This took forever again. I'm sorry! But this is the time I'll be posting things now, unless I get a free moment and I somehow write something before Saturday. I know I said next week's chapter was going to be the last one, but I was wrong! There's going to be 2 more chapters and an epilogue (obviously). So I'm not going to say goodbye yet! But I feel the melancholy coming. I hope you enjoy this chapter! See you next Saturday! 3
22
"Aunt Claire!" Gray says as soon as he sees Claire.
"Uh, uh! What did I tell you in the car, Gray?!" Karen hand shoots out to grab Gray by the shoulder before he bear hugs Claire. "She has broken. No bear hugs."
"Right. Sorry. Aunt Claire." He walks slowly up to Claire and hugs her as if she would shatter if he hugged her too strongly. He still bear hugs her, but very gently.
Claire laughs. "Hello, sweetheart. I've missed you."
"I've missed you too. Are you okay now? You scared me." He lets go of her and looks at Claire with those big blue eyes he has. Such a sweet kid.
Claire melts when she looks down at him. She caresses his cheek. "I'm healing. You don't have to worry about me. Okay?"
He nods and smiles. "Okay."
Claire looks up and sees Zach standing next to Karen. Zach takes a step forward.
"First a dinosaur and now this? Is your life not interesting enough?"
"Trust me, I would love for my life to be a little less interesting."
He smiles and walks the few steps to Claire and hugs her. "I'm glad you're okay."
"I'm getting there. My ribs are still bent in torturing me, though." She rubs Zach's back.
Zach pulls back and smiles at Claire.
"Doesn't your sister get a little love too?" Karen says walking towards Claire.
Claire rolls her eyes. "Yeah, yeah." She smiles and hugs Karen.
"How was your flight?"
"Uneventful. Thank God." Karen pulls back. "We have a lot to talk about."
Claire nods. "I can imagine."
I step forward and clap my hands together. "Okay kids. Let me show you your rooms. Come on."
Gray nods enthusiastically and Zach just nods. They each grab their bags and follow me up the stairs.
"Okay. Zach, you're getting my room, a bunch of cool stuff in there, including my Xbox, feel free to use it."
He nods. "Thanks, man."
"You're welcome. Now, Gray. You get the guest bedroom with my other cool stuff. Follow me, sir."
We walk a little further down the corridor and open the door to the guest bedroom in front of Karen's room. Gray steps inside the bedroom and he gasps.
"Wow! This- this is… wow!"
I stand next to him and look around. "I know, right? You're the first person who's seen these."
He turns to me, surprised. "Really?!"
"Yeah, really kid."
"Thank you!" He bear hugs me.
"Oomph, kid." He is a kid, but when you don't see one of his hugs coming, they can take away your breath a little. "You're welcome."
Yesterday when we came back from the bakery, mum and I were working the logistics of where would Karen and the kids sleep. We decided to put Zach in my room, since it's the first bedroom in the corridor and not as close to the rest of the other bedrooms, that way he has a little more privacy. We put Gray in the 2nd guest bedroom, where I had all the boxes with my books from university and the newly brought boxes from Costa Rica. In them, was all my research from the velociraptors, including video footage.
I pulled everything from the boxes and arranged everything perfectly. I even had posters from the velociraptors with labels and all.
"There's a dvd player right under the tv so you can see my girls. Everything is in those cds. From the moment they hatched, until their last training session. Knock yourself out, man."
He starts jumping up and down. "This is so awesome! You're the best!"
I prepare myself for another hug, but it doesn't come. Instead I see Gray run further into the room and start reading the labels of the cds.
"I take it he liked it." Isabella says standing next to me.
I laugh. "No, he hates it. Hey Gray, come here for a second." He turns around and walks up to us. "This is my sister Isabella. Isa, this is Gray."
Isabella smiles down at him. "Nice to meet you, Gray. I hear you're quite the dinosaur expert."
Gray stretches out his hand to Isabella and she shakes it. "Nice to meet you too. I read a lot."
"I bet you do. Owen has a lot of cool books from his university days that talk a lot about evolution. I'm not sure if you'll understand everything, but you can definitely give it a go."
He shrugs and smiles sheepishly. "I'll read them anyway."
