PART SEVENTY NINE
*Jess’ POV*
“What?” I asked, shocked to the core. I’d almost talked myself out of actually getting this place while I was sitting in my office over the course of the afternoon. It was just too easy to find a place that suited the pair of us it seemed!
“We’ve got it babe!” Aston grinned jumping up from his seat and coming around to give me a sloppy kiss and a hug, his phone still in his hand.
“I can’t believe it.”
“Well you better,” he grinned.
“Now Aston and Jessica,” the estate agent said, “You’ll need to come put a deposit down and sign a bunch of forms. They’re going to do a background check on you two just to be careful, but it’s basically yours.”
“Wow, that’s great!” Aston grinned, “When do they want us to come in.”
“If you’re around tonight you could do it, or we can schedule something later this week.”
“Jess?” Aston asked me.
“Tonight,” I shrugged, “I’ve got loads of meetings later this week so we might as well just get this out of the way while we're both in town.”
“Brilliant,” our agent said, fixing a time with us and then hanging up.
“I can’t believe that,” I said, “It was too easy.”
“I guess it was fate,” Aston said, slipping back into his seat. I left him to play on his phone for another half an hour while I finished up some emails, and then the pair of us left the office to go sign for our new home.
“We should go for a celebratory meal tonight,” Aston said as he started up his car.
“That would be fun. Where?”
“Don’t care, you pick.”
I thought through our options, thinking about what restaurants were in the area that I could give a quick call to get a table.
“Pizza?” I asked Aston.
“You want pizza?” he laughed, “I say celebratory dinner and you pick pizza? What are we a ten year old football team?”
“Well what do you mean by celebratory dinner? I’m just trying to think of what I want to eat.”
“I was thinking something fancier,” Aston laughed.
I gave him a frown, “I want pizza. I’m not going to order Pizza Hut or something! I was thinking of that stone oven place down by my old place.”
“Oh, that works.”
“See, I’m being sort of classy Ast!” I laughed, “God did you really think I was going to order a Pizza Hut?”
“Well…”
“Stop.”
We pulled up at the complex, my eyes scanning around me as we did so. This was going to be my home. It was so surreal. Aston parked in a side lot and we wandered up to the office together, ready to get this signed for and sorted.
It took about an hour, but after we were done we were handed our keys and told we could move in from March 10. That gave us a good two weeks to sort out moving our things and purchasing anything we wanted new.
“Jess, I already know you are itching to be in control of the move,” Aston said over our celebratory meal, “So I’m putting you in charge.”
“Cheers,” I said with an eye roll.
“Oh I know you’re going to freak out if something gets messed up. I can just sense it.”
I gave Aston an annoyed look, taking a big bite of my food. I didn’t always freak out over things! Did I?
“I’m just saying,” he said, “That if you leave me in charge I’m going to mess something up and you’ll get mad at me, and if we both take equal charge you’ll just take over anyways. Might as well just let you have it. Laying all my cards on the table here babe.”
“You’re just being lazy!”
“No,” Aston said, “I’m being practical.”
“Fine, as my first order of business,” I said with a laugh, “You have to give me the last slice of pepperoni.”
“Shut up!” Aston laughed, passing the plate over to me.
We bantered about for the rest of our meal, before agreeing to split a huge dessert.
“You know I’m glad you’re so chilled out about this,” he said, “I was expecting it to be more of a struggle.”
“What?”
“I don’t know, a year or two ago you would have been so high strung about something like this… buying a house together. I mean you agreeing to move in with me just a few weeks ago wasn’t this easy.”
“I guess,” I said with a shrug.
“I’m glad that you’re less uptight than you were before.”
I sat and stared at him, contemplating his words for a minute. He was probably right. The old me probably would have had a total meltdown at the thought of buying a house together. I would have micromanaged it to the tiniest detail. We would have probably looked at two thousand places before I was sure that we’d found something suitable. But not with this place. We saw it, we liked it, and we got it. In a single day.
“Well I’m actually excited,” I said, surprising myself.
“Yeah?” Aston grinned.
“I’ve got all sorts of ideas for things we can do with the place.”
“Hit me with one.”
“Well, do we really need so many spare bedrooms? There are like four down there. What if we use the big one in the back corner as like a study or TV room? Like the one at my parent’s estate.”
