I hummed in concentration as I perused the new menu at Blu.

To think I would find myself in this restaurant again. I couldn't help the little grin from my face, snorting at the luck and chances with a shake of my head. Did some of the servers remember me from that time- the girl who broke his heart and the boy in his father's suit that took hers and cradled it close?

"Hm?" I looked up from the menu at Frank's serious gaze. "Is there something wrong?" Before I could reply, he rushed out- "We could go elsewhere. I was a recommended by a friend, from business. I can-"

"Frank, whoa. Calm down." I laughed uneasily. "It's not like that. I like this place. Don't worry. I was just... reminiscing. Fond memories and all."

He exhaled, smiling shakily. "Oh. That's good. Great."

"Good." I tilted my head and he continued to ramble. I've never known Frank to be a rambler; even in his little quips and stories, I've known my mother's boyfriend to be natural with his charisma.

"If you like this place, I know I will love it," he continued. "I trust your tastes implicitly."

He said it with such conviction that I just couldn't take it anymore. Ever since he said last week he was going to be in the city for work and was hoping to have dinner with me (and subsequently show him some of the sights and catch up), I just shrugged on it. But since we met this morning, he hasn't been himself.

Too much blinking, a sweat or two, and now rambling.

"Are you okay?"

"Y-yes, of course I'm fine."

"You do know that I know you're lying, right? Frank, you're sweating like you know the nuclear codes and you've got fun fingers and poor impulse control."

Frank smiled poorly, sighing. "Your mother is the same. I'm very good in business with my poker face that clients insist I play poker with them, if not for the sole reason they want to see how it holds up. But your mother's good at seeing bullshit when she sees it. Reads me like a book. It's one of the things I adore about your mother. That I know I will always adore about her."

I twisted around my perfectly lined up cutlery. Unsure how else to approach this topic than spearheading through it, I asked. "Frank... are you here to personally tell me you're breaking up with my mother for some reason? Because as a child of divorce-"

"No!" He cursed in Italian. A sharp spit of a word that he immediately made a sign of the cross for, looking up as he apologized to who I guess is his mother, before turning back to me, half apoplectic. "Sorry, sorry. It seems like such a curse to have in the universe when I am here to ask for the opposite."

"The opposite?"

"Nadine, my dear." His solemn voice took precedence, taking my hands in his. My eyebrows rose infinitely into my hairline. "I am here to ask you for permission as I would love nothing more than to marry your mother. You and your brother are her crowning joy and love. You are the eldest, so I ask you first."

"Oh." I blinked, mouth agape before I could stop myself. "Oh my God. Yes. Yes, of course, I- Congratulations!" I stood up as he started laughing, relief and joy sparkled the formerly nerve wrecked man.

"Thank you for asking, oh, I can't wait, when? How? The ring, have you picked it yet?"

"Of course, of course. It'll be sometime, I want to give your mother the wedding she wants though she has told me she'd prefer a wedding at city hall, and I am all for it. I do not care much for the location, and we are city people and no longer at a tender age, why not? I am going to propose on Valentine's Day- it is cliche, I know."

He held up his hands at my pursed lips, but the man was grinning. Behind each word was a guy who was already planning the wedding of his dreams. "But I know it would surprise her. Would not see it coming, hm? And the ring, of course, I have with me, for luck. Safekeeping. You want to see?"

"Of course!"

When we've finally settled back down, my mother's future engagement ring in my hands- piercing dark ruby, oval and set in a thick gold rim and band, passed down from the last five generations in Frank's maternal family - I couldn't wait. Dinner seemed almost like an afterthought, hashing out minute details of a wedding to come.  

Time sped by so fast, it felt like it was eating away at my days, my hours. I spent so much of it preparing for graduation, for my dissertation piece, finishing workload to breaking up lectures; not everyday was fun. Some days included breaking down for an hour or two between a class and eating half a casserole for lunch just so I could cope. Dried my eyes, got a fresh slab of lipstick on, and finished the rest of the day.

Time ate and ate, and there were days where I get to spend with my favorite people, days where I could squeeze in the quickest 15 minutes before someone had to speed off to a lecture hall, or spent a whole all-nighter with Esther where we came out half zombie, half psych unit patient, full student- to a new extreme and finished the last of our required papers (my dissertation, her thesis).

When the bound copies came, there were tears and exhales between champagne bubbles and cold pizza.

I saw less and less of Bucky. As far as plates go, he was more or less buried in them. I remember the use of the word 'entombed' and the regaling note: and not in a fun way. Not to mention his entire major's thesis assessment broke the last few people that weren't already bent and shattered anew.

When we did find each other free, it was a sporadic display of togetherness, brought on by a tenderness only of two careful and anticipating people could have; of drives to his favorite diner on the lonely road between the rest of New York and Long Island, with the windows rolled down and our phone galleries fat with skies of every color, greased stained lips, and the scent of too strong coffee.

