I wake up to find myself on the couch. It's very early in the morning, I don't even remember falling asleep. I check the watch, it's 4:30 in the morning. I lay down on the couch again, but sleep doesn't come. The room is full of darkness so I get up and switch on the lights. I jump, as I suddenly see Nathan standing by the window. Whoa! He is not asleep. Or what if he doesn't sleep at all? Freaking hell, what if he is a vampire?! Arghhhh!! I facepalm myself to shut up. Mental note : being obsessed with Vampire Diaries is not a good thing.
"Uh - good morning." I say and he turns around.
"Morning." he replies, "Why are you up?"
"No reason. When did I sleep?"
"You fell asleep on the couch while reading your novel."
"Ohhh, and where is my novel?" He signals to the side table where my novel was kept.
"Thank you. Uh - why are you up?"
"Couldn't sleep," he mutters.
"Oh, why?" I ask out of curiosity. He is such an intriguing man, maybe it's because he is always cold and disconnected it makes me curious on what's going on in his mind.
"Do you even realize what a life changing thing has happened with us?" Memories of the wedding day flash back in front of my eyes. I have nothing to say.
"And it's all your goddamn fault!" his voice rises. He paces past me and goes outside. No, no, no! it's not my fault!! I did what I had to do!! I wanted to scream these words out loud but I knew no one would listen. But I do understand that he is not wrong, I ruined his life. I let out a deep sigh and sit on the sofa.
I'm startled by ringing of Nathan's phone. I reach to see that Lucas is calling him. Instinctively, I pick up the phone and immediately regret it. I don't even know Lucas that wel to have a video chat with him 5 o'clock in the morning.
"Hello??" Lucas says.
"Hi, it's April!" I reply.
"Hey April, how's your honeymoon going? Are you having a nice time in Paris?"
"Uh- sure
"You don't sound so sure." He says suspiciously, "Anyway, I'm still mad at you for taking Nathan away from me." I chuckle.
"I am no one to take him away from you, you guys are perfect for each other." I play along.
"Well actually, that's true too. So, where's that loser?"
"Uh- he has gone---" I am cut off by Nathan as he snatched the phone from my hand.
"Hey bro, what's up." he says. He went outside for the rest of the talk. Meanwhile I decided to take a long, refreshing shower. After I am done I wrap a towel around me and open my suitcase, taking my time to choose what to wear.
"Alright, we need to set some boundaries," Nathan appears out of nowhere startling me by his sudden presence. Good gracious, this boy really does possess the invisibility cloak.
"You are not allowed to touch my stuff!" he continues. I ignore him. What does he think of himself? As if he is some kind of king or something. "Do I make myself clear? Answer me!" I continue to ignore him and pace towards the bathroom.
"Don't you even dare to try that with me!" he swings me around and pins me to the wall. My back collides with the wall bouncing me off to his chest. His scent fills my nostrils, damn he smells good. He looks good, smells good, if only his behaviour was decent he would make a nice human being.
"What the hell?!" I yell, "I'm not one of your staff members, so stop treating me like one!! Now let go of me!!" and I feel my towel slip down which makes me realise I am not wearing much clothing underneath.
"Nathan!!! Let go of me!" I panic.
"Answer me, first!" he orders.
"Yes, I understand, I won't touch any of your stuff." I say quickly. He releases me and I rush into the bathroom. He is the worst person I ever had to deal with. After I get changed, I throw myself at the sofa and continue to read my novel.
"Excuse me, Mrs Walsh," I here a knock at the door, "May I come in?"
"Who is it?"
"It's David, Mr Walsh' manager." Oh the guy who received us at the airport.
"Yes, come in please."
"Good morning, Mrs Walsh," He greets me with a smile, "Mr Walsh have a client meeting in Deauville and he wants you to come along."
"Alright, when do we leave?" I smile thinking I'll be sight seeing Paris, although not with the person I imagined but it's okay.
"In 2 hours," he says, "And, there's a beach so you can enjoy there while Mr Walsh meets the client." Aww, he fixed up business while on our honeymoon. Don't I have the most romantic husband ever!
"Oh, alright, I'll be ready."
"Have a good day, Mrs Walsh"
"Hey, David, I hope I can call you David."
"Yes, of course."
"Please don't call me Mrs Walsh. I haven't even thought of changing my name, maybe I never will."
"Oh, I'll keep it in mind, ma'am."
"Just call me April. That's good."
"Sure. April." he says hesitantly.
He closes the door behind him and I get up to search for something to wear on the beach. I finally find a denim shorts and a bikini top. I pack stuff in a small bag. I'm getting so bored. So I decide to roam around the hotel. While roaming around I find a cloth store on one of the floors. After a while of random window shopping I buy a yellow hat for the beach. When I go back to the room I find Nathan sitting in front of his laptop, engrossed in work. It's now 6:50 in the morning. I lay down quietly beside him and surf through my phone. After an hour or so David knocks at the door.
