Dress Me Up, Dress Me Down (Ashton Irwin Fanfic)

Chapter 1 (Charlotte Greene)

I woke up to the sunlight peeking in through the shades of my bay window on a Saturday morning.  I looked at the clock on my nightstand and groaned, for I beat the alarm again; it was only seven.  Might as well get up, I thought.  I  slid on my robe that was hanging from my bed post and decided to make some breakfast.

Getting used to the common things of life here in London, I poured myself some tea and ate some crepes with Nutella, bananas, and strawberries.  It's funny how I never drank tea until I moved into the flat two weeks ago.  Already, I could see the streets below the terrace starting to come alive; black cabs as usual, double decker buses with tourists, and children hand-in-hand with their parents possibly on their way to the park. I turned around as I heard the sliding doors open.  It was just my flatmate, Will.  He grumpily sat down as I poured him a cup of tea.

"Well finally, sleeping beauty is awake," I said with a smirk.

"What are you talking about? It's only nine, this is pretty early for me," he said.

"I was up earlier you know," I said as I took a bite of my crepes.

"Yeah, I know. You forgot to turn off your alarm. I could hear it from downstairs! Why do you have to have it on so fucking loud?"

"Sorry," I laughed.

He put his head down on the table and shut his eyes to block the summer sun.

"The least you could do is thank me for driving your drunk ass home last night," I said.

"You could have left me there you know. I was having a great time with that one girl," he mumbled.

"That one girl? Do you even remember who you were kissing?"

"Hmmmm, nope. But she was pretty hot."

"You were kissing Diana, that girl who had a thing for you since that Christmas party you told me about?" I drank my tea, trying not to spew it out of my mouth from laughing too hard.

"No," he said in shock, finally looking up at me.

"Uh yeah,"

"No, Charlotte" he said again in his British accent, making me melt a little bit.

"Yes!"

"Ugh fuck," he said.  He got up from the table and opened the sliding door.

"I'm going to take an advil, go back to bed, and hopefully I'll wake up and this will all be a dream," he said before closing the door.

I looked after him at the way he walked and the cute, messy bed head he had.  Deep down, I was a little hurt about last night.  I wasn't a big party person so I decided to skip out on the party that my friend, Lily, was having at her flat.  I got the call at 3 AM this morning from her saying to come pick up Will before he did anything stupid with her friend, Diana.  I came just in time when things started to get hot and heavy between Will and Diana.  I literally pulled Will away from her and tried my best to carry him out to the black cab.  

I've had a crush on him since I took my trip to London here last year with my parents as a high school graduation present.  He was working at a gelato shop that I stopped by in next to my hotel each night to grab dessert, and to see him.  One night I stopped by late enough that it was the end of his shift, so we sat down and talked about adventures over cups of gelato.  We joked about moving in together, but we never thought it would actually happen.  I kept in touch with him when I was back in the US, skyping him when I could.  That summer I told my parents that I didn't want to go to UMD, or any college for that matter.  I told them I wanted to be a stylist.  They looked with worry, as they never saw me as a go-getter.  When I didn't take no for an answer, they finally decided that they had no choice but to let me make my own decisions.  

That autumn, I went to live with my grandmother in Connecticut, just a 20 minute metro ride from NYC.  There, I scored a professional buyer job  for a small boutique in SoHo after working as a sales associate for about a month.  My parents couldn't be more proud and relieved that maybe I could have a chance at a successful life in the fashion world.  I decided to build my resume by applying for a job at Topshop, one of the huge fashion retailers in the UK.  When I got a job there, it was then that I received a skype call from Will saying that he finally convinced his parents to let him move out and get a place of his own.  He recalled the time in London when we joked about moving in together, but this time he was being sincere.  My heart did somersaults.  I wanted this more than anything.  Will, the extremely cute guy from that summer trip to London, wanted me to move in with him, me.  I couldn't say yes fast enough.  Now here I was, living life the way I've always wanted, with a guy to pursue, and taking life as it goes.