Authors Notes: Couple of Emails asking about the frequency of Chapters. To make a long story short, I was actually on Chapter 10 but as I read the entire thing I felt like my character development was garbage so I went back and built it up. Some chapters will be shorter than others because of this. The chapters are going to be of varying lengths and once I run through my bank I'll be shooting for 10k+ chapters on a bi-weekly basis. Someone noted that this story was on another site. It is indeed but if you look at the first two chapters you'll notice a pretty big difference in the run up. The story has changed drastically so consider that one a rough edit.
On the note of editing if anyone with decent experience in editing wants to give me advice I'd be willing to listen in.
Thanks for reading!
The doorbell rang about ten times before I realized the housekeeper wasn't around and I had to wake up and answer it. I glanced at my phone as I groggily waked up the stairs, about 20 missed calls and even more texts from Jenna. I wasn't about to sort through whatever she had to say nor did I care. I didn't even want to think about what the hell happened last night. I wanted to believe it was all some ridiculous dream brought on by too much gin. I took a deep breath and reached for the door.
"I'm awake. I'm awake." I groaned as I opened the door. "It's my birthday you could have let me sleep in."
"I mean you should have woken up about three hours ago for school; I thought this was more than fair." I looked at him on my steps with a goofy smile and some balloons he got from the grocery store while he picked up the breakfast in his other hand. "Happy birthday!"
I gave him a bitter glare then turned around letting him walk in. "You're too much sometimes."
"You love it." He walked past me and put everything on the counter. "I got the spread. Pancakes, bacon, eggs." He rubbed his hands together. "I'm glad we didn't go to school this is going to be a great weekend."
"Ah shit I said yes last night didn't I?" I said feigning innocence. "I was really drunk Jon please understand."
"Drunk off telling Mark go to fuck himself maybe." He countered as he took everything out of the bag. "You were nice and sober by the time I called."
I ran my hands across my face in frustration as I sat down. I just wanted to crawl up into a ball and sleep my birthday away after the events of the past two days but there was no way Jon would let me. I just shut up and started eating much to Jon's delight.
After a few minutes of silence he finally said what I expected him to say. "So what did you say to Mark exactly?"
"You want from the start or the good stuff?" I didn't want to tell the whole story unless he actually wanted to hear it.
"Well we have to meet someone at the mall in a bit so tell me what you did that pissed him off."
"He gets really frustrated when you don't fall for his bullshit charms. He think he always has the answers. When you call him out of it he just gets angrier and angrier. It's actually so funny to watch him squirm. Once he started pleading with me to be "reasonable" I knew I had him." Jon had stopped eating at this point and started looking at me strangely but I didn't care as I was in the middle of a tirade. "It's hilarious how after all these years he's predictable as shit. He think's he's always right and he can just smooth talk his way through his entire life. I always knew how to put the idiot in his place and man did it feel good to do it again."
Jon put his fork down and and burst out laughing.
"The fuck are you laughing about?" I yelled as I shoved him off his chair.
"I'm sorry." He managed to sneak out between laughs. "I have NEVER seen you so animated." I narrowed my eyes as he got up. "You two are still on the same damn page after all these years."
"You want to hear about it or you gonna patronize me."
"Ok. Give me a second." He took a few deep breaths and eased his hands onto the table. "Ok please continue."
"The real breaking point was when I realized he didn't have control over me anymore. He got all defensive and shit and then he brought up you and I realized him and Jenna were probably in this mess together."
His eyebrow cocked before shaking his head and chuckling ." So you're telling me if it wasn't for me you and Houston probably would never have talked? "
"I'm like almost certain him and Jenna hooked up from a mutual shared hatred of you. But yeah that's basically how it went." I shoved some bacon in my mouth feeling energized after recounting my victory last night. "You're right though, everything has been so stressful lately. I'm totally down to just leave for the weekend. It will be nice."
"That's what I like to hear!" He started cleaning up the table while I finished eating. "You should go down and pack when you're done with that. I have a call or two to make." He walked off to the kitchen and checked out the place. "How the hell is this stand mixer brand new? Did you mom ever remove the wrapping from anything?"
"They just order out when they're home." I said as I finished up my last pancake. "I use like two pots for ramen and that's it."
"Beautiful kitchen going to waste. Kenny would have a fit." He shook his head as he looked at yet another appliance in the box.
"Wilker? That giant who plays on the same team as you?" I picked up my plate and threw it into the trash while checking out what Jon was up to. I knew of Ken Wilker, he was this tall white dude with brown hair and horrendous acne. Like he had legit craters on his face. I saw him a few times with Jon but didn't think much of it.
