Harry and I flew back to the twin cities the next day. When we were cleared to use our electronics, Harry called home to see how the kids were doing. He reached a very frazzled sounding Charlie. I didn't hear the entire conversation, but I could hear the distress in his voice through Harry's phone.

"Don't worry, brother, we'll make it up to you," Harry laughed as he said good-bye to Charlie. Then he turned to me, "We'd better buy them a bottle of wine on the way home. And maybe take them out for dinner. And maybe give them a weekend away."

"Do I want to know?" I asked, cringing.

"Apparently, Danny learned how to take his diaper off and is determined to start toilet training. But he hasn't quite found the toilet yet."

"Oh, my gosh!" I laughed. "I hope this experience doesn't turn them off from wanting their own kids!"

When we arrived, things were much more orderly than they had sounded on the phone. Harry went straight to the kitchen to pour four glasses of the champagne we had picked up on the way home. He gave the girls cups of white grape juice, and Danny got a sippy cup.

"Well, the first toast goes to Charlie and Courtney for surviving a crash-course in parenting," Harry laughed.

After we had all taken a drink, Harry said to Charlie, "Well, that's the big news. We just went away so you and Courtney could get your feet wet."

Charlie gave Harry a menacing look and said, "Uh, no, Harry. I know you have a bigger announcement than that! Don't forget, I have been your brother for twenty-four years!"

"Oh, all right," Harry sighed, dragging the last few words. "I've signed a recording contract with Urbane Records!"

Charlie and Courtney cheered and practically knocked Harry over with their hugs and congratulations. Then the kids enveloped Harry tightly, even though they had already hugged the two of us a million times since we walked in the door.

"Congratulations, Daddy!" Aurora said politely. She and Grace understood what being signed by a record company meant, but Rachael looked confused.

Charlie squatted down to her level and said, "That means your daddy is going to be a rock star like Justin Bieber!"

Rachael made a funny face and said, "I don't like Justin Bieber!"

"Who do you fancy then?" Charlie asked her.

"Katy Perry!"

Charlie laughed and said, "Well your daddy is going to be famous like Katy Perry!"

Rachael's eyes grew as wide as saucers while Harry said, "Well, I don't know about that, love. But I will get to make records and maybe do some concerts."

Harry could hardly contain his excitement when he called my parents to tell them the good news, but when we got Ryan on Skype, that was the most entertaining of all. I swear that they screamed like little girls when Harry broke the news to Ryan, but they denied it.

Harry didn't have much time at home. He had to fly back to LA by the end of the week to start working. He didn't have an exact schedule planned out just yet, but he thought he would be able to make it home every week or two. I didn't look forward to the long-distance relationship, but I had promised Harry I would hold down the fort while he pursued his dream.

"I love you, babe," I said, wrapping my arms around his torso and squeezing tight. We were standing at the curb of the airport terminal once again. I leaned my head against his chest and I could hear his heart beating in spite of the airport chaos.

"I love you, too," he said, kissing the top of my head. "And I'll see you next weekend, all right?"

I looked up and he gave me one more long and deep kiss. That was one thing about Harry – he was never embarrassed by public displays of affection. Since we'd been together, I'd grown more comfortable with them, too.

I waved good-bye as he disappeared into the terminal. As I drove away, my heart sunk. This was going to be harder than I thought.

Luckily, I had a lot to keep my mind occupied with four children, trying to sell a house and supervising the initial renovations of our "new" house. Since we'd been able to close on the new house quickly, Harry and I had decided we needed to move by the end of the summer. We wanted the girls to be able to start in their new schools at the beginning of the school year instead of trying to transfer them later.

The children loved coming with me to watch the developments on the new house. One afternoon, we visited the girls' new school before going over to check in on the new house.

Aurora was starting fourth grade, Grace would be in third, and my little Rachael was already going to start kindergarten. I put Danny in the stroller and led my troops into the school. First we found Aurora's room and met her teacher, Mrs. Glover. She was sweet old woman who looked a bit like Granny from Looney Toons with a white bun in her hair and wire-rimmed glasses.

"Nice to meet you Aurora," Mrs. Glover said.

"Lovely to meet you," Aurora responded.

Mrs. Glover chuckled and replied, "You have very good manners, Aurora."

"My husband is British," I offered by way of explanation. "But Rory as always been very eloquent."

"So, you like to go by Rory, then?" Mrs. Glover asked.

Aurora nodded.

"And what are your names?" Mrs. Glover asked the other children.

"Grace, and I'm going into third grade," Grace responded.

