NOW:

Arya Stark was not paying attention to what she was doing.

In the midst of people milling about with drinks in their hands and through a haze of smoke, she was absently throwing sharp pieces of metal through the air. Frankly, from his view from outside the window, Gendry thought it was dangerous. Other people called it a game of darts.

He saw a large, drunken man wave three darts in front of Arya's face and laugh. He took a swig of beer from his mug and set it at the edge of a table behind him, then narrowed his eyes at the dart board. With a practiced eye he crouched forward, aimed, and threw the dart at the blinking target…

Gendry could tell from his reaction that it had not landed where he intended. For a second time he aimed, this time glaring at someone who bumped into him, but still he did not hit his intended mark. The third time, he actually shushed the people crowded around him, which only made it more humiliating for him when he, judging by the reaction, failed to hit the target where he wanted to.

Arya grinned widely, swaying slightly on her feet, and took her set of darts from her partner, and took another sip of whatever concoction she was drinking, and whipped her first dart at the target.

It wasn't a bulls eye, but he could tell from the reaction of her teammate that it had landed in a good place. Barely paying attention, she flung the next dart, and it landed right next to the first one. After seeking out another sip of her drink (Gendry thought this was ill-advised, since there were many people standing around without full body armor, and Arya looked like she couldn't see straight) she squinted and wrinkled her nose at the target. Someone clapped her on the back and she grinned at them, glanced back at the target, and, without seeming to know she had done it, once again whipped the dart at the board.

At once, lights flashed, and half of the mob around the electronic dart board cheered. A few guys pulled out their wallets and grimaced as they handed cash to their cheering friends.

Gendry decided this was a wonderful time to break in.

"Hey guys!" he called nonchalantly to the mob around his girlfriend as he walked through the door to the bar.

A few of the guys greeted him with fist bumps and nods from across the room, or an offer for a beer, which he declined.

'I think I'll have enough trouble getting her home without being buzzed," he thought, casually pushing through the crowd.

"Gen-dry!" he heard a familiar, faraway voice say. It seemed as if the object of his affections had noticed his entrance. Indeed she had, as she locked eyes on him and took several studied steps in his direction, frowning when someone bumped into her and sloshed her drink down her hand.

Once she reached him, she carefully raised her arm and, still holding the glass, began to lick the spill from her hand.

Grabbing a napkin, he held it out for her, but she shook her head.

"This is the best way to not be sticky!"

Knowing she didn't get like this very often, he humored her, but kept the napkin in his pocket, just in case.

It was the end of the semester, and Arya had just finished a class that she fondly referred to as "the eightieth circle of hell." Every day when she came home from that class, she had a new irate story about the professor, lab work, or the idiots in her class. These were usually the days he made dinner, or suggested getting a treat that night, or found some new movie to watch, or made some sort of plan to get her out of the house.

The worst part had been when she had to do a group project. The work itself led to a terrible three weeks, but did change Arya's view of the idiots in her class to other suffering souls. Arya had started hanging out with some of them outside of class, where they could blow off steam together and vent about their days. Arya did have an improved disposition once this started happening, which was good, but left him alone at home, which bothered him more than he liked to admit.

Tonight marked the end of their final, which Arya had invited him to, but he had been unable to attend because he had a clinical to attend. However, it had ended early, so he stopped by to see what was happening, and found a rather drunk Arya throwing sharp objects.

"I won at darts!" Arya proclaimed proudly as she intently maneuvered an ice cube around her glass.

"So I saw…have you ever played before?"

"No, but I am amazing. They go flying and they thwack against the board. I like it."

"Drunken zen, man," said one of the guys in the crowd. "I'm not sure if she could hit the target if she was sober."

"Drunk-en ZEN!" exclaimed the drunk girl beside him, who was now grasping his arm very tightly.

Gendry began to make some absent-minded small talk with the guy that turned out to be Arya's darts partner, when he felt an urgent tugging on his arm.

"Gen-dry," she said, eyes wide. "I would like another drink, but I do not think that I can get over there." Arya furrowed her brow at the bar. Apparently walking through people to get a drink was not something she thought she could handle.

He raised his eyebrows at her, and she responded by batting her eyes at him. "Just one more…pleasssse?"

"One more," he agreed, making sure she was firmly settled at the booth and that her darts partner, who seemed the most sober person of the bunch, would stay with her until he came back. He pushed through the swarm of people celebrating the end of finals week and managed to reach the bar, catching the bartender's eye.

"Glass of water and…something without alcohol that looks like a mixed drink – with a cherry," he ordered, shouting to make himself heard. A few minutes later, two glasses were shoved in his direction as the bartender tended to other customers that were actually ordering alcohol.

Upon returning to the table where he had left Arya, Gendry found that in his absence, someone had bought shots for the group.

Arya moved her head around until she saw Gendry. "This does not count as a drink," she said, deliberately enunciating each word as she carefully set down the shot glass. "A shot is not a drink."

Wordlessly he handed her the glass of water, which made her frown, but she drank anyway, and then held out her hand for her drink.

"Cherries!" she exclaimed happily, pulling out the purple plastic sword skewering the fruits and popping one in her mouth.

