Life Love and Everything in Between

The school was ending in few months time. We both had decided to continue our diplomas in the local college after summer. It sounded prudent in many aspects rather than make a big move to university. Financially it would give us the breather we needed.

Sam came to my room one evening. As she lay on my bed, I continued working at my desk.

"X", she called out to me softly.

"Yes hon." I replied without looking toward her, continuing with my work.

"What have you thought about doing this summer?"

I put my work aside and looked at her. She turned in the bed, propped her head on her hand and while resting on her elbow she looked at me.

"Nothing much. I have been looking for some work but none so far." I replied.

"Me neither." She replied. "I have tried but everywhere it's dry."

I looked at her. Usually she had something floating in her mind when she asked such dead-end questions.

"I was thinking,..." she continued, "...instead of wasting the opportunity for some work experience, and feeling disappointed about job market, why not we collaborate and do something together?"

I was intrigued. "What do you have in mind?" I turned to her with keen interest.

"Hear me out." She continued. "Why not invest our time in getting our house renovated?"

"In what sense?" I was perplexed.

"Well this place has not been redecorated for a few years now. We both have developed sufficient skills to be able to paint, wall-paper or redecorate simple areas like the lounge or our bedrooms."

"Sure." I acknowledged. "But that's going to cost money."

"Eureka, Archie." Sam chuckled with sarcasm.

I smiled realising her twisted humour.

"We will put forward a proposal with a plan and a budget to our parents." She continued to elaborate. "Then if they agree, we will buy the stuff and redecorate it ourselves. Two months of solid work should be able to sort this place. There are two of us. That's a lot of man-woman hours."

Now I chuckled at her political correctness. "Sounds possible. I'm assuming you already have sorted some plan out."

"You aren't just a pretty face are you?" she teased me again. "Well I was thinking why not start with re-arranging of the lounge, re-painting the house, say select rooms for now, and then see if we could have some of the carpets replaced."

"I'm in." I agreed. "When do we tell mom and dad?"

"Let's broach the topic at dinner tonight." She suggested winking at me.

"Deal."

After a moment of silence, she put forward another question to me, "Will you be ok spending time working with me?"

I looked around to her. "I would love to. Why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't know; just asking if you would rather do something else with your friends."

"I would be more than happy spending time with you." I said. "I mean working with you."

She smiled at me with a twinkle. "I was thinking, let's make it a standard 40 hrs-a-week routine. Evenings and weekends are ours to enjoy. That way we will get a feel of what a full time job feels like."

"Good idea." I nodded. "That doesn't sound too hectic."

Then as she lay there, for a moment, she murmured quietly, "Don't worry I will make it worthwhile. It will be fun working together."

I stood up from my desk, turned around, went close to her and lay down next to her in the bed. She rolled on her back, threw her hands over her head and looked at me. I lowered myself on her and hugged her tenderly.

"Every minute I spend with you is full of bliss." I whispered in her ear.

She wrapped her hands around my neck and hugged me with warmth. "I'm glad you think that. I love to spend time with you too."

I sat up and rested my elbow on the bed. "Even if this plan does not shape up, we will find something else to do together, how about that?"

She smiled in acknowledgement. Her eyes glowed with excitement. I lowered my lips, kissed her cheek and hugged her for a while. She ran her hands over my back wrapping her arms around my neck.

In the evening, after the dinner, Sam and I broached the topic to our parents. After listening to us carefully, dad looked at mom.

Then looking at us, he spoke with appreciation, "Kids, this house is yours too. If you feel you wish to make home improvements, I am all for it. However, I would like to see some budget and some plans so I know what I am getting myself into. Not that I don't trust you, but at the end of the day, the buck stops with us." He looked at mom. "So you understand when I say this, as long as it will be a good investment, we are all for it. What do you say?" he looked at mom.

"I'm fine with it too." Mom nodded.

"Then in a week's time, we will provide you with a plan and a rough budget." Sam suggested.

"How about I give you a budget right now, and you make it fit inside it? I ain't no president or prime minister to work forward." He chuckled.

Sam and I looked at each other. "Sure."

So dad gave us a rough budget.

"Is that maximum or there is a leeway?" Sam asked.

"There is a leeway but not too much. Work with the figure as max because I know you will go over that definitely anyway. I'm already assuming a surplus in the figure I have given you." He smiled looking at mom.

"Ok." Sam and I looked at each other. "We have our project."

"So is this your idea for the summer?" Dad asked.

"Yep." Sam replied. "Rather than waste time looking for jobs and getting depressed, we thought it would be nice to invest some time and resources in our own home."

"Great idea." Dad looked at mom with admiration.

"Plus we were thinking, we would like to start doing groceries for us." Sam added looking at me. I just nodded.

"Mom, you don't have to worry about getting it anymore. We will get it every week." Sam said squeezing my hand.

"That would be kind of you." Mom smiled.

"What magic mushrooms did you have for breakfast today?" dad giggled looking at mom and then us both.

"Oh dad. Stop teasing us. We are trying to contribute to the family and we realise we could make a start somewhere." Sam was girlish.

"I'm just pulling your leg, sweetheart." Dad leaned forward on the table. "Your consideration and help is always appreciated. You know that. It is nice to see you kids taking responsibility in the house, and without our prompts. That is something."

After the meals, Sam and I went upstairs to discuss about our project. We spent the majority of a week looking at ideas and calculating costs for them. Sam was always the creative one so she came up with a ton of ideas for the makeover. I got the maths sorted and the different options and combinations. It was fun working with her. I saw a very different side to her personality. Sam was a bright and inspiring person to work with. She had a very calm and relaxed approach to work. May be she enjoyed working with me since we were close to each other anyway, but the time we spent together was always full of excitement.