Impromptu dancing on the rooftop of my building because he was spending so many hours bent and cracked over his drafting table that I started seeing mushrooms and moss grow over him (which he refuted but thought would be an epic burial, and it was truly the twice mention of death that had the concern rising)- and he spun me, and I tipped him, twice because I was unsuccessful the first time and nearly gave him a concussion.

He was a good sport and the hickey on the corner of his Adam's apple was a personal achievement.

It was long conversations on the fire escape of his department's building, dancing the topics between deep talks about the terrifying thought of being, the existence of so many in a packed city and how lonely it could be, to easy chatter about the many different fixations Bucky had as a child to his teenager years (he enjoyed rocks, thought he was going to be geologist one day before realizing it was kind of boring to, after finding out his older sister Leia was getting into knitting, became competitive about it, and both made knitted stuffed dolls for Hermoine on her birthday) (he "lost" by a thin margin).

The topic bounced and pulled, until we found ourselves to all the boys I may or may not have loved before.

"This is a dangerous conversation," I said, swinging my legs on the edge of the railing. Bucky said I was too much of a daredevil for his taste, citing horrible endings sitting on the edge of the railing could go wrong, and was comfortably sitting ten inches away from the edge.

"It isn't. I'm not the jealous type."

"Doen't make it any less dangerous?"

"I'm also genuinely curious about your type."

"Dangerously curious." I notched an eyebrow. He flashed me an impish smile to go with his wavy hair that bent at every wind, his hands that wandered over my hands, my knuckles, my arms. Sending goosebumps in their travels as if trying to find the bones of me. Imprint it on his brain, the way he hummed just like when he was figuring out semantics in his plates. The possibility before the calculations.

"It's just a type." He shrugged, his hands kneading through my wrist and veins. He found a pressure point and at the groan, continued moving his thumbs around it. Fascinated and distracted, one ear on what I have to say, another on how my body moved to his touch. "I want to know everything about you. In a very disturbing metaphor, I want to crawl into your skin and understand everything underneath. Like a sick little bug. Or typhoid fever."

"I can't tell whether that's sweet or sick, Gillian Flynn."

"We can call it both." He dared to move closer, shuffling awkwardly as the grate moved with him, wincing all the while until he was comfortably close to my body that he could wrap me in his arms and nuzzle his face against the corner of my neck.

I laughed, unable to stop myself from melting in his arms. "That and sleep deprivation."

"That too, very much."

"I'm just glad your cousin made dinner for you." I carded my fingers through his hair. He smelled like detergent I recognize and a cuddling scent that could lull a siren into quieting.

"Force-fed me dinner more likely." Warm breath tickled my collarbone until I felt the soft press of his lips on my skin. I shuddered lightly, contrast to the violent calmness it brought me. He repeated the action, moving along lazily as if he was making patterns. A constellation of want in the shape of his mouth.

"How is that your med student cousin has a more well-adjusted schedule and eating habits than you?"

"He's always been more well adjusted, it comes with knowing the threat of bad habits." He tilted my chin to press a languid kiss there, on my mouth, eliciting a sigh and a stronger grip on his arm. "Plus, you forget, he's in his third year of med school. It's like dog years inside once you've crawled past the first year. He's technically-" he paused for breath, for an incapacitating kiss, a thumb on my chin, tilting me up and up so he could kiss me better. So I could do the same. "-a well adjusted elementary kid. You can leave him alone with the pizza place's number and a decently stocked fridge full of liquids and he's golden."

"Disturbing." I grinned against his lips while he chased the word from my mouth.

Talks about all and nothing, the hanging thread of our relationship looming between us. There was no certainty, not yet. We proposed to wait on it until the very end, making our futures our first priority. Because he wanted the best for me in the same way I wanted for him; because he would wait for my answer and I would wait for his question. Properly. Sincerely.

Doesn't mean the sweet talking while I covered myself in his warmth, memorized his scent, imprinted his skin against my own, should stop. He was addicted to me as I was with him.

"What were we talking about?" He asked, half a tone breathless.

"Nothing." Everything.

"Make out?"

"Why not?"

My final art project for my final year hung with the rest of my peers on the renown gallery of the Arts Building's hallway. It only felt right to wear a dress of my own creation alongside possibly my final art piece collection. A caramelized pink dress, close to coral, in a velvet fabric with delicate lace pieces I found in an old negligee, deconstructed to emphasize on the femininity.

It was the exact shade of the pinkish hue I used when I was adding texture to the art pieces. Also a deconstructed show of random parts of multiple human bodies. One of each person I love.