"Hey – they've got two dollar Long Islands across the street!" called one of the guys from Arya's class to the group. "Let's head over there!"

"You guys should come!" darts-partner-guy said, raising his nearly-empty mug, still managing to slop some over the rim.

"Would you like my cherry?" Arya interrupted, holding up her plastic sword to Gendry's nose. Obediently, he leaned over to her and pulled off the last fruit with this teeth.

"That's what she said!" called some other drunken college guy, laughing with his friends from the next table over.

With a flourish, Arya turned to the table and aimed her purple sword at the speaker. "You do not know what I said. You, sir, are a scoundrel!"

"Dude, she wants to stab you!"

After a moments' consideration on if he wanted to see this scene play out and deciding he did not, Gendry gently pushed his girlfriend's hand, purple plastic sword skewer and all, back down to the table.

"No!" she said insistently, pouting. "I have a sword, and I know how to use it!"

The other table started laughing, while Arya's group watched with interest. They had spent enough time with her to know that she had quite the mouth when she she wanted, and how hot-headed she could be.

It was time for the big guns.

Leaning forward once more, he whispered something in her ear, making her elbow him in the stomach. With a surprisingly coordinated gesture, considering her inebriated state, she grabbed his wrist. "We are going home."

Grinning, Gendry waved at Arya's friends as she dragged him from the table and towards the door. He was not concerned about the catcalls and off-color comments about cherries, since he knew Arya would lay down the law the next time she saw them.

After they passed by the windows to the bar and reached the wall, Arya let go of his wrist, pushed him back, and growled. "I told you not to call me pipsqueak anymore!"

Knowing it would be a grievous error to laugh in her face, Gendry took a few moments to compose himself before answering.

"You get oddly formal and medieval when you drink," he said offhandedly, staring seriously down at her.

"That is beside the point! I can use a sword and…and…do you want waffles?"

Without waiting for an answer, she turned and started carefully walking down the street with a determined look on her face.

Quickly catching up to her, Gendry put his arm securely around her waist and allowed her to lead the way to the waffle house.

XXXXX-XXXXX

THREE MONTHS AFTER MOVING IN TOGETHER

They didn't have an anniversary. Or maybe they had too many, he wasn't sure.

That was romantic, right? Ask someone to marry you on your anniversary, at a fancy dinner, all dressed up with a violin player walking around? That was what the movies led him to believe, at least.

There were several obstacles in his way. One, of course, was the anniversary situation. He could say it was the night of her graduation party, but that would ignore so many other important times in their lives – the "date" he had took her on, that time at the zoo, the day she confronted him about his disappearance, when she finally forgave him for rejecting her, that awkward dinner with her family, they day they met. There were too many events, too many memories, to elevate one to "anniversary" status and downgrade the others.

The second obstacle, as he saw it, was that Arya hated getting dressed up. The only time he saw photographic proof that it had happened (as he was certain he never saw it in real life during the years he had known her) was a picture on the wall of the Stark home. It was school picture day, and Arya's mother had dressed her youngest daughter in a matching skirt and blouse outfit with acorns embroidered on the collar. Even though she was only five, the disgust you could see in her eyes was palatable. It looked like young Arya had gotten her way, since the closest he had seen her get to "dressed up" in any other picture was a ribbon tied to the end of her braid in fifth grade. This had never happened again because Arya had cut her hair short at this point.

The third obstacle, of course, was money. He had saved up money for a ring, which was fully paid for, but there was rent, groceries, school…and going to a fancy restaurant just wasn't in the budget, unless he walked the five miles to school every day, and used the money he would spend on gas for an engagement dinner. However, winter was coming, and Gendry didn't particularly like the idea of walking to school through snowdrifts.

And what if she said no? Or thought they weren't ready to get married. Or didn't want to? They had just moved in together, was this too soon?

Before he knew it, he had psyched himself out, and gave up on the whole idea of a fancy dinner. It was a stupid idea anyway.

XXXXX-XXXXX

NOW:

Later that night, after a plate of waffles and, after some prodding, several glasses of water, Arya had fallen asleep.

Gendry was not so lucky.

He lay on his back, arms folded behind his head, staring at the bumps on the ceiling as he considered the heavily slumbering body beside him.

They had been living together for a year, and it had been wonderful. When he had finally been able to move in, he had been so exhausted from doing an entire load of coursework over six weeks that he had still didn't know how he had managed to drive there, much less remember the apartment number or how to walk. As he opened the door, Arya had gotten up so quickly from her desk that she knocked the chair down, then bolted across the apartment to him, almost knocking him over in her effort to get to him as quickly as humanly possible. She had not seen him since he had left the weekend he had spent there when she first moved in, and she clearly had made plans of what would happen once he arrived. However, his body did not respect her wishes and he fell asleep mid-sentence as they were sitting on the couch. The next morning he awoke to his things being put away and a note simply saying 'I love you,' and a muffin, and an empty apartment.

That afternoon, when Arya came back from class, her plans went off without a hitch.

This, and the fact he had hidden a small box in his car instead of with the rest of his belongings, made him extremely happy.

