Until Next Time (Liam Payne)

Back at work and it's every bit of a Monday. A nasty cold virus is making its way through the office and my secretary has it. Hopefully since I was gone Friday, I wont get it. I go find the Lysol and start spraying everything. If I had bleach I'd probably use that too.
My next trip will be to Dallas. I've been there once before when I was younger so I remember very little about it. So that's whats on the books for this week, getting that presentation ready. I get in my groove for work and its coming together nicely when my email chimes. Its April, one of my friends from back home. She lives a couple hours away from our home town but her family has a lake house so she visits frequently. She lets me know what dates she can be there. Shes a shift nurse at the hospital where she lives so her hours and days off can erratic to say the least. Next down is Sawyer, he sent one last night, not too long after I sent it out. He stayed in town working and taking over his family's dairy farm. He and Jessie another of the friends married each other soon out of high school. Great, so far we have dates that are open for everyone. Two more couples to hear from. I exit out and no sooner than I do, it chimes again, twice. Its Chad and Kayla letting me know they can come whenever and next is Maggie and Jeff who say the same. Most of my friends married high school sweet hearts because that just seems to be what you do in our town. So its a go. I send Liam an email letting him know the dates that are available and get a response back immediately. He misses me and is looking forward to it. And will call me later tonight. I also hear back from April, Chad and Kayla that the dates are fine and they cant wait to see everyone.
I've forgot to mention I'm bringing friends.
Liam calls me later that night. He has a show tomorrow then one later that weekend. He's tired and is looking forward to the get away. He hasn't mentioned watching the movie I recommended so I know he hasn't watched it. I tell him next week I'm in Dallas to which he does his best interpretation of a Texas accent. I tell him to keep practicing. We've decided to stay at my families lake house since its the biggest and I know that 5 more will be joining us. After talking more we have come to the conclusion because of his schedule we wont be able to see each other until that weekend, which makes me very sad. He tries to cheer me up by reminding me that we will have the whole weekend together. In that time I will have traveled to Dallas and then back home for a week. He will have done no less than 10 shows, probably more. The next three weeks will be miserable, of that I am sure of and nothing or no one can convince me otherwise.
I go to bed pouting. I would pitch an all out temper tantrum if it would help. So tonight I'm just gong to be a brat. I don't get to behave like this, but tonight I am. No one is here to see me and no one is here to tell me I cant.
I wake up the next morning with a killer head ache. The first thing that comes to my mind is the office virus. But I cant. I have too much work to do and I have none of it with me. I take a hot shower hoping it will make me feel better. It didn't, now I feel bad and I'm wet. So this is the reason for my bratty mood last night, I was getting sick. I put enough makeup on for two people, trying to hide my paleness and dark circles under my eyes. It doesn't work. Everyone knows I am sick. There is no way I can do this. I grab what I need to work on it at home and leave. I feel like death, I look like death. I get home and go straight to bed.
I'm awakened by my phone ringing. Its Liam.
"Hello, I was just calling to check on you. I sent you a couple of e mails that you never responded to."
"I'm sick."
"Is there anything I can do?"
"No, I'll die shortly, it's OK."
"That's the spirit! Love that positive attitude!"
I laugh as much as I can. He is truly concerned about me and I assure him I will be fine in a couple of days, even though I don't have a couple of days. I have to get next weeks presentation done by Thursday night at the latest so it can be put together on Friday. He tells me to get some sleep and he will call and check on me tomorrow.
A fever induced sleep is not sleep at all, but a continuous film of weird dreams. My medicine wore off around 4 Am so I got up to take it and turned on the TV and flipped through the channels. I stopped on a music channel when I saw a One Direction video being played. It was one of the first ones. They were so cute, so little. I finished watching it and made sure they didn't play another one after that. They didn't. I really do need to get on YouTube to watch these.
I sleep most of Wednesday and wake up on and off through out the day. Just enough to go the bathroom and take medicine. I wake up around 4:30 and feel decent enough to work some. I work until 11 or so and decide to take some night time medicine, which I never do. With in 30 minutes or less I am down for the count.
I wake up when the alarm clock goes off and vaguely remember a phone call or was it a dream that Liam called. I don't know. It must have been a dream because any details are foggy. Before I can get out o the bed the phone rings, Its Liam.
"Are you all right? I called last night and you were mumbling all kinds of things and not making any sense. Are you all right?"
I start to laugh, so it wasn't a dream. I explain the night time cold medicine and how this morning I thought it was a dream. He laughs also and told me it kind of alarmed him. He asked how I was feeling and I was feeling some better, but I had to go in. He made me promise if I started feeling bad to go home.
