Jade awakes one Saturday morning towards the end of November to her phone buzzing on the nightstand beside her. The digital clock displayed next to it reads 8:43 am, and she can't help but groan as she reaches for her phone.
It's too early for anyone to be calling her, this had better be important.
The phone stops buzzing before she has a chance to answer it, and the home screen lights up with a missed FaceTime call and three text messages from Beck. Before she has the chance to unlock her phone and respond to anything the phone starts buzzing again, signaling that Beck is making another attempt to call her. Jade makes an effort to fix her hair and wipe the sleep out of her eyes before sliding the green button across the screen to answer.
"Hello?" She yawns
"Hey." Beck chuckles as his face fills the screen "Did I wake you?"
"Yeah..." Jade yawns again "S'okay though. What's up?"
"Have you looked outside?"
"We literally just established that you woke me up with your call." Jade yawns again "I've barely had the chance to sit up, let alone get up and look outside."
Beck can't help but laugh; his girlfriend is most definitely not a morning person and it isn't hard to tell.
"You should look outside."
"Look outside!" Jade hears Chelsea exclaim in the background of the call "Look outside! Look outside!"
"Alright, alright." Jade sighs, throwing the blankets off of her body "I'm going, I'm going..."
As soon as she swings her legs over the side of the bed, she immediately misses the warmth of the blankets she had felt only a few seconds prior. She likes to keep her apartment cooler at night, she finds it easier to sleep that way, and the heat hasn't kicked on yet this morning. Yawning once more, she carries her phone over to her bedroom window with her and pulls back the curtains, then pulls up the shades, revealing a sight she's never seen before.
Everything outside is completely covered in at least three inches of snow. The weather reports had warned them that there was a possibility of some falling overnight, but it looks as if the meteorologists had underestimated just how much.
"Wow." She gasps
"It snowed!" Chelsea cheers
"Snow!" She hears Aspen giggle somewhere off camera
"Surprise." Beck smirks "What do you think?"
He knows this is the first time she's ever seen snow in person, and one of the reasons he had called her so early was because he wanted to see the look on her face when she saw it for the very first time.
"It looks beautiful." Jade admits "But I have the feeling it doesn't feel so beautiful outside right now."
"Oh no, it's very cold." Beck laughs "But you can't have snow unless it's cold."
Growing up in Southern California, it was rare for it to ever rain...let alone snow. Jade had spent the first twenty-five years of her life only seeing it on TV or in Christmas movies. As much as she hates the cold...she is tempted to pull on her coat and boots and run downstairs to check it out. At least she's prepared with the right clothing.
"This must be real fun to drive in, huh?" She asks her boyfriend
"Definitely." Beck laughs "Especially before they've salted or plowed anything. The trucks have been out this morning already though, we saw one come by earlier...right girls?"
"Right!"
"One or two outings in it and you'll adjust." Beck assures her "It takes me a little while to get used to it each year too."
"Dadddd!" Chelsea groans "Ask her!"
"Ask me what?"
"You can ask her." Beck tells Chelsea, handing the phone to her "It was your idea."
"It was your idea to invite her!" Chelsea insists
"What do you want to ask me, Chelsea?"
"Do you want to go sledding with us this afternoon?" Chelsea asks as she positions the phone in front of her face "Dad says you've never been, so we should ask you to come with."
"I think that would be really fun." Jade admits with a smile "I would love to, Chelsea. Thank you for asking me."
"You're welcome." Chelsea shrugs, then hands the phone back to her father
"Hey." Beck smiles again "So you're in?"
"I'm in." Jade nods "Just tell me where to be and where."
"Well, I told these two we weren't going anywhere until after lunch." Beck informs her "So if you want to go back to sleep for a little while longer, you can. Maybe head over here around 12:30?"
"Sure." Jade agrees "That sounds good."
"You have the snow scraper I gave you for your car, right?"
"In my car, yes." Jade tells him "Why?"
"Because you're going to need it."
Jade's first experience driving in the snow is not a pleasurable one.
While the roads are mostly clear by the time she leaves, she still feels like she should drive slower than she normally would on dry pavement. She tries to tell herself that it's just like driving in the rain, but that definitely isn't true. Her knuckles are gripping the steering wheel so tightly she's afraid she might never be able to remove them. Between all of that and the ten minutes she had to spend scraping ice and snow off of her car before she could go anywhere, she feels absolutely exhausted by the time she gets to Beck's house. Her boyfriend tries his best not to laugh, knowing very well that by this time next year Jade will be more than accustomed to Connecticut's winter weather.
Beck drives all four of them in his truck to the hill that had been his favorite to sled down as a kid. There are already quite a few people there, but he assures Jade that it won't be a problem. The more people that sled down the hill, the more likely the trails left by the sleds are to ice over...and the faster the other sleds will go. Jade begins to worry that this sledding thing might be a bit dangerous if not for Chelsea then at least for Aspen, but her boyfriend assures her that it will be fine.
"Pen looks like a blueberry!" Chelsea giggles as Beck zips the baby into her full-body snowsuit
He didn't want her to wear it in the car for fear that she would overheat.
"Well, she's a very cute little blueberry." Beck smirks as he tugs a hat over Aspen's ears and then pulls the hood on her snowsuit up "And she needs to stay warm."
"It's Aspen's first time sledding too." Chelsea tells Jade as the begin walking up the hill "Last year she was still too little and had to stay with Grandma and Grandpa while Dad took me."