His original plan was to ask her to marry him that day, but she had an exam early the next day, and he felt it wasn't fair to her to distract her like that.

Also, he didn't have an idea of how to do it.

So he waited.

No matter what he thought, or how he planned, it never seemed to work out right, and so the ring box remained securely hidden where Arya would never think to look, and the thought of it was always in the back of his mind.

XXXXX-XXXXX

FOUR MONTHS AFTER MOVING IN TOGETHER

Arya turned her head to the left for the fifth time that afternoon.

"You're staring at me," she said once again, and paused the movie.

"No I'm not!" Gendry insisted, glancing her way. "I was just watching the movie."

"Then what just happened?"

"Venkman just said that everybody has three mortgages nowadays."

Arya frowned and looked at the screen. Perhaps she should have picked a better test than asking him what was currently happening in a movie they had watched together dozens of times.

"Bad example. But seriously, you keep on looking at me."

"No more than usual."

"This is definitely more than usual. There's something wrong."

"Arya, nothing's wrong."

Gendry couldn't quite look her in the eye, and that made her suspicions a certainty.

"You know it's stupid to hide things from me. It never ends well, so you should just go ahead and tell me!"

"There's nothing to tell!" he exclaimed, widening his eyes. "Just a normal day, watching Ghostbusters." Seeing the look in her eyes, he continued. "I'm glad I don't have any exams next week…I'm thinking about making popcorn…considering going for a run this afternoon…considering what would come to my mind if I had to think of nothing…that's really about it."

After a beat, he put on a huge smile. "See! Nothing wrong!"

After considering his demeanor for a minute, Arya, still wary, sat back and picked up the remote. Gendry was planning something, and she intended to figure out what.

XXXXX-XXXXX

FIVE MONTHS AFTER MOVING IN TOGETHER

Last month he had not been careful, and she had caught him contemplating. He wasn't sure how, but he had managed to avoid detection, and they had continued their weekend.

Anything he had thought of was just stupid, so he had given up for a while. The semester was over for both of them, and they were enjoying an abundance of free time. Currently, Gendry was taking advantage of the lack of need to study and had put on an action movie that they had both wanted to watch for months, but never found time for.

"Yippie-ka-yay!" Arya called out, pumping a fist into the air. Gendry laughed as he avoided her fist, settling back onto the couch and absently traced a line on her arm. "That feels nice," she commented, glancing up from where she was resting her head on his lap. She then got distracted by another shootout on the screen and turned back towards the television.

For a while they sat like that, watching as bad guys were taken out and the hero saved the day. After a while, when the protagonist was having a moment of realization about his estranged love interested, Arya suddenly sat up.

"I love you," she said seriously, staring him in the eye.

"I love you too," he replied, slightly confused at this sudden declaration.

After a slight pause, she nodded quickly, then turned and leaned against him, pulling his arms around her. Even after the credits began to roll, they did not move.

XXXXX-XXXXX

NOW:

Hours after Arya had fallen asleep, Gendry managed to follow her, but slept fitfully and woke suddenly when he heard a car starting outside.

Also startled by the noise, but not awakened, Arya rolled over, moaned something sleepily, and tossed a possessive arm over him. There were creases on the side of her face from the blankets she had been lying on, and a lock of hair fell apart from the rest and was balanced on the edge of her nose. She wrinkled her nose to try to displace it, but was unsuccessful. He would have tried to help, but his arms were pinned down by Arya's arm, and he thought she might wake up if he moved her. So, the lock of hair stayed.

Soon, it did not matter as she burrowed closer to him and nuzzled his shoulder region. Closing his eyes once more, he relaxed and decided that, if he could spend the rest of his life just like his, he would be happy.

XXXXX-XXXXX

SIX MONTHS AFTER MOVING IN TOGETHER

"I don't know why I agreed to this," Arya muttered into her scarf as they trudged along the sidewalk.

"Agreed? You begged me to go fifteen minutes ago!" Gendry replied, his breath making a white cloud in front of his face.

"That was before I came outside," she said again, shoving her hands deeper into her pockets.

"Did you really want to wait until next week to pick it up?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

Making a mock-angry face, Arya veered sharply into his path to push him to the side.

"Besides, I'm the one that's going to be carrying it,"

"I hope they don't get frozen," she mused.

"I don't think that ten minutes outside will hurt them."

Arya had been thrilled when she got home from classes that afternoon to find a note on the door from the postman, saying that there was a package waiting at the post office for her that was too big to fit into the designated package section of the mailbox. Even though the official note didn't state what the package was, Arya was certain that she knew. For years, her aunt Lysa sent a large box of oranges and grapefruit to her sister's family a little after Christmas. The first year that one of her nieces or nephews was living on their own, she sent a box to them as well, so she was certain this was what she was receiving.

She didn't know why she was so excited, because she could get fruit at the grocery store any time of the year, but something about opening the box and smelling the citrus brought back memories of eating grapefruit on Saturday mornings while watching cartoons.

Arya had hardly been able to wait the four hours until Gendry came back to the apartment, and had immediately told him to keep his coat on, since she needed him to go to the post office with her, since she knew she couldn't carry the box on her own. With a part-laugh, part-smile, he had dropped his bag on the floor and waited for her to put on her winter gear.