I was able to work through the day and got a lot accomplished. In fact I finished. I left the files and papers on my secretary's desk for her to put together in the morning and have ready for me by the time I went home.
Liam called me while I was on my way home. He had a show that night so he wanted to call me at a decent time to make sure I was doing better. I assured him I was and was well on my way to a fast recovery. I told him to have fun and be careful, they did an awful lot of jumping around on stage. He laughed and said always.
The next week flew by. Dallas kept me very busy. Home that weekend. No calls from Liam but lots of texting. Lots of pictures. Silly pictures, serious pictures, pictures of I don't know what. pictures of the guys, and pictures of places. I tried to keep up and resorted to taking pictures of plants, random people, and food in my refrigerator.
The next week would be the hardest., no traveling but I did have a prospective new client coming in. A couple of phone calls and many texts throughout the week and the weekend was upon me. I was so excited to see him and of course my childhood friends. They were set to land in Atlanta and I have a friend who is a pilot who was to take them from there to a tiny airport the next town over. I would meet them there.
I sat in my parents huge SUV waiting for them to arrive. Right on time, I see the plane taxi in. As they get out of the jet, the jokes about the 'large' airport start. I just nod my head, what more can you do? They see me standing next to the vehicle and everyone starts shouting "Shot gun!" and running towards me. I jump in and lock the doors laughing the entire time. Liam then convinces them that he is the only one that gets shot gun because with out him they would not be there. So its settled, Liam gets shot gun.
The ride to my parents house is 30 minutes. As we near the town I tell them not to blink or they may miss it. A small grocery store, a mom and pop full and self serve gas station, a Dairy Queen and a post office. All other buildings were behind these. At the next road we turn and drive 5 miles. There on the left is my driveway. My very long driveway. White fence bordering all around, pecan trees with green nuts, Bradford Pears lining the driveway. Cows in the far pasture grazing lazily. Everyone is silent, still no house just yet. We pass Mr. Morgan repairing one of the fences, he waves and tips his hat. I wave back. Just around the bend is my house. We have a turn of the century plantation style house with eight huge columns in the front, a porch large enough to hold a party on. Twenty five windows in the front to be exact. A huge wooden door with the letter 'H' hand engraved on it. I think they are in shock because no one has made a sound. They just look at each other.
By birth my father is a farmer, by occupation an engineer. Both have been good to him and our family. We are certainly not the richest in our town but as we say 'we get by'. Every one piles out of the SUV in awe of the house and grounds. Magnolia trees, gardenia bushes, azalea bushes, Crepe Myrtle trees and all types of flowers in the flower beds. My dog Buster runs from around the corner to greet everyone. He's a huge bull mastiff that wouldn't hurt a flea but scares everyone none the less. I think its kind of funny.
And this will explain why I dont like him for his money. I dont need his money. I have money and so does my family.
My Mom comes to the door welcoming everyone in with hugs and the southern custom, "Would you like some tea?" Of course they all respond with yes and forget our tea is not their tea. We like ours sweet with a lemon wedge on the side. When she brings the tray out to the porch they soon realize this but are gracious and choke it down anyway. Supper will be ready at 6, so until then they will be shown to their rooms. Everyone gets their own room, two have an adjoining bath. Being the old southern family we are, there will be no sharing of the bed tonight and we all get a laugh out of that when my mother leaves. So out of respect for my family, I tell him to stay in his bed or my dad could get the shot gun out. That quietens them all.
Supper is fried chicken, green beans, black eyed peas, mashed potatoes with gravy, sliced peaches from our orchard and pecan pie for dessert, pecans also from our trees. There were very few leftovers and everyone left the table stuffed. It was beginning to get dark so I took them on a tour around the house and named each of the bugs or animal noises as they presnted themselves. Katydids, tree frogs, cicadas, crickets, owls, bats and the lightning bugs coming out from under the trees. Oh and we cant forget the misquitoes. They typically dont bother me but they were biting everyone else. Nights like this make me miss home. The sights, sounds and smells. We all head in to unwind before bed but Liam pulls me to the side and we duck behind a large bush and kiss. I feel like a teenager sneaking to steal a kiss. I dont want to let go, its been so long since I've seen him or kissed him. We pull apart and smile at each other and decide its best if we go in. Everyone is tired from traveling so we retire early so we can run by a grocery store on the way and get to the lake house a little early to open it up and get it ready.
I walk Liam to his room, he bends down and kisses me goodnight. I turn to go to my room and he says, "About that movie . . ."
I laugh and walk to my room.

Notes

Two chapters tonight, arent y'all lucky :)