Paul pulled up in front of a house with the address Stephanie had texted to him, he sighed and thought why he was doing this for her, like Shawn had asked, he shrugged and got out of the truck. He was coming up the front steps when Stephanie quickly opened the door and slammed it behind her, "what went on at the office?"
"Shawn is going to help you. And I said you weren't feeling well and everyone is leaving early. What's it to you?" He saw the front door open again, "I was going to ask about your mom, are you going to tell her the truth?"
"Paul, hi, how are you?" Before Stephanie could answer him, her mother Linda came running outside, "I can't believe what Stephanie told me today." She hugged him, "I guess its hard to not fall in love with someone who you've been working with for nine years." There was his answer.
"Yeah." He let out a small laugh, "I've been fine, how are you?" The last time he'd seen Linda was at least eight years ago, when he had just started working for Stephanie, "I haven't seen you in forever."
"It has been forever. And this is the news I get, you and Stephanie are getting married, I'm so excited." She couldn't stand still, "so she said you guys have been together for a few months and she's just now moving in? You guys must really want this on the down-low."
"We do." Stephanie stood against Paul's arm, "but now that we're getting married, its okay that some people know." She smiled, feeling uneasy being that close to Paul, but then she got another whiff of cologne, and it made her lean farther towards him.
He slightly moved his arm around her, not really knowing what to do, "yeah. Well we'd better get the stuff in the car," he looked down and squinted, "I have Shawn on our side too." He whispered, just out of Linda's hearing, "I just have to call him when we're ready."
She nodded, "thanks." Once her mom turned her back towards them she swiftly jumped away from Paul, pretending to be disgusted, "I have only a few things here, but I have a lot more in the locker."
He rolled his eyes and followed her inside, greeted by an older man, "you must be Stephanie's new fiancé, I'm Jack, Linda's husband and Stephanie's step-father." Jack held his hand out, "nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet you too." Paul shook his hand, "yes I'm Paul, Steph's new fiancé." He turned around to get a box thrown into his arms, "oh, okay, which car should this go into, honey?" He stuttered, smirking at her face when he said 'honey'.
"How about you put it in the Mercedes, Paul." She sneered, nearly pushing him out the front door, "honey? You called me honey?" She followed at his heels all the way down to the cars, "you don't call me that."
"Whatever. Just be glad that after everything Shawn said to me, I didn't change my mind about this." He shoved the box into the trunk and walked away.
"Hi Shawn." Stephanie smiled as she got out of Paul's car at the storage locker, "how are you? I'll bet having the day off today was pretty nice." She noticed he was showing no emotion so she became a little nervous.
"Yes it was." He cleared his throat, "Paul must have forgot to tell you, I know Stephanie." He nodded, waiting for her to get what he meant.
"What? What do you mean you know?" She opened the trunk of the Mercedes, then turned to him again, "wait, you know?" She made a hand gesture back and forth between her and Paul.
He nodded, "Paul told me. And I promised him that I would keep my mouth shut, I'm not even gonna say anything to my own wife, which I think is wrong, but hey, who cares what I think." He stared at her, "so how'd you talk him into this?"
"I was told that I can't work in America, and if I was out of work, he would be also. He doesn't see it that way, but I do." She crossed her arms, "he didn't say he was going to tell you." She pushed a couple numbers into the keypad next to the big orange door, "he was supposed to be over here after me. I don't know where he went." She looked around, his truck nowhere to be seen.
A few minutes later, Paul pulled in front of the gate and entered a code into the pad beside him. He waited as the gate slowly rolled open, then sped through the opening. He parked behind Shawn's truck and shut his engine off, sitting back in the seat and shoving a handful of fries into his mouth. Shawn poked his head out of the doorway and looked back at the truck, "there's Paul. It looks like he just got himself some food." He came out and opened the door, "what the hell? You get to eat and nobody else does?"
"Hey, how do you know I didn't get you anything?" Paul handed Shawn a Burger King bag, "here's your lunch, I'll just pretend I didn't get Stephanie anything." He got out and stood in front of the door, sipping on the straw of his soda, "need help?"