Her enthusiasm was severely dampened, however, when she walked outside and realized that a snowstorm had started while she was inside, beginning an essay and daydreaming of oranges. This was exacerbated by the fact that t hey had to park a block and half away from the post office because of the number of people that apparently had to send packages today.

When at last they reached the front door, Arya loosened her scarf and took off her gloves, and grasped the note from the door in her hand while she bobbed impatiently in line. Gendry stood behind her and smiled, then looked out the window, as it looked like they had quite a while to wait.

The sky was white and brilliantly bright, making him wince. With a sigh, he dismissed yet another plan. Skywriting during the winter would never work, since the writing would match the color of the sky, and he supposed the words "will you marry me?" written in the sky could cause some interesting conversations for other couples.

After a moment, he realized Arya was happily chattering about the treat she was eager to get, and he put his arm around her. "You're cold," she protested, but leaned into him anyway.

XXXXX-XXXXX

SEVEN MONTHS AFTER MOVING IN TOGETHER

Gendry was startled out of his concentration by the sound of a pen hitting the wall, and turned to Arya's desk behind him.

"I hate this class," she said as a way of explanation, without any apology in her voice.

With a small grin, he closed his book on the effect of drugs on the human body and how this would change physical treatment options and turned around.

"Want to take a break?"

"Yes!" she said emphatically, and dropped her book on the floor to add emphasis. She almost ran out of their study room to the living room.

"So wha-" he began, but was interrupted by his eager girlfriend.

"Let's go somewhere!" she exclaimed, heading to the set of hooks where they hung their winter coats.

"And do what?"

"Something...anything...I just need to go out and do something."

Gendry grinned. "Like get coffee?" He just managed dodge the hat that was flung in his direction.

"Let's go for a walk."

A few minutes later, they were walking around the block, glove and glove, in the softly falling snow. As they walked by a park, she tugged him towards the entrance, the immediately ran to a miraculously unblemished field of snow, and dropped down on her back, waving her arms and legs back and forth.

"What are you doing?"

"Making a snow angel," she replied, as if this were the most obvious thing in the world.

He looked at her blankly, and she responded by holding out her arms to be helped up. After she was on her feet again, she pulled him back a few steps.

"See," she pointed to the brushed out area she had just occupied. When he looked her her quizzically, she pushed him down onto the snow.

"You have to make sure you don't mess it up when you get up," she instructed.

With a bemused look in his eye, he deliberately put an elbow down in the snow.

"Why you little..." Arya said under her breath, then launched herself on top of him.

"That wasn't very nice," he said with a glimmer in his eye.

"What're you going to do about it?"

In response, he rolled her over and shifted himself on top of her. For a moment, he thought he saw something like anticipation cross over her face, but he dismissed it as a trick of light.

During his moment of distraction, he did not see her reach over and grab a handful of snow, so was surprised when he got a face full of it. Without bothering to wipe it off, he leaned down and kissed her, but soon decided that the potential for frostbite was not worth paying her back for being snowed in the face.

After brushing themselves off and getting up, they spent a few more minutes walking around the park. As they exited, Gendry took Arya's hand, and they walked in comfortable silence back home.

XXXXX-XXXXX

EIGHT MONTHS AFTER MOVING IN TOGETHER

"-And then he told us to read this entire book this weekend, and there's going to be a test on it on Monday!"

Arya finished ranting with an exasperated moan and flopped, face down, onto the couch.

"How long is is?" Gendry asked tentatively.

"Four hundred," she groaned into the pillow.

He picked up the offending book and flipped through it. "At least fifty pages are appendices." It was a small consolation, but the best he felt he could offer at this point.

"And," she continued, raising herself up on her forearms, "he said that the project that's forty percent of our grade is a group project! My grade is going to depend on morons!" With another noise of misery, she once again buried her face in the pillow.

At this point, he was fairly certain that nothing he could say would get Arya out of her funk, so decided he would take care feeding them tonight, even though it was technically her turn. Walking into the kitchen, he looked in the cupboards for inspiration, then decided inspiration was overrated, and started boiling water for spaghetti.

As he started heating the sauce, he heard a rustling from the couch, and his girlfriend's head popped up like a prairie dog's.

"Food?" she asked hopefully.

"Five minutes," he replied. With a slightly happier noise, she collapsed back on the couch.

Half an hour later, they were taking care of the dishes – he was washing, and she was drying. As he handed her a dripping plate, he took a breath and began to speak.

"So, about this book," he began, and Arya immediately clenched her jaw. "How about we make a deal. I have a lot of studying to do this weekend myself. Let's say, every time you finish a chapter, we take a study break together, and you'll get some sort of reward."

"This sounds like I'd be a dog in obedience school," she said accusingly.

He crossed a finger over his chest. "I promise I won't give you dog biscuits and pat you on the head."

"What would I get?" she asked suspiciously.

"Well, if I tell you, that'll ruin the surprise!"

After staring at him with narrowed eyes for a few moments, she nodded her assent. "Do I get a prize to start me off?"

