This Story's Going Somewhere

Chapter 20 - Nora

 It was the end of our first week in New York City. The boys had a show last night, and it went spectacularly. Now, we were all sitting in the hotel room, wondering what we should do with all the time we had to ourselves for the rest of the weekend. Pete had been locked in his bedroom all morning, talking on the phone with Ellie, while Patrick and I actually made an appearance outside of our room for a while. Truth be told, I was beyond sore, and Patrick was just tired. We'd really worn ourselves out over the past week, but we just couldn't keep our hands off each other.

Currently, we were all lying around the living room, sans Pete, shooting idea back and forth. Patrick and I were reclined across the sofa together, and Joe and Andy were occupying the chairs. Andy wanted to do something touristy, while Joe wanted no part of it, and I just wanted to go someplace where I could take some pictures. Patrick was up for anything, and we all just assumed that Pete would want to get some New York style pizza while we were here at some point, so at least we had solid plans for lunch. Finally, I spoke up with an idea for us. "Why don't we all go sightseeing before lunch, and then this afternoon, we can do something less touristy? We can go to a movie, or a show, or something."

"I like that idea," Patrick said. His hands were playing in my hair, as they had been for most of the morning. Apparently, he could braid, and I now had a handful of little braids on one side of my head. He told me he'd learned from playing with his sister's hair when they were little. I'd had no idea that he even had siblings, so naturally we spent a good hour talking about his family. He promised I would meet all of them once we got back to Chicago.

"Sounds good to me," Joe said, shrugging. We all turned to Andy then, hoping we could all agree on something.

"Why don't we head to Central Park first?" He suggested.

"Perfect!" I gasped, "Let me grab my camera!" I jumped off the couch, leaving Patrick alone for a moment, and jogged to our room to retrieve my camera from my bag. While I was in there, I took a moment to fix my hair. Once I took all of the braids out, it left my hair a little wavier than usual. Unfortunately, it was only on one side. I found my curling iron in my bag, and made the other side just as wavy, then walked back out to the living room with my camera on my hip. Joe was still in his chair, and Andy was gone, probably talking to Pete. Patrick was sitting up now, and when he saw me, I didn't miss the way his eyes moved quickly up and down over me, before settling on my hair. I smirked and went to sit beside him.

"I like your hair like this," he said quietly, still gazing at me.

"Thank you," I breathed. "I'll have to make you braid it more often." I stuck my tongue out at him, teasingly, but he only grinned.

"Anything for you," he whispered, leaning in to press a kiss to my temple.

"If you two are going to be like this all day, I'm not going," Joe said from the chair, barely glancing at us as he said it.

Patrick glared at him, shaking his head, but I laughed. "Don't worry, Joe, we won't be too obnoxious, I promise."

"You lie," Joe sighed, but he smiled at us. I leaned into Patrick, knowing Joe was right, and the bedroom door opened to the right of us. Andy walked out, with Pete in tow. He had the usual sappy grin on his face that he always had after talking to Ellie, which told me that they were still doing great. I was glad to see my best friend in such a happy relationship with such a good guy. Speaking of which, Patrick and I had called everyone earlier in the week, our parents, Ellie, and Shauna, to tell them all that we were having a boy. We didn't reveal the name we'd decided on yet, just in case we changed our minds, but I was pretty set on keeping Declan. When I was alone, I'd started talking to the baby once in a while, and rather than continue to call him little bun, I'd started calling him Declan, or sometimes just Dec. Patrick, on the many occasions that he spoke to my baby bump, did the same.