All those years ago- Joseph Quinn

Walk me home

Addie was busy working away on her plan for her book when the doorbell to their apartment rang. She quickly sprung up from where she was sat and unlocked the door to a large bouquet of flowers. A head peeks out from behind the flowers with a smile.

"Adrianna?" The man asks.

"That's me" She replied quickly.

"These are for you" he smiled again hanging her the flowers before walking away wishing her a good day.

"Thank you?"She called down the hall to him before closing the door behind her. Quickly she walked over to place them down on the coffee table. Quickly she noticed a note placed neatly in the middle of the sunflowers and roses and picked it up to examine it.

'Miss your face a lot. -Joe'

Addie chuckled at the note rolling her eyes at how cute he could be. He had to film that day and had left before she woke up so he had ordered them as a way of letting her know he was thinking of her. She quickly pulled out her phone and sent him a text.

A: thank you for the flowers.
I miss your face too. X

She quickly hit send and a minute later and incoming call from Joe appeared on her screen. Quickly she hit accept and greeted him excitedly.

"Do you love them?" He asked

"So much. You're the best" she chuckled.

"I felt bad that I didn't get to give you a proper goodbye this morning" he sighed. "So I thought I'd get you your favourites."

"That's on me I was the one still asleep" she chuckled

"I know but that doesn't stop me feeling bad" he argued. "Anyway, I wanted to call because my parents are back from holiday and want us to go to dinner. They're eager to see you again properly"

"That sounds great. When?" She asked.

"That's the thing- tonight" he winced waiting for her to be concerned.

"Okay, I'll just need to get ready and walk Lola beforehand" she shrugged.

"Don't worry about Lola I've asked Meredith to take her on a walk this afternoon, knew you were busy with your book and I didn't want you to potentially have to stop in the middle of a creative streak" he smiled. Addie rolled her eyes, she knew he always tried to make her life as easy as possible, no matter how unnecessary the steps he was taking would be.

"Thank you Joe. Want me to make anything to take with us? The writing isn't going well and I could use a baking break?" She asked.

"I think my mum would kill for your banana bread again so go with that" he smiled. "I have to go now but I'll give you a call when I'm on my way home so you can be ready to just head out" he smiled. "Oh and Addie?" He asked.

"Yeah?"

"I love you" he smiled widely.

"I love you too" she smiled back before the call ended.

She threw herself down on the couch, her head and body tingling with pure joy at his words, she hated allowing herself to feel so deeply about it all. This was because she had done this before, allowed something to entirely consume her every thought, action and moment in life, and it landed her nowhere but broken. She glanced at the clock noticing she still had about 2 hours until Joe would normally be home from filming, so she decided her first step was a long hot shower to ease her nerves about the evening. Of course she grew up around Joe's parents her entire life but that was as Addie, his best friend, never Addie his girlfriend and the thought of them potentially disapproving made her skin crawl. They'd never given her any reason to feel like them being disappointed was even something to consider but she couldn't help but self sabotage the second the words of seeing them left Joe's mouth. All this was streaming from the fact the Addie they knew isn't the Addie she is now, especially since she's inadvertently the reason Joe currently has a court case against him.
2 hours, a shower, 8 outfit changes and 4 self pep talks later, Addie was finally ready when the door swung open revealing a giddy Joseph on the other side.