"Where were you?" She saw the cup and bit her lip, "oh," she leaned over and grabbed a box, "looks like you were hungry."
He pulled the straw away and frowned, "you aren't gonna get upset and ask why I didn't get you anything?" He handed her his cup, "want some soda?"
"Not your soda." She took the cup and handed the box to him, "this could go in your truck I guess. It's taped shut."
He turned around and went back to his truck, "anyway, if you're hungry, I brought you some food, but if not, I could eat again, either way its not a problem." He snatched his cup from her and took another drink.
"I'll eat after we get all my stuff in the cars." She turned to walk back to the locker but he touched her shoulder, "what are you doing?" She faced him again, an annoyed expression on her face.
"How about you just go eat and leave this to Shawn and I. We'll quickly put everything in the cars while you just sit with Madison and eat. Your food is on the passenger's seat in my truck, and your drink, which I remembered to get you Diet Coke, its in the cupholder in the backseat." He smiled and gently pushed her towards the truck.
"Okay." She smiled back at him, "Shawn, Paul just said that you're gonna help him get all my stuff out of there, I'll sit back there with Madison." She sat in the backseat of the Mercedes and opened the bag, she usually would never eat at Burger King, and Paul knew that, but he apparently also knew that if she had to eat there, she would only eat the chicken sandwich, without tomatoes, and with extra lettuce. She pulled the sandwich out of the bag and unwrapped it, finding no tomatoes. She took a drink and watched Madison as she slightly moved in her sleep, "I can't believe I'm doing this to him. And the fact that he agreed amazes me." She turned and looked at Paul and Shawn through the tinted windows.
She waved, and waited for one of them to wave back, but when they didn't, she knew they couldn't see her through the window. She leaned forward and opened the center console in the front, seeing a couple packages of cigarettes, and two lighters, "he smokes?" She asked herself, "since when?" She noticed that out of three boxes, only one was open, and the open one was two short of being full. She slammed the console closed and thought, "I wonder if I stress him out that much. He takes Ambien, and smokes?" She was still hunched over the console between the front seats, she turned and smelled the leather seat next to her, "well it doesn't smell like cigarettes at all in here." She considered taking them just to see if he would notice, but instead, she sat back in her seat and finished her soda.
"Shawn, why do you keep opening the boxes and going through her stuff? Stop it." Paul held his back, "that's just weird, stop."
"What if she has like a gun or something in here? How do we even know Randy actually got in a car accident?" Shawn looked at the end of Paul's car to make sure he wasn't being watched, "maybe she killed him cause he said she was mean. If she killed him, she wouldn't have any problem killing you too."
"Shut up. She didn't shoot Randy, trust me. I know more details of his car accident than you would believe. She wouldn't kill me anyway, she's gotta be married to someone who lives here. We aren't even married yet."
Shawn put the box down and stared at him, "you're really have to marry her? Like, this is really for real?" He folded the box shut, sighing, "I still don't believe this."
"What? I said her and I are getting married, that's that. Yeah this is really real. Her and I have to get married, like, soon. I just don't know how the heck I'm gonna break the news to my parents, let alone my mother."
"Your mom's gonna kill you. Why don't you just tell her the truth, that you 'have' to marry her for one reason only, she'd probably be a lot more understanding of that, even though, maybe not. I remember when your dad was having heart surgery and Stephanie there, wouldn't let you go to him. I'll bet your mom will bring that up."
Paul thought, "I can't tell her the truth, cause I know she would do anything in her power to tell Immigration all Stephanie's plans and get her sent away. Steph and I have a deal, this is all just for Madison. So she can have at least one real parent, after Randy died. This wouldn't be happening of Randy were still alive, okay?"
"It probably would, cause eventually Randy would have gotten fed up with her and all her bitchiness and probably left her and Madison. Plus, you wanna know what I heard? I heard her and Randy weren't even together when he died. They split up and he was drunk because of it, and that's how he crashed." He picked up a couple boxes and carried them to his truck, giving Paul a smirk on his way.