good friends.

When she was seventeen Marie learnt how to drive. She and Christopher got their licenses the same day.

When she was eighteen Marie crashed her car into a guard rail after her breaks gave out. Rosalie, Emmett and I all looked at the car and determined that she had done nothing wrong and had crashed to keep an even bigger accident from happening.

Marie was fine after the crash, mainly due to Christopher, who'd driven by shortly afterwards and helped her out of the car. He stayed by her side for days, making sure she was okay and doing errands for her.

I never understood why he never asked her on a date. Every time they spoke about dating and things like that, his ears grew red in a blush that could rival Bella's.

They went to prom together because Jacob from the kindergarten finger painting incident professed his undying love for Nessie and they ditched their original dates (Marie and Christopher).

When Chris showed up with Alice and Jasper to pick up Marie, I had to admit he looked pretty good. He'd joined the football team, so while he built muscle, he kept himself lean, just like his father. Marie came downstairs with her mother in an off white, delicate looking prom dress. Christopher's face lit up when he saw her in a way that reminded me of how Jasper's changed when he saw Alice, probably how mine looked when I saw Bella.

"You look beautiful," he whispered to her, blushing as she smiled at him. They gave each other flowers and he held her arm strongly as we climbed down the stairs to the beach.

Emmett and Rosalie were waiting to take pictures for us, their three kids kicking a football up and down the sand. Charlie whined about wanting to join them and I squeezed his shoulder, telling him to wait for just a little while longer.

Rosalie wielded the camera since Emmett was positively clueless with things that weren't cars or sentence structure. Charlie, Bella, Marie and I all posed in front of the setting sun before we came up with all sorts of combinations that were repeated on Alice, Jasper, Christopher and the twins.

Jasper grinned at me as we watched our oldest kids stand together looking, I have to admit, quite the pair.

Marie's eyes were bright and alive as she smiled to the camera, excited for Prom and everything that went with it.

Christopher's eyes hardly ever left her face.

They left for prom, Christopher driving since Marie still seemed shaky behind the wheel.

I thought to myself, this is it. They'll come home and Christopher will have told her how he feels and she'll have his complete adoration.

Marie walked into the house late that night, after whatever party she'd gone to, gushing about some girl's brother she'd met and how great he was.

She spent that summer working in the bakery and going on dates that weren't with the young Mr. Hale. Christopher worked with a local newspaper, and in the fall they both left for university.

Marie went to England.

She stayed with my parents on weekends while she studied for a degree in English. She took her holidays at my parents and called every week about all the things she'd seen and done. Bella and I were proud for her, but we missed her a great deal, too.

While Alice and Bella began outwardly plotting ways for Christopher and Marie to get together, I learned from Jasper as we helped Emmett build his house next door that Marie had called Christopher nearly every night since she'd been gone.

My hopes were up for the boy.

Christopher finished his first year with a 4.0. Marie did just as well, but seemed to have lost her passion. When Bella and I heard her considering culinary school like her mother had done, we'd started hoping she'd come home.

When Charlie's birthday came around our three families congregated at the beach. Most of the kids were playing volleyball while the six of us grownups sat around drinking and remembering our youth.

"We sound ridiculous," Bella laughed after Rosalie shared one of Emmett's more charming (stupid) moments on one of their dates in London.

I pulled Bella close to me and kissed her forehead. She smiled up at me and traced my lips with her fingers.

"I'm going to go get Charlie's cake," she announced, pecking me on the lips before hopping out of my lap.

"Can I get you guys anything?" Chris asked, addressing the group of us. "I was going to walk up to the house now." Before any of us could speak he froze, his eyes widening and his mouth slackened.

"Hey!" I heard a faint voice call. We all turned and there was my daughter, running across the beach, her entire arm waving to us.

Chris took off with sand kicking behind him. I was vaguely aware of my parents and Bella walking across the beach, far behind Marie.

"You know how on the day they were born you told me to keep Chris away from Marie?" Jasper asked, standing up next to me to watch them running. I nodded. "I don't think he's going to listen right now."

"About time," I said with a grin.

Christopher grabbed Marie by the waist and spun her around in a hug, their laughter echoing across the beach. They fell down onto the sand, still laughing as I walked past to help Bella and greet my parents.

What surprised all of us was when Chris cupped Marie's face in his hands and kissed her, surprising us even more was the fact that Marie complied, wrapping her arms around his neck.

When they separated they seemed to have forgotten where they were, or didn't think they were in hearing distance.

"I missed you," they told each other.

"I love you, Marie," Chris told her seriously. "I've been in love with you since we were five years old. It's driven me crazy for years, but I can't let you leave again without telling you. We were each others' first everything, you're my best friend, and I love you."

"Chris," Marie breathed out, a stunning smile crossing her features. "I've always cared about you, but I didn't know what to do. You've always been my best friend." Chris leaned in and kissed her again and we left them alone. Lord knows they'd wasted enough time.

With a gathering of three families, a total of fifteen people in all, I couldn't help but stare out at the ocean and think that we were so close to never having this at all. The bottle Bella had set sail and i had found was standing proudly in the middle of our mantle. Our wedding photos and family pictures were to either side.

Had it not been for that ocean that carried her bottle, our two children wouldn't be her. I most likely would have never met her, and Rose and Emmett's family never would have started.

Christopher would have never known a Marie, never fallen in love at five, and never would have suffered as he had when Marie had left. That ocean had separated them, prolonging what was meant to be. Until that moment I hadn't truly fathomed just how powerful those rolling waves were.

I stood there with my wife and kids, our eleven other family members and smiled. I looked at Christopher and Marie leaning against each others' shoulders with their toes dipped in the water. I looked at my son and his friends, laughing and running and eating cake.

I looked at Bella, who I couldn't love anymore than I had since I met her. I kissed her with smiles on our lips, realising that this was how it was meant to be.

There we go. Sorry again for the delay! This is the end now, for good.

I know there will be people who will want me to continue a story about these two, but then that's not Twilight fanfiction. And, honestly, I finished this story a long time ago, I feel like you can all believe what you want to :)

Thanks for your unending support, it really means so much to me!

If you liked Across the Ocean, and you're looking for something similar, I am posting a new story shortly, called Kismet. It's similar to this one, but I'm hoping I'll stay true to my romantic nonsensicalness!