〖 chapter eight 〗
home sweet home, captain

Celine Darling had her eyes focused on the street ahead of her. The aviators she was wearing keeping the sun out of her eyes as she moved over the road. Her hands wrapped around the wheel that belonged to her 2014 Jeep Wrangler, a car she had decided on many months ago as she had always wanted to have a jeep and since she had enough money to get the jeep she did this year. Her fingertips were drumming on the silicone wheel to the music that flowed into the air through the radio.

"Look at me now, I'm falling," Celine whispered to herself, her fingers beating down harder and harder as she bobbed her head slightly to Somebody To You from The Vamps. She was enjoying the trip she had been forced to, sun beating down on her as she turned her head slightly to see the sign indicating she was driving into Miramar. The known fightertown in California, a town that was quite near to San Diego and belonged to it without being the main city.

Her foot pressed down onto the gas pedal, the engine making a sound as she let the car get faster with every passing second. The boxes that she had stuffed into the back of the jeep moving slightly as she stopped the navigation system from helping her. She knew the town well enough to find to the house near base belonging to her for 5 years, a house she had not visited since she had come back home from that mission. A mission she hoped she would be able to forget even though she was stuck in it.

Celine slowed a bit down as she turned on her indicator, she was stopping in front of a stop sign for a second before she turned to the right. She bit her lip softly as she got near the house, her pace slowing with every second until she drove into the small drive way. She stopped the car, her eyes focused on the teal coloured front of the house. She exhaled once as she shut the engine off. Continuing to sit in the silence of her car as she turned the radio low, her eyes focused on the hands that she had wrapped around the wheel. Celine inhaled deeply as she tightened her grip, her head leaning forward to meet the silicone so that she could stop thinking of the teal house that had so many happy memories and yet made her so sad.

Celine
I am at the house. Will let you carry all the heavy stuff, Old man.

Maverick
Don't fall while carrying them. Don't want you complain about it.

Celine did not even chuckle as she stared down at the smartphone in her hands. She sighed as she slowly raised her head, her hazel eyes looking over the top of her aviators. The sun shining down on the dark grey roof that seemed lighter thanks to the light reflection. The teal front staring at her as if it had been awaiting her. She needed to do a lot of work on the house before she could consider it a small home for herself and Pete.

Celine exhaled once, as she pressed her hand against the handle of her door. She settled her boots on the pavement, her eyes on the ground as she could feel eyes of the neighbours on her. She was not know by the few that were newer in the region and the few that remembered her could only see a broken girl that had lost the only parental figure she could look up to.

"Home sweet home," Celine whispered to herself as she stared at the house in front of her. She turned around to look back into the car, taking the key she had left in the ignition slowly out so she would not startle the cat she had in the passenger seat. Turning back to the house as she pressed a button that was on the smaller switch for the garage to open. Her hazel eyes sweeping over the many carton that were still stuck in it and had never left.

"A bit of work, don't you think, Captain?" she asked in a whisper to the spirit of the house. A house that she had been raised in after her parents did not have enough time for her, even her uncle had more time for her as a naval aviator than her parents had. A wavering smile on her lips as she sucked in a deep breath so she would not break for the whole street to see her.

"Let's get to work." Celine nodded to herself as she took the first few steps towards her home. The first few steps that would make her remember the good memories she had from her family, her uncle. A man she decided to call father instead of the man that had given her his genes. She leaned her head into the garage, her eyes flitting around until she saw few cobwebs and spiders hanging around. "Those will be Pete's problems." A smile on her lips as she left the garage and made her way to the front door that had been painted canary yellow by herself so that there would be a more happy colour than the teal on the front of the house she had lived in.

The key she had stuck into the lock turned as she used a bit of force, pushing the yellow door open. The air was as warm as you expected after many years of no one living in it and yet Celine knew that the house had been cleaned a few month before because she paid for it. She did not want the house to rot even she had the thought of never coming back. She walked into the house with enough confidence so she could open every window on the lower floor, letting fresh air flow into the rooms.

Celine walked into the small living room that had three windows at the side of the front. She stood before the windows, pressing her hands against the glass and slowly sliding each of them up to let air flow through the room. A soft smile on her lips as she numbered the winters in which she played with the snow outside while her uncle was able to watch her from the window without a care.

"Are you the owner of this house?" Celine heard a voice as she turned around to continue with the few house work she could do before she would have to take the packages she had in her jeep out and bring them into the house. She turned back, meeting the cold blue eyes of a lady with dark hair that was glaring at her with her arms crossed in front of her chest. Celine put up her sweetest and kindest smile on her lips before she could let her real expression make a stand.

"Yea, why?" Celine asked as she leaned her arms on the window on the right of the living room. Her hair falling on her shoulders. Celine had her hazel eyes set on the woman that still stood below her with so much hatred in her eyes that she probably though would scare Celine away.

