AN- I'm writing a new fic! I'm writing a new fic! Im so excited about it!
16. DIY.. or with a little help.
Tom bustled through the door after having been at B&Q. In each hand he carried a large tin of cream paint. Josh followed suit armed with wall stickers and paint rollers. They were of course for the Baby's room which would have a theme of farmyard animals, nothing to gender specific, given that they didn't know the baby's gender… Of course the room should have been decorated weeks ago but both Tom and Nikki were notorious procrastinators, yet with their baby's imminent arrival they thought it might be an idea to start making the necessary preparations. So while Tom and Josh had been out shopping for paint and such like, Nikki had been attempting to put together the cot, and in her defence had done a fair job but had a few screws left over…they couldn't have been that important she had thought.
She was slightly taken aback by the sheer volume of paint that her fiancé carried with him.
'This looks like its going to be a bigger job than I thought' she said, putting her hands on her hips, assessing the situation.
'Yep, the guy in the shop said we'd definitely need this much and it should have at least 2 coats'.. Tom lugged the tins of paint upstairs and set them down on the carpet in the baby's room.
'The cot looks great love!', neither of them were particularly good at DIY so he was genuinely impressed by her efforts.
'Yeah, I thought so too, and I only had three screws left over'.
'ah they cant have been that important anyway!' tom reassured her.
'Yeah you say that now but then when you put the baby in it and it collapses… It'll be a whole different story' warned Josh sarcastically.
Nikki had chosen to ignore josh's comment, 'Tom we're not going to have time to put 2 coats of paint on it, God! We should have done this weeks ago!'
'Nik, its fine' tom spoke soothingly and out his hands on her shoulders. 'we'll just move the crib into our room'.
'I could ring Lauren and Finn, they could come and help out if you wanted' Josh interjected to try and calm Nikki, yet she still looked doubtful. It was Tom who answered,
'That's a great idea Josh! Many hands and all that, I reckon we'll be done by tonight'. Josh left the room to call his friends while Tom pulled Nikki into a hug, 'it'll be fine love, we'll have this place looking great, maybe we should put some lunch on for everyone? We're probably going to be here all day'. He ran his fingers through her hair and kissed her softly on the cheek before bending down to decant the paint into the tray.
'TOM!' she yelled, causing him to jump about a foot into the air and keep the paint from going everywhere, 'what's the matter love, whatshappening' he said quickly the panic evident on his face.
'Is the paint non-toxic?' she looked deeply into his eyes for an answer.
'Um yeah, I..i think so' he said reading the writing on the tin.
'good, that's all, I didn't want the baby to be getting high of paint fumes' and with that she left the room, leaving tom still crouched on the floor slightly bewildered.
Later that day, Tom, Josh, Finn and Lauren were hard at work rolling paint onto the walls. They had actually managed to get a fair bit done; the first coat of paint was nearly dry. 'Im starved', moaned Josh, and as if on cue, Nikki came in with a large plate of sandwiches and a bowl of crisps. She had been making curtains from a stencil in a magazine, no one had wanted to say anything but they didn't look anything like the picture.
'Tom said you were going to be here for a while so I thought I'd bring some lunch up'
'cheers miss', said Finn, putting down his paint roller and taking a sandwich.
Nikki tutted, 'how many times have I told you to call me Nikki outside of school!'
All five of them sat on the floor enjoying the sandwiches and chatting about school and coursework and of course the leaver's prom! Which Lauren in particular was especially excited about and was giving Nikki all the details of the dress she had bought. However their conversation was a little broken up as Nikki had to keep shouting at Josh, who was dangerously close to getting crisp crumbs on her lovely curtains which were still laid out on the floor waiting to be sewn.
When every last morsel was finished, Nikki took the plates back downstairs to be washed, and everyone else picked up their paint rollers again as tom has said that the walls were dry enough to move on to the second coat of paint.
Finn watched Josh quietly, stealthily. He swapped his roller for a brush and got as much paint on it as it would hold, he waited for Josh to be deeply immersed in what he was doing before flicking all the paint in his direction. He hadn't waited long enough, Josh had seen it coming, he ducked, the paint flew over his head. Silence fell and Finn's eyes widened. Standing in the door way covered in cream paint was Nikki Boston, her mouth was wide open as the looked down at the paint on her clothes…
'Miss, i.. I never meant to.. it was supposed to hit Josh, im so sorry'. No one else spoke. To everyone's amazement, Nikki started to laugh. She picked up a paint brush and fired the paint back at Finn. Soon everyone was covered in paint and the work was abandoned for laughter.