PART NINETY NINE
*Aston’s POV*
Standing in our empty bedroom I stared at the pile of suitcases around me. I was actually livid with our management for the first time ever. We’d been planning a recording trip to America for some time, but the details had been up in the air while studios were booked and meetings were penciled in. So, to be informed that we were leaving in just a few days for a much longer trip than we had expected… I was beyond annoyed.
Hearing the door open and slam at half past two I was shocked. Why was Jess back so soon?
“Babe, is that you?” I called from our room.
“Yeah!” she shouted back. Her voice sounded weird, a bit strangled if I was honest.
I ran down the stairs to meet her, taking them two at a time. I found Jess stood still by the front door, a massive frown on her face, her eyes glazed over and her things all over the floor.
“What are you doing home?” I asked, all worried. Something was definitely off.
“My Dad sent me home early,” Jess replied quietly.
“Why?”
“I need to lay down,” she muttered, refusing to keep eye contact. “What are you doing here?”
“Packing,” I sighed. I’d spent the last hour at home, looking at my bags and dreading telling Jess how long I was going to be away. And how soon I was leaving.
“Oh,” she said, still refusing eye contact.
“Yeah, you feeling ok?”
Finally I managed to catch Jess’ eyes, to see them welling up with tears. With a quick shake of the head she turned and ran up the stairs, me hot on her heels.
“Woah babe!” I exclaimed as she threw herself on the bed, “What’s going on.”
“I can’t, I can’t, I can’t…” she said quickly, shaking her head.
“Can’t what?”
“Work, I don’t know…” she replied cryptically.
“Jess, you need to tell what is going on. Are you ok?”
“I told you at Christmas to let me have the necessary meltdown yeah?” she replied, her head buried in the pillow.
“Yeah?”
“Right now,” she said.
“Oh god, babe,” I soothed, climbing on the bed and trying to pull her into my arms. For a moment she tried to resist, but clearly her body was already exhausted from whatever was going through her head and in no time I had her pulled into my chest as I lay next to her. “What is it?”
“Everything,” Jess cried, “I can’t do it all.”
“Do what?”
Instead of responding Jess just let out a frustrated cry, her head buried against my chest. I had no idea what was going on, and in that moment I knew it was best to just let her have the meltdown as she said. As long as I was with her, she wouldn’t do anything stupid.
We lay in bed for nearly two hours, Jess crying the entire time. I’d given up hopes of getting my packing done that afternoon, and I was planning on canceling on the launch party we were meant to go to that night.
“When do you leave?” Jess asked me after a while, her crying subsided just enough for the words to get out.
“Umm…”
“Soon right?” she sighed.
“Monday night.”
“This Monday?”
“Yeah,” I replied, “I can not believe they put off telling us until literally the Friday before.”
“So you’ll miss my birthday.”
That was the worst part about all of this. I was definitely going to miss her birthday. And mine. And Valentine’s Day. It was cruel almost. “Yeah,” I replied sadly. “But I thought I’d get my packing done this afternoon so we can spend the entire weekend together just us.”
“You’re always so thoughtful,” Jess mumbled, releasing me just enough so she could twist and look at my packing progress. “Why so many bags?”
“Lots of clothes,” I replied.
“Long trip?” she asked, her eyes turning back to mine.
I nodded my head gently, a worried look on my face. She was already mid-meltdown, I didn’t want to send her over the edge. I could break her with this information.
“How long?”
I continued to stare at her.
“Ast, how long?” she said again.
“Seven weeks.”
I watched her eyes go as wide as saucers, her breathing picking up just slightly as it hit her.
“But…”
“We’re recording in LA, New York, and Atlanta. And they’ve booked us a few random gigs. We’ve got meetings too.”
“But… That is so long.”
“I know,” I sighed, “I’m not terribly pleased. But it’s my job.”
“Yeah,” Jess said, tears starting to streak down her face again.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, pulling her closer to me as we lay side by side.
“You didn’t plan it, your management and label did.”
“Still, I wanted to do something big for your birthday. Maybe go abroad for a long weekend or something.”
Jess didn’t acknowledge this statement, instead she let our another frustrated cry as the sobs picked up again. Whatever had happened to her at work was clearly messing with her head, and I was sure there were other factors that were involved too. Work had just been the icing on the cake.
Jess cried into my shirt for another hour as we continued to lay on the bed. She hadn’t said a word about what was going on, and I knew it was only a matter of time before the ranting began.
I was surprised when instead of exploding, Jess drifted off to sleep, clearly all cried out. I laid with her a bit longer and then climbed off the bed, first canceling on the event and then wandering around to try and get my things packed while she slept. I didn’t want to leave her in the room alone, but it was just early evening which meant I wanted to try and get things done while I could. If I was lucky I could get my packing done while Jess slept and still have the weekend free to do whatever we wanted.
It wasn’t until 8pm that Jess stirred again, sitting up blearily in bed as I sat on my side, playing on my iPad.
“Do you think I’m a psycho bitch that hates change and wants everything my way?” she asked me suddenly.
I turned and stared at her, my jaw dropped. What the hell was going on with her?
PART ONE HUNDRED
*Jess’ POV*
“Excuse me?” Aston asked, his mouth open as if I’d just shocked him.
“Do you think I’m a psycho controlling bitch?” I said slowly, enunciating every syllable.