“That could be cool,” Aston said with a smile, “We can get a really awesome comfy sofa in there and I've got one of those projector TVs in my basement now.”
“And I do like the idea of the Jacuzzi on the roof,” I grinned, twirling my straw in my glass.
“Oh yeah?” Aston smirked.
“What dirty ideas are you getting?” I questioned, flicking some of my drink in his face.
He blinked the liquid away, biting his lip gently, “Well…”
“Please don’t answer that in public,” I said, shaking my head at Aston.
“I’ll tell you later then.”
“I’m sure you will,” I replied with a laugh.
We walked out of the restaurant after we finished our drinks, wandering around Chelsea a bit to digest our food and then heading back towards Aston’s house. I was actually pretty tired from the eventful day we had, and I found myself falling asleep in his car on the way home.
“You’re properly shattered aren’t you?” Aston asked me as we pulled up in his front drive.
“Exhausted.”
“Well you head in and get sorted for bed, I’ll make a hot drink if you want one.”
“I think I’m good,” I yawned, stumbling up the stairs to the bedroom.
Once in bed, Aston came in and flicked the TV on, sipping his drink as I burrowed into the covers on my half of bed. “You aren’t worrying about that job thing are you?” he whispered after a few minutes.
“To be honest, I’ve totally forgotten about it,” I said.
“Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to put it back on your mind. Was just checking that you weren’t stewing about something.”
“I’m not. I'm actually tired,” I told him, stretching out. “Anyways, I’m not going to take it.”
“No?”
“You were right earlier, it’s not what I want and I know I won’t be happy. I love what I’m doing now, and if I take this new job it could take years to be in a position to even enjoy what I’m doing again. I’d probably be a pretty miserable person to be around and I really don’t want to deal with that.”
“You’re sure?” Aston asked.
“Positive. I’m saying no,” I yawned, “Decision made.”
“Sorry to bring it up tonight. I know I said we’d wait till tomorrow,” Aston said.
“No, it’s good you did.”
“Well, if you want me to get your mind off it, I could tell you how we could use the Jacuzzi…”
PART EIGHTY
*Jess’ POV*
“AST!!!” I shouted through the house for the third time.
“What?” he asked, dumping his sports bag on the floor of the kitchen, “Quit screaming at me woman.”
“Where have you been?”
“Just getting my things,” he shrugged, grabbing a sports drink out of the fridge.
“I’ve been calling for you!”
“I know,” he laughed.
“And you ignored me?” I asked, scandalized.
“I was coming.”
“You’re the worst.”
“What do you need Miss Jessica?” he asked, smirking lightly as he took in my annoyed appearance, hands on my hips and all.
“You need to tell me what to do with your kitchen,” I said, sweeping my arm behind me.
“Umm…”
“I’ve diagrammed out your cupboards, now take two minutes and tell me what’s coming with us, what’s going to your brother, and what we’re donating.”
“Sorry,” Aston said slowly, “You’ve diagrammed my cupboards?”
I held up a sheet of paper with his cupboards etched out on it, little boxes scribbled to indicate the different stacks of dishes. “Just take some colored pens and mark blue for us, red for your brother, and yellow for donate.”
Aston burst out laughing at this, clearly amused at my organization. “You seriously crack me up sometimes,” he said, ducking as I threw the pens at him.
“Just do it!”
“I should never have put you in charge.”
“Well you did, so do what I say!” I huffed, stomping my barefoot on the ground.
“Only for you lovely,” he mocked, collecting the pens from the ground and wandering over to the counter to do what I asked of him. “Happy?” he asked as he passed the paper back to me.
“Yes, thank you.”
“Ok, I’m going to head to Tour rehearsal,” he said, “Are you sure you want to stick around here and pack for me? I know you have a lot to do at your old place before the movers come tomorrow.”
“I’m just going to do your kitchen cabinets,” I told him, “Then I’ll enjoy one last long cab ride down to Chelsea.”
“If you’re sure.”
“Someone needs to do this,” I shrugged.
“Thanks,” Aston grinned, “I’ll come around yours with a quick takeaway when I’m done.”
“You don’t have to,” I said, “There’s still loads to do here.”
“Well we should be done at rehearsal relatively early, if it goes late I’ll call how about?”