"Yeah, she was only a few months old then." Beck nods as he recalls the memory "Now she's big enough though. Do you think she'll have fun, Chels?"
"Yeah!" Chelsea exclaims
"What about me?" Jade asks "Do you think I'll have fun?"
"Hmmm..." Chelsea stops to ponder the thought "Yeah, I think so. You're old enough to not be scared."
Beck pulls one sled up the hill while he carries Aspen and Jade pulls the other, Chelsea walking between them. When they reach the top Beck sets Aspen down but holds tight to her hand, not wanting the baby to accidentally slip and end up rolling down the hill instead.
"Alright, Chels...what do you think?" He kneels down next to his oldest daughter "Left? Right? Middle?"
"Middle." Chelsea tells him "We won't run into anyone walking then."
"Good point."
"You guys take this pretty seriously, huh?" Jade laughs
"Oh we take it very seriously." Beck tells her as he stands up "We Oliver's don't mess around when it comes to sledding, do we ladies?"
"Nope!" Chelsea exclaims
"Here's what I'm thinking..." Beck says, more to Chelsea than to Jade "I know that normally you and I go together, but we can't send two first timers down on their own...wouldn't you agree?"
"That's probably not a good idea." Chelsea shakes her head "You should take Pen, I'll go with Jade."
Beck and Jade both share a surprised look with one another. Although Chelsea and Jade had a bit of a breakthrough the night that she babysat, both of them had expected the little girl to request to go down the hill the first time with her sister.
"Good idea." Beck agrees "Let's get you two set up then."
Jade sits down in the plastic toboggan and Beck helps Chelsea climb into her lap.
"Lean to steer, remember?"
"I remember." Chelsea nods, then looks back at Jade "Are you ready?"
"I'm ready." Jade smiles "Are you?"
"Yup!" Chelsea confirms "Give us a push, Dad!"
Beck places his hands on Jade's back and gently pushes them forward a bit, then gravity takes over and begins pulling them down the hill. It's like a giant, icy, slide, Jade determines...and she will admit, it's pretty fun. The best part, however, in her opinion, are Chelsea's squeals and giggles of delight as they race towards the bottom of the hill. She keeps her arms wrapped tightly around the little girl's waist so she doesn't fall out, and eventually the sled slows to a stop at the bottom.
"That was fun!" Jade tells her
"I know!" Chelsea grins "Do you want to go again?"
"I'd love to."
They wait for Beck and Aspen to make their way down the hill on the other sled, and it seems as if the infant enjoys the ride just as much, if not more, than her sister had. The four of them make their way up and down the hill multiple times for the next hour or so, each of them taking turns riding with a different person. Beck loves watching his girls have so much fun, almost as much as he loves watching them with Jade. The three of them are very clearly starting to care for each other very much, and that makes him happier than he could have ever imagined feeling.
When the girls start to grow tired, they all return to Beck's house. Jade makes hot chocolate while Beck gives Aspen and Chelsea a bath and dresses them in warm pajamas. They order pizza for dinner and eat it on the floor in front of the fireplace as the sun starts to set outside, snow still falling and accumulating on the ground. Beck asks Jade if she wants to stay and watch a movie with them, and she says yes. She and Beck position themselves on either side of the couch with Aspen on Beck's lap and Chelsea in between them as they settle in to watch Frozen.
Less than halfway through the movie Aspen is fast asleep with her head on Beck's shoulder, obviously exhausted from the afternoon's major events. Not long after she falls asleep, Jade feels Chelsea's head slump against her arm. She looks over to see that Beck's older daughter is also asleep, and moves her arm so that she can wrap it around her. Beck lets the movie play for about thirty minutes longer before he carries Aspen up to bed, then returns shortly after to do the same for Chelsea.
"She'll be mad you didn't get to read with her tonight." Jade tells him when he returns
"She might be." He shrugs "We'll read two chapters tomorrow night to make up for it."
"Is it normal for them to fall asleep like that after a sledding adventure?" Jade asks
"Yeah." Beck chuckles with a smile "Or after a day at the pool...or any kind of major outing really. It's cute. I know it won't last much longer with Chelsea though, she's getting older."
"Enjoy it while you can." Jade nods
"I'm trying to." Beck sighs as he returns to his spot next to her on the couch, draping an arm around her this time "So, what did you think of your first Connecticut snow day?"
"I had a lot of fun." Jade admits as she snuggles into him "I do wish it was just a little bit warmer though."
"You'll get used to it." He assures her "Just wait, this isn't even as cold as it will get."
"Lovely." Jade rolls her eyes
"You can take the girl out of SoCal, but you can't take the SoCal out of the girl, huh?" Beck laughs
"Yeah, something like that." Jade smirks
"In all seriousness, I'm really glad you came with us today." Beck tells her "Thanks for tagging along."
"Thanks for inviting me." Jade tells him as he presses a kiss to her lips softly "Like I said, I had a lot of fun."
"Do you want to stick around for a little bit longer and watch a grownup movie?" Beck asks "It's getting close to the holidays, we could watch Miracle on 34th Street? The original, not the remake."
"I'd like that." Jade smiles "But..."
"But what?"
"You have to clean the snow off of my car when I leave." She says "I can only handle so much of that in one day."
"That's fine." He laughs before kissing her again "I'll clean your car off whenever you want."
"I'm going to remember that you said that."