Chapter Twenty-Four

I woke to the sound of Britney Spears’ voice blasting near my ear. I winced and flinched away from the sound as Rosie groaned loudly, shifting and pressing her face into the side of my neck. Her hand blindly slapped onto her bedside cabinet, looking for something. I smiled, a little confused, then I realised she was reaching for her cell phone. I laughed as I noticed what the Britney song actually was, ‘Womanizer’ was blasting way too loud for this time of the morning.

Finally, she found it and pressed it to her ear without moving her face away from my neck. She didn’t bother with any hellos. “This had better be important or I’m gonna kick your ass,” she growled into the phone, her voice thick with sleep.

I laughed and wrapped my arms around her tighter, kissing the top of her head as I blinked, trying to get my stinging eyes to adjust to the light in the room.

“Heck yeah you woke me up! What time is it anyway?” she asked, then she groaned again. “Josh, I hardly ever get to sleep in, let alone sleep in with an incredibly hot guy, and you have to wake me up at seven thirty? Seriously, do you not know me at all?”

My muscles tightened unconsciously at the mention of Josh. I closed my eyes as she pushed herself away from me and sat up, rubbing a hand over her face.

“Yeah, he’s here. Why so interested? I don’t think he swings that way, but I’ll ask him, if you want,” she teased, laughing at his response. Suddenly she frowned, looking a little shocked at whatever he’d said.

“What? No! I told you last night that I was busy today. No, I can’t rearrange. Look, just call your mom back and tell her that her son’s an idiot and was obviously too drunk to remember the agreement that we made last night. No, I said that I’d call her for coffee. Josh, you’re supposed to be working today!” she scoffed at something he said.

“Well he’s at Anna’s all day anyway so you can’t. If you wanted to see him today then you should have told me last night and I could have arranged for him to be here for you! Oh, don’t try and blame this on me. I wasn’t the one that cancelled anything, remember?”

She was quiet for a bit, listening to him speak before she sighed and shrugged.

“Look, I don’t care, okay? Let’s just leave it for now. If you want him next weekend then that’s fine with me. Just call me in the week and we’ll arrange it. Okay, well just pick him up Saturday morning then instead of Friday night if you’re working. Yeah, it’s fine. No, he’d love to see you too, just don’t cancel again, please?” she begged, closing her eyes and biting on her lip.

“I know you do, I just hate seeing his face when it happens. I know you have to work. Hold up, I never said it was your fault, I’m just telling you what he sees.”

She looked at me apologetically, and I forced a smile, putting my hand on her knee, rubbing circles in her soft skin with my thumb. She spoke to him for another minute, then disconnected the call and pushed her phone back onto the side, her eyes looking at the clock before she shook her head angrily.

“I hate mornings,” she mumbled, settling herself back down against me, resting her chin on my chest looking up at me with her beautiful brown eyes. “Sorry about that, I think he was still drunk. He was asking what time I was going to his mom’s for dinner today with DJ.”

I stroked the back of her head. Her hair was all messy and tangled – though it still managed to look incredible. “Maybe he was too drunk to remember that you told him you were busy with your new boy toy,” I joked.

She smiled and dipped her head, kissing my chest lightly. “Boy toy, I actually like that almost as much as Rosie’s bitch.”

“Am I ever going to live that down?”

She shifted her body, swinging her leg over mine and hovering above me, her eyes were teasing and playful. “I don’t think so; the image of that black writing is burnt into the back of my eyelids.”

I rolled my eyes and pulled her mouth to mine, ending the conversation.

We spent the day just hanging out, talking and fooling around. We went for a walk in the park because I thought that might be romantic. As it turns out I was right, we ended up making out against a tree for ages, then sitting on a blanket and ‘people watching’. Making up funny stories to fit what they were doing at the time, trying to outdo one another and make the other person laugh. I got the impression that Rosie thought I was a funny guy, at one point she pretty much spat her drink out of her mouth when I made up the reason a man was wearing a trench coat when it clearly wasn’t cold enough for one.