"Good, you'll be right across the hall from your sister," Mrs. Glover explained. "And what about you?" She directed the question to Rachael.

"Kindagawten," Rachael said. "But I don't know who my teacher is yet."

"Well," Mrs. Glover said, "I think we still need to find a teacher for Kindergarten."

"Really?" I asked excitedly. "Are they still taking applications? My sister-in-law is a teacher and she's been looking for a new job. In fact, she and her husband are wanting to move to Lilywood."

"Well, I'm sure they're taking applications," she said. Then she lowered her voice to a whisper as if she was communicating some scandalous piece of information. "The teacher just up and left yesterday. No explanation whatsoever. How do you like that?"

"Great, well, I'll be sure to tell my sister-in-law about it. We'll look forward to seeing you in the fall," I said as we made our way across the hall to find Grace's teacher. However, we didn't find her in the class room, so we stopped in the front office before leaving. I wanted to make sure I had the correct details to pass along to Courtney.

I loaded everyone back into the van and drove the few miles to our new subdivision. It really was a lovely neighborhood. Children were outside riding their bikes and playing in sprinklers, and the trees offered a nice, breezy, shady alternative to the late summer sun.

We pulled up in front of our house and Mr. Malik's truck was there, as always. I left Danny in the car since he had fallen asleep in his car seat on the way over. I instructed Aurora and the other girls to keep an eye on him.

"Hello, Mr. Malik!" I said, happily eying the progress on the house. "How's the basement coming along?"

"It should be done by next week," he smiled. "And you can call me Zayn."

I laughed. "Okay, Zayn. I'm thrilled it will be done so soon. You really do great work!"

He seemed pleased with the compliment. He took me around the house and showed me some other improvements that he had finished. We were putting in all new windows and we were going to have the siding re-done as well. He and his crew had made a lot of progress.

"How do you do it?" I marveled. "You and your team are so fast. I've heard horror stories about constructions and renovations taking forever, but you're ahead of schedule. I'm impressed!"

"I'll tell you a secret. I work extra hard for clients that I like," he said with a wink.

I smiled with a slight blush. "Well, I hope you still like us after this entire renovation is done! We want to do a lot with this house. By the way, I keep meaning to ask where you're from. I can tell your accent is British, but it doesn't sound exactly the same as my husband's – he's from London."

"Oh, really?" Zayn asked. "Well, I've been in the US since I was a teenager, but I grew up in Bradford. I'll have to meet your husband some time then, won't I?"

"Hopefully you'll meet him. He's extremely busy and he's practically living in LA. He just signed a record deal with Urbane Records!"

"No kidding! That's great," Zayn said. "I wish him well."

"Thanks," I smiled, as Zayn brought me back around to his truck to inspect colors of siding. I got lost in the variety of colors and before I noticed what was happening, Zayn was handing me a sleepy, whiny Daniel.

"Oh, my goodness, thank you! Was he fussing?" I asked, letting Danny snuggle into my neck.

"Yeah, he was pretty cranky."

I looked around and didn't see the girls, so I made a mental note to give them a stern reminder to stay with their brother next time.

"Well, thank you again. My daughters were supposed to be watching him. I really appreciate it." Then I turned my attention back to the siding samples. "I think I like this one," I said, pointing to a very pale sage green.

"That's a pretty popular one, but there's not too much of it in this neighborhood, so it will look nice here. You'll probably want some different accent colors, though, but I think I forgot the book that has those colors. It gives you some examples of which colors coordinate nicely."

"I can stop by your office some time," I offered.

"No, why don't I bring them to your house after work tonight? I can swing by my office, and I have another project out near your place, so I can just drop them off. Does that sound okay?"

"Yes! That would be perfect. I really should find my girls and get going. Thanks for everything, Mr., uh, I mean Zayn," I said smiling and waving as I went to locate my other children.

When we got home, I told the girls, "You should start thinking about how you want to decorate your rooms in the new house. There are six bedrooms, so you will each get your own room."

Rachael got a little pout on her face and asked, "Do I have to have my own room?" She asked. I knew she might be a little nervous about sleeping on her own.

"Well, you can always have sleepovers with your big sisters, if you don't like having your own space," I said, giving Aurora and Grace a wink. Rory just rolled her eyes, but she didn't say anything. Being the oldest, she had craved her own room for a long time. But I was proud of my daughter – she was always so gracious with her younger sisters. I suspected that might change as she reached the teenage years, but for now, I made a point to praise her for it.

