Chapter 20: Preparations
A/N: My deepest apologies for taking so long to update! But I'm on winter break now and there's only a few chapters left so I should get them out fairly quickly!! For this chapter I went without a song or song title because it's kind of an in between chapter. We'll see about the next few, but the wedding chapter will definitely have a song ;-). And now it's time to find out who Craig's best man is going to be…
Craig and Ashley stood outside waiting for someone to come to the door.
"Think he'll be surprised?" Ashley asked.
"I don't know, maybe." Craig responded, knocking once more.
"Seriously, what did you do with your key?" She sighed as she adjusted Julia who was sleeping soundly in her arms.
Before Craig could respond, the door opened.
Joey looked slightly surprised to see them, "Oh, hey guys I wasn't expecting a visit…"
"That's cause we didn't tell you!" Craig laughed as Joey opened the door further so they could walk in.
"So, to what do I owe the honor? Let me guess, an announcement?" he inquired, grinning knowingly.
Craig bobbed his head in acknowledgement, "Yep, that and a question. Is Caitlin home?"
"Nope, she's at work."
"Well, we were hoping to make the announcement to both of you, but I guess we'll just have to tell Caitlin later. So as you seemed to have guessed the big announcement is that we're getting married…"
Joey grinned, "I thought so after that conversation we had. Congrats!"
Ashley looked confused about the conversation Joey was referring to but shook it off and returned the hug Joey offered her.
"So the question," Craig continued, "is 'Will you be my best man?'"
Joey looked somewhat shocked but very pleased, "Oh, Craig, of course. I'd be honored."
Joey handed out more hugs as Angie came bounding down the stairs.
Craig grinned at his little sister, "Hey, Ang, how do you feel about being in a wedding?"
Angie squealed, "Yay! You gave her the ring!"
Craig, Ashley, and Joey laughed, "Yep, I gave her the ring."
Ashley held out her left hand for Angie to see the ring on her finger, "See."
"Aw, it looks good there." Angie proclaimed with a firm nod.
"Thank you," Ashley kneeled down to Angie's level, "so you have a real important job for the wedding, ready to hear about it?"
Angie nodded vigorously as Ashley began to tell her what her job in the wedding was going to be. Craig and Joey looked on in amusement at Angie's inability to contain her excitement over the situation.
Ashley sighed as she got up for the fourth time to scoop up her newly crawling and as a direct result, hyper, infant who had covered the entire living room and was insistent upon venturing into other rooms. Julia began to squirm in her mother's arms just as Craig walked in through the front door. He walked over to Ashley and his clearly frustrated daughter, who Ashley gave up on and set her back on the ground. The minute Julia was on the ground again she renewed her trek around the living room, forgetting she had already explored it.
"I don't know how there can be anything wrong with her, cause I can't keep up with her!" Ashley observed as the two watched Julia.
Craig chuckled, "She's got a lot of energy!"
"Yeah, and now you can use yours to go chase her around. But first, how did the search go?"
He smiled, "Okay. Found some options. Are you coming next time?"
"Depends on when. Me, Ellie, and Paige are going dress shopping tomorrow."
"Ah, also very important." Craig said with a mock serious tone.
"Yep." Ashley giggled.
"Well, I suppose I can work around the dress shopping schedule so you can come to help choose where we're going to be living together."
He emphasized the last word and pulled her close. Ashley smiled, savoring the moment before Craig inevitably had to break away to chase their baby before she succeeded in escaping the living room.
"Oh my God, this one is perfect for you hun!"
Ashley and Ellie shared a look, "Paige, that's not even a wedding dress."
"Oh, duh, not for the wedding. But you should buy this one anyway cause it'd just look awesome on you."
The other two girls glanced to each other again, this time rolling their eyes, Ashley had to hold back laughing, "Okay, I'll think about it Paige."
"So, back to the wedding dresses..." Ellie pointed out, earning a glare from Paige.
"What color are we going with again? Are you sticking with the no white because you're not a virgin rule or…"
"Paige!" Ellie cut in.
"What? It's going to be kind of obvious to everybody since the kid is bound to be there. But, personally I think it's a stupid rule, so Ash, white or no white?"
Ashley took a moment to answer, flustered from Paige's little speech, "Umm…I guess whatever color the dress I find that I like the most is, that's what I'll go with."
Paige nodded in approval, "Okay, good, that works."
Ellie simply rolled her eyes again, "Well, let's keep looking."
Remarkably, Paige remained relatively quiet for the next hour as the girls scoured the racks of the dress store.
Ashley was currently in the dressing room with a stack of dresses.
"Okay, how about this one?" she asked stepping out of the dressing room wearing an off white strapless dress with a lot of beading.
"Hmm…well by your wrinkled nose I can see you don't like it." Ellie observed.
"I don't think beading is me. Not this much anyway."
"Are you kidding? That's not even a lot…" Paige sounded indignant.
Ashley turned to go back into the dressing room, beginning to unzip the dress, "Well than you wear it to your wedding."
"Then hand it to me, I'll try it on!"
Ellie swatted Paige's outstretched hand, "You don't even have a wedding in the near future!"
"Well, it wouldn't hurt to be prepared."
"So make a mental note."
The girls were too busy going back and forth to notice Ashley reemerge in another dress. This one had an off white lace colored criss-cross type top that ended just below her chest, from there it was a cream colored silk that flowed down smoothly to her feet.
Both Ellie and Paige had identical open-mouthed looks on their faces.
"Umm…so hows this one?" Ashley asked cautiously.
"Perfect!" the girls shouted in unison.
"You guys think so?" she said hopefully.
"Yes, Ash, you look gorgeous!" Ellie gushed.
"Stunning," Paige nodded in approval.
Ashley took a deep breath and turned to face the full length mirror, "Okay, so I guess this is it then."
Oh, and one more thing: I cut off what Angie's job is on purpose, that will be revealed in the actual wedding chapter ;-).