Isa and I laugh. "Okay kid. Make yourself at home and I'll call you when lunch is ready. Is that okay?"
He nods and turns back excitedly to the cds. Isa and I walk out of the room and into the corridor. "Hey, let me introduce you to Zach."
We walk to Zach's room and I knock the door. "Come in." I hear him call. I open the door.
"Hey, I just wanted to introduce you to my sister." I open the door fully and Isabella steps into the room.
"Hey Zach, nice to meet you. I'm Isabella" She stretches out her hand and Zach shakes it.
"Nice to meet you, Isabella."
"Are you into dinosaurs too? Gray is going nuts in there." She laughs.
He laughs too. "No, I'm not. I'm more into cars and that kind of thing."
"Cool, you'd get along with my dad then. He knows everything there is to know about cars. Right, Owen?"
"Yeah, his dad owned a garage shop. He worked there when he was about your age."
Zach nods. "Cool. You never stop learning. I could talk about cars all day."
"Then he'll love you. Hey, where's your mum? I want to say hi to her."
Zach points to the door. "She's downstairs talking to aunt Claire."
"Okay. Nice to meet you again, Zach."
"Yeah, nice to meet you too."
Isabella turns around and goes down to the living room.
"Okay, I'll leave you to it then. I'll let you know when lunch is ready." I turn around and I'm closing the door when Zach calls me.
"Hey. Your sister's hot." He smirks.
I point to him. "Don't. Plus she has a boyfriend."
He raises an eyebrow briefly. Just like his aunt. "Too bad."
"Behave, Zach. You've seen me punch."
He raises his hands. "Chill, dude. Just joking."
"Yeah, yeah." I point to him one more time and close the door. I smile and shake my head.
Teenage boys.
I go down to the living room and see Claire, Karen and Isabella talking. I stand at the bottom of the stairs for a second and look at them for a little bit. It all seems to be coming together. My family and Claire's are getting along super well and things seem to be getting better in general.
Claire and I trust each other 100% now. I don't think there's anything we haven't told each other. Anything of importance, that is. The small details we'll learn little by little in time.
Oh my God.
We're going to live together. We're going to live together.
Why hadn't that sunk in before? We're official now. Claire and Owen. A couple. Officially. And we haven't told anyone yet.
I walk to up to them. "The kids are getting settled. I told them I would let them know when lunch was ready, but I don't think we'll see Gray for the rest of the weekend, to be completely honest."
Karen frowns. "What do you mean?"
"Owen put all of his research on the velociraptors in Gray's room." Claire says.
"Oh, that's so nice of you. Yeah, we won't be seeing him at all." Karen laughs.
I shrug it off. "If someone is going to appreciate all that info, is Gray."
"Yeah, that's certain."
"Well guys, I'll leave you to catch up. See you at dinner." Isabella says.
"We're you going?"
"Remember Charlotte?"
I think for a little bit. "Oh, the one who dyed her hair blue?"
"Exactly. Since I couldn't go to her parents wedding anniversary party, she's going to show me the video footage; which I can't wait to see. So, see you guys later."
We all laugh. "Okay, Isa. See you."
She turns around and leaves.
"Okay. So you two want to know what the lawyers told me now, or later?" Karen asks looking between the two of us.
I look at Claire. "Up to you."
She nods. "Let's talk now."
"Okay." Karen says.
We move to the living room and sit down. Karen opens her purse and pulls out a huge file.
"Okay. The most important thing you guys need to know is that everything is ready. The case is 100% ready to go. Evidence, witnesses, everything. The only thing that's missing is your signature, Claire."
We both nod. Karen continues.
"Last night I received a call from one of the lawyers telling me Castell had been bailed out. By whom? They don't know. They were curious to know, because the bail had been set at $50,000."
I look confused at her. "I don't understand why that's important."
"It's important because if he has access to that kind of money, then he can probably get good lawyers. And if he can get good lawyers…"
"Then he might get out of this scot free." Claire finishes for Karen.
Karen nods. "Exactly."
I shake my head confused. "How could he manage that? There's so much evidence, that cannot happen."
"The lawyers assured me that even though it was very unlikely for him to get out of this, there have been cases were someone who was obviously guilty, has been declared innocent. They gave me OJ Simpson as an example."