“Sounds good,” I said, going over and giving Aston a quick kiss as he grabbed up his bag. I watched him wander out to the front door, before realizing I needed one more thing from him. “OH! Merrygold?!” I called, chasing him down.
“What?”
“Can you confirm dates for Costa Rica today?” I asked, “I presume your manager will make an appearance.”
“Costa Rica?” he asked, dumbfounded.
“Our holiday? May? Two-year anniversary? Have you forgotten?” I asked.
“No,” he said, shaking his head lightly, “I just thought with the move that wasn’t happening. We haven’t done any planning.”
“You haven’t,” I clarified, “I’ve been researching during my lunch breaks the past week since it’s been too rainy to go out.”
“Oh! Find anything good?”
“You’re going to be late if we start discussing this now,” I said, pushing him towards the door, “Just please remember to check on dates for me. We should book flights as soon as possible.”
“Course, love you babe!” Aston called, pushing his way out of his house.
I turned to head back towards the kitchen, shaking my head back and forth. Sometimes it was like I was his mother, not his girlfriend!
Switching the radio on I began taking dishes down from his cabinets, wrapping them in paper and putting them in their allotted boxes. The big day had finally come, March 10. We were moving into our new home the next morning, which blew my mind because it seemed like we had about ten million things left to do before we were ready. But nope, the movers were coming to our respective places to collect our things the next morning, and we were getting a fair number of new things delivered over the course of the afternoon. It was sure to be a madhouse.
Once finished in the kitchen I called for a cab, collecting my things and heading back down to Chelsea. Since Aston and I had agreed to look for a new place I hadn’t made much of an effort to pack up my old flat. Marnie was still there, and it wasn’t like I had anywhere to put my furniture anyways! But, with a moving van hired, it was finally time to clear my things out.
“Ast is going to be annoyed at you,” Marnie said when I pushed my way into the flat and slumped down on the sofa.
“Why?”
“Have you not seen your room?” she laughed.
“What about it?”
“You haven’t touched it yet!” she said, “You’ve got till tomorrow morning to pack it all up and have it ready to go, and there are about two million dresses still hanging in your closet! You haven’t touched the en suite! And what about this kitchen and lounge?”
“I’ll figure something out,” I shrugged.
“He’s going to show up here for dinner and get so annoyed!” Marnie laughed, “And I’m not helping because I’m packing up my stuff too!”
“You are?”
“Yeah,” she said, “I’ve found a room in a flat near Camden.”
“Wow,” I said, “You sure about that?”
“It was the only thing I could afford,” she shrugged.
“I don’t want to seem like I’m kicking you out,” I told her.
“It doesn’t!” Marnie replied, joining me on the couch. “You’ve pretty much let me live here for free for like ten years. I’m 28 now, I need to figure out how to provide for myself.”
“Well you know you can come stay with Aston and I if you ever need to,” I said, giving her a quick hug. “Now I better get started.”
I wandered into my room and cringed when I realized how right Marnie was. It would take a team of about five people to get things ready for the movers the next morning, and all I had was me. Unless... Maybe...
Two hours later and the door buzzed, Aston coming up the stairs with a Chinese for the three of us.
“How’s the packing?” he asked as he stuffed his face.
“Great!” I said, hoping he wouldn’t go in my room. It didn’t look much different and it had been over two hours.
“It doesn’t look like anyone has started packing the front room or the kitchen,” he frowned.
“I’ll be there soon!” I said.
“Yeah, your room is done?” he questioned, jumping off his seat and pushing his way into my room. “Holy shit Jess!!” he said, staring at the pile of dresses on my bed.
“So I may be in the middle of a big sort through,” I shrugged.
“How in the hell are you going to be ready for the movers? I thought you were Miss Organized Don't Worry I’ll Have Everything Sorted Out?”
“I am,” I said, “Don’t worry! It’ll be ready.”
“I don’t believe you!”
“Trust me,” I smiled.
“I’m going to, even though my brain is yelling at me not to,” Aston said, leaving my room and going back to finish his food. "It'll be up to you to move things if they aren't ready for the movers!"
We ate in relative silence from there, and soon after Aston left to go back to his place. There was still a fair amount to pack there as well.
“Back to work!” Marnie grinned.
“I’ve got a plan,” I told her with a sly grin, “I just hope it works.”