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T-MINUS FOUR HOURS (BEFORE THE GALA)
“You’re nervous.” The statement came from Jameson, who saw right through her rapid finger-tapping as more than just an outlet for boredom.
Out of all of the things Avery needed to do that day, filling out forms seemed like the least stressful- and yet, it didn’t seem to curb her anxiety.
She looked up from her desk, and watched Jameson lean his back against the doorframe, putting her in the center of his field of vision.
“Of course I’m nervous! The Hawthorne Foundation Gala is today, and for some reason I’m doing taxes-“
“-and for your pain and suffering, you deserve at least a year’s worth of chocolate donuts!” Xander burst into the room, bearing said chocolate donuts and nearly knocking over Jameson. He tossed his brother a donut before taking a better look at Avery. “I fear you may require a stronger source of sugar with the amount of stress coming from you.” he placed the donuts on her desk.
When Avery didn’t take a donut, he raised an eyebrow. “Does this have nothing to do with taxes and everything to do with an upcoming press release involving the two of you?”
Avery looked at him, seeming close to panic, and both of Xander’s eyebrows went up. “I will take that as a yes, leave this room, and strongly recommend you lovebirds speak to each other.”
Jameson left the door and stood against her desk, facing away. “Do you regret this, Heiress?”
Avery stood and braced herself on the desk. “Of course not. You know that, I know that, but does everyone else know?”
Jameson looked at her. “We’re doing this so that everyone knows. I don’t know if they’ll believe us, but they’ll be informed.”
Avery turned around, and leaned against Jameson. “They’re never going to believe or accept it. This community is weird, Jameson. They hate me enough as is, they’re never going to accept us together.”
Jameson raised an amused eyebrow. “Is that what you think?”
“What?”
“Look, you gave Alisa the picture and the caption yesterday. She posted it about two minutes ago-“
“-when the donuts came?” Avery’s shock was mixed with anger and relief and it caused Jameson to give her a small smirk.
“-yes, when the donuts came. I think you’re prepared for the worst, Heiress, but maybe not as prepared for the reception we’re truly receiving.” He handed her her phone.
Avery rapidly opened up Instagram and found her phone filled with notifications. She checked her latest post and found a picture of herself and Jameson covered in paint, from the day the two had built and painted her desk. In the photo, she gave Jameson a kiss on the cheek and it was captioned ‘first love ❤️❤️’.
It had over a million likes.
“Wait, a million?” Jameson leaned over her shoulder to look at her phone. It felt oddly domestic and she embraced the feeling. “Alisa said it had 10,000. It’s been less than five minutes, how is the app still running?”
Avery shrugged, a smile finding its way onto her lips. She opened up the comment section.
angel_face222 THEYRE SO CUTE
SONICSCREAMS people date this guy?
reply from lia-eliza dude imagine the kids 😍😍
HOT_TO_GO OPPOSITES ATTRACT CONFIRMED?????
reply from SONICSCREAMS didn't she date his brother 😭 like that one interview
laffytaffyhappy does this mean he’ll stop being all law-breaky or will she start doing illegal shit.
my-name-is-slim-shaky wait, I lwk never imagined this, but they work so well together, it's my new OTP
theCALENDARRR oh to be young and in love.
reply from I_is_calculator you're like 16
reply from theCALENDARR shut up Jessica
reply from I_is_calculator my name is Elena 😭
Jameson stopped her from scrolling further. "Look, the reception isn't all going to be puppies and chocolate donuts. But I think you're doing pretty good if Instagram thinks it’s not propaganda.”
"Jameson, that was five people out of-" she checked the phone again. "nine thousand comments."
Jameson shrugged. "I highly doubt they're the only five positive ones, Heiress, you would've had a harder time finding it otherwise."
Alisa, who Avery hadn't seen since that morning, walked into the room holding a large garment bag, followed by a makeup artist. "Congratulations, Avery. That's one of the most positively recieved posts I've ever seen on your account."
Jameson raised an eyebrow at Avery, giving her a look that said I told you so, and Avery let go of a breath she didn't even know she had been holding. "You're not joking?"
