PART NINETY-FIVE
*Jess’ POV*
"See that wasn't so bad," Aston said to me as we sat on the couch in the main room of the house, his family just departed.
"No," I sighed, leaning my head on his shoulder.
"Can't nod off now," Aston said, popping his shoulder up so my head fell off, "Gotta pack up and head to see your family."
“Now?” I whined.
“Now!” he laughed, “Unless you don’t want to go anymore…”
“Of course I want to go! Just… How exhausting," I replied, letting him grab me by the hands and drag me up to our room, "Promise we'll have an early night?"
"This is your part of the holiday!" Aston laughed.
"Definite early night," I said, grabbing my weekend bag and starting to fill it with warm clothes and a few other things.
Christmas with the Merrygold's had been fun. We'd drunk our way through most of the alcohol in the house and had quite a few laughs along the way. On the day itself Aston's Mum had cooked up a huge feast and we'd exchanged gifts with his family, the lot of us partaking in some high-energy drunken board games late into the evening. We’d done gifts on Christmas day, but Aston and I were saving our gifts for each other until after we'd seen our families, something just for us to do after devoting our time to one another’s families.
"Ready?" Aston asked me twenty minutes later, a sports bag on the bed next to the shopping bag full of gifts for my family.
"Yeah," I replied, slinging my bag over my shoulder, "Let me just find my purse."
After a quick jog around the house I was satisfied we were ready to go, the pair of us taking the lift down to the garage to hop in Aston's car.
"Should I put Christmas music on?" Aston asked me, the streets of London fading away quickly.
"You could do," I yawned, already dozing off.
It was lucky Aston knew the way to the estate at this point, I was out cold for the entire journey, the exhaustion of trying to be a good host for his family getting the better of me. The Merrygold’s had definitely worn me out.
"Jess," Aston said quietly, shaking my shoulder.
"Hmmm?"
"We're here," he whispered, kissing my cheek gently.
"Wow, already?"
"Slept like a rock," he laughed, nodding towards the big mansion.
"Sorry," I mumbled, pushing my way out of the car and walking towards the boot to collect my things.
We grabbed our bags and walked up to the big familiar house hand in hand. I wasn't exactly sure where my family was so I first took Aston to my room to drop our things off. It was becoming familiar for us, the estate. We'd come up whenever we had a long weekend together, to avoid the bustle of London and relax a bit, just us or maybe with my family.
"Shall we find your parents?" Aston asked, grabbing the shopping bag of Christmas gifts we'd brought.
"Sure," I replied, leading him out of the room and through the house.
My parents were in the kitchen sipping hot cups of coffee and chatting away.
"There they are!" my father exclaimed upon seeing the pair of us.
"Hi Daddy."
We did a general round of hellos, hugs all around as we shared Christmas greetings.
"Let's collect everyone and go do presents," my Mum said excitedly.
"Right away?" I questioned, throwing Aston a confused look.
"Why not?" my Mum shrugged. Clearly she knew something I didn't.
"Ok..."
We all assembled in the formal living room, a gorgeous Christmas tree standing regally for all to see.
After greeting Freddy and his wife from the TV room, I dumped out a handful of gifts onto the floor, handing them out to the appropriate recipients. Aston and I had tried to shop for our families together, to make it seem more genuine. I could tell he was slightly tense about all of this, it being our first Christmas with the other's family. To be fair, I'd been bricking it around his parents!
"Open this first!" Freddy's wife, Hilary, exclaimed. She had the biggest grin on her face, like she couldn't wait for me to see the contents.
It was a rectangular box, addressed to Aston and I. I gave my brother a quizzical look as I pulled the top off, my heartbeat speeding up as I saw what was inside.
"Auntie Jess?" I read out, staring at the pink t-shirt in the box. I signed 'What the hell?' to my brother as I stared at the gift in my lap.
"We're having a baby!!!" Hilary said excitedly, the biggest smile on her face. I stared from her to my brother, reading the elation in his eyes.
"Wow! Congrats!!!" I both said and signed, taking it all in.
"There's one for Aston too," Hilary said excitedly, "We couldn't decide if it was more awkward to include or exclude you."
"It's great," Aston grinned, pulling his 'Uncle Aston' top from under mine. He smiled at it for a moment before getting up and hugging both Hilary and my brother.
Robotically I followed suit, only half listening as Hilary gave the details. Due in early May they'd wanted to tell us after the 12 week scan but had decided to try and hold out for Christmas. They'd told my parents on the day, unable to resist, and were clearly excited to finally have us in the know.
I could hardly comprehend what was happening after that, still in shock by the revelation.
"You ok?" Aston asked me as we got ready for bed that night, the early night I'd requested.
"Sure," I mumbled.
"Seriously Jess... I mean Auntie Jess," he grinned, coming over and kissing my head. "Is the whole ‘Uncle Aston’ thing weird to you?" he questioned, grabbing me in a tight hug. “That they called me that I mean?”
"I don't know," I replied with a deep sigh, "No."
"Good," he replied, nudging my head back so he could press a searing kiss against my lips.
The pair of us were certainly becoming a package deal and in that moment I think I was more weirded out about how ok with that I was.
PART NINETY SIX
*Aston’s POV*
I lay in bed that night, Jess’s head resting on my chest as she slept soundly. To be honest I was so honored to be including in the whole baby thing I found it hard to nod off. I knew I wasn’t legally a part of this family, but they’d more or less brought me in as one of them. It was just assumed by them all at this point that Jess and I would be together forever.
“Why you awake?” Jess mumbled after a good hour had passed.
“Sorry,” I whispered, realizing I must have shifted around too much and woke her up.