She took every opportunity to touch and hug me, get close and hold me. She ran her fingers though my hair, held my hand while walking, wrapped my arm around her and hugged me sometimes. It was all very warm and loving.

We had realised that we ended up using many skills to create the plan from the given budget. It helped us develop and strengthen our technical and personal skills. I had begun to realise the significance of such in-house projects as good substitutes for work placements.

Where Sam fell short, I would help her out. When my abilities fell short, she filled the gap. We made a good team and we loved working together. Apart from the learning we were gaining, we were also getting closer together.

When we were presenting the plan one evening, dad just stopped us and looked at the maths. "I trust you guys to make good decisions about the colours and aesthetic. I just want to make sure you have not missed anything critical in your consideration. That is all. So far, it looks good. Go ahead." He approved with confidence. "And remember, we are in this together. If you hit a wall, so as to speak (he air quoted 'wall') do not think it is your problem to solve alone. We will solve it together. You are never alone. This is not a test. It is an exercise to develop and learn." He smiled at us.

Sam hugged him. "Thanks dad."

The weeks that followed were really good. During the summer, Sam and I worked on our project every day. We had created daily and weekly planner so we had a target to reach every day. The first week proved challenging. We were falling behind by the end of the second week. Therefore, we sat down and re-did the schedule with some additional buffers. What seemed like an easy 5-week project now looked more like a 7-week one. Moreover, we had to scale a few bits down and reduce the scope slightly. Since this was not a test, Sam just smiled and said, "More quality time together." She hugged me and we both smiled at each other.

During work, we listened to our favourite music and took time to dance to some tunes. Occasionally, we used to chat about different things. I would watch her every gesture, her every expression and her every movement. She would enjoy my gazes, encourage my closeness and hugs and touch me at every opportunity. By the time we had finished the makeover, I had lost touch of time. I would look forward to spending time with Sam everyday without really paying much attention to what we were doing. She had a very unusual way to take the chore out of work and instead make it enjoyable.

When we were painting Sam's bedroom, I left a small kiss mark of my lips on the wall very close to her bed when the glossy paint had half-dried. It was placed so that when she lay in her bed on her side facing the door, she would notice it directly in front of her sight. I did not tell her about it. Two days later, Sam came into my room at dawn and climbed into my bed under the duvet. She kissed me softly on my cheek and said, "Thank you for the kiss."

I had just smiled. "You noticed it then huh."

The next time I had seen it, she had painted red outline of a perfect heart around the kiss mark, with the kiss mark just on the bottom right corner inside the heart.

While I was standing there admiring her idea, she came and stood by me, hugging me with her arms from behind me. "You kissed my heart," she said softly.

"You felt it then." I whispered, kissing her forehead as I pulled her by her waist by my side.

"uh huh." She nodded. "Deep inside."

When we had completed the work, we showed it to our parents, not that they did not see it being completed every day. The final amount did go a tad bit over, but dad actually smiled. "You have done extremely well I must say. This is not too over the budget. I had anticipated a lot more extra expense." He smiled. "And it does look professional, not just good and new. Well done guys." Our parents looked at us with pride.

We both were chuffed. We were thrilled about our success with our first real project. There were lessons we had learned in hindsight. Nevertheless, the most important thing that had happened was Sam and I had gotten closer to each other.

We got one more surprise - dad decided to 'pay' us our labour charge for the makeover. "You did it out of the goodness of your heart, without being prompted and without any expectation of reimbursement. I feel you deserve some remuneration for your hard work."

He had paid us both full-time wages for the hours we had spent working on the project. In addition, he gave a generous 'tip' for being such good kids. Mom and dad looked at us with complete admiration and we both were thrilled beyond words.

"This is way better than any work placement." I exclaimed. "We enjoyed the work and got paid for it." I laughed.

Sam and I hugged dad and mom and we enjoyed a lovely meal that evening.

We had installed an audio surround system for the TV with built in USB audio player in the receiver. I had purchased the speakers on the internet. Sam had selected a nice unit to house the entire media centre. We had digitised all of mom and dad's CD collection. The bookshelf was redecorated with glass doors. We had also managed to change the sofa to an L-shaped corner unit stretching the entire width of the lounge in front of the TV. There were two recliners built-in the sofa and Sam had loved the lounger-style end corner unit. We could seat five people in the lounge now.

Once the makeover was done, we all loved enjoying the new sofa. Sam would love to sit with me reclined in the lounger and then plonk herself in front of me reclining back on my chest. Dad loved his recliner and mom got used to it soon enough. "This is the life." Dad remarked occasionally when he relaxed after meals.

"It is really comfortable, isn't it?" Mom agreed with him. "Nice work you two."

Sam would feel chuffed and I would snuggle her while she cuddled close to me on the lounger.

Occasionally Sam had fallen asleep lying on me - sometimes on her back with my arms around her tummy, her hands pressed on my hands, or sometimes she would turn and lie on my chest, her head on my shoulder or nuzzled in my neck, her feet intertwined in mine and I would be holding her in a soft embrace. Her tender warmth would feel so loving against me at such times. I would not want to move all night. Seeing her sleep so peacefully in my arms would be such a complacent moment.

Mom would often throw a blanket on us before she and dad went to bed.

"I will carry her up later," I used to quietly whisper to mom.

I used to stay there for a while until such time I could feel Sam stir up. Sometimes she did not, so then I carried her in my arms to her bed.