Kai

Our living room looks like a supply closet married to a thrift store, and they had very functional babies.

There's a turnout coat slung over the banister, two EMS bags under the coffee table, a pulse ox clipped to a succulent (her fault), and the shared trophy sitting smack in the middle of the mantel like it pays the mortgage. A faint ribbon of smoke smell lives in the couch cushions. A stethoscope naps over the back of a chair like a cat.

Also: my fiancée—no, not yet, Hart, don't sprint ahead—my woman, barefoot in my Station 4 tee, eight months pregnant and glaring at the framed plaque proof I picked up from the engraver today.

"Explain," Violet says, hands on her hips, belly out like a challenge coin I have definitely not stopped kissing. "Why does Hart appear before Sinclair on the commemorative mock-up?"

"It's a draft," I say, putting two mugs on the coffee table and trying to look innocent, which I have never once been. "A test. A conversation starter."

"Cool. Here's a conversation: fix it or die." She squints. "And why is there glitter on your ear?"

I wipe at the crime scene. "The mayor's wife hugged me. She had... festive nails."

"Mmm." She narrows her eyes, then softens around the edges the way she does when her brain admits it's in love before her mouth does. The tee rides up as she reaches for her cocoa. I have to look away to keep my heart from crawling out of my chest and surrendering unconditionally.

We tied the Games again today. Because of course we did. The town howled like a stadium and then handed us the same damn trophy to share for another year. We smiled. We bickered. We kissed behind the bleachers until Paige yelled, "I CAN STILL SEE YOU," which is a lie—she cannot—but we cleaned up our act and came home with our ridiculous chalice like the greediest raccoons in the county.

Violet sips, humming. "I still plan to take you down next year."

"You'll have a baby on your hip."

"Then I'll take you down with an audience."

"Rude." I grin. "Hot."

She hides a smile in her mug. The late sun casts a golden glow through the window, painting everything gold. I swallow the lump in my throat that's been there since she handed me her phone at the field, and the background lock screen was... us. Trophy room, last year. My hands on her cheeks. Her mouth on my mouth. Eyes closed. Happy as sin.

I'm so far gone it's medical.

"Hey," she says, softer now. "You okay?"

I nod because if I talk without preparation, I'll propose like a muppet. "Yeah. Got you something."

Suspicion lifts one brow. "If it's another test plaque, I will staple it to your... ego."

"Not a plaque." I nudge the trophy on the mantel. It wobbles—the same offended wobble as the first night in that cramped room—then settles. "A modification."

"You touched the holy chalice?" she deadpans, stepping close as I lift the lid. Her palm finds my chest like it's meant to live there. "How dare you?"

"Filed form 47-B," I lie. "Signed by a committee of one."

Inside the cup, nestled in red paracord like it's ready to rappel down my spine, is a small ring box. Black. Simple. Shaking in my hand because my hands are attached to me.

I don't kneel right away. Not because I'm a coward. Because she gasps and presses her knuckles to her mouth, and her eyes go shiny, and I need the moment to hit me—us—like a backdraft.

Then I go down on one knee in our messy, perfect living room. The only time I've willingly dropped like this, and not because she kicked my shin.

"Violet Sinclair," I say, and it still fries my circuits that I love saying her whole name, "I like losing to you. I like tying with you. I like you stealing my fries, my hoodies, and the best side of the pillow. I like that you bark orders, and I pretend to hate it. I like that you've turned my house into a triage bay, and I never want to clean it up."

Her laugh comes out broken and beautiful.

I open the box. The ring is simple—oval diamond, low profile, a band that won't fight with gloves. Firelight catches and throws tiny sparks at the ceiling. I've never been more nervous about anything than I was about choosing hardware for a woman who can carry a human out of a wreck but still side-eye a scuff on her boots. (Heels now. God help me. But boots will return.)

"I want forever with you," I say. "No more 'ish.' I want to fight you about alphabetizing every morning and then make up for it every night. I want to raise a tiny human who thinks we're both superheroes and learns very early that Sinclair absolutely comes before Hart—"

Her eyes flash. "It does."

"—except on Tuesdays," I add, because I'm brave and foolish. "Marry me, Vi. Be my partner on paper, in chaos, in bed, in every bet we'll keep losing and winning together."

She looks at me like I've just handed her the sun. Then her gaze drops to my knee on the rug, then to the ring, then to my face again, and she says, "Stand up."

My heart stops. "That's—uh—that's not a no?"

"It's a yes," she says, rolling her eyes, smiling like I'm oxygen. "But if you stay down there another second, I'm going to cry and then Henderson will drive by and... sense it, and we'll never recover."

I stand—shakier than any ladder—and slide the ring onto her finger. It seats like it was bored, waiting, smug. She watches it settle, then grabs my dog tags and hauls my mouth down to hers.

"Forever," she says against my lips.

"Forever," I echo, already lost.

***

Violet

I married trouble.

Okay, I haven't signed a single piece of paper yet—but the second that ring clicked home, I felt married in all the best ways: to his stupid laugh, to his steady hands, to the way he looks at me like I'm a sunrise he has the privilege to hold.

We're still arguing about the plaque, for the record.

"Trial compromise," I tell him, happy-tears drying, hormones moonwalking. "Top line: Sinclair. Bottom line: Hart. Font sizes are identical. Kerning noble."

