Chapter Twenty 

It seemed almost impossible to announce the engagement, but finally Sophie and Keefe decided to take an hour before she had to go to work on that Monday to plan out how they were going to take on everything, at Keefe's apartment. 

"My meeting today is strictly between Bronte, Oralie, and I so the engagement shouldn't be reaching too many people just yet," Sophie started, taking out a notebook she had already started jotting down important details inside so it could be organized. "I think we should have a get together at my house, let's just invite all our friends and family and announce it together then."

"Do you want to announce it to only our closest friends and family, or maybe extend it a little past. Like coworkers and old classmates?" Keefe questioned. 

Sophie huffed. "That's exactly what I was hoping you wouldn't ask because I don't know." She sat still for a moment, simply thinking over the two options. "I think maybe just keep it close, and then coworkers and old classmates we can tell separately or maybe with a wedding invitation." She sighed. "Don't even get me started on wedding invitations."

Keefe reached over to her and gently slipped a glove off so he was touching the bare skin of her hand, and utilized the calming trick for her he had learned when she first gained the ability to strengthen everyone else's. "Don't stress yourself too hard there, Foster, I want to get married before you bury yourself in the ground with those thoughts up there."

She smiled softly and looked back at her notebook. "So we're going with a small engagement announcement party for close family and friends?" 

"That sounds perfectly fine to me," he told her, taking his hand away and grinning. 

She slid her glove back on absentmindedly looking through the notebook. "Okay, well here's a sheet of paper," she ripped a blank one from her notebook, "and you can quickly write out a list of all the people you want to invite. I'll cross reference everything and make sure that I invite everyone." 

"How about I do that?" he handed the paper to her. "You're overworked, I have the time to do the wedding stuff." 

"Are you sure?" He nodded in response. "Well, then okay." She took the time to start writing out names. "While I'm writing this out, I want to bring another thing up."

"What's up?"

She took a deep breath. "Moving in together," she told him, trying to be casual as she spelled out The Vackers on her invitation list. 

"Well, I thought we already talked about that months before we even though about marriage," he stated. "That after we'd get engaged we'd look for a house together and move in."

"I was thinking that maybe I could move into your apartment with you before we start looking for the house. House hunting could take a while, and I just really want to be with you as much as possible." At those words she looked up and grinned at him. 

He leaned over and kissed her, but they were both smiling too hard for it to work out. "I'm obviously not going to say no to my beautiful fiance and love of my life wanting to move in with me," he finally replied. 

She laughed slightly. "Well, I guess the engagement party can also be my official goodbye party to my house," she joked. The words were slightly laced with sadness, as the thought of once again moving away from that house made her upset. Since she was twelve, the house had become a safe haven for her, and every time she left it was like losing a piece of her heart. "I'm going to miss it there."

"It's not like you won't ever come back," Keefe replied, smiling slightly. "And it's not like you're moving out tomorrow. Give it time, we're not getting married yesterday." 

She smiled as a reply. "Well, there's some other things I need to bring up about this but we can get to that later. First, let's go over this invitation list." 

Soon enough the hour had passed and Sophie was needed at her job. "I'll talk to you later," she told Keefe before kissing him and leaving for work.  

"Right on time," Bronte commented as he let her into the small meeting room. Her arms were filled with important documents from the Black Swan that Forkle had asked her to bring over, so she wasn't able to open the door without help. 

"Thanks, sorry for almost being late then," she said, a bit frazzled as she dumped the paperwork on the small table in the middle of the room. Oralie sat at one end of the table, eyes widened at the amount of papers Sophie has just brought in. 

"How many trees did you guys kill to get that?" Oralie questioned, almost measuring the stack with her eyes, before turning towards Sophie. A reflection of light caught her eyes, which led to a small piece of jewelry being caught as well. A smirk appeared on Oralie's face. "How many hearts were broken for you to get that?" She pointed to the ring on Sophie finger. 

Sophie's face immediately turned red at the second question, but her her eyes lit up looking to the small ring. "It's extremely recent and unannounced so far," she replied simply. "But I'm happy." She took a seat, gesturing Bronte to follow suit. 

"We can take the time to talk about our personal lives later," Bronte commented. "But I will add on that I'm very happy for you and Keefe."

"Thank you," she said, smiling. "Anyways, this is all the information we have on the Neverseen. From the beginning to modern, everything down to their shoesizes is in here." 

Bronte took a small pile. "What does he want the council to do with it?" 

"He wanted the information to be distributed across all the different keepers and then burned. All of this is very fragile, and there are still people out there who would do anything to get their hands on it and use it to their advantage." 

"That's a lot for the keepers to handle." Bronte stared at the pile. "We might have to select a few trainees to hold some information as well, we'll just have to speed the loyalty section of training and making sure they know the consequences of telling."

They continued to talk about the papers, going through as much as they could and weaving out anything unimportant that Sophie could memorize really quick if needed later. "Okay, well I believe that's everything we needed to get done today," Oralie finally ended after they got to the last paper. 

"It only took us ten hours," Sophie replied, sarcasm lacing her tone. 

"We can reconvene tomorrow and quickly make sure all the information we've stored is accurate," Bronte stated. "Thank you for meeting with us, Sophie."

She slightly nodded her head as she smiled. "We're not sure when yet, but I'm pretty sure it's this weekend that we're going to be having a small party to announce the engagement so ahead of the actual invite I'll give you a heads up an invite is coming," Sophie told them as they walked away from their meeting room. "Also, we're trying to keep it secret until the party because it would just mean more if we announce it together so please avoid telling too many people." 

"I promise I won't tell a soul," Oralie promised, giving Sophie a gentle smile. 

"You have my word as well," Bronte agreed. "Congratulations, as well Miss. Foster. Mr. Sencen is quite lucky to have found you." 

---

i miss bronte tbh. he had a way bigger role in good match (that fanfic i wrote on my first account that is absolutely atrocious but for some reason people are still reading and commenting on it more than two years later) so i wish i could add more of him in this story but he doesn't fit. but idk i still almost laugh when i remember that i had bronte be a matchmaker for keefe and sophie in that book. idk what i was thinking but i was thinking something. 

school is ending soon and i'm just really sad because no matter how much i complain, i really do love coming in everyday. especially this semester, considering i don't have any bad teachers and i have best friends in every single class. 

high school is going by so fast so no matter how cliche it sounds, i really am telling y'all you gotta cherish it really well. I still feel like the 14 year old freshman writing her first kotlc fanfic. now i'm almost 17 and i'm about to finish my junior year. time just goes by so fast. it's insane. i know i haven't finished the year yet and i still have my whole senior year to look forward to but i'm just a sap today sorry. 

chapter questions:

1. who's your favorite singer and who's your favorite band? 

2. what chapter do you think i'm going to have them get married in? (reminder they still gotta announce the engagement, move in together, and plan so it's def not gonna be as soon as you'd think)

3. what's the worst book you've ever had to read for an english assignment?