"Have you ever known Alisa to joke?" Alisa glared at Jameson, who punctuated the statement with a smirk.
Alisa turned to Avery. "About 95% of the general public reacted well, and out of that 5% that didn't, most were teenage girls."
Avery sighed. "As expected."
With the problem mostly settled, Alisa clapped her hands. "Okay, then, onto the rest of our duties. Avery, you have a gala in about four hours. Jameson, get out."
Jameson opened his mouth to protest and then decided against it, for he closed his mouth and dropped a kiss on the top of Avery's head before leaving.
Avery turned to Alisa. "You didn't have to kick him out."
Alisa closed the door behind Jameson, before ushering Avery to the bathroom. "Once you figure out how to get your makeup on while holding a conversation with him, he'll be allowed to stay. We need you both there on time, and you take significantly longer to get ready than he does."
T-MINUS ONE HOUR (Before the gala)
Jameson wasn’t exactly one to panic, but neither was Avery. He began tapping his foot and took a deep breath in an attempt to calm down.
Alisa had left him a selection of four ties and matching pocket squares, and Jameson assumed he was supposed to wear them with a tuxedo. He pulled out the garment bag containing the black one, and began slowly buttoning his shirt.
The sounds of Hakuna Matata filled the room while he tucked his shirt in, and Jameson sighed before picking up his phone. Xander had set his ringtone over two weeks ago; Jameson hadn't gotten around to hacking it yet.
"How are ya doin', Jamie?"
"You live three doors down, why don't you tell me?" he hung up the call.
Not two seconds later, Nash strolled into his room, wearing flannel over jeans and a band t-shirt.
"You look like a waiter. Didn’t Grayson ever teach you to dress yourself?” he took a look toward the rest of the clothing Jameson had set out to wear.
Jameson ran a hand through his hair. “I look the same. I wore this last week.”
“And then someone asked you for champagne. And you socked them in the face.”
He then proceeded to walk into Jameson's closet -"There’s nothing wrong with what I'm wearing!" "People are gonna ask you for more caviar; Grayson told me to not let you leave the house like that."- and after rummaging for two minutes, found a waistcoat that he didn't even know existed. It was the exact color of the tie Jameson wanted to pick, but Nash procured a black tie and pocket square.
"I think this is the same color as her dress, but honestly, it's gonna be dark, who's gonna see?" Nash held up the waistcoat, as if the nonexistant light would help him see better.
Jameson took it from him. "Have I ever worn this?"
"Maybe. You were also drinking a lot, so I doubt you or the news remembers." Nash sniffed the cloth. "You would never even know. It doesn't even smell like bourbon."
Jameson raised an unimpressed eyebrow as he began to put his tie on.. “Don’t tell me you’re being serious.”
Nash crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. “I couldn’t tell you whether it was true or not, Jamie, you wouldn’t believe me no matter what I said.”
Jameson buttoned up his waistcoat. “A wise man takes all truths with a grain of salt.”
“Bullshit.” Nash drew out the first syllable.
Jameson gave his brother a smirk. “Don’t you know it.” He grabbed the suit jacket and left.
1.5 HOURS IN
“Oh hello dear!” The sound of posh over-confidence crept up behind Avery, who quickly turned.
“Mrs. Anderson!” The woman was one of the slightly overconfident head of a charity created to support budding culinary minds. While incredibly specific, the charity had sent over a thousand students to culinary school, who went on to open restaurants that were all doing pretty well. Avery didn’t mind the woman; she was a lot nicer than most of the attendees, and used her reach to benefit the people who needed it. “How are you, ma’am?”
“I’m doing great, darling, but we need to talk about that dress. You look stunning!”
Avery was draped in dark red silk, covering one arm, and hugging her body until it hit her hips, where it flowed in waves, just shy of reaching the ground. The asymmetrical neckline and bottom of the skirt were covered in minimal silver embroidery-visible when the light hit just so. Alisa had shoved her in a pair of black stilettos, and curled her hair, painting her lips with the same red as her dress. A silver choker was clasped around her throat, matching her earrings and the bracelets on her left hand.
