One Night Stand, Eight Surprises: Pampered by My CEO Husband --- - Chapter 175: Chapter 175

The hallway buzzed with quiet music and half-closed doors. The scent of fresh paint mingled with candle wax, old books, and the faintest tinge of nostalgia.
The house—always full—felt different.
It wasn’t empty.
Just... preparing.
One by one, the heirs were moving out. But before they did, each claimed a day to redo their rooms. To paint, redecorate, purge, or preserve—however they needed to mark the ending of a chapter.
No rules. No help. Just time.
And memories.
Julian played piano softly as he pulled old posters off his walls—faded jazz icons, scribbled sheet music, a festival flyer signed by strangers who felt like home for a weekend.
He rearranged his shelves so the records faced the window.
“Why now?” Damien asked, leaning against the door.
“Because I want to remember the light,” Julian said. “The way it hits Miles Davis at 3 p.m.”
Damien nodded. “That’s how you frame memories. Not in gold. In light.”
Skylar stripped their room bare.
The collages came down first—snapshots of identity, transition, courage, and community. Then the wardrobe. The pins. The mirrors.
They repainted everything white.
A blank canvas.
Arielle brought tea and didn’t say a word until Skylar finally whispered, “I need a room that isn’t telling me who I was.”
Arielle just said, “Then paint it however you need to become.”
Amara transformed hers into a dance studio.
Mirrors. Barre. Soft gray paint.
She rolled up the rug and danced barefoot in silence until sweat soaked her back and tears blurred her reflection.
Micah came in and watched.
“You building a shrine?” he joked.
“No,” she said. “A cocoon.”
He didn’t ask more. He just handed her a water bottle and sat cross-legged in the corner until her music faded.
Micah lined his room with vines.
Live ones.
He hung planters from the ceiling. Replaced his bookshelf with terrariums. Glued poetry to the dresser drawers—some his, some ancient.
When Arielle stepped inside, she whispered, “It feels alive in here.”
“It has to be,” he said. “Because I want to remember what growing looks like when the world outside forgets.”
Aiden kept every award.
Lined the wall with old debate trophies, model UN plaques, and handwritten campaign fliers. But in the center of it all, he mounted a corkboard.
Empty.
Julian came by and raised an eyebrow. “Statement?”
Aiden nodded. “Future accomplishments.”
Julian smiled. “Arrogant.”
“Optimistic,” Aiden corrected.
Leila boxed up her books, every single one, and labeled them: To teach again.
She painted her room a soft lavender, hung quotes from her favorite students, and left one wall blank.
Damien helped tape the edges.
“What’s going here?”
“Pictures of the kids I haven’t met yet,” she said. “My future classroom.”
He swallowed a lump in his throat and didn’t speak until he left the room.
Eli installed programmable LED lights in every corner.
Their room became a galaxy. One night red, the next indigo, always shifting. They brought in a projection globe, speakers, a soft bean bag, and declared the room a sensory haven.
“I need a space where the world can’t touch me,” they said.
Arielle kissed their forehead. “Then build that sanctuary.”
Ava turned hers into a scrapbook.
Photos. Drawings. Childhood clothes she couldn’t part with hung from ribbon. She hand-painted the timeline of her life along one wall like a vine, with each leaf holding a memory.
She cried over a tutu from her first recital.
And laughed at a broken tiara from her fifth birthday.
At the top of the timeline, in gold:
“Bloom where you’re planted.”
On the last night before the first child left, the house gathered.
Arielle lit candles.
Damien poured wine.
And they walked room to room—no fanfare, no commentary—just presence.
Each door opened to a different version of goodbye.
And in every room, something sacred was left b
ehind.
Not clutter.
Not just memories.
But proof that this house had been a nest.
And now... the wings were stretching.
Wide.
And ready.