Ok, so this is my first FanFic, so I hope I do ok! Hope you like it!

I do not own Twilight (although I really really wish I did), nor do I own anyone else that I use in this story (although again I wish I owned them)

Enjoy!

"Ughh! I hate these stupid things" I said to myself in the full length mirror. I had already spent all day getting my hair done, which I hated and now I was putting on my gown for the night, which I also hated.

I was getting ready for The Grammy Awards. If it was up to me I would skip it, but it was advised by a few people that I better be there.

I hate playing dress up. I prefer to spend most days with my hair in a ponytail and unless I have to I don't use much makeup. Unfortunately, today was one of those have to have makeup on type of days.

"Bells! Rosalie is here!" I heard Curtis yell. Like I didn't hear the doorbell. I swear he does things he knows I hate just to get me going.

"Well send her on back!" I yelled back to him. I knew he knew to do that too so I truly believed that whole conversation was wasted.

"Oh my God Bella!" Rosalie screamed. Rosalie had been my make-up/stylist for a few years. She was a little bit too spunky for my taste but she also knew when to keep quiet. And I liked that she told me bluntly what she thought, she didn't shy around whatever needed to be said.

"Didn't we already get out all of your excitement when you was here earlier Rose?" I said. She was the one that had done my hair. Then we had a small break and then I got dressed and now she was back to do my make-up.

"I know but I'm just so excited for you. I just know you are coming home with 2 Grammys tonight!" she gushed.

"We will see I guess" I said without her same interest. Did I want to win? Yes. Was I a little excited? Yes. Was I honored? Oh yes. But did I think that I would actually win? Probably not.

You see, my name is Bella Payne. I'm a music writer/composer, producer and occasionally I direct and produce music videos. I help out a lot of today's top R&B/Hip Hop artist. And tonight I was nominated for Best Producer of a music video for a video of Eminem's I did back last summer. And also for Best composer of a song for a song a did for 50cent aka Curtis. If I had to say if I had earned one of the awards it would have to be for Eminem's video. Eminem aka Marshall was one of my oldest friends and I loved him so much but it took a lot of my patience for that video. The video called for women in the background and those women got on my nerves. Their only concern was trying to get Marshall to notice them. They were practically throwing themselves on him. And like usual he was eating it up. He always said that the best part about being a rapper was the women. Even though I knew and he knew that he wouldn't mess up his video by screwing one of the background dancers it still didn't make it any better. So let's just say that it was a long hard time filming that.

"Oh you will get them, I know!" Rosalie said. "Ok, so let's get you all pretty now!"

I groaned. She was very good at her job but I still hated it. Good thing was she knew I liked it quiet while getting my make-up on. So I went into my vanity/closet room and sat in the chair. Her make-up kits were already on the counter from earlier in the day when she first came over. I sat back and closed my eyes while she started.

Like usual I let my mind wonder while she was putting on my make-up. Of course I thought about my husband. Well my deceased husband I should say. Laurent Payne. The love of my life since I was 11 years old.

I grew up in the projects in Long Beach, CA. My mom was one of those people with only enough love for two things, crack and men. From a very young age I knew she was pimping herself out for crack. When you grow up in the projects you learn these things early. So starting about the age of 5 or 6 I learned to stay out of the house as much as possible. Only problem with that was that I was a young white girl in an all black housing project. So mostly I learned to stay out of people's way. I was a master of being invisible.

But my gloomy days of just surviving picked up a little the summer I was 11. A new family was moving across the hall. That didn't interest me because that happened a lot. People moved in and out all the time. But this family was different although I didn't know it at the time. I saw they had a boy about 14 that lived there. At first he would just ignore me. I tried to say something to him once and he just looked at me like he had never seen me before then walked away and mumbled something about "a crazy white girl".

But that all changed one night. Mom had a guy over. She said for me to call him "Uncle James" I thought it would be a cold day in hell before I ever called one of her men "uncle" but it was so hot out I didn't want to go outside. So I was hoping mom's 'friend' would just be inside a short amount of time, most of them were anyway. So I just sat outside in the hallway. The hall smelled like body odor, shitty diapers and cabbage. Add to that was the heat which felt like 100 degrees. But all of a sudden I heard a lot of yelling and screaming. And there was a lot of banging like someone was throwing bags of potatoes into the wall. The woman's voice was saying something about someone being worthless it sounded like and I wondered who she was talking about. Then it got silent from inside that apartment. I started to crawl closer to the door just to see if I could hear anything else. I was almost to the door when it opened and I was staring at the feet of the boy I had seen there. He kind of jumped back after seeing me there. He looked over his shoulder into his apartment then looked back at me. He then looked as if he made a decision and he reached down and grabbed my hand and pulled me up. He then practically dragged me down the hall and into the stairway. He hit the exit and started running while still holding my hand. I could tell he was going slower because of me.

He didn't stop until we were at the corner next to the liquor store. He stopped and slumped against the wall. I wasn't sure what to do so I sat next to him. And for the first time since he had pulled me up from in front of his door I looked in his face. His left eye was swollen almost shut. His nose had dried blood crusted around one side of it and his upper lip was swollen.

He put his head down into his hands for what seemed like a long time. He wasn't making any noise but I thought maybe he was crying. I wasn't sure what to do but I was thinking that this boy probably didn't want a hug or to be held so I just sat there with our shoulders touching. I hoped that was good enough.

Finally he sniffed and slowly looked up at me. At first he looked up at me almost startled like he had forgot I was there. Then he half smiled at me with the side of his mouth that wasn't swollen and spoke for the first time.

"Hey, I'm Laurent."

A/N Keep in mind when I first wrote this I was thinking about Tupac when I wrote Laurent's character, so most of what I say about him is from Tupac's life.