“This is ridiculous.” Edward muttered in total and obvious annoyance, and I couldn’t help but agree with him. Neither Jacob nor Edward had made the slightest amount of effort to alleviate, or at least give voice, to their differences since Angela had left three hours ago, and I was starting to feel a bit desperate about the whole situation. It had to be ten o’clock at night at the very least right now, and aside from my wish for my missed dinner, I hoped that Angela, in all her devious planning, had at least warned Charlie that I wouldn’t be coming home. Maybe she’d told him I was sleeping over.

Because I wasn’t coming home. There wasn’t a chance in hell that I was leaving these two on their own in the school gym. Who knew what they’d get up to. Knowing Edward’s stubborn conviction that he was always right, and Jacob’s infamous and totally obnoxious persistence in pretty much everything (including a romantic relationship with me), they’d probably find a way around Angela’s safety spells and beat each other to pulp. Or diamond dust, in Edward’s case.

The thought made me shudder, even though the thought of Edward being ground into anything by anyone was so unrealistic and ludicrous that it didn’t freak me out for more than a millisecond.

“This is ridiculous,” he repeated, and Jacob’s breath hissed out in little less than a frustrated growl.

“Yes, we heard you the first time, leech. No need to repeat yourself.” He snapped.

“Good, we’re making progress.” I said, and chuckled slightly hysterically, my voice laced with desperation. “You’re actually talking now. Maybe it’s enough for the first session?”

Nobody was convinced, least of all me.

“Bella, you don’t have to stay, you know?” Edward said, his irritation replaced with concern. He clearly didn’t like the idea of my being stuck in the gym with them all night anymore than I did.

“Haha, yeah sure I’ll leave. Finding your charred and battered remains is going to be great when I come back.” I said, feeling ridiculously close to tears. I mean, we didn’t even have a cell phone on us, and really, who would we have called?

“I’m glad you have so much trust in my abilities to defend myself.” Edward said dryly, and completely confident. I ignored him. Who would we have called with a cell phone?

Okay, maybe someone like Carlisle, who wouldn’t do something rash like rip Jake’s throat out, but we didn’t have any way to contact him, so there really was no point. What a day for Edward to have left his cell phone at home because Alice having sent his phone number to various clothing companies so that they sent him advertisements every five minutes had driven him half-insane.

“We won’t kill each other, Bella.” Edward tried to reassure me, though his powers of persuasion were sadly impaired by the obvious discomfort of his body, sealed to the chair as it was, and Jake’s extremely skeptical snort. They didn’t look too happy in their imprisonment.

And it wasn’t like they were nice chairs either. Oh no. They were two of those plastic school chairs with the desks attached, the ones where it’s impossible to sit comfortably, unless you slouch. And Edward

was not going to slouch. And Jacob just plain couldn’t (although I’m sure he would have) because he was so large that Angela’s spells weren’t even necessary; the desk was literally clamping him to the seat.

“Besides, how would we get out of the seats? I assure you, you can go home. We’ll be fine. I promise we won’t try to kill each other.” Edward continued to cajole me. His eyes gleamed with sincerity. He truly wanted me to get out of the situation and eat and sleep at home. Then again, it was hardly all that chivalrous, considering that Edward didn’t need either. Still, it was hard not to believe him.

“Hey, I’m not promising anything.” Jacob growled in protest. Edward’s hands abruptly tightened into fists, and he closed his eyes for a moment in annoyance, his jaw clenched.

“If you could for once,” he said slowly between gritted teeth, his words directed at his archenemy, “Overlook your own selfish desires to attempt to hurt me and consider the fact that Bella hasn’t had anything to eat since lunch, exactly ten-and-a-half hours ago, and probably wants to sleep, that would be truly amazing.”

Jacob self-righteously opened his mouth to argue, but then glanced at me and seemed to change his mind. I looked at him expectantly.

“Fine,” he grumbled, “I promise not to kill him ‘till you come back.”

A weight seemed to lift off my heart and I quickly stood up, giving them both a relieved smile. Edward’s topaz eyes also seemed to lighten somewhat, although his general form still gave off a bit of dejection. Poor vampire, stuck in a school gym with a hormonal, young werewolf. My heart almost melted with pity, before I remembered that Jacob was in the same position, though his was probably worse.

Poor werewolf, stuck with the girl he can’t have, and the smug undeserving creature who calls himself her boyfriend. For a moment, I knew exactly what he felt like, and wondered who out there in the universe could be held responsible for this. Surely not God. I doubted he’d ever planned for werewolves and vampires to populate the earth. And surely not the devil, who would have probably made aforementioned species a little less amazing and beautiful.

“I’ll be right back after grabbing something to eat.” I announced happily and headed towards the doors.

They were locked.

The gym doors were locked.

I grabbed the handles and rattled them. They didn’t budge. Duh.

“Oh God, please don’t do this to us.” I whimpered, hoping desperately that my rattling would somehow get the bloody doors open.

No luck.

“Please, please, please, please,” I threw my body against the doors, and, to my surprise, heard a quiet swish and suddenly found Angela’s face watching me through the narrow glass pane in the door with a

curious, somewhat suspicious expression on it. I was so startled I stumbled backwards and landed on my butt.