I rub my face. "I'll kill him if he gets out of this."
Karen points at me. "That's another thing they asked me to talked to you about. You were lucky he didn't sue you. But they can still use that against us. So those kinds of comments don't even think about saying them out in public. They're not going to help."
I look down at my knuckles and see the bruises. I'll gladly get more if it means he gets to feel a fraction of the pain he caused Claire. But Karen's right. Those kinds of comments or actions won't help Claire. I look up at her.
"Are they sure it's unlikely for him to get out of this?"
"There's no way to know until we listen to what they have to say, but no, they don't think he'll get out of this. They already went through the jury. They are all parents and seem like decent people."
I nod. I look at Claire. "What do you think? You're quiet."
She's stays quiet for a while. "Claire?"
She shakes her head. "I'm just a little overwhelmed, that's all."
"I know. But all this will be over soon." I hold her hand.
"It will, Claire. We have a date, actually. September 23rd."
"That's in less than 2 weeks." I say.
"Yeah, the press is covering the story thoroughly. I don't know if you guys have been watching the news, but apparently that has speed things up. Which is good."
Claire nods. "Okay. What else have the lawyers told you?"
"They want to know if you're going to be there. You don't have to be, everyone is aware of the extent of your injuries, but them choosing their strategy depends on whether you'll be there or not. But it's completely up to you, Claire."
Claire looks down at our intertwined hands. "He's going to be there. I don't know if I want to put a face to the person who almost killed me."
I squeeze her hand. "You don't have to be there. If it's too much for you, you don't have to be there."
I want her to know she doesn't have to act tough. What happened to her was horrible and it's too soon to ask her to go and be in the same room as him.
"The only difference between one strategy and the other is that if you're there, then they'll let you do most of the retelling. If you're not, they'll focus more on your injuries and the fact that you're not there because of what he did to you."
"When do you need an answer?" Claire asks Karen.
"Between today and tomorrow."
She nods. "Okay. Let me think about it today and I let you know tomorrow."
"That's perfect." Karen says. "I just need you to sign this. All these are documents stating that you are aware of the legal process and that you will follow any decision the judge makes."
Karen hands Claire a pen and she takes it. "Do you have a piece of paper? I don't know if I can sign properly with the cast."
"Yeah, I have a notepad in my purse." Karen opens her purse and looks through it. She pulls out the notepad and hands it to Claire. She puts the notepad on her thigh and signs it.
"Do you think that's good enough?" She shows it to Karen and I. It's a little shaky, but it's a clear signature.
"Yeah, that's good." Karen says. She hands Claire a handful of documents, she goes through them quickly and signs them. "There." She sighs. "This is not a fun process."
Karen huffs. "No, it's not. But it will be over soon."
"Yeah, I hope so."
I bump Claire with my shoulder. "Hey, should we tell her?"
Claire looks confused at me. "Tell her what?"
"Oh my God! Tell me what?!" Karen looks excitedly between us.
"About Philadelphia."
"Oh, that." Realization dawns on her face. "Sure. Why not?"
"What is it?!"
Claire smiles at Karen. "When we were in New York, Masrani Global offered me to choose which ever job I wanted."
Karen nods. "Yes, Owen told me."
"Okay. Well, I chose one. Operations Senior Manager at Roche Pharmaceutical…. in Philadelphia. We're moving to Philadelphia."
Karen smile widens. "Oh my God, you guys are moving in together!"
We both laugh. "Yes, we are." Claire says.
Claire looks at me and I can see the same surprise I felt in her face. The realization that we're taking a huge step, and that it feels completely right.
"You guys are so cute!"
We stay in the living room talking, talking and talking. It feels incredibly good to talk about the future. Even though Claire and I are not moving to Philadelphia until her ribs heal up and this whole thing with Castell has gone away, the fact that we will have a life after, it's amazing.
"Sorry to interrupt, but lunch is ready." Teresa says.
"Perfect. Thanks, Teresa. I'll let the kids know." I stand up.
"No. Don't worry about it. I'll go. I have to leave all of this in my room anyway." Karen says.
"Okay. Same room as last time."
