with love, always, michael clifford

vacation with the faucheauxs.

"Mr. and Mrs. Faucheaux?"

Asteria Clifford slowly opened her front door in her early morning pajamas. She wore pajamas with a light purple plaid design on them, and a white padded lululemon tank top – Her messy dirty blonde hair cascaded down her shoulders.

It was quite an odd thing to see Mr. and Mrs. Faucheaux at her door, barely passed 8 am.

"Good morning, Asteria," Mr. Faucheaux greeted her with a bright smile on his face. "Mind if we come in?"

Asteria stood for a moment, but nodded and stepped aside. As the two parents walked in, she caught eyes with Casper, who was behind his parents with a slightly annoyed look on his face.

"Is your father home?" Mrs. Faucheaux asked.

"Yeah – he's in my garden," Asteria pointed to the back door.

"We're going to go speak to him for a little while. Casper, stay here and wait. Maybe you two can go hang out in Asteria's bedroom."

Asteria put on a fake smile as the two parents left the room. After they had walked to Michael, She dropped her fake smile and let out an annoyed sigh, turning to the smugly smirking teenager on the couch.

Asteria hadn't spoken to Casper since the dinner at his house a week ago – due to the redness on her freckled cheeks after the fact. It was embarrassing and she hoped to never face him again.

"What are you doing here?" Asteria asked.

Casper simply shrugged. "I don't know," He said, "My parents woke me up, told me to change, and demanded I come with them. Oh and, cute pajamas."

Asteria glanced down at her pajamas and backed up at him with narrowed eyes. "Mind I remind you that it's the weekend. And it's 8 am. I am going to be wearing pajamas in my own house, Casper."

"I'm not judging, Asteria," Casper raised his hands in defense. A moment later, he stood and stretched his body whilst saying – "Care to show me your bedroom?"

Asteria pressed her lips into a sarcastic smile and said. "Aren't you annoying?"

Asteria turned around and made a gesture for Casper to follow her up the staircase and into her bedroom. She didn't want to show Casper her bedroom – but what choice did she really have?

"Aren't you cranky?" Casper shot back as he followed Asteria.

When they entered her bedroom, his eyes darted around the room – admiring how she had put everything up.

It was a very well decorated bedroom. It wasn't messy, but it wasn't clean. She had notebooks scattered on her desk with pens and pencils sitting on top of the college ruled paper. Her bed covers were pushed back – like she had just rolled out of bed. The door that led to the "balcony", which really was just a door with a small fence in front of it, was slightly open and was letting the sea air inside.

Casper took notice of the surfboard on the wall. Asteria knew he surfed, but she did as well. Casper lifted his finger and asked, "Is that your surfboard?"

"Yes," Asteria replied shortly as she sat back on her bed.

"Is it for decoration? Or do you actually surf?" Casper looked at Asteria who was looking at her surfboard.

As Asteria looked back at Casper, he couldn't help but notice the color of her eyes. Of course, he had looked into her eyes at least once in his life, but this was different. She had a glimmer of the stars inside of her eyes, along with the sun shimmering in through the opened door directly into her eye at the right angle.

It made Casper freeze.

Fuck. Casper thought, bringing his lips in between his teeth. I should hate you, Asteria Clifford.

Casper found himself cursing his thoughts. He was fucking stupid for being so captivated in those gorgeous dark green eyes and those stupid purple pajamas. And not to mention – he was now aware of the fact she surfed.

"No, I do surf." Asteria said, looking at Casper. "I have for a while. You do too, right?"

Asteria should hate this man. With all of the bullshit he put her through, all of the teasing that she endured – but the way his tongue swiped the bottom of his lip and the way his fingers ran along his jawline – had her mesmerized.

Has his jawline always been that sharp?

"I do, yeah," Casper replies, still biting his lips and slowly sitting down in Asteria's desk chair. He watched as her lips slightly quivered into a smile.

"Wow," She huffs. "Who knew a ghost could surf?"

Casper then rolls his eyes with a small snort. "Fuck you."

10 minutes after the awkward silence and both Casper and Asteria calling themselves idiots for everything they had just felt, they were called down to the living room. Asteria saw Michael, her father, leaned against the counter with a cup of coffee in his hand, laughing.

"Asteria," Michael hummed softly. "Morning."

Asteria simply nods to her father and stands in the middle of the two sets of parents. Asteria stands near her father, and Casper stands more near his parents – but the two are necessarily beside each other.

"We hope we didn't wake you, love," Mrs. Faucheaux said quickly. "I'm terribly sorry. We probably shouldn't have knocked so many times,"

Asteria waved them off. "Don't apologize." She insists. "I have to work today anyway, so I should've been up—"

"Sorry honey, I called you out of work today," Michael interrupted – causing the two teenagers' heads to turn to his head, collective confusion on each face.

"What?" She spit, "What are you talking about? I-I promise Henry—"

"Henry?" Casper interjected.

"—That I would help him train today! I can't skip," Asteria spoke quickly, stammering over her words while Casper's eyebrows knitted together, trying to figure out who Henry was.

"I'm sorry," Michael repeated the word sorry, frowning. "We have important plans today. You can't work,"

Asteria found herself a little irritated by the sudden change in plans. She crossed her arms over her chest, glancing at the couple across the kitchen island, "What plans?"

Michael paused. Took a sip of his coffee that was in his hands and spoke. "Mr. and Mrs. Faucheaux have invited us to their vacation house an hour away! One near our vacation house. How ironic?"

"Why?" Casper spoke for Asteria.

"Well," Mrs. Faucheaux stepped in. "Since summer is beginning, we thought it might be an experience to go on vacation together! So, in summary, the 6 of us are going on vacation on Monday!"

Asteria and Casper's jaws both dropped down to the floor, glancing back at each other and then stammering over their words in unison.

Apollo, who had been sitting on the couch and pretending to watch some lame ass children cartoon, but was really listening to the conversation, spoke silently through his lips on the couch.

"Awkward."