What The Heart Wants (Sebastian Vettel)

37. New Years Eve

"Seb, I'm terrified," Jessie admitted, fiddling with the gold band on her finger.  "What if they're mad? What if they don't approve?"

Seb wrapped his arm around his stressed out wife and pulled her into a hug. 

"Jessie, it will be fine.  They might be shocked at first, but they know how we feel about each other.   They love us and want us to be happy, yes?"  Jessie nodded. "There you go then.    Being together, getting married, it makes us happier than either of us have ever been."

Jessie looked at the clock on the wall above the fireplace.  It was nearly five o'clock.  It was New Years Eve, and soon both sets of parents would be arriving to see in the new year with their respective children. 

Seb and Jessie had worked together to prepare a finger buffet, which was set out on the kitchen breakfast bar, covered for now in clingfilm.  

They'd also stocked up on plenty of beer for Jessie's dad, Jägermeister for Seb's father, and a large bottle of gin for their mothers to share.   Seb had decided on a bottle of whiskey for himself, and Jessie had bought lots of Alcopops.  It was going to be a great evening, once they got the bombshell of their wedding out of the way that was.

Despite his reassuring words to Jessie Seb was secretly worried about his mother's reaction. He thought his father would be fine about it, but marriage was such an important thing to Heike Vettel. She'd been upset by the failure of his first marriage, and although she'd accepted it he had no idea how she'd react to him jumping into a second
marriage so quickly.  And as for the fact that she hadn't been invited....well he just hoped that she wouldn't take that personally, or the shit could well and truly hit the fan.

"We should take our rings off," Jessie announced. "So they don't find out from spotting them.  Once we've broken the news we can put them back on."

Seb frowned.  He hated the thought of taking his ring off but Jessie was right.   It would be better that their parents found out from being told, not from spotting their rings.

He reluctantly slid the gold band off of his finger and slipped it into the pocket of his jeans. 

Jessie removed both of her rings, concealing them in the pocket of her smart black trousers.  

A few minutes later a loud buzzing sound came from the intercom installed in the hallway.  Seb jumped to his feet.

"I'll get it," he said.   Jessie was feeling extremely nervous now.     The last thing she wanted was for her parents feelings to be hurt,  but the beach wedding Seb had proposed to her was her dream wedding, with her dream groom.  Sure, they could have arranged a beach wedding for a later date, but it had felt so right. 

She heard Seb speaking into the intercom. She heard a beep as he pressed the button to open the gates.  Moments later he walked back into the room. 

"It's your parents," he said. 

"Oh shit. How are we going to tell them??"

"Well, for a start it will be best if we wait for my parents to get here. That way we only have to go through it once," he told her. "Their flight landed two hours ago so they should be here any time."

Jessie nodded. She took a deep breath and began to run things through in her head. What was the worst that could happen? They'd be mad but they'd get over it, right?

A few minutes later there was a knock on the front door. Seb went to let Thomas and Laura Thornton in.

"Thomas, Laura, come on in! Hope you both had a great  Christmas!"