"Here," I said, pulling some home decorating magazines out of a kitchen drawer. "Look through these to get some ideas. You can pick any colors you want. And you get to help paint!"

The three girls happily went off to peruse the magazines together. But Danny stayed at my feet, saying "Mama! Mama!" I picked him up and he clapped and then snuggled into my shoulder.

"You're gonna have your own room, too, you know," I said. "What do you want? Dinosaurs? Trucks? Trains?"

"Tucks," he said. "Tucks!" He was now pointing to his toy box. I set him down in the living room so he could dig in his toy box, and I went back to the kitchen to start dinner.

I hadn't been in the kitchen five minutes when I heard a knock on the door. I wiped my hands and went to find Zayn standing on the doorstep.

"Hi Zayn! That was fast. Come on in, if you don't mind."

He followed me to the kitchen. I set down a glass of ice-cold lemonade in front of him while he spread out some samples for me to take a look through.

"I brought some flooring samples, too, because you mentioned putting in hard wood floors," he offered.

"Thank you!" I gushed. "That was so nice of you."

I took a sip of my lemonade as Danny came toddling in with one truck in each hand. He walked over to Zayn and handed one to him. Zayn took it, squatted down to Danny and then pretended to drive the truck all over the floor. Danny was tickled and couldn't stop smiling at his new playmate.

The truck game went on for several minutes, and then finally I distracted Danny by putting him in his high chair with a freeze pop.

"Sorry to interrupt your game," I said to Zayn. "But otherwise, you would have been here all day."

"No problem," he grinned. "I really love children."

"Oh, do you have kids?" I asked.

"Not yet. Still waiting for Mrs. Right, I guess," he said, chuckling. "Anyway, I'll leave you with those samples, and you can just bring them back to me tomorrow or whenever you come back to the other house."

"Sure thing," I said, walking him to the front door. "Thanks again!"

The next day, Courtney came over to help me pack for the move. I couldn't wait to tell her about the teaching position.

"Guess what?" I asked excitedly.

"You're pregnant!" She practically shouted.

I furrowed my brows at her and said, "No! We're not exactly attempting that right now. If you hadn't noticed, things are a little busy." But then I laughed and said, "The girls' new school is looking for a Kindergarten teacher!"

"Really? I thought I knew about every job opening for 50 miles around!"

"It sounds like the teacher just left without notice, so they need someone for the start of the new year. They might not have even posted it yet."

"Wow, that sounds awesome!" Courtney agreed. "I'll call when I get home."

"No, you'll call now!" I insisted with a smile. I pulled out my cell phone and pulled up the school's number, which I had already conveniently saved. I handed the phone to Courtney.

She pushed the call button and waited. "Hi, my name is Courtney Styles. I understand you have a Kindergarten teaching position open."

She listened for a moment and then it sounded like she was transferred because she gave the next person the same introduction. She listened for a few more minutes and then said, "Yes, of course. Tomorrow at 10:00 is perfect!"

When she hung up, she squealed like a little girl and then she told me, "I have an interview at 10:00 tomorrow!"

"They will love you! And if you get the job, you'll be Rachael's teacher!"

We spent the better part of the day loading up boxes while fending off children. The older girls were really helpful with the younger ones, but by mid-afternoon, the tension was high. I took Danny and put him down for a nap, and then I gave the girls permission to watch a movie in the basement where it was cooler than the main floor, even though the air conditioning was running full blast.

Courtney and I made lots of progress on packing, but by the end of the day, we were exhausted. I decided to order pizza for dinner and I asked Courtney to stay since Charlie often worked late.

"Charlie is coming home for dinner tonight, so I think I'll go home," she said, winking.

"Okay, see you! Let me know how the interview goes tomorrow."

I settled the kids down with pizza and then I called Harry. I was feeling selfish, and I didn't want to share with the kids, so I didn't tell them I was calling him.

"Hey, babe, I miss you," I said.

"Yeah, miss you too," he said quietly.

"We got a lot of packing done today. And guess what? Courtney is going to interview for a teaching job at the girls' new school!"

"Wow, that's exciting!" He agreed.

"Oh, and Zayn is going to finish the basement ahead of schedule. He's making a ton of progress."

"Who's Zayn?" Harry asked.

"Harry! Who else would be working on our basement?! Zayn Malik! The contractor who's busting his butt on our new house!"

"Oh, yeah. Sorry. I'm just really tired."

"I know, babe. Are you getting a lot of work done?" I asked.

"Singing my heart out," he chuckled.

We chatted a little more and then reluctantly said good-bye, promising to Skype soon.

I missed him like crazy.