He smirks, tugging me closer until my belly presses his. Our son (working title: Gremlin) gives a perfunctory kick, like he's a referee. "Deal," Kai says. "With an asterisk."

"Absolutely not."

"You didn't hear the terms."

"Don't need to. I reject 'asterisk' on principle."

"Fine. No asterisk. Footnote."

"Captain," I warn, and he laughs into my mouth, and that's how I end up pinned to the mantel by a man wearing soft sweats and a look that could light up the station.

He's careful with me. It makes me want to be feral.

"Bedroom," I say, but it comes out like bed—ah—room because his thumb is stroking just above my waistband and his mouth is finding my stubborn spots, the ones that make me forget what letters are.

"Copy," he murmurs against my throat.

We don't make it to the bedroom immediately because we trip over an EMS bag (my fault) and an air bottle (his fault), and then we're laughing, then we're kissing, then we're laughing while kissing, which is medically inadvisable and my favorite thing. When we finally tumble onto the bed, I straddle him—careful, he's careful, we're careful—and kiss him like I'm domestically violent with love.

"Mrs. Hart?" he tests, wicked, thumb grazing my ring.

"Absolutely not," I say, breathless. "Ms. Sinclair, who owns a permanent share of Hart."

"Sold," he says instantly, because he's learned.

He rolls with me, settles to my side, palms my belly with reverence that doesn't make me feel delicate—just precious. His eyes go soft; his mouth goes hungry; I swear if this man says you're beautiful one more time, I will cry into his sternum and that will be his fault.

"Do the thing," I demand, because I'm a poet. "The one I like."

"I require specificity," he says, eyes laughing.

"The hands," I say, and he obliges—callused, warm, remembering exactly how to touch me so I feel powerful and wanted and a little bit unglued. The heat we always carry for each other sparks fast; it always has. We kiss and tease and talk trash between breaths, and when we finally move together, it's that perfect, practiced wildness that belongs to us: greedy but gentle, urgent but easy, a language translated straight to the skin.

"Alphabetical," I whisper, just to hear him groan.

"Shared," he answers, low and wrecked, and somehow it's the hottest word I've ever heard.

Later—sweaty, smiling, my ring glinting on his shoulder as I sprawl on top of him like a dragon who has stolen her favorite hoard—there's a knock on the door. Three polite little raps that mean Henderson can't help himself.

"GO AWAY," we yell in unison.

"Just checking the structural integrity of the house after all that cheering," Henderson's voice calls, smug as a cat. "Paige says—oh, hey, did you two finally—"

Kai throws a pillow at the door. I snort laughter into his neck. Our son kicks once more like a high-five from the womb.

"Tomorrow," I say, softly, tracing the lines of his dog tags. "We'll tell them tomorrow."

"We can tell them now if you want," he offers, and it's sweet, and I'm tempted, but—"No," I say, kissing his jaw. "Let me be greedy a little longer. Just us. Just tonight."

"Captain and Ms. Sinclair, off-duty," he agrees.

We eventually relocate to the couch because pregnancy and gravity are friends, and the couch is Switzerland. We eat cold pizza. He engraves Sinclair + Hart on a practice plate with the tiny pen he kept from last year, then hands it to me with a look so proud I have to hide my face in his shirt for a second.

In the dim, with sirens far away and the trophy catching the glow from the streetlamp, we scroll the town group chat. Henderson has posted a blurry photo captioned "THEY'RE SUSPICIOUSLY QUIET, SEND HELP". Old Man Harper has replied, "I'M ON THE PORCH WITH BINOCULARS". Paige has added "IF YOU PUT 'MRS. HART' ON ANYTHING I WILL MAKE YOU DO BURPEES".

Kai types: Calm down. We're alphabetizing.

I add: And making out.

He adds: And she said yes.

The dots bloom like fireworks.

Paige: I KNEW ITTT

Henderson: I'M DRIVING OVER WITH A SIR—

Mayor's Wife: 💍🔥🔥🔥

Old Man Harper: DO YOU NEED AN
OFFICIANT I'M ORDAINED

Jess: pics or it didn't happen

Paige: NO PICS

Grandma Lois: 1 Corinthians 13—

Hardware Hank: Need ring resized? I can—

Coach Dean: Team workout canceled tomorrow. Your hearts have done enough reps.

I set my phone down and tuck into Kai's side. He kisses the top of my head like it's a signature.

"You sure about forever?" he asks into my hair, half-teasing, half-terrified.

I turn his face to me. "I'm sure about you. Forever is just... the easy name for it."

He smiles like a boy and a man at once. "Plaque argument again in the morning?"

"Obviously." I nudge his chin with the new sparkle on my hand. "And then we settle it."

"Bedroom?"

"Kitchen. Fridge has good leverage."

He wheezes, delighted. "God, I love you."

"I know," I say, smug, then softer: "I love you, too."

We fall asleep with the windows cracked to the summer hum, the trophy wobbling smugly on the mantel, our names etched side by side on a practice plate on the coffee table, and the baby giving a final little thump like, Hurry up, I want in on this circus.

Next year we'll tie again. Or we'll win. Or we'll lose. We'll argue about fonts and take turns being first. We'll make out in storage rooms and on stairwells and once, probably, on the roof when the stars are nosy.

But tonight—tonight we're exactly what we promised: tied for life.

And in the morning?

We head to the bedroom to "settle it." Again.

The End

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