"Perfect. Thank you." Karen says.
She collects her things and goes to her room.
I turn to Claire and she's looking at me. Her eyes are shining with happiness.
"We're moving in together. For some reason I hadn't realized that."
I walk closer to her. "Me neither. But I can't wait 'till the day that we do."
"Oh, yeah?" She says taking a step closer to me.
"Oh, yeah. You have no idea how much I want us to share the same kitchen, the same living room, the same the bedroom, the same shower." I lean forward and kiss her. I feel her left hand rest on my side. I hold her face and rub my thumb against her cheek.
"You two have a room. Why don't you use it?" We hear Zach say.
We break apart and we turn in the directions of Zach's voice. He's standing next to the piano with his arms crossed and Gray by his side, smiling.
"Oh trust me, buddy. We are using it." I feel Claire hit me on the arm. "Ow!"
They both laugh and we walk to the dining room. Karen comes down a moment later.
"So, what are we having for lunch, T?"
"Roast beef."
"Yum!"
We all sit down and enjoy an amazing lunch. We talk and laugh. I ask Zach about his girlfriend and he tells he broke up with her.
"She was nice and everything, but she was too clingy. She was before we went to Isla Nublar, imagine how she was when I came back. It was too much."
We laugh. "You're 17, dude. You'll find someone you truly like."
He looks at me and smirks. "You mean someone like – "
"No! Someone else." I point to him again.
"Someone like whom?" Karen asks.
"His sister's hot." Zach tells Karen.
I grab my napkin, make it into a ball and throw it at him.
"Hey! I'm just saying…"
He's teasing me, I know that. But it's still fun to throw things at him, cause I sure as hell won't be able to do that to Alexander. Not without Isa hating my guts, that is.
After we're done eating lunch, I ask the kids if they want to get into the pool and enjoy the sun. They both agree and they go into their rooms to get changed.
"You want to get into the pool today, Claire?" I ask.
"No, not today. But I'll change into more comfy clothes and definitely enjoy the sun with you guys."
"How about you, Karen?"
"I don't go into the water. Ever."
Claire nods. "That's true. I think she's allergic to it."
"I think I am. But I definitely enjoy getting a tan, so I'll go change."
"Great! See you guys at the pool."
Karen goes upstairs to change and Claire and I go to the pool house. I grab the same swim shorts I wore yesterday and change into them. Claire grabs a pair of shorts and a sleeveless white t-shirt. She goes into the bathroom and changes.
"Do you need help?" I ask Claire.
"No, I don't." She replies. I laugh.
When she comes out of the bathroom, I help her put her sleeve on and we go out through the French doors into the pool. We come out in the exact moment Gray and Zach jump into the pool excitedly. We laugh and walk around the pool to the chairs.
Karen is already sitting down, shaking her head at her kids. "I hate the water, they love it."
Claire sits down next to Karen. "Do you need anything?"
"No, I'm good. Thanks."
"Then if you'll excuse me, ladies." I turn around and jump into the pool.
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"So?" Karen asks.
"So what?" I look at her.
"You told him you love him."
I turn my head to look at her. "How do you even know that?"
"He told me; in the hospital. He was so excited, so happy. You really found the perfect guy for you Claire. Congratulations."
I smile at her. "Yeah, I did."
"And now you're moving in with him! How did that even happen? This is not like you at all. Not that I'm complaining, but I want to know." Karen asks excitedly.
I shake my head. "I don't know to be completely honest with you. There's just something about him…" I see Owen pick up Gray and throw him across the pool. He squeals in delight. "When he told me he would follow me wherever I chose to go, I froze. No one I've ever been with has ever been so quick at letting me decide. He was willing to completely uproot his life to go with me. And we weren't even together really. We haven't been together for long. Which is crazy! So many things have happened, and now that I think about it, Owen and I have been together for – " I think of that day in the hotel room. When I told him I was willing to give us a chance. "3 weeks! We've been together for 3 weeks. That's ridiculous!"
I look at Karen. "Does it feel ridiculous?" She asks me.
"No. No, it doesn't. It feels completely right. Which makes everything crazier."
"But you're loving it."
"I'm loving it."