After eating lunch, we arrived at the Taylors’ apartment at just after two. As we stepped into the elevator, I smirked at her as I pretended to run my hand over the buttons. Just as we got near Ashton’s floor, my cell phone started ringing. I smiled apologetically and pulled it out of my pocket, already knowing it was my mother by the ringtone.

“Sorry, it’s my mom,” I muttered.

She smiled and patted my ass as the elevator doors opened. “Are you a secret momma’s boy, Officer Peters?”

I nodded unashamedly. “Sure I am. She does my laundry,” I joked.

Her eyebrows shot up. “Seriously? She does your laundry?”

I shrugged, playing along. “What can I say, I can’t be good at everything.”

“So, if I were to do your laundry…” she trailed off, looking at me expectantly.

I wrapped one arm around her waist, pulling her against my chest. “If you were to do it, then I’d get that Rosie’s bitch slogan tattooed on my abs for real,” I stated, pretending to be serious.

She laughed and traced her hand down my back and onto my ass as I walked her backwards towards Ashton’s apartment. The phone was still ringing endlessly in my hand. “I’d rather have it tattooed on your ass. It’d look pretty good there,” she flirted, kissing the base of my throat.

I laughed and pushed her against the wall, kissing her softly before pulling away and nodding at Ashton’s door. “You go in, I’ll just be one minute,” I suggested, holding up the phone.

She grinned and knocked, Ashton answered the door almost immediately, I waved in greeting and answered the phone. “Hey, Mom.”

“Nathaniel, I was starting to get worried, you never let the phone ring for long. I was starting to think bad things had happened!” she scolded.

I smiled and leant back against the wall. “Sorry. I was making out with my girl,” I told her, grinning as she gasped and made a little aww sound.

“Nate, I can’t wait to meet her! When are you going to bring her home and introduce her to everyone?” she asked, her voice taking on that whiney quality it always did when she wanted something really badly.

I laughed cautiously. “When the time’s right, I will. It’s still only been seven weeks.” I shrugged; I didn’t want to take her home yet – not that I was frightened of putting our relationship on that path. It was more like I was scared that she wasn’t ready to go down that track; I didn’t want to scare her away from me by coming on too strong.

“Seven weeks is plenty of time to know how you feel about someone!” my mom rebutted. “How do you feel about her? Is she, you know, the one?” she asked, her voice hopeful.

I sighed and closed my eyes. “Mom, I’m not having this conversation with you.”

She sighed dramatically. “I’m not giving up! I want to meet her and her little boy. Ooh, why don’t you bring her to the barbeque on Saturday for Hannah’s birthday? You could bring her and DJ to meet everyone, it’d be perfect! Oh, please, Nate? Please?” she begged. She’d been like this ever since I’d told her about Rosie and DJ. At one point this week she’d threatened to drive down to LA and knock on every door until she found her.

“Mom, will you stop pushing me? I don’t want to scare her away!” I moaned, knowing she wasn’t going to let this go.

“Don’t be so silly, Nathaniel. I’m sure she’d love to know that you’re serious about her and want her to meet your family,” Mom countered.

I sighed and rested my forehead against the wall. Dread was building with every second.

She clicked her tongue. “If you don’t invite her here to meet us then I’m calling Ashton, I know he’ll give me her number and then I’ll ask her myself!” she threatened. I groaned. She freaking would do that too, damn devil woman! “Nate, I want to meet the girl who has my son in a knot!” I could practically hear the pout in her voice, and I could easily imagine the face that accompanied that voice.

I sighed and nodded; it needed to be done sooner or later, I just prayed that this wasn’t too soon for Rosie. “Okay, fine, I’ll ask her. But if she is free then it’ll only be Rosie, not DJ. He’s with his dad next weekend. He’s picking him up on Saturday morning,” I told her, rolling my eyes. If that as**ole keeps to the plan this time and doesn’t cancel last minute!

She squealed in response, and I had to laugh at her enthusiasm, she was going to love my girlfriend when she met her, and Rosie would have my family under her spell just as quickly as she hooked me.

“Oh, Nate, I can’t wait! I’m so excited! Can’t you ask his dad if he can have him another weekend instead so he can meet his new nanny?” she pleaded.

