I’d been at Aston’s for a week now, still trying to figure things out on the job front. Aston and I had agreed not to make a big deal about me being around his until we’d come completely to terms with what was going on. While we’d told my parents that we were ‘together’ that morning in my kitchen, we still hadn’t had the relationship talk yet. In fact, I’d only spent one night in the same bed as Aston since I’d moved in. This was in part due to the fact that the lads were just finishing up rehearsals for their summer tour and were insanely busy.
It was early on a Tuesday morning and I was busy getting myself ready for an important meeting. Not a job interview, a conversation with Tinie Tempah’s label about releasing the single and that. I threw on the only professional-looking thing I had, a tight pencil skirt and a billowy ivory colored top. I pulled my hair into a sleek ponytail and did some simple makeup.
I ran downstairs with my heels in my hand and my bag banging away at my shoulder. Only had ten minutes for breakfast before the taxi arrived to take me to the label.
“What you doing up so early?” asked Aston as I ran into the kitchen and dumped my things on the floor. “And dressed like that?” he added as he noticed my clothes, his eyebrow raised.
“Meeting with Tinie Tempah’s label,” I said as I dug around for something to eat. I settled on some cereal and fruit and quickly sat down to eat it as fast as I could.
“Running late?” laughed Aston. I just nodded my head at him, indicating that I thought it was pretty obvious that I was running late.
We sat in silence as I tried to eat as much as possible before the taxi arrived, and when I’d finished I rinsed my bowl off and then ran up to brush my teeth quick. Arriving back in the kitchen I grabbed my shoes and slipped them on.
“So uh babe,” said Aston awkwardly as I stood at the counter digging through my bag to make sure I had everything.
“Yeah?”
“The boys sort of invited themselves over for the football game tonight,” he started nervously.
I looked up at him, surprised. As far as I knew it he hadn’t told the boys about me living with him yet, the tension over the whole Marvin thing still slightly palpable. “So…”
“You don’t have to be here if you don’t want to be. But I don’t mind if you are either,” he said.
I walked over to him and looked down on him sat on the stool, the most uncertain look on his face. Gently I placed my hands on his shoulders and smiled faintly, “Do you want me to be here?”
He looked up at me with a wide-eyed expression before nodding his head.
“Ok, I’ll be here,” I said. Without warning he grabbed me by the hips and pulled me so I was sat down on his lap.
“Thanks babe,” he whispered, nuzzling my neck before placing a series of kisses on it. "Might I add that you look insanely hot in your work clothes," he husked in my ear.
I giggled at this before changing the subject back to the boys, “You going to tell them I'm here at rehearsal then?” I asked.
“Hmm might do,” he mused still trailing kisses along my neck. “Or maybe I’ll just leave it as a surprise,” he concluded just as my phone buzzed.
“Cabs here,” I whispered, turning my head to look at Aston.
“Bye baby,” he smiled before placing a sweet kiss on my lips and then releasing me. “Love you.”
Slowly I got up from where I was sat and grabbed my bag, before turning back to Aston and kissing him one more time. “Love you too, see you tonight.”
I quickly left the house and got in the cab, ready for a long morning of meetings at Tinie’s label. While I was there we talked about distribution and rights, as well as what I would be paid for the track. To be fair, it was a considerable amount of money, much more than I was used to receiving. They even gave me a subset of my earnings at the meeting as a sort of deposit on my work.
Alongside the money, I was also going to get a writing credit on the track, something that would help immensely later on if they tried to sell it for commercial purposes as it would allow me to get royalties from it.
As the meeting wound down I sat chatting to two gentlemen from the label. They mostly dealt with listening to demos and trying to figure out what tracks to release as singles or on albums. We got talking about my time at Mosley and the fact that I’d recently left and was looking for a new production company to work for.
Eventually we took our conversation to lunch where I told them about how I really wanted to have my own production house, but couldn’t afford it yet.
“You know,” said Jeremy, one of the label agents, “Some of the best producers we work with do their own thing freelance. You just need a decent studio.”
“Yeah, but I haven’t got one of those,” I sighed. “Really, if I had enough acts coming in and working with me and a studio, I would be more than happy to give freelancing a go, but I just don’t have that.”
“Well…” said Troy, the other agent, “Tinie wants to work with you more, I bet if we could track down a studio for you things would kick off in no time.”
“I don’t know…” I sighed.
“That’s funny,” said Jeremy, digging around in his briefcase for a moment. “I happen to know someone who is trying to sell their studio.” With that he handed me a flier that advertised a one-booth studio and all of the appropriate equipment.
“What is this?” I asked.
“A mate of mine is doing the reverse of what you just did, moving back to America. Thing is, he doesn’t need his studio anymore. You should give him a call and check it out.”
“I don’t know…” I sighed looking down at it.
Eventually we finished up eating and I went off to run a few errands about town, namely opening up a bank account to put my large check into. Once I’d finished I grabbed a cab back out to Aston’s house, the entire ride staring at the pamphlet in my lap. I wasn’t sure if I should call or not. I mean it wouldn’t hurt to just check it out. Right?
As the cab pulled up at Aston’s house I jumped out and paid the driver, putting the code into the front gate and then letting myself into the front room. The second I walked in five pairs of eyes locked on me.
“Hi…” I said, kicking off my heels by the door.
“Whaaaa?” said Oritse, just staring at me. Marvin and JB were sat with similar expressions on their faces, and there were two confused looking girls as well.
“What’s going on?” asked Aston as he came into the room with a few beers in his hands. “Oh hey babe,” he smiled.
I just took a deep breath as I watched everyone stare at me and then turned towards the stairs, suddenly nervous about everything. “I’m just going to go change,” I bit out, before I legged it up to my room and shut the door behind me.
Wasn’t really expecting that reaction.
