Notice: this refers to sexual acts, but is not explicit. Scroll down to the Chapter heading if it bothers you.

Request for Jasper meeting Alice:

"Well, ma'am, I suppose you would be my mate."

"That's right."

Jasper can feel everything Alice feels: wonder, disbelief, the sense that at last, they are together. This is an unusual case, certainly, but Jasper has seen mates meet before. This is similar, but far more extreme.

Because she is his. And he is hers.

Alice's gift means she knows almost everything about Jasper that there is to know. He doesn't know much about her, but he feels, beyond the lovely mate feelings, that she has been hurt. That makes him angry, makes him want to soothe her hurts.

"Can I kiss you?"

"You can do whatever you want, please kiss me."

Clothes come off - words have failed. They make love that shakes the roof of the little house.

When Edward and Emmett get close, Alice and Jasper are still naked, but she does inform Jasper of their return.

He sighs, wipes himself off, and pulls on a pair of jeans. She pulls on a t-shirt of his, as she brought no clothing besides what she was wearing. She also grabs some boxers, to avoid a scene when Edward sees that she is only wearing a t-shirt.

Both of the boys smell the scent of vampire venom, the scent that comes with either two vampires boning, or a vampire being torn apart to die. The scent is rather pungent, and Emmett, of course, comments on it. But his emotions are cheerful - he isn't offended by anyone having sex, and he fist-bumps Jasper.

Edward, of course, is a bit more conflicted. He himself is a virgin, saving himself for his own mate, so he doesn't want to be judgmental about two people who just barely met falling into bed. As he normally would be, but vampires have to be open-minded about mates. There's something almost magical about the way they fit together, the way that their brains give off satisfaction, not just sexual, but spiritual and emotional. It's almost too much for Edward to take, and he's seen mates together before.

And then it hits him.

"Oh my God," he moans.

"What?" asks everyone but Alice, who has a smug look on her face.

"I think Bella Swan is my mate."

Chapter 17

Jasper and Emmett were staring at Edward as if he had the black plague. Alice was merely smiling smugly.

"Uh, why do you think that, Edward?" asked Emmett.

"I'm obsessed with her safety and want to watch her all the time. When she's not in my line of sight, or hearing, I get rather anxious. And she's rather beautiful, don't you think?"

"She's aright, I guess," drawled Jasper. "I think you might be right, damn."

"Oh for God's sake, of course she's your mate," snapped Alice. "This isn't brain surgery guys."

"What do you know?"

She shrugs. "I can only see things you decide to do. You were already thinking of turning her, so I saw that happening, and if it does, you two will definitely be together forever."

"This is not good. Carlisle won't change a healthy person," said Emmett.

"I don't need Carlisle to change her. I made sure that our treaty said that we wouldn't bite a human, and we won't. Apparently injecting venom to major pulse points makes the change even faster than three days, so that's what we'll do," said Edward.

"But what about Bella's life?" asked Emmett.

"What about it? She'll be a vampire with me. Look at these two! Look at how happy they are!"

"Well, I can't tell as well as you can, but what if Bella doesn't want to be a vampire?"

"I'm not sure I understand what you mean," replied Edward, scratching his head.

"Edward. I know you've been a vampire for over a century, but you have to remember some stuff about being human."

"Of course I do, Emmett, but the memories are fuzzy compared to after turning."

Emmett sighed, then said, "Rosalie sometimes hates herself. Hates me and her for being vampires, not able to have children."

Edward blanched, eyes wide. "Oh. I - I never thought about that."

"If you don't change her, she'll go to college, maybe meet someone and have kids. Why don't you at least talk to her about it, maybe give her the option to wait a few years? Eighteen is kind of young you know."

"It's not that young, I was changed at seventeen."

And we can all tell. "I read that the human brain isn't finished forming till like age twenty-five, in fact."

"You want me to wait seven years for her? What if she dies during that time?"

"Edward, if she gets hurt, then you can change her guilt-free. But you actually need to talk to her about it. And be honest about the bad things as well as the good things. Hell, some people think their right to die is important. She may never want to change, and you have to accept that."

"But - but - why? Why would she not want to - " To drink only blood, and have humans scenting all the time distracting you. To have one mistake equal a death, a human life snuffed out forever. To never age, never change from day to day, to never ever sleep or dream.

Jasper coughed politely. "I wouldn't say that I had a great life before I met you. There's plenty of shit that goes along with being a vamp, and there's plenty of reasons someone wouldn't want to change their species."

Edward slowly nodded, then shrunk into a ball on the floor. Bella Swan was definitely his mate, if his reaction to her dying - wanting to die - wanting to stay human - not wanting him - meant anything at all.

If he was human, he would have cried, but tears are another thing vampires can't do.