"Bring me your book," he said, grinning, "and we'll see."

With a grimace coming unbidden to her face, she walked over and picked up the hated book from the floor by the couch.

Flipping through once again, he saw that there were fifteen chapters, and the first one was fairly short.

"You have to put in at least a little effort, so you'll have to wait until you finish your first chapter."

With yet another sigh, she trudged to the couch, book in hand, and rummaged in her bag for a notebook and pen, and settled herself into the corner of the couch.

Smiling, Gendry put away the last of the cleaned and dried dishes and began to prepare for the first reward. It would have to be something small and quick, since Arya would likely be finished within the hour. With a sudden surge of inspiration, he went to their shared bookshelf in the study room and picked up one of his books from the prior semester, then settled himself at his desk for a bit of review.

Sure enough, in a little over half an hour, he heard the sound of papers shuffling and someone walking into the room. Without a word, Arya raised her eyebrows expectantly at him.

"Come with me," he said, rising out of the chair and extending his hand. She reached out and he grasped her hand, then led her to the bedroom. Confused yet intrigued, she followed him.

"Lay down on your stomach at the edge," he instructed, and rubbed his hands together.

Once she was in place, he pulled her arms down flat next to each other. She turned her head to the side to look at her.

"What are you planning on doing to me?"

"So, remember last semester, when I took that intro class to massage therapy? It wasn't all theory, I got some practical experience. I thought I'd practice a little on you since, if I know you at all, you've been carrying way too many books in your bag on this shoulder."

He then reached out to her right shoulder, and felt the muscles tighten.

"Don't think about anything, just relax."

With that, he began to rub the tense muscles in that area as he had just read in the book, and practiced months ago. He heard Arya make a far more pleased moan into the pillow as he worked, and he thought it was a good change from her earlier angry noises.

Several minutes later, after the problem muscled had loosened up, he slowly stopped rubbing, then sat on the bed beside her.

"Why did you stop?" she asked contentedly from her spot on the bed, pointedly not moving from her current position.

"At this point, too much more manipulation could do more harm than good, so you'll have to live with that," she said, putting a hand gently on her back.

With a distinct effort, she rolled to face him. "Does this mean I have to go back to work?"

"If you want another reward…yes."

With another sigh, this one far less angry, she walked back to her spot on the couch and settled in again. He followed her to the main room, then turned to the kitchen once again, and opened the freezer.

"What are you doing?" she asked with interest, eager to abandon her book.

"Getting ready," he said simply, gesturing for her to go back to what she was doing.

He moved things around the freezer for a bit, but waited until she had begun to read again and turned the page before he pulled out a bag of frozen green beans that had been sitting in the back of the freezer since they had moved in. Catelyn had fully stocked their cupboards, refrigerator, and freezer with food when she had help Arya move in. Early on, when he had finally joined her, he had tried to make a side dish for dinner. She had refused to eat it because she said she hated green beans, and didn't know why her mother had brought them in the first place. And so the bag had sat, partially used, shoved in the corner for months.

It was here he had decided was the perfect hiding place. Carefully shielding what he was doing with the freezer door, he opened the twist tie holding the bag closed and rummaged for the small Ziploc bag he had placed inside. Pulling it out, he removed the bag containing a small ring, and stashed it in his pocket.

'Maybe the freezer wasn't the best choice...frozen gold is really cold!' he thought to himself, making an effort not to make a noise as he adjusted to having a piece of frozen metal pressed against his thigh.

Knowing he had to have a reason for being in the freezer for this long, he shuffled through the contents once more and luckily found a carton of ice cream, and put it in the door to pull out easier later. Checking the refrigerator he found chocolate sauce. With the sprinkles in the cupboard he had seen earlier while pulling out noodles, they should have the makings for sundaes when Arya finished her next chapter.

Heading into the study room, he pulled the plastic bag out of his pocket and removed the ring, rubbing it between his hands to warm it up. After he was satisfied it wouldn't freeze his thigh this time, he put it back in his pocket. He decided he would keep it on him until Sunday, or whenever the book was done, and use that as his last "reward."

Pleased with how things were turning out, he picked up his notes from class today and headed out to the living room and settled himself on the other end of the couch. Sighing, he realized that he could hardly read what he had written, and would have to re-write everything, and picked up his pen.

They worked in silence for some time, until finally Arya dropped her notebook to the floor in disgust.

"Finished already?" he asked curiously, lowering his own pen.

"No," she said in disgust, standing up and stretching. "I just can't handle reading another word of this right now. I have other things I need to do this weekend, I'm going to work on my philosophy assignment for a while."

As he heard her settle in at her desk, Gendry sat down his own work and turned to a new page in his notebook, then began to jot down some more ideas for end-of-chapter rewards. After a few minutes, Arya popped her head into the living room.

"Why is there a wet plastic bag on your desk?" she asked, holding up the aforementioned item.

"I brought some carrots to school today, and I guess I forgot to throw the bag in the garbage," he lied quickly, hoping she wouldn't notice the feebleness of his excuse.

Eying him suspiciously, she deposited the bag in the garbage can and went back to the study room.