“Of course I don’t!” he replied, “What’s happened to get you like this?”
“There’s just so many things going on right now and I sort of just want time to freeze and stop it all.” I concluded this statement by falling back into my pillow, my head facing the ceiling.
“Like what?” Aston asked me, “What sorts of things?”
“Freddy having a baby. You going away for ages. My Dad is retiring.”
“Oh wow, congrats for him,” Aston said, clearly happy for my father.
“Congrats?” I laughed sarcastically, “Think about what that means.”
“What does it mean?” Aston asked.
“If my Dad isn’t working he doesn’t need anyone to work for him,” I sneered.
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“So that’s what this is all about today? You don’t have a job anymore?”
“It’s just one of many things,” I sighed.
“But none of those things are actually bad things,” Aston reasoned, “I mean it sucks that I have to leave, but its for my work and you know I’ll be back. And of course you can always come with me. Or come visit. And job wise this might be good, you could find something new that you like even more!” He had an optimistic look on his face, clearly hoping I would calm down and realize that all of this change wasn’t bad.
“None of them are bad things, but they aren’t things I know how to deal with.”
“So you learn,” Aston said slowly.
“What if I don’t want to?”
“Well to be honest you don’t have a choice on any of those.”
“Thanks for pointing that out Ast,” I mumbled.
“It’s part of growing up. You take change head on and learn how to deal with it,” he explained.
“It’s just hard,” I sighed.
“Jess, I promise everything is going to be ok. You’ll find a job…”
“Jeremy wants me to work for him,” I blurted out, sitting back up and crossing my legs so I was facing Aston
“For him? Doing what?” Aston asked. He reached a hand out and put it affectionately on my knee to show that he was there, listening and ready to help me out.
“He’s running for House of Commons.”
“So you’d just have your same job? Babe, that’s fantastic,” Aston grinned.
“What if he doesn’t win the election though? He said wants me to run the campaign and I’ve never done that before. What if I do a terrible job and he loses? And anyways, I’ve never worked in the Commons. It’s going to be different, what if it’s all miserable work and I hate my life?” All of my insecurities about this whole situation tumbling from my mouth.
“You and Jeremy get on well,” Aston said, “I doubt it would be that bad.”
“What if it is?”
“You’ll never know unless you try it out.”
Aston was parrying back everyone one of my insecure rants with some sort of cryptic, ‘It’ll all be ok’ line. Part of me felt like I should keep shooting insecurities at him until he couldn’t respond. But part of me was thankful that he could keep me grounded. Only he could do that.
The door buzzer went off, stunning us from our heated conversation.
“What is that?” I asked, confusion clearly on my face.
“Food,” Aston said, climbing off the bed. “Come on.”
“Ast…” I sighed. Food was the last thing I wanted.
“You’re coming with me, come on.”
He grabbed my hand and practically dragged me off the bed. If I hadn’t budged I was sure he was going to pick me up and carry me so I obliged. As I followed him downstairs I noticed his bags lined up along the wall, presumably all ready to go. Yuck.
I was sat down at the kitchen counter while Aston dealt with the food, and then he laid out two pizzas in front of me.
“Your favorites,” he said, opening the boxes. A cheese and a pepperoni. Nothing fancier than that.
“Aren’t we supposed to be somewhere tonight?”
“We’re staying right here, you and I,” Aston responded. “No one is bothering us all weekend.”
I looked over at him perched on the stool next to me and quickly slithered off my seat, standing up so I could wrap my arms around his neck tightly.
“What would I ever do without you?” I whispered into his ear as I hugged him tight.
“I don’t even want to know,” Aston replied, a hand running down the length of my back. “Now let’s eat before its cold.”
I tried to eat a piece or two as Aston made his way through the equivalent of a whole pizza. We didn’t speak, the silence hovering between us as we both clearly thought things through.
“How you doing now?” Aston asked me quietly as I closed up the pizza boxes and tried to shove them in the fridge.
“I just really hate change,” I sighed, pushing the fridge door shut and leaning my back against it.
“Why?”
“It just freaks me out. Why can't everything stay the same.”
“Life would be boring that may. Change, it's scary yeah,” Aston replied, “But sometimes it’s the beginning of something incredible.”
I stared at him. I knew exactly what he was referring to. I’d seen it all in that conversation he’d had with Freddy.
“I…” I started, ready to spill the beans that I knew everything. But I couldn’t. He was leaving for so long. I didn’t want this to awkwardly hover between us right before he left. What if he was mad at me? It would be a horrible way to see him off. “I love you,” I said instead.
“Love you too,” Aston replied, grabbing hold of me and kissing me quickly before wrapping me tight in his arms again. “Everything is going to be fine.”
“You’re still leaving me.”
“Only seven weeks.”
“Practically forever,” I sighed.
“It’ll fly by.”
“For you maybe,” I replied wryly as I pulled away.
“We’ll sort something out,” he said. “Now, what are you going to do about this job?”
“What do you think I should do?”
“I think you should try it,” Aston replied. “I don’t always understand what you’re talking about with your work, but this sounds like a good opportunity to me.”
I nodded my head at Aston, agreeing that he was right. It was the best opportunity I had going at least.
“Everything is going to fall into place, just let it,” he told me that night, as we got ready for bed. “Don’t resist change.”
I knew this was his veiled plea with me. He just didn’t know that I knew this…