"Kenny's my best friend. He's like the best cook I've ever seen. Even better than my chefs. Then again they're all expats who only know Chinese food but still. He would kill for a kitchen like this." He shook his head looking a bit down. "Anyways, Go. I'm going to your backyard to make a call. He gently moved me to the side and opened the door to my backyard. "IS THAT A POOL AND A HOT TUB? JESUS CHRIST JASON."
I rolled my eyes and walked downstairs. It's nice to have all the luxuries but when nobody's around to enjoy it with it's actually just junk. I can count on one hand how many time's I've swam in that pool. I guess it's just hard to see it from my point of view.
I took out an overnight bad and started stuffing it with the essentials. Jeans, shirts, underwear, socks you get the idea. Once I had that settled I made sure Jon wasn't anywhere near me before I opened my safe.It had been a while since I had opened it. I keep emergency cash in here along with a copy of my parents will, and some family heirlooms. Today however I was looking for my fake id. Yeah, stupid as it sounds I had a pretty good quality fake id made just in case I needed to get in somewhere. I haphazardly threw it in here when I came back from Scotland and now I couldn't find it for the life of me.
"Jason?" I heard Jon shout from upstairs and he made his way down. "You all packed? We have to head to the mall to pick up something."
"Don't come into the closet I'll be right out." I shouted back as I fumbled through everything. After another 5 minutes of searching I found it stuck under the will. I held the sealed document in my hands before shuddering and dropping it. One of my biggest fears in this world is the fear of death so anything associated to it freaks me out.
"There you are!" Jon looked up from his phone and immediately made his way up the stairs with my bag in his arm. "Come on we gotta hurry."
"Sorry I didn't realize how important your time was on my birthday holy crap." I thought out loud as I following him up.
"Look we have a four hour drive out to the shore. I just want to be there for dinner tonight."
"Then why on earth are we stopping at the mall?" I got in the passenger seat while he settled our bags in the back.
"Well I need to get some clothes and I figured it would help if you had something nicer to wear for the weekend."
"What makes you think I don't have formal wear."
"Jason." He deadpanned as he turned around. "For the entirety of me knowing you, you have worn some dark color with some jeans and a hoodie. I also looked through your clothes the other night when I was finding you clothes to change into. You don't need a three-piece suit but I just want you to have something in between should there be something to attend while we're out there."
"Do you have a fake?" I crossed my arms annoyed at how correct he was. "Because I won't be the problem if we wanted to club. I have one."
"Come on, I just want to get something fresh for the weekend don't think too much about it." He turned around and opened the basement door.
I followed him out to the car and got in as he threw my bag in the back.
"Ten minutes I swear." He said in a panic. He turned on the car and drove faster than normal while saying something in Mandarin to the person on the other line. After a few miles he said bye and hung up.
"You gonna tell me who we're meeting?"
"You'll meet her in like ten minutes." He shook his head. "My cousin is an assistant to some high profile designer and she said she would help you with clothes. I already regret this decision." Not once in my life have I ever seen Jon nervous but right now he was twitching like someone had told him he was going to die today. We made it to the mall and he didn't do his usual banter just got out of the car and told me to follow him as he walked at a brisk pace.
"There you are!" A tall, slim Asian girl waved at us right in front of the store. "Is this him Johnny?"
"Sorry, we had a couple of issues leaving the house." Jon scratched the back of his head and flinched. "Jason, meet my cousin Suzy."
"Hello Jason!" Suzy was about an inch taller than me with long black hair and glasses that accented her deep blue eyes. Her loose white sweater accentuated her perfect tan skin. She finished her outfit with some perfectly fit black jeans, a large black leather handbag and black platforms. Money was good enough to make all of the Hans look good or they were raised to take care of themselves, probably both. She walked over swiftly to get a closer look at me. "You're just as Johnny described you! I already know what I want you to wear. Come come! We don't have much time to waste."
"Uh what's going on?"
"He didn't tell you I was your personal shopper today did he?" Suzy turned her head and gave Jon a glare. "That's Johnny for you, always likes to leave out the details."
"Suzy for the love of god please be nice to him." Jon turned around flustered. Suzy had some kind of effect on Jon. They began conversing in Mandarin like in the car. She shouted at him and smacked him twice and he winced and gave what I assume to be an apology.
"Whatever. Sorry sweetie allow me to explain, Johnny told me to come here today so we can get you some clothes for this weekend. Johnny doesn't know the first thing about dressing up other people so he asked me to help you out. Don't worry this is literally my job." Suzy was just as chipper and upbeat as Jon usually was. Something about this family really confused me. "Jon has to go get something apparently so it's just you and me! Now come, I have to get back to New York by tonight we don't have much time." She took my hand and quickly dragged me away from Jon and into the store. "Ok Johnny, see you in an hour!"