Feeling his heart beat faster, he resumed his list making, switching back to his notes when Arya eventually emerged and came back to her book on the couch.

Minutes later, she closed the book with finality.

"I'm done again," she said in a slightly pitiful voice.

For a few minutes, they scooped ice cream, drizzled toppings, and licked chocolate off of their fingers. After a few bites, Arya sat down her spoon and looked at him glumly.

"I shouldn't have stopped in the middle of the chapter."

"Why not?"

"I'm finding that this sucker is better read in big chunks, because the author is a jerk who doesn't know how to separate chapters, and everything is interconnected. If I'm going to stand a chance of making sense of this, I think I have to do this in big chunks."

"So…no study breaks?"

"Not like you're planning." Arya avoided his gaze and started stirring her ice cream.

"Hey," he said, touching her hand to halt its movement. "Whatever you need to do, you do. I'll still be right here when you're done."

After they finished their treat, Arya said she was going to finish the rest of her homework tonight, so that she could spend the rest of the weekend reading the book and digesting the information for the test she had to take on it. They spent the rest of the night in the study room. Every half hour or so, Arya would heave another big sigh and glare at the clock, then go back to work.

The next morning, her alarm went off at the disgusting hour of seven am and Arya climbed out of bed, quickly showered, and went straight to work. Gendry tried to check in on her and say hello when he himself work up, but she waved him away, so he busied himself in the living room watching TV with the volume turned down.

At lunchtime, he tried to get her to take a break, but she waved him away again. Instead, he made a sandwich and brought her some juice, leaving it at the side of her desk. An hour later, he checked back, but the sandwich was only half eaten, so he decided to leave it there for a while longer. Meanwhile, he retooled his proposal plan. Initially, he was going to build up romantic gestures culminating in the presentation of the ring, but that was obviously out. Slowly, a new plan began to form in his mind.

Around three, Arya finally emerged, holding her head and, having been sitting all day, was limping slightly. Without speaking, she stumbled over to the couch and fell onto it.

"How's it going?" he asked tentatively, not sure if she was capable of human communication.

"Got to a sentence where the author said it was a good stopping point…so I stopped," she mumbled, eyes closed.

Carefully, he removed the television remote from under Arya's back and turned off the screen. He felt she might want the droning in the background to be gone, at least for a while.

After ten minutes, she finally rolled over, then sat up and looked at him.

"I'm starving." Without further comment, she went straight to the refrigerator for food.

Gendry took this as a good sign, and that she may be able to hold on a conversation. Apparently Arya agreed, as she began to speak.

"I peeked ahead, and it looks like there's another good stopping point about a third of the way from the ending," she said, sniffing at a Tupperware container she found. "I'm going to get to that point tonight, and do the last part tomorrow morning. Then I can review everything, and I should be prepared."

"I take it you don't want to go for a walk tonight, then," he replied, getting himself a drink of water.

"By the time I'm done, it'll be really late, so…no."

He said he understood, then cleared out of the kitchen, because Arya looked ready to eat her hand, and he feared that if he stood in her way, she may start gnawing on him.

After shoveling food in her mouth and spending half an hour relaxing on the couch at Gendry's insistence, Arya returned to the study room, flipped to a fresh page of her notebook, and began reading again.

Just as he was beginning to get restless and he had decided to go on a walk on his own, the telephone rang. Not wanting to disturb Arya, he dashed to get it before it rang again.

"Hello," he said quietly into the receiver.

"Hello Gendry – it's Catelyn," Arya's mother said over the line. "Is Arya around?"

"She is, but she's in the middle of some homew-"

"I really need to speak with her," she insisted in an urgent tone, speaking over him. "Please put her on the line."

"Just a minute," he said, setting down the receiver. He faintly heard her say 'thank you' in the distance.

He paused at the door and spent a second watching Arya work. Her right foot swung back and forth under her chair as she read, and he could see the side of her hand was smudged with blue ink.

"Arya," he called quietly, but she didn't seem to know he was there.

"Arya," he tried again, more loudly this time. Still no response.

Fearing the worst, he crossed the room and put a hand on her shoulder, causing her to jump and kick the bottom of her desk.

He could tell she was annoyed with him before she even began to speak.

"Gendry, I told you I need to concentrate!" she exclaimed, glaring at him.

"I know…but your mom's on the phone, and it sounds like something important is going on."

Groaning angrily, she dropped her pen and scooted back from the desk, then strode out of the room and picked up the receiver. He could hear her speaking with her mother, and occasionally muttering responses. Not wanting to interrupt anymore, he took a closer look at the open page of the book. It looked like half the words on the page were pushing twenty letters, and it took him two tries to read a sentence and derive any meaning from it. He knew he didn't stand much of a chance, since this was such an in-depth book in something he had never studied, but he didn't know how Arya derived any meaning from it.

A few minutes later, Arya put the phone back on the hook and walked back into the room, looking haggard.

"It seems," she began, with a forced smile on her face to alleviate some of her anger at being interrupted, "that my aunt Lysa is crazy. Not normal crazy, like I've told you, but 'pushing the plumber out of the window of her thirty-story walk-up because she thought he was going to rape and murder her' crazy. The plumber's family, of course, is suing, and I'm supposed to serve as a "character witness" for her. So, I have to go all the way back to mom's with my brothers and sisters to talk to the lawyer next week."

