I like AU stories about bella and Edward getting together . . . so im trying to write one. Anyway everybody is human. Alice and Emmet are siblings, Edward's their cousin, Jasper's just a friend. Starts out at an Art school in New York, then heads to the south where you meet Rosalie and Bella. Hope you like it (or can at least tolerate it haha)

Jaspers POV

I didn't know how to say it, or how anyone would take it.

After more than a year of absence I, Jasper Whitlock, was going back to Banner, Texas, to once again attend Trinity River School of the Arts. It was where I had spent the majority of my childhood, and freshman year.

Banner was a town small enough to count as little more than a village, and everyone was everybody else's family. I missed the mercantile where we all bought milkshakes and cheeseburgers, the fireworks stand my best friend's uncle owned, spending' all our free time down by the river or at the tiny movie theater, running free just cause' we'd all been there since we were babies and had little reason for supervision anymore. I was more than ready to see the people I'd left behind, the closest thing to family that I still had.

When I was a sophomore, my brother Jeffery, who was convinced Banner would never get anybody anything or anywhere, convinced my parent to send me to an art school in New York, where he was currently living. I went, grudgingly, kept on painting and made a few new friends. That was before everything got a little lonelier and a lot more depressing.

Last new years my mom and dad, who still lived back in Banner, were going to parties with their closest friends, the Swans, after having been "over-indulging" in alcohol related activities. They told me and Bella that they probably hadn't even felt anything. When the car had rolled, the hill was steep enough to immediately crush the roof of the automobile, causing instant death most likely.

I and Jeffery had gone back for a few days for the funeral, but he was scared of that place, still treating our hometown like it was the black hole. I hated him for not caring, and not letting me sit with my best friend and daughter of the Swans, Bella, so we could at least help one another. I didn't understand his aversion to the place where he grew up, and he'd never cared to explain it.

Ever since then I'd been living with him and his fiancé, Bethany, in some upscale apartment. It was uncomfortable to say the least. They were very much in love, and had no problem with showing it. I liked Bethany, honestly, but she was everything Texas hadn't been, and I was always afraid that it was most of the reason he liked her.

School was probably the only thing that I was pretty satisfied with. There were a lot of opportunities to learn about art and improve my painting skills. People here were really different, but I hadn't decided if that was a good or bad thing yet. I'd made some really good friends, and was nearly inseparable from the Brandon's and their cousin Edward Cullen.

Bethany had introduced me to them when I'd first moved here. Something along the lines of her working for Edwards mothers interior design company. They were all really talented artists, and really nice.

Emmet was possibly one of the hugest guys I'd ever met, and was really good at photography. He had an awesome sense of humor, and had gotten us in trouble more times than I could count. Emmet loved practical jokes, and often dragged us down with him.

His sister, Alice, was really nice, and pretty, and it was safe to say I had a little bit of a crush on her. But I didn't want anything like that while I was here, I'd always planned on going back to Texas. She was tiny, less than five feet tall, even at 16. She was one of the top dancers at our school, and everyone liked her. Alice was way too social for anyone not to immediately make friends with her.

Finally, there was Edward. He was probably the closest friend I had in New York. Edward Cullen was a master pianist, and had been playing since he was old enough to properly function. He was quiet, like me, and didn't talk just to make noise and fill silence. He was stiff though, and didn't think much outside of his music and his family. We were too much alike though, not to be friends.

Back to the task at hand, I still had to figure out a way to tell them I was moving back to Banner. I doubted it would be any harder than telling my brother I had wanted to move back. He'd been adamantly against it, saying I'd never amount to anything down there.

"What is so great to you about that nobody town?" He'd shouted. "Go back there, and you'll never get out. You'll be just like dad and all the other kids that end up at Trinity River. Marry some girl from town that you've known all your life, live there, have kids, and die. No one will remember you."

I'd shouted back just as loudly. "What would you know Jeffery? You were born tryin' to get out of that town. If you'd have opened your eyes for a second, you would have seen something better then that black hole your mind told you it was!"

"Jasper, please! Your paintings are so much bigger than Banner, Texas. Hell, you're so much bigger than Banner! We all are . . . "

What he'd said then probably made me angriest. I couldn't help but cut him off.

"Jeffery, I'm not bigger than Banner! I am Banner. It's a part of me. It always will be. And, no matter what you say, so are you."

In the end, he'd agreed. Bethany had convinced him, probably with a lot of coaxing and heavy petting, that it was what I wanted. That was always one of the things I liked about her, she'd pick my side against his if he was being an idiot.

I walked into the common room, hesitantly, to look for my friends. It shouldn't be that big a deal. I'd only been here for about a year. But I still felt like it had been longer. Emmet was stretched out across a couch, messing with his camera. Alice was sitting cross-legged on the floor, listening to her iPod, and Edward was at the piano, as-per-usual. They all looked up when I came over, and I tried to smile, but I think it came out more like a grimace.

"What's wrong?" Alice was good at understanding me. Right now, I kind of wished she wasn't.

"N-nothing really. Actually I'm pretty happy."

I was loving how confident I sounded, next I'd burst into tears and tell everyone that I loved them. I sounded like a girl.

Emmet sat up, so I could sit on the other end of the couch, and I sighed. This was going to be awkward at best.

"So..." Edward prompted, "why are you pretty happy?"

Looking up, I really grinned this time. I was thinking about being home again, running wild again and being with my old friends.

"I'm moving back home, to Texas. I want to spend my last couple of years in school back there. I mean, I like it here alright, but I miss it there more, and my brother finally agreed to let me go back."

I realized after I'd said it, that it had come out rushed and a little bit like I wanted to run away from all that was New York.

"Obviously, I'll still miss you guys, and I'll stay in touch."

Alice was looking like she might cry, Emmet was looking at me like he was confused, and Edward was frowning. I would have been more satisfied if they had screamed or cheered or cried, or something. At least then I'd know what they were thinking.

"When are you leaving?" Alice said quietly.

I was looking at her closely, her short black hair was covering her face, so I couldn't tell how she was feeling, but I thought she sounded sad. wishful thinking.

"Not till the middle of August. Jeffery wants to keep me here as long as possible, even if it means missing the best time of the year. Summers when we spend all our time hanging out around town."

"What if...we went too?" Edward was speaking dully behind me, his usual quiet, stoic self.

"I've certainly been dying to get out of the monotony of New York. Maybe Texas would be a good change.

"Why is it," I asked sarcastically, "that you talk you were born in 1901?"

All I received from that comment was a glare from Edward, and Emmet & Alice agreeing with Edward. I would be thrilled if they came, but I doubted their parents would be ok with them just packing up and shipping off to Banner, Texas.

"You guys seriously think your parents are gonna just go for that?"

Alice piped up with her usual perky, well educated wisdom. "Time in Texas would be a positively wonderful cultural experience which we could not pass up."

I couldn't help but laugh at that. It was terrifying how manipulative she could when Alice set her mind on something.