"Hey woah stop for a second. I appreciate the help but what is going on?" She continued to drag me to the back towards the shirts.
"Johnny is so stupid sometimes. He wants to take you to dinner tonight at some fancy place and then you're supposed to enjoy AC or something. I don't have the full details because he didn't bother to explain them to me. I'm just here to help you out with some clothes." Suzy finally stopped in front of the button downs. "Now I want to find some solids and some patterns for you. What size shirt do you wear? Small right? Hmm...maybe a medium."
Suzy had a way of drowning you out while she did her thing. Realizing I wasn't about to stop her from shopping for me I gave up and waited as she moved shirts in front of me seeing what she liked. After being thrown several outfits and lots of projected emotions Suzy picked out 3 for me.
"So you're going to wear the blue striped long sleeved with the white slacks for dinner tonight. After that the black shirt with the jeans should be perfect for Saturday and you wear the grey shirt with this hoodie and these dark grey slacks if you end up at the beach. Any questions?" Suzy handed the cashier the card told her she didn't care about the cost and brought back her focus to me.
"You work fast." I look at my phone and realized it had only been about forty minutes so Jon wasn't due back for a bit. "No, no questions...thank you very much."
"Not a problem! I have to wait on Johnny too, let's go get coffee!" Suzy took the receipt and walked out of the store at a brisk pace, I was getting exhausted imagining spending a day with her. I thanked the cashier and ran out to catch up to Suzy. After about 30 seconds of running we walked into a local coffee shop and waited in line.
"Ugh, work." Suzy took looked up from her phone to glance at the menu. "Sorry hun, one second then I'm all yours." She swiped something on her phone then put it in her purse as she walked up to order. We got our overpriced coffee after about 3 minutes and sat down by the window. "So who are you, how did Johnny find you and how did you manage to be so special to him?" Suzy still in her face paced attitude bombarded me with questions I wasn't really prepared for.
"Uh...I'm Jason. We go to the same high school and I don't know." I answered quickly trying to match pace with her.
"Calm down. You're so timid for some reason I can't imagine why. Are you nervous about this weekend?" Suzy was fairly oblivious to the affects her personality were having on me it seems as she glanced around the coffee shop and sipped on her latte. "Honestly I've never actually met any of Johnny's girlfriends so you must be really special to him. I didn't even know he liked guys before this week!"
"Uhh it's just you're so fast that i..."
"Oh sorry that's what happens when you live in the city. Fast cars, lights, lifestyle and all that wonderful jazz. I do miss the suburbs though. When I need a break I spend a few days here or on a nice island and god knows I need those. Ah sorry I'm doing it again I'll stop tell me how you and Johnny met and take your time I swear I'm not as intimidating as I seem."
"Well, he started talking to me in detention last march asking for a date."
"Wait, he has been trying to date you for six months and he didn't give up? Aww Johnny's in love! I have to text Karen about this oh my god this is just too cute." She swiped her phone and started typing rapidly. "Keep going I'm listening."
"Wait Karen Han? That's Jon's sister?" Karen Han was known as quite possibly the smartest person to ever graduate from Wilson High. She was a year older but she was finishing up her Bachelor Degree already.
"Yeah! You know her? Oh who am I kidding everybody knows her!" She didn't look up from her phone once. "Tell me more though. How far have you two gone? Kissing? Sex? Anything juicy?"
"Uhh...well I mean..."
"Suzy why must you embarrass me every chance you get?" I sighed in relief as I knew Jon was right behind me. "We haven't done anything. That's all you need to know."
"Oh shut up you always bragged to our cousins about how you fucked all those girls and now here you are taking this one to AC and it's a guy. I can't help but be curious."
"Are you trying to get him to hate me? Jon took out his wallet. "What do I owe you? I'm not going to stand here and give you the chance to pump him anymore."
"Oh don't worry about it Johnny. This is his birthday present from me!" Suzy stood up with her things and shot Jon a sheepish grin.
"Don't pull this bullshit Suzy. How much was it?"
"Just make sure you take care of him this weekend. You clearly care a lot about him." Suzy walked past us and waved. "Happy birthday Jason. It was a delight to meet you!"
"What did you tell her?" Jon sat down as he pulled on his rubbed his face trying to remove the pink from his embarrassment. "Did she pressure you into saying anything?"
"I just told her how we met. Am I really the first person you've introduced your family to?"