“I can’t do that, Mom. It’s not really my place to start asking for plans to be changed around, know what I mean?”

She sighed. “Yeah, I understand, poppet.”

“Right, if this meeting is happening then I need to set some ground rules,” I stated. “One, do not call me ‘Poppet’ ever again. Two, no showing her na**d baby pictures of me. Three, do not tell my girl that I used to be scared of clowns. Four, just calm the heck down,” I ranted, checking them off on my fingers as I said them, racking my brains to make sure I had everything.

She laughed. “Anything else?”

I frowned and closed my eyes. “I don’t think so, but if I think of anything else then I’ll text you beforehand. Just be on your best behaviour, promise?”

“I promise.”

The door to the apartment opened and I saw a brown head of hair for a fraction of a second before something short bowled into my legs, almost knocking me over. I laughed and looked down at DJ as he hugged my legs tightly.

“Nate! Can we press the elevator buttons, then go get ice cream?” he cried, grinning at me excitedly.

I smiled and patted his head. “Sure, Kid, just let me finish speaking to my mom, okay?”

Rosie came out into the hallway then, prying DJ off my legs, kissing my cheek lightly as she took his hand. “Anna said do you want a drink?” she whispered.

“Sure. I’ll be right in,” I replied, ushering her inside the apartment and closing the door, wincing as she looked at me a little bewildered. I put the phone back to my ear and closed my eyes. “I need to go, Mom. I’ll speak to you later in the week.”

“Okay, have a great week. Be careful at work.”

“I always am. I’d better go, apparently DJ wants ice cream. See you soon.” I disconnected the call and let myself into the apartment, grinning as DJ ran up to me and held his hand up for a high five. “Hey, Kid. Been good?” I looked up in time to see Rosie shoot Anna a look that I had no idea what it meant. It was like they were having a silent conversation.

DJ nodded enthusiastically. “Yep. I sleeped all night and didn’t wake up Cameron. I washed Uncle Ashton’s car with him this morning. I eated all of my dinner, and I even helped clean the dishes after!”

I grinned and ruffled his hair, looking at Ashton. “Well that sounds like child labour to me. You should ask Uncle Ashton if he’s paying you for that,” I suggested, winking at him.

DJ raised his eyebrows and looked at Ashton, who held his hands up innocently. “You wanted to help, no one forced you!” he protested.

I bent down to DJ’s level and looked at him, trying to keep my face deadly serious. “If you’d helped me wash my car and cleaned all my dishes, I would have paid you at least five bucks. I think Uncle Ashton’s a cheapskate.”

DJ frowned looking a little puzzled. “What’s a cheapskate? Like a roller-skate?” He questioned. Suddenly, his face brightened, his eyes widened, and his mouth pulled up into a grin. “I want to go roller-skating! Can we, Momma?” he sang, looking at Rosie excitedly.

Rosie’s mouth dropped open and she looked at me accusingly, as if I had suggested it or something. “Baby, I can’t roller-skate, last time I tried that I almost broke my butt, you remember?”

Ashton burst out laughing and nodded. “Oh that was too funny. We should definitely do that again. That was epic!” he stated.

“It wasn’t that funny! I couldn’t sit right for days,” Rosie scowled, pouting at DJ playfully.

He grabbed her hand, jumping up and down on the spot. “Can we, Momma? Pleeeeeeeease?” he whined, giving her the cute face that he seemed to be the master of.

Rosie groaned and shook her head. “I’m not doing it again. Ask Daddy, he might take you next weekend.”

Before I could even think about what I was about to say, the words burst from my mouth. “I’ll take him.”

Everyone stopped laughing and looked at me. Anna and Ashton looked shocked, Rosie looked like she thought I was joking, and DJ, well DJ was looking at me like I’d just suggested that I buy a real live penguin of his own.

Rosie opened her mouth and then closed it again, seeming a little lost for words. She looked at Anna again, and they seemed to have that whole silent conversation again. I really wished I was privy to it, I’d love to know what went on in my girl’s pretty head.