My mother's lips, her chin, in her signature smile that was a touch mischievous at the edges, the fine lines that shown her age. My baby brother's ear, the graze of his gold hair and the green edges of his iris as he looked on. The hint of freckles that gets darker during summer. My father's shoulder, roped in sinew and muscles and sun spots. The solid lines of Frank's shoulder, his frame, so different from my father's lank. Nika's soft cheeks, the edges of an amused smile and the dimple that's been passed down from her great, great grandmother.

Esther's trio of moles on the corner of her thumb and forefinger. Ella's birthmark on the elongation of her ankle, shaped like an anatomically correct heart. Claudia's back, the shape of her hard bones and soft skin, her black dreads carefully swept to one side.

My girls. The boys were no better.

Ross' eyes, the milky way contained in two center circles and the crowd of lashes that could launch a thousand ships. Another piece of his hip and torso, twisted in a seating position akin to a Greek statue of a hero curled in on himself. A controlled mess of shades and lines. Shadows and every color on an effervescent light.

And then the boy that my hands knew before my heart.

There was the multitude shades of black and blue of his hair. The corner of his nose and eye of the two moles that my lips had traced. One hidden on his eyelid. The sinew and strength, elegance and absolute sexiness that are Bucky Choi's hands and arms. The stylish movement of each finger as it worked magic in charcoal and pale paper. On pen and pencil.

Parts of him, the corners and niches, strung up and framed by the people I adore. It was sentimental. Cheesy. And I didn't care. I was proud of it. It hung proud in a sea of students and faculty, in intellectual conversation to the stupidest commentary of Marx I've ever heard.

A tug on my hand made me turn and look up from my date's impervious gaze.

He smiled, soft and becoming before he leaned close to my ear and whispered, "Are you happy?"

I laughed, whispering back on my tip toes as his hands automatically went to my waist to help me, "Exceptionally. Why are we whispering? You smell like cognac."

"Dean Fisher gave me a swing, he's packed a separate vodka bottle. It was either the vodka or cognac. I haven't tried cognac yet so."

"What's the verdict?"

His breath tickled my ear. "I'm going to be honest with you, I had to give it a shot two more times to really know, but now I'm a little hammered so I can't really say."

I laughed loudly, head thrown back before I pressed my fingers to my mouth, eyes bright and reflective of the heart on my sleeve. "Oh God, I think I love you."

He grinned, tipping me back, hand on the back of my head, and a kiss that swept my nerve endings from top to tip broke the remnants of fear and strength.

I started hearing boo's before I was upright again, hiding against Bucky's coat.

"They're in love," Ella sung.

"Disgusting," Esther crooned.

"Exactly. And you owe me forty bucks," Ross said.

"This is why we're all single," Claudia said. "It's the bitterness."

Esther snorted. "Amen to that if nothing else."

"Let's go out," Bucky whispered against my hair, then loudly, "We're leaving you single folks for a bit!"

"Boo!"

"Don't do anything I wouldn't do!"

"Wrap it before you tap it!"

"You all suck!" I shouted back, hand in his as we got out to the muted chaos of a city breathing at night. Suckling in air like it was fresh, Bucky shrugged off his coat to place it on me, pulling me close to the hem of his sleeve before he pulled out a piece of paper from it's inner pocket.

"What's that?"

"It's for you." A playful tone. A concealed nervousness. "Mind reading it carefully before getting back to me?"

"What?"

But I pulled the paper apart and squinted at the black letters. I started laughing.

NADINE 'NADDY' LYNCH (Henceforth known as Party A), of sound, mind and body, agree to go on the project of a lifetime. This transformation, entitled, 'MAKE NADINE LYNCH HAPPY SUBSEQUENTLY MAKE BUCKY HAPPY BY BEING STUPIDLY IN LOVE AND TOGETHER', will be curated by BUCHANAN 'BUCKY' CHOI (Henceforth known as Party B), of sound, mind and body, will entail as follows

-Official relationship status, i.e. boyfriend/girlfriend, very third grade.

-Definitely long term relationship

-To assure, understand, compromise, and love the other party.

-Promise to choose the other party every morning for the time that the party allows. To wake up loving her and to sleep knowing I am loved by her

To ensure these achievements, I agree to do ANYTHING party A tells me to do, knowing and understanding that she understands my position and what I want to achieve from it. With my welfare cared for in her mind, and vice versa, we understand each other's limits and things we excel at (i.e. my hands and mouth apparently, I'm joking maybe I should delete this lol)

Falling in love with each party is a must, I'm afraid. Sorry, I'm writing this at four am, I'm trying to be cute.

Anyway.

Said contract will last until all parties are satisfied.

(I love you, if you still don't get it yet).

"I don't think this will hold up in court," I teased, and I'm laughing and I think I'm crying, and god, do I love him. I do.

He was grinning, impish. Sexy. Nervous. "You'd be surprised."

"Do you have a pen?"

FIN.