"Mr Walsh, are we ready to go?" he asks as he enters.
"Yep. Go get the car ready."
"It's waiting for you, Sir."
"Alright." Nathan closes his laptop and gets up. I too pick up my bag.
"Here, I'll carry that April." David offers me a hand.
"No thanks, David, it's not really heavy." He insisted on it anyway, so I let him carry my bag. I am carrying two extra pair of clothing just in case my spare clothes are ruined I'll have a back up for my back up.
I researched about Deauville it's 2 hours away from Paris. Great, I have plenty of time to get bored. I check my emails to see if there is any answer from any of the universities I applied to. Stanford accepted my application. Well, nothing to be happy about, I graduated from there so it was kind of obvious they would accept my application.
"Hey Nathan, which university did you graduate from?"
"Berkeley." came a simple reply. Okay, so now I know something about the man I am married to. I am making progress. Baby steps, April, baby steps.
"Alright."
I have applied there too. No answer till yet. As I read more of my emails I found nothing important. So, I plug my earphones and start listening to music. The view on the way was quite nice, plus when it is combined with music it became nicer. After half an hour, my eyelids became heavy and I drift off to sleep. I wake up to the sound of knocking of horns.
"What the hell?" I say as I wake up.
"Traffic." Nathan says. I then realize that my head was on his shoulder.
"Oh I'm so sorry." I move away. He says nothing and continues to look outside the window. It takes us another half an hour to reach the beach. I could see shirtless boys and girls roaming around.
"Mrs Walsh, we will be free in an hour. Mr Walsh said that you can chill on the beach." David approach me as I get my bag out.
"Thank you, David. Is there any place I can change?"
"You own that cabin, ma'am." he points towards a cabin.
"Own it?"
"I mean Mr Walsh owns it, so you own it." he explained.
"Oh yeah right." I say and pace towards the cabin. It is so not a cabin, rather a mansion. He is so damn rich. I know my parents also has money but we are not as rich as the Walsh that is pretty clear to me now and also why my parents wanted this merger so badly. I quickly change into my bikini top and shorts. I put on my yellow hat and find a calm spot to sit under a tree. I continue to read my novel to pass time. Suddenly, I feel a soft and chubby thing touching my leg, I look up to find a cute little infant. Awww, my heart melted when I saw his eyes look into mine.
"Hello, you cute little thing." I say as I pick him in my arms. He smiles at me as if recognising me.
"Mason! Ah! There you are!" a woman comes behind him. She must be his mother.
"I'm so sorry, did he disturb you?"
"Oh no no, not at all. He is just too amazing to disturb anything or anyone." I smile at her.
"Thank you." she smiles back, "By the way, I'm Lily."
"Hi, I'm April."
"April, would it be completely inappropriate if I ask you to take care of Mason, while me and my husband go for a swim?"
"Oh no, not at all! I would love to!"
"You are a sweetheart, April. Thank you very much."
"Oh don't be ridiculous. I love him." She smiles at me and Mason and then joins her husband.
I play with Mason for the rest of the time. In the distance, I see Nathan coming towards us. Mason was sitting on my lap, playing with my hair. Oh God, he is the cutest little thing. I hug him softly. Then he grabs my bikini string and started to pull it. Thankfully I tied the string tightly.
"Oh love, you are too small for this." I kiss him on the cheek.
"Who's baby is this?" Harry asks me as soon as he reaches me.
"A couple asked me to take care of their baby," I answer, "They wanted to go for a swim."
"Okay." he smiles at Mason.
"He is cute, isn't he?" I smile back.
"Yes." He sits down next to me, "And naughty too." he chuckles when he sees Mason pulling my bikini string.
"Yes, he is." I laugh.
"What's his name?" He moves closer to him. Mason grabs Nathan's finger with his whole fist and he pecks the baby's cheeks. Mason starts to lean into Nathan and Nathan closes his distance with me. I gulp, feeling unconfortable by the lessening of distance. Then, I feel Nathan's hands on my bikini string and I panic.
"Hey, what are you doing?"
"Shhh." he shushes me. I then feel him tie my string back. Oh, I was so lost in Mason's cuteness that I didn't feel the string loosen up. Nathan then quickly pulls away lifting Mason from my lap and makes him sit on his chest.
"Hey there, little buddy," he says. Mason smiles at him and locks his hands in Nathan's hair. I feel a deja vu. This has happened before, just not here in Paris and not with Nathan but Dylan, the love of my life. I miss him. Six months and I still miss him, how stupid is that. I look at Nathan again, he's very busy playing with Mason. I smile at them and move closer to Mason and started to make funny faces to make him laugh. 5 babies, I chuckle at the thought and close my mind.