Trying Your Luck // Joel Hokka

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It was the middle of September and I finally had found myself a place to move in. Alice, obviously, wasn't too keen on this, but I needed my own place as Alice's presence sometimes could become a bit too much. When she was bored, she was hanging around my room or making me go on walks or on shopping sprees with her. Thankfully she had found a new date, so there was less nagging but still too much for my liking.

The flat wasn't much, but it was near the city center. It wasn't too big, but it had big windows which made the place look bigger and most importantly it had a balcony. The kitchen and living room were combined together, there was a smaller room that would serve its purpose as a bedroom and study. I actually couldn't have been happier about the place. But a new flat required new furniture and new furniture meant IKEA shopping, and that meant I needed someone with a car.

It was a sunny Sunday and surprisingly warm for Finnish autumn, I was putting away some boxes with records. Alice told me that I should have my record player back, so I at least had something in the apartment for now. For now, there were only few boxes of things I managed to gather in the month I was living here and my parents were sending my books, clothes, and other stuff from England, that they were storing after I left France.

My phone started vibrating on the kitchen counter and I saw that Joonas had sent me a message that he and Joel are downstairs. At first, I asked some other friends, as I knew the boys were busy with the new album, but all my friends had other things to do and once again I was proven that people rarely had time for others nowadays. So my last resort was the boys. I asked only Joonas and he agreed almost straight away, but then Joel also heard about it and so I now have two cavaliers to help me pick some furniture and other things for the flat.

Mine and Joel's relationship have gotten really weird, to say the least. We didn't have much time to spend together, but yet every time we saw each other we were always close, we shared a few more kisses here and there, but every time we were hanging out together there were other people, so I didn't know what to make out of our situation.

I was dressed in my mom jeans that had some paint on them, because I decided I wanted to repaint walls in my bedroom, and some old, oversized shirt, but I knew that Joel wasn't known for his patience and I had no time to change, so I just grabbed my jacket and my bag and ran downstairs.

"Thank you so much for helping me out," I got into the car, and without saying hello I already thanked them, because I always felt so guilty for asking people for help.

"For you always!" Joonas cheered, "Also, I think it's going to be fun to annoy Joel at Ikea," Joonas let out a devilish laugh and I joined him.

"Don't forget that I'm the one driving," Joel rolled his eyes and looked at me through the rearview mirror.

About 3 hours later, I had had enough. I have had 3 breakdowns, 3 embarrassing moments because of Joonas, who for starters broke one of the sofas and we had to play it cool and then tried a bed loudly announcing that it would be great for a threesome and about 4 times Joel was ready to commit a crime because I couldn't decide on something. Joel hated my indecisiveness because I could change my mind on the spot.

Eventually, I just got a dining table, a few chairs, a bookshelf, and a mattress, as nothing really seemed to match my expectations. I paid for the delivery as I knew there wouldn't be any space in the car for the boxes, yet the car still was somehow full, because I bought too much shit, I didn't even need.

We just finished putting the last things into Joel's car and I desperately needed a cigarette, three hours is too much of a time.

"I'm not sure how to repay you for this, so maybe I can offer dinner at my place? Also, I could use someone to help me set up all this furniture," I looked at the guys with the best puppy eyes I could make.