Karen sighs. "Well, let me tell you, it is very nice to see you this happy, Claire. You deserve it. You two will be very happy. I can see that already."
I look at Owen and smile. "Yeah, I think so too."
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"Hey, Isa. Did you have fun at Charlotte's?"
I turn off the blender and pour the protein shakes into tall glasses.
"Oh my God! You have no idea how good it was! I actually almost wet myself. Where's everyone?"
"Claire is taking a nap, and Karen and the kids are in their rooms. I came to make protein shakes. Claire should be up soon."
Isa sits down on the chair behind the island. "Hey I was thinking maybe we could play charades? I haven't played that game in years and there's a bunch of us. It will be fun. I'll even convince mum and dad to play. What do you think?"
"Yeah, that would be cool. We'll ask them after dinner."
"Awesome! So, how was your day? Did you guys have fun?"
I put some water in the blender and let it soak. "Yeah. After lunch we went into the pool. I played some basketball with the guys. Gray kept asking me throw him across the pool to see if he could manage to put the ball through the hoop mid-air."
"Did he?"
"Just once. But it was fun. Karen and Claire were tanning."
Isa laughs. "I actually have to do that. I'm basically transparent."
I shake my head. "No, you're not."
"Yes, I am." She stands up and opens the pantry. She looks through it and pulls out a box of chocolate chip cookies.
"Alexander is coming back from Hawaii in 2 weeks. He's going to be super tan and I am not. I'm not going to be the pale one in our relationship."
She opens the box and pulls out 4 cookies. I walk to her and take the box from her. "I'll take this, thank you very much."
She shakes her head. "One day, you are going to get fat. Keep eating like that, you'll see."
I pull a cookie out and stuff it completely in my mouth. "When that day comes, I'll stop, but until then…" I stuff another cookie in my mouth, grab the protein shakes and walk out of the kitchen.
When I open the door to the pool house, I see Claire has already woken up.
"Hey, did you have a nice nap?" I ask. I sit next to her on the bed.
She yawns. "Yes, I did."
I give her the protein shake. "Thought you might want some and I stole Isabella's cookies. She says I'm going to get fat someday."
"That's probably true. Don't worry, I won't leave you for a younger, fitter man once that happens."
"Aw, babe. That's so nice of you." I say overly emotional.
She laughs and takes a cookie from the box.
"So, I was thinking. Should we start looking for a place to live in Philly?"
She looks at me. "I don't know. We won't be able to go there until my ribs heal up. That's what? 2-3 months away?" Her eyes widen. "Oh wow, that's not enough time. Yes, we should definitely start looking."
"Okay, then." I stand up and grab Claire's laptop and turn it on. I move closer to her so she can see what I'm doing. "We should start looking now."
I go to google and type apartments for sale in Philadelphia. I choose a website that has filters in it. I personalize my search. "Do we want an apartment with 1 or 2 bedrooms?"
"2 bedrooms."
I click on the '2 bedrooms' option. "Okay, city or suburbs?"
"Which one do you like best?" Claire asks me.
"For the both us? Definitely city. Plus all the sporting events are there."
"I like the city too."
"Perfect." I click on the city option. "Do you have Roche's address? I have the option to type it here, so it can look for places close by."
She closes her eyes and thinks. "Ah, yeah. I think I have it in my email."
I open another tab and open gmail. "Scroll down. There. That email right there."
"Okay." I copy and paste the address in the search engine and click 'search'.
A lot of options appear. I scroll down and see we have 7 pages to choose from. I look at Claire. "Lots of options."
"Yeah. But wait, we have to discuss one little detail before we start looking for anything."
I drink some protein shake. "What little detail?"
"Money. We need to discuss how we are going to for pay this."
I put the laptop on the bed. "Oh. Well, I was thinking, I'll pay for everything, a-"
"No."
"Yeah, I thought you would say that." I scratch my head. "Okay, how about you tell me how you want to do this and then we'll go from there."
She raises an eyebrow. "I was thinking, we should go 50/50 on everything we share. So, the place we live in, food, all those things. And if you want to buy, a playstation or something like that, then you pay for it. Same for me."
I nod. "Yeah, that sounds pretty reasonable. Wait, I'm curious now. I'm going to ask you something, you don't have to answer it if you don't want to though."