“You can’t go out.” She said resolutely from the outside, frowning. I could still hear her as if she were standing right next to me. “How do you expect them to resolve their differences if you’re not there providing reason?”

“Angela, I need food. I need to sleep. I need—“

“Okay, okay,” she muttered, clearly seeing the light, closed her eyes for a second, and to my immense surprise and pain, a box of Einstein Bagels fell right on my head, along with a small box of icebreakers (tropical flavor) an inflatable queen-sized mattress, a pillow, and a sleeping bag.

“There,” she said cheerfully, “That ought to do it,” and disappeared.

“Fantastic,” I grumbled to myself. Silently, I wondered if Angela wasn’t slowly turning into Alice, for the small vampire, too, was utterly deluded in that she periodically blessed me with gifts in the belief that they somehow would make my life better.

Still muttering to myself, I dragged the inflated mattress and all the things piled on top of it over to Edward and Jacob, who had watched the whole thing with bemusement (Edward) and amusement (Jacob).

“It’s not funny.” I growled at Jacob, but he only chuckled in response.

“At least you get a mattress and food.” He said, the chuckle leaving his throat as he stared glumly at my mattress of supplies.

“You know, I don’t think all this security spell business was really necessary,” Edward said in an unnecessarily loud voice. “I’m sure Angela is smart enough to know that I have impeccable self-control, and, if we ‘resolve our differences’ it would be that much more of an accomplishment if I were free and still didn’t grind the dog to dust.”

I was wondering what exactly was the point of his argumentative thesis right there when I heard a ghostly, decidedly-Angela chuckle echo through the gym, and suddenly, Edward jumped out of his desk in delight, before turning to Jacob and favoring him with an extremely self-satisfied, gloating smirk.

“Hey,” Jacob protested loudly, directing his yell towards the ceiling. “You know, Angela, it won’t be much of an accomplishment if I’m safely tethered up. He wouldn’t have the guts to try anything anyway, so it’s only a true truce if I managed to stay in control, which I can totally do.”

Edward snarled wordlessly at him, the sound reverberating deep and inhumanly in his chest. It made a shiver race up my back, and not one of fear.

Weird. I never figured that sounds emitted from members of the cat family (because Edward’s was a very lion-like snarl) could turn me on.

“Nice try,” Angela’s voice said very calmly. “But I’m afraid Edward has a bit of a point. His self-control is a little better than yours.”

“Way to be hypocritical, Angela,” I muttered.

“Bella,” she said in a wounded voice, “I’m only doing what’s best for all of you, surely you can see that?”

“Let me ask you an honest question.” I snapped up at the ceiling, feeling deep irritation well up inside me.

“Yes?”

“Has Alice mastered the power to take over people’s bodies? Because you’re turning almost as tyrannical as she is.”

“Hey!” Came the outraged shout of Angela’s voice, though it immediately fell silent when it realized—

“Oh my God.” I felt the blood rush out of my face. “Alice?”

“What?” she said testily in her own voice. “You’re wrong. I didn’t take over anyone’s power. I just asked Angela to help me out with her powers, and then figured you’d be more receptive to this idea if I looked like Angela. She helped me create the illusion.”

“But…but…” I stuttered, and dazedly realized that Edward, standing next to me, and Jacob still confined to his desk, were frozen in shock. “You don’t even like Jacob.”

“Well, Angela had her input.” Alice grumbled.

“That’s right.” Angela’s voice suddenly made itself known. The true Angela. And she sounded appropriately remorseful. “Sorry, Bella, but I figured Alice would be good help here, and she sort of had a point. Except that her point was that Jacob and Edward locked in the gym would make Jacob lose it and you’d finally realize how dangerous he is.” Edward growled again deep in his chest, and it sounded much more threatening than it had before.

“Of course we would have whisked you out of there before anything would have happened.” Angela added hastily. “But I didn’t like Alice’s idea, so I made a few alterations.”

“What is it with everyone but vampires being deluded about how dangerous werewolves truly are?!” Alice snapped unhappily, sounding a little like she was sulking.

“Excuse me?” Jacob hissed through gritted teeth, sounding remarkably formal in an absolutely infuriated way. “We’re dangerous? Take a look in the mirror, you revolting freakish bloodsucking mishap of nature.”

“Now, now,” Angela giggled nervously, “Let’s all just stay calm.”

“We’d be a lot more calm if you let us out of this damned gym.” I muttered, finally finding my voice again after getting over the shock.

“But this will never work if we don’t sit you down together properly,” Said Alice firmly, finding her resolve again, “So if you’ll just excuse us, we’ll be leaving. Don’t call us unless it’s an emergency.”

And they left. Audibly.

For a moment, we just stood there in silence (well, Jacob was still sitting). Then, I let myself fall onto the mattress and stared miserably at the gym floor.

“Great, this is just great.” I muttered miserably, “How terribly fortunate of me to be stuck in school in the middle of the night with my hard boyfriend and hairy best friend.”

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A/N: Haha, nice finishing touch, no? Yes, the “hard boyfriend and hairy best friend” was Bella’s attempt at unhappy humor, and my attempt at a dirty innuendo.

Sorry that I didn’t update for so long. There is really no excuse. I guess the incentive was missing. Hope you all like it. )