"That house is obviously older than you and abandoned." Celine put a hand over her mouth as she smiled at the stupid words of the lady before her. A lady that was not much older than herself and yet seemed to think she had any right to speak about the house. "No one dares step into it except those people coming every three thumbs to clean it or something. Heard it belongs to a Navy dude and I want to speak to him about selling it to me."

"To you?" Celine asked, a snort escaping her as she let her hand fall from her face. The smile she had tried to keep to herself breaking out before she sucked her lips between her lips.

"Yes, me. I am a respectable woman married to a man in the Navy and had been eying this house since before we moved here and yet everyone told me that the man owning this house was not there to sell it to me. And you are obviously no man."

"Yet it belongs to me," Celine moved from the window, she was already so done with the conversation and did not want it to continue. She sighed as she moved out of the house and past the woman without a care, she could feel the burning blues of the lady, which she decided to name Karen as she had no knowledge of her name.

"It belongs to a man." Celine rolled her eyes as she opened the door to her passenger side and took the animal carrier out. She walked again past the woman and through the yellow door. She put the carrier of Nick onto the small coffee table before opening it so that the cat could be adventures in his new home.

"A man that is dead." Celine did not even consider her words or how they sounded. Her brain was overworked with the lady that had simply followed her into her own house, she did not consider that it sounded threatening or that she had practically spoken about her uncle in a bad way.

"So it belongs to no one?" Karen sounded hopeful.

"I told you lady." Celine turned to the woman as with narrowed eyes and anger burning her veins. Her hands turning into fists as she tried to cool herself down. "It belongs to me. I am the owner and I want you out of my house."

"I am gonna tell my husband about you, only people in the Navy are allowed to live here." Karen sounded serious as Celine pushed her out of the house and onto the small porch that wrapped around the right side of the house. The huffing of the woman did not escape Celine as she walked down the stairs and small way.

"Have fun with that!" Celine exclaimed as she waved at the lady with the brightest smile she had on her lips since she had been able to watch Maverick half-naked and working on the F-18 plane. "Want to meet him, from Navy man to Navy woman." Celine closed the door and sighed from exhaustion of the conversation.

The meowing at her legs calmed her down, her head bowing as she met the blue eyes of Nick. She knelled down, putting her hands under his arms and picking him up as she continued to meow, she let her fingers softly go through his fur to enjoy the calm before she had to go back outside and getting attacked by another of the newer neighbours.

"I know, Sweets, new people are annoying." The purring of Nick made her smile as he cuddled himself into her neck. Licking her jawline a bit before pressing his head against it. Celine giggled as she put the cat back down after she pulled a plastic back off, dust flowing all around her from under it and leaving Nick to settle down on it. "Stay put, okay?" A meow left the cat before she curled up in herself because she was hungry. "I am getting you something to eat, no worries."

Celine left the room after she pulled the plastic off the other furniture in the room. She took it with her and stuffed it into the small cabin in the hallway before she opened the yellow door again and decided to get the packages slowly after one another so she would not strain herself more than she probably already did. She moved slowly, heeding the words that Pete had texted her. He knew her too well and sometimes she hated that about him, most times she simply loved it because it made sure that they had an understanding with each other.

"Here you go." Celine smiled as she opened one of the cartons and pulled out the cat food she had prepared to take with her so that she would not have to stop in a grocery shop. She rattled the bowl she had found in the cupboards (and had of course once washed with water) and waited until Nick tattled towards her, stretching his legs to jump onto the counter were she sat the bowl of tuna. She let her hand go over his brown fur once again before deciding she had procrastinated long enough and needed to get the boxes out of her jeep before she decided to go anywhere in Miramar to enjoy the night before her first meeting with everyone else that had been called back to Top Gun, she also hoped to see the other faces she would be forced to spent time with for at least a few days.

"I should make Pete do this," Celine grumbled to herself as she carried another box into the house, slowly settling it down onto the couch. "But he would break his back, my Old Man." She did that until every single box that she had squeezed into the back of her jeep with Pete's help had been in the house of her childhood. After all he was gonna live with her (for the Navy it seemed to not indicated anything) but the two of them were used to the comfort of the other at night and would not stop simply because they were not in a house or apartment on their own.

"Do you agree, Nick?" Celine leaned down to rub her nose against the one of her nose only to get hit with the brown fur all over her face. Forehead against forehead as Nick pushed up further to show his affection for the lady that had taken such good care of him. "Your dad would break his back doing this." Celine pressed her lips against the head of Nick before she worked through every single box and put the things they needed into their respectful places. She knew she had to finish this before she would be able to take a shower and dress for a bar she had searched up a few minutes ago.

Celine
Going to the Hard Deck (it's a bar, Old Man). Will be waiting for you, Pete.