"Uh oh. Okay. I think I know where this is going." She smirks.
"How much money do you actually have? Are you Martha Stewart rich? Or Steve Jobs rich?"
Claire laughs. "I don't think I come close to either of them. Especially Steve Jobs. I could ask you the same. How rich are you? Michael Jordan rich? Or Sir Richard Branson rich?"
I shake my finger at her. "Nah uh. I asked you first. So you answer first."
"Ugh fine. I'll let you do the math. A regular Senior Operations manager makes anywhere between $130,000-$150,000 a year. That's what I was making before I started working at Masrani Global. Once I started working at Masrani Global, my salary immediately increased, and that's because the corporation was Indian-American and as an American employee working neither in the US or India, I automatically made more money. Th-"
I interrupt her. "How much more money are we talking exactly?"
"At first, $175,000."
"At first?!" Oh my God! I think Claire is a millionaire.
"As I was saying, my salary increased once I started working at Jurassic World. I was hired as an operations manager, but Mr Masrani saw potential, so he promoted me to senior operations manager. That increased my salary a little more."
"How much is 'a little' to you?" I ask not trusting Claire in telling me how much of a raise she got.
She rolls her eyes. "$10,000 more."
"You were making $185,000 a year working at Jurassic World?" I guess she could pay for her own lawyers.
"Not exactly."
I lean back on the headboard. "What? Were you making more money than that?!"
"If you keep interrupting me, then you'll never know."
"Sorry, please continue."
"The reason he promoted me, was because I manage to convince representatives from Bank of America and Coca-Cola to give $6 million each to start the process of bringing the Spinosaurus to life. After that, he promised me that if I ever managed to get funding of $15 million or more, I would receive 3% of it."
My mouth is hanging wide open.
"The next meeting I had with investors was for your velociraptors. Each of them cost $5 million dollars to make. Mr Masrani wanted a pack, so we agreed we needed at least 4 of them, which meant we needed $20 million. It wasn't easy convincing the investors, but I managed to get $22 million. Those extra $2 million were used to build the space they hatched in and the initial costs of care."
I blink up at her. "You received 3% of $22 million? That's…" I run the numbers in my head. My eyes widen. "That's $66,000 straight to your pocket!"
"Yep." She says proudly. And she should, not a lot of people would've managed that.
"Were you also the one who got the investments for the mosasaur and the indominus rex?"
She smiles a wicked smile. "Yes."
Motherfucker! If my math is correct, then in her time at Jurassic world, Claire made… "You made like $750,000 at Jurassic World!" I stand up and look down at her. "You know what? I think you're going to be my sugar mama."
She bursts out laughing and then gasps. "Ow! Don't make me laugh! It hurts!"
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." I sit back down next to her. "That's very impressive, Claire. And that's not even counting the money you made before you started working at Jurassic World. So you're a millionaire."
"No, I'm not. I pay my taxes. If I didn't, then I would be. Well, how about you? Your turn to tell me about your riches."
"Ha! My story is nothing as impressive as yours. When nonno died, he left me $200,000 and part of his shares from the bakery. When I came back from Afghanistan, I talked to an accountant and he told me the smartest thing was to invest. I decided to buy shares instead, so I bought shares at Apple and Microsoft, which I thought were pretty safe, and they have been. All in all, I have around $500,000 in my bank account. But that money was basically given to me, you made all that money by yourself. You are amazing!"
She smiles at me. "Do you feel emasculated by the fact that I have more money than you?"
I nod. "A little, yeah. But I'm mostly impressed." I grab the laptop and put it back on my lap again. "So do we put a price range or not?"
Claire mulls it over. "I think we should. Just in case we find something we love and then it turns out to cost $900,000. I think we should do it like this: how much money would you spent in buying an apartment in Philly, in the city with 2 bedrooms?"
"Mm. I think I would be willing to pay $200,000, maybe $250,000. But it would have to be something amazing! Somewhere where I would plan to stay for a long time, cause I'm not about to spend that kind of many and sell it a year later!"