"Yeah, I'm sorry. I've never seen the need to introduce any of my ex's to Suzy. She would have made them cry. I just needed someone to help me out with clothes because I have no idea and Suzy was in town for once. It was a terrible idea in hindsight."
I walked up to throw out my coffee cup by the exit. "Need anything else?"
"Just you."
"You're hilarious." I flipped him off as we walked out. "How far are we from the hotel anyways?"
"It's about a four hour drive. You can crash in the back if you want."
"I can sleep in the front; you would be lonely without me. Where did you go anyways?"
"Oh just needed to see someone and pick up tickets."
"Tickets for what?"
"That would ruin the surprise. There's a reason we're going all the way out to AC."
"You know I can just look at my phone you asshole." I looked down to turn it on only for Jon to snatch it out of my hands and run. "Nope."
"Jon stop being an asshole and give me my fucking phone." I stood there and shouted outside of the mall as he ran to his car. I shook my head at the futility of yelling and ran to the car.
"There you are. Thought you would run quicker than that. Maybe I need to take you to the gym."
"Jon stop being a dick or I'm gonna leave."
"You won't leave. I know you appreciate how much I'm putting into trying to make you happy." Jon was leaning against his car fiddling around with my phone trying to figure out my passcode.
"Why are you such a prick?" I attempted to snatch it out of his hands but I instead tripped on myself and found myself in Jon's left arm.
"Alright, how about this," Jon stood me back up and put my phone in his right pocket and covering it with his hand. "I'll give you back your phone if I can kiss you again."
"Why the fuck would I agree to something stupid like that?"
"Because you like me enough to try." Jon brought his arm around me in to get closer.
"What?"
"I don't think you would let me hold you like this if you weren't trying. You could of told me to fuck off hours ago but here we are ready to head out to AC." His eyes pierced me with that raw Jon Han charisma that was so hard to ignore when he had it on. "Look if you're really uncomfortable with the idea I can just give you your phone back but I'd like a second try. Our first form of intimate contact wasn't exactly the greatest and I regret it a lot but I think you're ready for another try at this " The trickster had been replaced by a more serious and calming Jon.
"Well..." Today was the first day Jon had been serious about how he really felt about me. I don't know if it was because of how he saw me on Wednesday but he really wanted this to work. I would be lying to myself if I said I was past the point of contemplation. Jon was the first person other than Jenna that cared about me and my well being. "I think we could try again."
"Alright let me do this right." He switched places with me and had me lean against his car and before I knew it his lips gently brushed against mine, briefly grazing them as to make certain that this is what I wanted. He opened his eyes to observe my reaction; his deep dark jewels told me how much he wanted me to remember this kiss, my first attempt to be intimate with him. I smiled a little and nodded before he came back in to seal the deal. Our first kiss was really forced and awkward, it was mostly him sucking on my lips while I was in a state of panic and confusion. This time however Jon's lips were soft and manageable, he was being gentle and slow. At first I had no idea what to do, but Jon was trying to guide me. He wanted to move at my pace as we worked it out and slowly I understood that he wanted me to open my mouth wider, as if he was asking for permission to open a door. After a bit I opened my mouth slightly to let him in and it was from there he took complete control; Jon coaxed out my tongue and he continued to work my lips to get them to relax completely. I still didn't quite understand what I was supposed to do so I just surrendered to him and allowed him complete control. His tongue spread around mine passionately and before I knew it he was working in sync, every part of mouth was following him as if it was a dance of passion. My eyes opened wide as I came to the realization of what was going on; I looked at Jon with his eyes closed doing his hardest to make sure I felt safe and comfortable while at the same time making every second memorable about our first real kiss. After what felt like a century I had to break off for air.
"How was that?" Jon stepped back and flashed his signature smile as he observed my reaction.
I was speechless as I caught my breath. All I could do was nod and look down.
"Yeah you need to breathe through your nose." He came back close and looked up as he continued to talk. "I hope I didn't disappoint you."
"It....was perfect actually..." I finally had enough time to catch my breath and talk again.
"Well great." He pulled me from the car and grazed my lips one more time. "I hope you never forget this moment. Now come on we still have to make 9:00 reservation." He let go and walked around to the other side of the car.
"You still didn't tell me who you had to go talk to." The afterglow was fading and I was slowly coming back to reality.
"I'll tell you everything when we're on the road." Jon opened his door and got in. "We just have to get moving or we won't make it there with enough time to get ready."
I nodded and jumped in the passenger side. I was worried about what happened between him and Jenna but I knew it would all be resolved in a matter of time. However, for now I just wanted to sit back and enjoy what looked to be like a promising weekend. Maybe Jon wasn't such a bastard after all.