Things had been different in the arcade today. There were more teenagers with glasses and spectacles than there had been any other day, and most of the people playing Sugar Rush held hands as they 'drove'. Sometimes, if one looked closely enough, they could almost swear that Fix-it Felix was fighting cybugs along with the rest of Calhoun's team in Hero's Duty while one of the men from that game was taking his place fixing the apartment building. Vanellope felt like she was the only one who didn't know what was going on.
As soon as the arcade closed, Vanellope drove her kart back to her castle (hey, a president could still have a castle, right?) and sought out Sour Bill, who was still her treasured advisor.
"Yes, pri- president, what is it?" he asked, looking up from where he was cleaning her ever-messy room.
"Everyone in the arcade has been acting different today," she began, and then listed everything that she'd noticed that day. Sour Bill listened, nodding occasionally, while he piled her various stuffed animals and other toys onto her large canopy bed.
"I'm surprised you don't remember," he finally answered. "It's a holiday called Valentine's Day. Back when you reigned, you spent this day taking a random racer or citizen on a date. You called it 'a date with the princess'."
"I remember now," she gasped, and would've glitched if she didn't have it under control. Now she had the perfect excuse to take the guy she liked on a date. And with her recently-unearthed memories of previous dates, she had the perfect ideas of what she'd do.
"Thanks, Bill, you're the best!" she called as she changed into her princess dress (it was the perfect time to wear it, after all) and made her way to the various places she had to visit in order to make this date perfect.
Finally, she made her way through to Game Central Station (breathing a sigh of relief when the gate allowed her through even though it always did) and found the game that she had to go to so she could get her date.
"Oh, hey Vanellope," Felix greeted her from the seat in front of her on the train. He was sitting with Calhoun, to nobody's surprise, but she was wearing a nice dress for once. Maybe it was her first time wearing a nice dress, and maybe it was only because of her husband that she could want to wear one.
"Hey, kiddo," Calhoun greeted her with a grin. "Looks like I'm not the only one with a date here."
"Well, I'm actually taking him back to my game, but yeah," Vanellope nodded, her cheeks turning slightly pink.
"So are you going to tell us who he is or is it going to be as much a surprise for us as it is for him?" Felix asked.
"You'll find out," Vanellope shrugged, but she wondered if maybe he already knew.
"Well, it's a good thing you are taking him back to your game. Gene might even want to go with you," Calhoun chuckled.
"Why?" Vanellope asked, her brow wrinkled in confusion. Felix's honey glows were suddenly back with a vengeance, which served only to further confuse her.
"N-no reason," he stuttered, and Calhoun laughed loudly. Vanellope giggled along with her, still not understanding it but going along with it anyway.
Upon reaching Niceland, Felix and Calhoun departed for the apartments while Vanellope made her way over to what had once been the dump but was now East Niceland. The biggest house there was the one she was looking for, but she just hoped that he was in there. Finding the house, she stood in front of the door and tried to calm herself down. In the near-silence, she heard a door close and looked back at the apartments to see Gene going somewhere with a suitcase. With the distraction chasing away her nerves for the moment, she knocked on the door and stood trembling as she waited for it to open.
A slight trembling in the ground informed her that this was the guy she was looking for.
"Hey," Ralph greeted her with a grin.
"Hello," Vanellope replied, smiling and hoping that he couldn't hear her racing heart.
"You're all dressed up," he observed, gesturing to her dress and hair. "Going on a date?"
"Yeah, and that's why I came to you," she informed him, getting right to the point. "When I was a princess, I used to take someone from my game on a date for Valentine's Day. This year, I decided to take you. It might not be as nice as a date with a princess but will you accept your date with a president?" There, she'd said it. Now to wait for his answer...
"Sure," he replied after contemplating for several minutes (or maybe it was only seconds). "Felix has got a date and even Pacman and Mrs Pacman are over here. Everyone's going on a date in Niceland, so why not me too?"
"Great! We'll be going to my game anyway so you won't have to see all the happy couples," she informed him, chattering excitedly to hide her slight disappointment over the fact that he hadn't admitted to loving her. He just saw it as a date between friends, but a lot of her subjects had too. Come to think of it, she had too. This was her first date with someone she actually liked, and she was determined to make it perfect.
Back in Sugar Rush, Vanellope held one of Ralph's fingers as she led him towards their first destination. She'd left Candlehead at the kart bakery with strict instructions to make her a perfect cake for her date.
