Just Play Along

One Hundred Three & One Hundred Four

PART ONE HUNDRED THREE

*Aston’s POV*

I stared at the text again. It was all I ever did when I was bored or missing Jess, it just meant so much to me.

[Just picked you over my job. Love you. J <3]

Of course after receiving that text I’d called Jess and demanded she explain what she meant. I was seriously freaked out that she’d done something stupid and quit her job. Luckily she’d assured me that it was more of a symbolic gesture, but that she was serious about it.

Which just made me miss her more.

After a full month of recording and performing a bit in LA us boys headed to New York for a week, with two weeks in Atlanta scheduled to round out the trip.

“I’m so tired of hotels,” I moaned as us boys sat in the back of another car on the way home from another studio.

“Why? They deliver food straight to your room,” Marvin pointed out, “You used to love that.”

“I still do,” I sighed, “Its just not the same.”

“Nah, I get what you mean,” he replied, “No girlfriend to wake up next to.”

“Exactly!!”

Marvin smirked and rolled his eyes at me. I don’t know why but the boys always loved torturing me about Jess. It probably had something to do with how we’d started out, that silly game where they’d made me go on three blind dates. Crazy blind dates.

“What we doing for your birthday this weekend?” JB asked me as we sat in bumper-to-bumper traffic.

“Don’t care,” I shrugged.

“Yes you do.”

“I mean, it’s not going to be a proper birthday without Jess and my friends from home. We can just find a club or something. I was planning on doing something when we get back.”

“In three weeks? Bit of a late birthday,” JB scoffed.

“Whatever.”

“We’ll sort something out, it’ll be fun, promise!”

“I don’t know if I want to partake in whatever you’ve got in mind,” I said with a laugh. I could only imagine that they’d get us into some sort of trouble. It was almost tradition for us boys to mess with each other on birthdays.

We got to our hotel and split up for the evening. I started out doing a session in the little gym and then I ordered up a meal while I got showered up. As I ate my food I flipped channels on American TV, and then I played around on my computer for a bit as I waited for it to finally get late enough that I could Skype Jess.

We had this sort of trade off system for skyping where we’d rotate around who was getting up early or staying up late depending on our schedules. It had actually worked quite easily when we were going between London and LA because it was a full eight-hour change, but with only five hours between New York and London it was a bit more awkward.

“Heyyy!” Jess yawned as she signed in.

“Hey pretty girl!”

“I look like death,” Jess laughed, “I just woke up.”

“You look gorgeous,” I replied with a grin, “I miss waking up to you.”

“Don’t even start,” Jess frowned. She’d made it pretty clear early on that she hated not having me around, especially in the mornings. I was forbidden from mentioning the word ‘miss’ in any respect.