Turning, she began to slowly beat her head on the door frame. Gendry quickly crossed the room to stop her, so she leaned into him and started beating her head on his chest. It wasn't an ideal situation, but it was much better than the door frame.

"If one more thing happens this semester – good or bad – I think I'm going to snap," she said woefully into his shirt. "This class is hell, and I can't do that on top of stupid real life stuff."

He pulled her closer and pressed her head closer to his chest. "You'll get through this. I'm going to do everything I can to keep things running smoothly for you, and at the end of the semester, you don't have to worry about it anymore."

They stood there for a few minutes, immobile in the middle of the room, before Arya finally pulled away.

"Any chance of another massage before I go back to work?" she asked hopefully, looking up at him.

As if he would deny her anything.

With a nod, she went to the bedroom and laid down on her stomach, and he began to rub her back. Briefly he tapped his pocket, feeling the small circle inside, and decided to find a new hiding place until the time was better. His new task was to make life as unobtrusive as possible.

Slowly, he began to feel the tenseness of Arya's muscles melt away, and she slowly drifted off to sleep. Making a note of the time, he decided to give her twenty minutes to rest, then wake her up, or else she would be upset at having lost so much time tonight.

The things he did for love.

XXXXX-XXXXX

NOW:

Arya woke the next morning feeling better than she thought she would, considering the amount of alcohol she had consumed the previous night. She supposed that was largely in part to Gendry's insistence she drink lots of water, eat something, and then have some more water.

Rolling over, she tore off the previous day's sheet on her page-a-day calendar, and smiled at the new word that was revealed.

Quietly, she got up and walked to the kitchen and began to make hot chocolate, partially to have something tasty to drink, and partially to mentally prepare herself.

After a few minutes, spent heating water and opening windows to let in the glorious brightness of a day not shadowed by work from her hell class, she had two steaming mugs in her hand, and pushed open the door to the bedroom.

XXXXX-XXXXX

TEN MONTHS AFTER MOVING IN TOGETHER:

With a sudden movement he was not expecting, Arya threw her pen across the room, and it hit the window with a ping.

"You're making a habit of this," Gendry said, grinning at her over the book she was supporting with her knees. The walls around her desk were littered with small black and blue marks from the pens she had been throwing this semester, and he did not look forward to the day when they would have to clean them off.

"I'm done for tonight," she announced, closing the book and setting it down with finality.

"But you said that you needed to finish up those questions before you had your group work time tomorrow."

"Everyone else has missed a few problems every time we've met. They can handle my not having finished everything just this once." She paused and then switched off her desk lamp. "I want to have a normal night with you."

"I think that sounds like a great idea," he agreed, and shut his own book. Truthfully, he had only been going through his notes again so he could be in the same room as Arya, and not because he wasn't confident with the material. He had actually rearranged his class schedule so he could drive down every other Friday afternoon to go and visit Catelyn, and help out with some things around the house, since she was spending as much time her sister as she could, given her recent episode. He hadn't told Arya about it, since she would feel guilty that she hadn't been doing anything herself, but knew that if she were to worry about her mother more, she would have an even worse time this semester.

Putting it out his mind, he walked out to the living room with Arya, then stopped and looked at her.

"What's a normal night?"

She stopped as well, then started laughing. "Actually…a normal night nowadays is spending all night on homework and studying, then collapsing into bed…but that's kind of what I'm trying to avoid…"

"So…what abnormal things do you want to do?"

"When you phrase it like that, it just sounds weird," she said, glancing around for inspiration. "I want to go outside."

Minutes later, clad in unzipped windbreakers, they strolled to the park near to the apartment, chatting about anything but their classes. Arya was currently relating the story of how she had almost been run over by a guy on a skateboard earlier that week.

"So I look up, and it's this blond guy with hair in dreadlocks standing over me, he apologizes, helps me up, and then boards off again." Raising her right hand to her nose, she gave it a smell. "And it still smells like patchouli!"

"Wait…when was this again?"

"Last week Wednesday."

"Do you even bathe?"

Giggling, she punched him on the shoulder. "You know very well I do!"

"I don't know, if you can still smell it on you, I'm not sure I want to hold your hand anymore…"

When he pretended to try to get away, she just pulled him closer and grabbed him around his waist. "You're not going anywhere."

He tilted his head down to her upturned face and kissed her. "Well, I guess I'll just have to stay with you, then."

"Forever?" she asked seriously, pulling back a bit.

"If you'll have me."

With a quiet smile on her face, she pulled him close once again, and didn't let him go for a long time.

XXXXX-XXXXX

NOW:

Gendry growled into his pillow as he buried his face further into it. He could hear vague noises coming from the kitchen from his amazingly awake girlfriend. He knew his continued desire to sleep was his own doing, since he had been up late last night, but he wanted something convenient to blame, and that something was in the kitchen making hot chocolate, by the smell of it.

As the door opened and light streamed in from the open window in the living room, he pulled the blankets over his head to seal out the light.