"Is it ready?" she asked the racer after the door opened to her knocking.
"Yes, I've just finished icing it," Candlehead replied, ushering her in. Vanellope stepped inside, gesturing for Ralph to follow her. She couldn't stop herself from running down to the floor where the cake sat perfectly decorated in all its three layers of chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry. The chocolate was, of course, for her, and was as such the smallest layer.
"Good job," she nodded to her faithful subject. "For that, you can sleep in the castle tonight."
"Thank you," Candlehead smiled, and skipped out of the bakery.
"Wow, a cake," Ralph grinned, "You went to a lot of trouble for this."
"Well, you were pretty upset when the Nicelanders wouldn't give you a cake," she figured. "I know they give you one every time the arcade closes now but I know you like it."
"You didn't have to explain," he chuckled. "I understand. It's really sweet of you, which makes sense because you're the president of everything sweet."
"Aww, thanks," she blushed, and busied herself with carefully slicing the top layer of the cake off and placing it on a table that Candlehead had also set up. It was quite simple, with a pale pink tablecloth and a single candle in the middle. She took the chair that was built especially for racers while Ralph sat in one that had been specially built to withstand his size.
"I didn't know you could make normal cakes in the kart bakery," Ralph observed, taking a large chunk of strawberry cake and eating it. He looked a little confused at the very non-square chunk.
"Well, Sour Bill told me how Turbo changed the game's code and I changed the bakery's code to put in a normal cake shape as well as all the car shapes," she explained. "Candlehead likes the change."
"Of course she does," Ralph nodded. "Maybe you could give the winning racer a cake after each character select race." She'd told him all about it after her first week as president.
"That's a good idea," she gasped excitedly. "Thanks, Ralph!"
"You're welcome," he smiled, and finished eating his cake. He'd only finished his 'wrecking' cake a few hours before Vanellope arrive to take him on a date, but he didn't mind the extra cake.
After the cake was gone, Vanellope led Ralph to the candy tree forest. Warning him of double stripes, she climbed to the top of the tree and sat on a branch that was not too thin but not overly thick either. Ralph had to sit a few branches below her, but she quickly jumped onto his shoulder and sat on her new seat, smiling. Her puffy pink dress tickled his face, but he didn't mind.
"So did you take all of your Valentines to the cake bakery and then the candy forest?" he asked, shifting to lean again the trunk of the tree.
"No, just the kart bakery and then my castle," she recalled. "The candy forest is our special place."
"It is where we first met," he agreed. "The trees are growing back nicely since I first arrived."
"Felix and Calhoun come here a lot and he fixes everything," she told him. "I think this is their special place as well. I don't know why they keep going back to Niceland if they like this place so much." Ralph laughed and she again felt left out but laughed along with him anyway. She liked seeing him happy, just like she liked seeing everyone happy.
After the character selection race (which she let Candlehead win), Vanellope returned to her castle with Ralph sitting on the back of the kart that they'd built. Candlehead drove alongside them until Vanellope sped up to get to the castle first, and they had a few minutes before the other racer arrived.
"So did you have a nice date with the president?" Vanellope asked, sitting on her bed in her normal outfit until Ralph sat on the bed as well. She scrambled up his arm and took a seat on her favourite perch again.
"Yeah, I did," he replied. "You're a good leader. At least I had something to do today. Thanks for choosing me to be your date."
"But the date isn't over yet," she told him, scrambling off his shoulder to stand on the bed in front of him. "The last part of my date is that you get to sleep in my bed with me."
"And this time you won't have to wake me to go to your game," Ralph figured. "How will I know when the arcade opens, though?"
"I'll get Sour Bill to tell us," Vanellope assured him, and called in her assistant to relay to him the instructions.
Once everything was sorted out, Vanellope shut the shades against the game's ever-present daylight and got comfortable under the covers of her bed. The bed was so big but Ralph filled it perfectly, and she secretly wanted him to share her bed every night so that it wouldn't seem so big. He was so big and warm and comfortable, like a living huge teddy bear. Snuggling under his arm, she was asleep within minutes.
"Litwak is moving in the arcade," Sour Bill reported, standing next to the bed the next morning. Ralph nodded and stepped out of bed, carefully removing his arm from Vanellope. He didn't want to wake her too early, even though she'd have to wake soon anyway.
"Seeya, kiddo," he said quietly, stroking her messy black hair with one of his large fingers. She smiled and moved a little, but didn't open her eyes. That wouldn't happen until the arcade opened.