Born Inked

Chapter Two

                                                                              ~*~*~JAMES~*~*~

I walk in the door and hear the tv on in the living room. Lennon must be home, either that or we are going to have a long talk again about the electric bill.

"Lennon, are you home?" I go to my room and grab a file before heading to the living room to work.

"Yeah, in the living room. Did you bring food?" I hear her yell back. As round the corner into the living room, I hold up the bag.

"I brought us both lemon bucatini pasta alfredo from Avec. I figured it could be a slight cheat night."

"Oh, yum! I'll get the forks, you get this onto a video you haven't seen." she exclaims, moving the remote she'd been holding into my direction before heading for the kitchen. I set out the boxes on the coffee table, followed by napkins.

"I have news, but we should eat first before I tell you, or at least start to eat." I don't know how to actually start the conversation, maybe putting off a while longer is best. She comes back in with the promised utensils and a wide smile.

"No problem. Did you want something to drink? I brought water otherwise." she offers out a water bottle that looks like she just pulled it out of the fridge.

"This is perfect, better to stick to this rather than soda." I grab it from her and set it on the table with a napkin under it. I sit down on the floor in front of my food, pointing her to her box, "Eat before it gets cold."

"Yes sir." she quips, but her smile doesn't dim. She must have really enjoyed her day off then. I start the first video I haven't watched as we settle down around the coffee table. I missed the livestreams from TinMaskGames, and he's been streaming the same game all week, so we start with the stream from Sunday.

"Okay, so what are you doing three weeks from now?" I look at her, not eating another bite or blinking.

"Er, depends? With a two week notice I can ask off for... up to two weeks? I haven't used any vacation days. Why? What did you need? Is something wrong?" she delves into a kind of panicked rapidfire questioning that surprises me slightly.

"Well, um, what if went to Seattle from the 2nd to the 5th of September." I want it to actually click in her mind, before showing her the badges I received yesterday in the mail. I had them delivered to Kel to keep it a secret from Lennon.

"I mean, we can if you want? I won't object to a road trip. But can I ask why? What's going- oh. Oh! Are you, are we?" Her face quickly changes from panic to excitement in about .5 seconds.

"Yep, we might actually have to leave on the 4th, that way we can relax and get used to the time change." I pull the powder blue badges from my pocket and slide them over to her so she can see them. I went all out and got the best badges for us through my job at Google. She makes a strange sort of squealing sound I've never heard from her before.

"James this is amazing! I have two weeks to take off, how long do you have? Can we stay the whole time and just go back to work the seventh? These are expensive passes, you can't waste a day. That will give us a day to travel and a day to rest! Please?" I chuckle a bit, looking at her like she is a child again.

"Yeah, I figured we figure everything out after we hear from work. I have a meeting tomorrow about a promotion, so I'm waiting to request my days until that is over with." I quickly shut up, realizing I hadn't told her about the promotion yet, and that I had just royally fucked up.

"You might be getting a promotion? That's great James! Why didn't you tell me? We could have celebrated! Well, we will celebrate if you get the promotion. Maybe go to the movies? Or out to eat somewhere." She says, practically bouncing in excitement. We've both abandoned eating now. I roll my eyes before responding to her.