Shy Love [#wattys2016]

Chapter Thirty-Two

Noah's POV

"Hey dad," I call out into the empty hallway, letting myself into the front door.

"In here son." My dad calls back, his voice sounding like it is in the kitchen. I stand shocked for a minute, that is the first time in a very long time that I have walked in the door, calling out to my dad greeting him, and he has actually responded.

It is definitely improvement, and I'm so happy.

I walk through the hallway, which somehow seems brighter, livelier.

I enter the kitchen, sure enough my dad is there, staring at an empty wall.

Chills run through my body, this was unexpected.

"Dad, what're you doing?" I ask.

"Well, in my drunken state I never really noticed much detail. Now that I am much more sober and actually here I realize how much this house needs an update."

I laugh lightly, glad that's all it is, "I couldn't agree more. This house was out of date long before you started drinking."

My dad chuckles, "yes Noah, even then. I can remember always telling your mother we needed to at least paint the place, but she would never listen, always telling me that 'vintage is in' " he says jokingly, quoting my mother.

I smile, even now as he brings up mom, I get a little teary.

"Well, what do you want to do about this?" I ask, clearing my voice before I speak.

"Seeing as I have nothing but time, I'm going to fix it up." He tells me.

Pride runs through my veins. This is the father I am used to. The man always willing to do new projects, take on more tasks. This is my dad.

"Let's start today," I state. My dad's eyes widen a bit, "let's do it," I continue, "as you said, we have nothing but time. Let's fix this place up. Make it how it used to be. Together."

I can see emotions flickering in my dad's eyes. Pride. Sadness. Happiness. Just pure, raw, emotion.

"Together." He says.

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"Are you able to drive yet?" My dad asks, looking over the drawings once more.

We just made the plan as to what we are going to do. Today, we are starting with the kitchen. We have planned to get a new island and countertops, seeing as the cupboards are in, surprisingly, good shape. We are also ripping down the hideous wallpaper and putting back splash on the walls.

"No, well, not legally. I need an adult in the car, which is why Jamie and I rent so many taxis." I answer, laughing.

"Well, I'm an adult, so you can drive us to the store under my watch so we can get everything we need."

"Okay, that works for me." I tell him, grabbing the keys to his old beat up pick up truck, and heading outside, locking the door as he leaves behind me.

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We arrive at the store quickly, making small talk in the car.

Instantly we head to the kitchen area of the store. We had a few ideas on what we wanted but weren't totally sure yet.

Seeing as our cupboards are a dark, chocolate brown, we wanted something to accent that.

We reach the island top options, all of them are either white, light brown, or black.

"Well, we don't want too much brown, and black doesn't exactly do with dark brown does it?" My dad asks, scanning the options.

"No," I answer, "I think our best best is white."

"Me too, I do like this one." He says, pointing to a white stone with flickers of what looks like diamonds in it, giving it some character.

"Me too." I agree, running my hand over the smooth stone, "I think this is nice."

"I think that will look really nice with the cupboards, now all we need is the back splash."

"Hello, can I help you?" Asks a kind looking lady with the store shirt on,
walking over to us.

"Yes... Ally," my dad says, reading her name tag, "we are renovating out kitchen and we picked out a new island, all we need is a back splash."

"If I may ask, what colour are your cupboards?" She asks kindly.

"They are a dark chocolate brown." I tell her.

"Ahh, yes, then this is a lovely stone you picked out. Would you like some help finding a back splash."

I look at my dad, who nods at Ally, "yes, that would be nice."

"Okay," she says happily, leading us to a wall full of different stones and tiles.

"So you really want something that will tie the whole space together," Ally starts again, "are you thinking of painting some and just doing a little tile around a certain ares or tiling the whole thing?"

"Our cupboards cover a lot of the wall space, so we were just thinking of tiling the entire area." My dad tells her, while his eyes scan the options in front of us.

"Okay, so if that's the case, you don't want to go with something over powering, but you don't want if so simple that it just looks like paint. You need something in between."

My dad and I both nod, as she laughs slightly at our faces.

"What about something like this?" She points to a tile example, it is white with lines of brown running through it, but the shapes are hexagonal which looks a bit odd.

My dad turns to me, considering the option, "I like the design," he says, "but something is off about it."

"I think it's the shape." I say, trying to help him out a bit, "I really like the design and the white and brown, but it needs to be more rectangular."

My dad nods, "yeah, that's it."

Ally nods her head, searching the walls, "oh!" She says suddenly, "like this?"

We look to where she is pointing, it is the same pattern as the last one, but in long rectangle shapes.

I look at my dad, who is smiling.

"I like that one." I say.

"Me too, I think with that and the new island the kitchen will look great." He says.

"Yeah, so what do you say? You wanna get them?"

"Yeah."

"Alrighty then," Ally says, looking between the two of us, "the island can be delivered in four days if you order now, and the back splash, you can take home, or order online and it can be delivered with your island stone."

"Let's have them both delivered at the same time, make things easier." My dad says.

"Perfect, I'll go ring it all up for you and get your information." Ally says, leading us to the check out.

I follow my dad, getting excited. Finally a project that we can work on together, this will be great!

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Thank you so much Monkeypin1 for the cover, I love it!!

Hope you all liked this chapter!

if you haven't already please go check out a new book I've been working on called 'let it snow' its a romance/teen fiction novel. Feel free to leave comments and votes;)

Vote, comment and recommend:)
-Maxine <3