So he wept without tears, crying and moaning for his lost love.

"Jesus Christ, Eddie, she's probably gonna say 'yes'," pointed out Jasper.

"Let me do this now," he groaned. "I'm never going to be in love if she rejects me."

"Um, it's actually quite possible for vampires to love each other even if they aren't mates," said Alice. "You just didn't even ever try with the Denali girls, or anyone else who would have converted to vegetarianism for you."

"Alice," said Edward, his voice muffled by his fist, "you're ruining a perfectly good pity party. Please stop."

Emmett stared at Edward, still curled up in a ball, making little moans every so often. "Do you think he's gonna do this for a long time?"

"Honestly, I have no clue," said Jasper. "Obviously this is the first time he's met a girl he likes at all."

"Uh, well, we do have extra soundproof rooms at the Cullen HQ, if you guys wanna hang out."

"That sounds more appealing," said Alice, throwing off the t-shirt and putting her dress back on.

"Hey, nice boobs," said Emmett as she got dressed.

She threw the finger at him as she laced her boots up.

Jasper put the t-shirt back on, and his sneakers, and the three of them ran to the Cullen house.

Everyone was reading, except Rose, who was working on her convertible '68 Mustang. "Hey Rose, look up!" shouted Emmett.

At his shout she stood up from under the hood, smiled, and opened her arms to him. He picked her up and whirled her around while they kissed. "Babe, we got a new vamp in town. This is Alice. She can see the future, so she knew Jasper was her mate for years."

"Except I can't see parts of Forks, so I got scared and came over." She shook hands with Rosalie.

"Let me guess, these are your only clothes? Esme has a short dress or two that might fit you, but we must go shopping. Or if you can't handle crowds, online, for sure."

"Oooh, I've never been shopping before! Can we do it now?"

"We can online shop now, if the boys are ok with it?"

Jasper kissed Alice on the forehead. "Can't wait to see what you get babe."

"Me too! Get some new undies!"

Rose kissed her palm, then smacked Emmett with it. "Of course."

They followed the girls into the house, where Esme and Carlisle were snuggled up and reading books. "Hey, Esme, Carlisle, this is Alice, Jasper's mate. She can see the future, so don't ask what she wants."

The two laughed. "Esme Cullen, and - " "Carlisle Cullen. Pleased to meet you. So you've known Jasper was your mate?"

"Yes, but there's something weird in Forks that prevents me from seeing him sometimes. Do you have any idea what that would be?"

"It might well be the werewolves," mused Carlisle. At Alice's wide-eyed look, he added, "They aren't really werewolves. They have a tribal ancestor that could shift from man to giant wolf, and now they can too. The presence of vampires seems to activate the shifting."

"And I can't see them at all! I had no idea they were around. Huh. Maybe that's why Bella's future went away."

"What?"

"Oh, I was hanging out with Bella Swan before you guys. It was like, I couldn't see Jasper or Edward, so I went to Bella's, then when they came back, she was gone, so I went to see Jasper. She's back now, though."

"I believe she's family friends with the Black family, descendants of Ephraim Black, whom we met in the '30s," said Carlisle.

"Then that is definitely what it is. Oh boy, this is going to be crazy weird, not being able to see stuff all the time," Alice sighed.

"Eh, forget the dogs. Come and see my computer shopping bookmarks!" announced Rose.

"Oh! Certainly," agreed Alice, and they went to the office to shop. It was fascinating to Alice, who'd never even seen a computer before. It took a while before she settled in to simply browsing for clothing - first she wanted to watch television, then listen to music. Finally she was ready to shop, and after Rose measured her, she asked what her budget was.

"Assume we have five thousand dollars for you."

"I can work with that."

Overnight shipping. Alice couldn't wait. "Can we go real shopping in the morning?"

"If you really want to. But I've got stuff to do, could you just go with Jasper?"

"Yeah, that's fine," he called out from the video game he and Emmett were playing.

"I mean, I'll go with you," she sighed. "But I am not spending my whole day shopping with you, after we spent three hours playing around on the internet."

"Rosalie, how did you become a vampire?"

Rose started. "Do you really want to ask me that?"

"Well, the point is, I know. Do you want to hear how similar my story was?"

"I, uh, I -"

"I'm not going to tell you now. I just want to let you know, if you need to let anything out, I'll be there for you."

"Uh, ok. And uh, yours was worse?"

"In some ways. Really it was more after turning, that was bad."

Rose gave a slight shudder. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine. I killed them both before I came to Forks."

"Both?"

"Victoria and James. They called themselves my owners."

"OK, ok, I'll go shopping with you later, promise."

Alice gave a fake smile. "Thanks Rosalie!"