She thanked the woman, handing her a glass of champagne, and asked, “Have you heard about the charity we’re sponsoring today?”
Avery and the woman chatted for a couple of minutes as Avery convinced her to donate thousands of dollars out of pocket.
“Cancer truly is a scary thing.” Mrs. Anderson smiled softly. “I lost my husband to lung cancer. I doubt the majority of these people consider the research worth funding.”
“They think they’re untouchable.” Avery said.
“Precisely, my dear.” The woman grabbed another glass of champagne before looking behind Avery. “Oh, I must add, you and Jameson Hawthorne are a beautiful couple.”
Avery felt her cheeks heat and she looked down, but Mrs. Anderson hadn’t finished. “The amount of love you two have for each other is simply incredible. Just being in the same room as you two makes me feel like an outsider; your bond is so sweet.”
Avery paused. Same room? She turned and saw an incredibly familiar face.
Jameson Hawthorne had finally showed up. He wore a dark grey suit-so dark it was nearly black, with a waistcoat the color of wine and silver chains. His tie matched his suit jacket and his hair was artfully arranged, neat with enough personality such that he still looked like himself.
Mrs. Anderson gave Avery a soft smile. “You two look at each other like a man seeing the stars for the first time in years. If this isn’t true love, I don’t know what is!”
Avery’s lips parted. “Really?”
“Oh trust me darling, you and Jameson are something that happens once in a lifetime.” The woman winked and walked away, exchanging greetings with Jameson, who was headed Avery’s way.
She motioned towards the side of the room, and he showed up a minute later with two wineglasses.
She leaned on a pillar and he stood her to her. “You look beautiful, Heiress.” Jameson handed her the wineglass as he said the statement.
Avery smiled. “And yet, you still upstage me by millions. How has this gala gone so far?”
Jameson grimaced and drained the wineglass like a shot. “All people want to talk about is the fact that I’m ‘off the market and it’s such a shame and won’t I please put in a good word for Grayson’ - if I hear another woman tell me any of that, I’m going through the old man’s whiskey stash.”
Avery suppressed a smile and switched their glasses. She doubted she would drink the wine, and Jameson seemed like he needed it more than she did. Jameson wasn’t usually this open, and she wondered if the wine wasn’t his first drink of the night. “You seem like you’ve had fun.”
Jameson shot her a smirk. “And you should be prepared for more, Heiress,” he clinked his glass against hers, “because I believe the slow dances just started.”
For the few hours, Jameson and Avery alternated between spinning around the dance floor and resting at the bar. Their routine was occasionally interrupted by a speech, a person or both, but by the end of the night, they had raised over a million dollars to charity. The venue closed, but they stayed for an additional thirty minutes to supervise cleanup.
It took about forty minutes to get back to Hawthorne House and once they made it to Avery’s room, she tossed her heels into her closet and sat on the nearest chair.
Avery sighed. “I am never doing this again.” She stood up and began removing her jewelry, shedding her media persona for the sake of comfort.
Jameson unzipped her dress. “I highly doubt that.”
Avery shot him a look and she had to stifle a laugh when he mirrored it.
Once they were both changed and under the covers, Avery turned to Jameson and propped her head on a hand. “Do you know what day it is?”
Jameson’s eyes glittered and Avery knew he knew the answer. “The fourteenth?”
Avery rolled her eyes. “Valentine’s Day.”
Jameson smirked. “An astute observation, Heiress. And while one AM is a perfectly reasonable time to exchange gifts and other things, I don’t think you want to leave this bed right now.”
Avery nodded. “Definitely not.”
“Then Happy Valentine’s Day, Heiress, and I’ll see you when we inevitably wake up in six hours.”
Avery laughed and pulled him in for a kiss. When they broke apart, she whispered, “Happy Valentine’s Day, Jameson.”
And if she woke up the next day with several news articles focusing on the gala (or rather its hosts), well, she was going to ignore it all and spend the entire day with her amazing boyfriend.