“It’s fine,” she replied, “Why you up?”
“Just thinking.”
“About?”
“The baby thing I guess,” I said quietly.
“What about it?” Jess asked, tipping her head up to catch my eyes in the darkness.
“I just really like that your brother and his wife included me,” I replied with a soft smile, “It was nice of them.”
“Why wouldn’t they include you?”
“I’m not actually going to be the baby’s Uncle,” I said after a moment of silence.
“Oh.”
“Not trying to start an awkward conversation or anything,” I sighed, “You just asked what I was thinking.”
“It’s ok,” Jess replied with a yawn, “It’s complicated.”
“I know,” I replied, “You should sleep.”
It was always complicated with Jess, and as she closed her eyes and drifted off again I couldn’t help but feel that familiar twinge of disappointment. It was definitely complicated.
I awoke to Jess nudging me the next morning, a massive smile on her face.
“Horses?!?”
“You’re really asking me that?” I said, rolling my eyes as she grinned down at me still in bed. I did a dramatic stretch, grabbing hold of her waist and pulling her down on top of me.
“Well…” she giggled, right before I pressed a kiss against her lips.
“I’ll come out and watch you, but there is absolutely no way I’m riding anything.”
“Anything?” Jess asked with a smirk hinting at the unintended innuendo. Before I could clarify what I meant Jess squirmed free from my grip, hopping off the bed and skipping across the room to the en suite.
“You seem excited,” I laughed, sitting up and taking in her hyperactivity.
“Just well rested and ready to enjoy the day, it’s lovely and sunny,” she called out. “And I can’t wait to see Peanut!”
“I’m glad you love that horse more than me!”
“Hey,” Jess said, emerging from the en suite with her hand on her hip, “I love you both equal.”
“Crazy girl,” I muttered, climbing out of bed and sorting through my things to find something to wear.
After getting ready the pair of us wandered down to the kitchen for a light breakfast and a cup of coffee. The rest of Jess’ family was already up and milling about the estate. It was fun to be there with lots of people, it made it livelier and it certainly made the place seem a bit less huge.
Once we’d eaten, Jess and I grabbed our coats and headed outside so she could ride around on Peanut a bit. It wasn’t particularly cold, just windy.
I sat on a lawn chair near the riding ring, watching Jess get Peanut saddled up. I didn’t have ill feelings towards the horse, I just didn’t trust it, so I made sure to keep well back.
Jess rode around in circles for a while, as I sat and watched on. To be honest it was really boring, but there wasn’t much else to do and Jess had really been looking forward to riding over the past few weeks.
About a half hour after we got outside I was joined by Freddy, who pulled up a chair next to me, a notepad in his hand. Ever since we’d written what we wanted to say to each other at the Arsenal versus Chelsea match where Jess and I had fought, it had sort of become our thing. I'd tried to learn some sign language, but I just didn't have the time to learn it properly so I only knew a handful of things.
‘You look bored, you want to come in for a beer?’ Freddy jotted down, showing me the page.
I grabbed the notepad from him, ‘Sure, let me just tell Jess.’
I waved Jess down, watching her ride over and then slide off Peanut, the reigns securely in her hand as she stared us down.
“What’s up?” she asked.
“Freddy and I are going to go inside and have a beer.”
“What?” Jess asked, “It’s like 11.”
“So?” I shrugged, “We’re going to chat. Guy stuff,” I added, pointing to the notepad.
“Ok,” Jess said, “I wanted to ride around the estate anyways.”
“Works for everyone,” I declared, giving Jess a quick kiss and then following Freddy inside.
The pair of went first into the kitchen, grabbing a beer each from the fridge. Jess’ mum and Hilary were sat at the counter, looking at baby things on the Internet. I raised my eyebrows at Freddy as we left the room, receiving an eye roll back.
We ended up settled down in the TV room, the notepad balanced on our knees as we wrote back and forth to each other. It was a long intense conversation that we had, sharing some of our personal hopes and fears. Our beers were emptied very early on, but we were too enraptured in what we were writing to bother getting more.
After finishing up Freddy ripped the many pages of our conversation out, indicating that he would dispose of them so no one saw. We hadn't said anything bad, we just didn't want our personal conversation to be seen by anyone else. It was just between us.
“There you are,” Jess said as I wandered into our room.
“Hey.”
“You have a good time with Freddy?”
“Sure,” I smiled, staring at her as she dug through her things to change out of her riding clothes.
“What did you talk about?”
“Random guy stuff.”
“Like?”
“Football,” I lied.
“I like football,” Jess said, indicating she wanted more detail.
“It was just fluff really, banter while we had a beer.”
“You had a very long beer,” Jess said, sidling over to me with her eyes narrowed, “I’m going to get this out of you somehow. You definitely aren’t telling me something.”
“Trust me babe, there is nothing to tell.”
“Promise?”
“I would tell you,” I said quietly, pulling her close to me by her waist. “I tell you everything.”
“I know,” Jess said, “Just making sure you weren’t trying to sneak something by me.”
“Nah,” I said, “I mean we talked about the baby thing a bit. But nothing crazy. I thanked him for including me in the whole top thing.”
“You’re really into all that aren’t you?” Jess asked, her hands wrapping around my waist as well.
“Yeah,” I shrugged, “It’s exciting. I’m happy for them.”
“I mean, about being included,” Jess said.
“I love your family,” I said, “And I love you. Of course I like to be included.”
Jess grinned at me, pressing a kiss against my lips. I was so tempted to drop on one knee right then and there, but our year wasn't up yet and I knew it would just cause problems.