"Okay. I would pay up to $300,000. I have grown used to living in a certain space and I'm not about to change that. So, that would mean, assuming you would pay $200,000, that we can buy a place that cost $400,000. Since we're going to be paying 50/50, then I'll pay $200,000 as well. That's pretty good. We can get an amazing place with $400,000."
I smile. "Perfect." I click the option that says $350,000-$400,000 and 10 options show up. "Not as many, but let's see."
I've never been to Philadelphia, but I hadn't really noticed how beautiful it is. The open parks, the museums, the river, it's truly beautiful. I can definitely see myself here with Claire. Walking out on a Saturday morning, drinking coffee, walking through the park, laughing about something dumb I said. Yeah, this city is perfect.
"Hey, look at this one. Walking distance from University City and Rittenhouse Square, 24 hour guarded gate, concierge in building, deeded one-car parking, state-of-the-art gym with an outdoor pool, community centre with library & entertainment area. This one sounds pretty awesome!"
"Are there photos?"
I scroll down. "Yes, there are. Let's see." I click on the photos and they cover the whole screen. "Oh, that's just beautiful."
I go through each picture. I am completely fascinated by what I'm seeing. "What do you think? You don't like it? You haven't said anything."
She shakes her head. "No. No, I love it. It's just that – I had a moment. I actually saw us there. It was weird."
"Me too! I saw us walking through the park, drinking coffee, laughing. It was awesome! Should we call?"
She looks at me surprised. "Now?"
"Yeah, we can't risk losing this place. Where's my phone?" I look around me and grab my phone. "Let's call!" I dial the number and put it on speakerphone. I look at Claire.
"This is exciting."
She laughs. "Yes, it is."
"Hello?"
I raise my eyebrows. "Hello. My name is Owen and I'm calling about the add you posted in Sotheby's realty."
"Oh, great. I'm Jason. Is there anything in specific you would like to know?"
"This is going to sound like a weird question, but how's the vibe? My girlfriend and I have gone through a lot lately, and we're just looking for a place that's chill, you know?"
He laughs. "No, I get it. It's a great place really. It's not that close to main avenues, so there's no noise from traffic, the majority of people who live in this building are in their 60s, so you're not going to have raving parties on Friday nights. It really hurts me to put this place on the market to be completely honest. I don't know if I'll ever find a place I love as much as this one."
I look at Claire and she nods. "Okay, Jason. You sold it perfectly. The thing is my girlfriend was in an accident, so we can't travel until 3 months from now. Are you getting a lot of offers?"
"Not really. This is an expensive apartment and in these times people are selling more than buying."
"Okay, man. We are all in for this place, but we can't really buy it if we haven't seen it. Would you be willing to wait 3 months for us to fly to Philadelphia?"
"Yeah, totally. I mean, as long as I don't get someone who's willing to pay upfront, which I doubt will happen, I don't have any problems in waiting for you guys."
I do a fist pump. "Thanks, Jason. You're awesome, dude."
"Don't worry, Owen. If I get another potential buyer, I'll call you up and let you know."
"That would be awesome. Thanks again."
"Sure. Nice to kinda meet you, Owen."
"Ditto. Have a good evening."
"You too. Bye."
"Bye."
I hang up and throw my phone on the pillow. "I think we have found our dream home, baby!"
"Oh God! That happened really fast!" she laughs.
"I know! We found our home! Let's just hope nobody else takes it."
"I don't think that will happen. When was the add posted?"
I scroll up and look at the date. "10 months ago."
"I think that apartment was waiting for us. What are the chances? Really? This is too much of a coincidence."
I think it over. It's true. Everything has happened in the last month. Literally everything. Claire and I getting together, us deciding to live together, then the accident. So much has happened in such little time, and yet, the pieces seem to be falling into place by themselves.
"Maybe the universe is really rooting for us."
She laughs. "Maybe. I'm just glad things are finally calming down for us."
"Yeah, me too." I close the laptop, push it aside and kiss Claire. We are going to get our happily ever after, and I don't care how cheesy it sounds. That's what I want for us.
I feel my phone vibrate. I pull away from Claire; she bites her lip. I grab my phone and unlock the screen.
*Yo, dinner's ready! *
* Coming. *
"It's Isabella, she says dinner's ready."
"Let's go then."
I lean forward and kiss her one more time. "Now we can go."