"Wake up, sleepy head!" she said softly, trying to pull back the covers.

Giving up quickly on that pursuit, she set both mugs of hot chocolate on his bedside table and hopped onto the bed next to him.

"Gendry," she said in a slightly pouty voice. "I want to go somewhere with you…it's such a beautiful day, and I don't have to come back and spend the rest of the day on another project, or essay, or lab, or whatever for the eightieth circle of hell, and I want to have a good day with you!"

"'S too early," he mumbled through the covers.

"But I want to do something…special today."

"There's all day for that," he responded, still muffled by the sheets covering his face.

"But I kinda want to do it right now," she said almost uncertainly.

Knowing he would have no option but to comply, he regretfully removed the covers from over his head and squinted at her in the bright light streaming through the door. "What would you like to do?"

She lowered herself down until she was lying next to him, and rolled on her side so they were eye to eye.

"I love you," she said simply.

"I love you too, he replied, blinking sleepily at her.

"And I want to do something new today."

"You had mentioned that."

She stared at him for a second, then continued.

"Today I think…that we should get engaged."

He was certainly awake now.

Sitting up straight, he stared at her for a moment, then got out of bed and opened the closet door.

"Gendry," she said uncertainly, sitting up on the bed.

He did not respond, instead reaching up to the top shelf of their closet for a large box, and pulled it down, then set it on the bed and sat beside it.

Opening it, he pulled out several boxes of trading cards he had collected over the years, stored in plastic boxes. Finally he found a bright red box, opened it, and dumped out the contents. A deck of cards in plastic protector sleeves fell out, as well as yet another smaller box inside that bore the label 'dice.' This too he dumped on the bed, and instead of dice, a piece of cloth slid out. He carefully unfolded it and slid something small into his right hand.

Clutching his hand over the item he had picked up, he looked at Arya, who seemed to have frozen in place.

"Well, I could never quite find a way to do it myself…" Extending his hand, he opened it to show her the item he had placed in his palm.

Slowly, she extended her own hand and picked up the object, and saw it was a ring. It was a thin white gold band, with a small emerald embedded in it. A small infinity symbol was engraved on either side of the stone.

"I think that's a great idea," he said, gently picking up the ring from her hand, holding it up to her left hand.

With far less apprehension than and far more excitement, she allowed him to slip the ring on her finger, then threw herself on top of him, and smothered him with kisses.

He saw no reason to protest.

XXXXX-XXXXX

LATE THAT NIGHT:

Eventually, then ended up lying on the couch together, talking, and Gendry was the big spoon.

"I've been trying to ask you for months," he admitted as he folded his arm around her, and she snuggled closer.

"Oh, you mean since the end of last semester?" she asked. He didn't even have to see her face to know she had a devilish grin on her face.

"How did you know?"

"You started acting really strange around then….and every time I saw my mother, the first thing she would do is check out my left hand…and you got really weird whenever I went into the freezer – did you have it in the freezer?"

He chuckled. "In the green beans….I washed it."

"Good."

"Why can't you be normal, and have put it in your sock drawer?"

"Too cliché…it was also hidden behind the books in the bookshelf for a while…and in my suitcase…and that weird pocket on the side of the couch…and for a brief time in my book bag, but that made me too nervous."

"You think too much."

"And you didn't go searching though my sock drawer?"

"Well…" she said guiltily.

"So I was justified!" He kissed her neck gently to show her he wasn't mad.

"Where did you find this?" Arya asked, admiring the ring on her hand.

"I designed it…had a hell of a time telling the woman at the jewelry store that you wouldn't want a huge diamond."

She giggled at how flustered he must have been. "You were absolutely right."

For a few minutes, they lay in silence, listening to the crickets chirp outside.

"Why today?" he asked, slowly stroking her finger.

She glanced into the bedroom at the page-a-day calendar sitting on her bedside table.

"It just felt right," she said simply, smiling as she remembered how she felt when she tore off the page and saw her word for the day.

Eternal.

She liked the sound of that.

fin

Author's Notes: Gendry and Arya were watching Ghostbusters, mainly because I feel there are no obscure lines from that movie. Basically, I'm trying to disprove the first episode of How I Met Your Mother.

There is a version in my head of the "Arya reading book for her hell class/Gendry gives her rewards for getting through each chapter" that ends up with far less Lysa going crazy and pushing a man out the window leading to yet another aborted proposal attempt and far more sex. Maybe one day I'll write it as a one-shot.

There's also fun in Gendry picking out a ring.

This chapter was originally much shorter, but I felt that Gendry would keep on getting tripped up in small details and worrying about finding the "perfect" moment, and kind of failing at closing the deal, so he would take FOREVER to propose, and I just had to write some of those moments. I also felt like Arya would pick up on it pretty quick, but decide to try to preserve his masculinity and let him do things on his own time, then get impatient and just do it herself.

If you read closely, you can find a small callback to phase two at the end of this chapter.

Thank you once again to everyone that has read this. Your encouragement has been amazing, and made this such a great process. I'm really enjoying writing again, and looking forward to a couple of things I have in mind.

PS: Still don't own this, in case you're wondering.