Slightly shorter than usual. But we're getting somewhere I promise.


April 10th, 2029, 5:00 PM
Downtown Los Angeles

Phoenix shifted nervously on the sidewalk where he stood staring into the window of a jewelry store, the same jewelry store he walked by every day on his way from the bus stop to the office. Some of the people who were passing by gave him dirty looks for standing in the middle of the sidewalk, but he paid them no attention.

He looked to his left down the street and then to the right. Maya was in Kurain Village for the day doing some high profile channeling, along with Pearl, and Trucy was in school, so there was no reason to be nervous, yet he couldn't shake the niggling feeling in the back of his mind that someway, somehow, Maya would find out what he was up to. He couldn't let that happen, this had to be perfect. He wasn't going to let anyone ruin the surprise. He still hadn't even told Trucy or Pearl of his plan, on the off chance that they accidentally let it slip.

After talking with Iris and having a few more "therapy" sessions with Athena over the last month, his anxious thoughts about marriage were dwindling significantly. He was starting to find himself excited or even giddy at the thought of it now. It was a good feeling. He'd needed the month to save up some money, but luck had been on his side for once when he and Athena were hired for a rather important case and were paid quite well for their win, and this was one purchase he didn't want to cheap out on. It was as if the universe was telling him that now was the time to finally do it.

He took one more look down the sidewalk each way, not seeing anyone he knew. He opened the door to the store and stepped inside. The saleswoman was busy helping another man at the front counter, so he turned to busy himself with looking at the bracelets and necklaces. He was bent down slightly, still staring hard at a charm bracelet and trying to read what was written on one of the charms when a voice spoke up from behind him.

"Excuse me, sir? Can I help you with something?"

He straightened up and turned around at the strangely familiar voice. The woman he came face to face with was recognizable immediately, with that blonde hair pulled up into a neat bun at the back of her head. Her glasses were a bit thicker now and square instead of rounded, but they suited her. She was wearing a simple black pantsuit and looking as professional as always.

Her look of surprise when she saw his face indicated that she knew exactly who he was as well. "Oh! Mr. Wright!"

He grinned. "Miss Andrews. It's been a long time, hasn't it?"

"About nine years or so," she answered. "My, you haven't aged a day since I last saw you."

"The same can be said for you," he said. "You look great."

"Thank you." She smiled at him, seeming much more confident than he remembered.

"So, you're a jeweller these days?"

She nodded. "Well, I just work here as a salesperson, but I'm actually quite interested in different gemstones and things like that, so it's fun to help people find things for their significant others." She tilted her head. "Speaking of, why are you here today? I saw you looking pretty hard at that charm bracelet."

"That's not what I'm here for. I'm actually here to look at engagement rings."

Another look of surprise from her. "Oh, congratulations! Who's the lucky lady, if I may ask? The only woman I ever saw you with was that little spirit medium from the Fey clan that I helped at Lordly Tailor."

"That would be said lady," he confirmed. "She's a well respected spirit medium now, and the leader of her whole village."

Adrian nodded, not seeming at all surprised. "I still remember all you did for her back during that case with Matt, and then again when the urn was stolen from Lordly Tailor."

He rubbed the back of his neck and smiled embarrassedly. "I'm still really sorry about that whole thing, Miss Andrews."

"It's quite alright. It's all in the past and I understand how much she meant to you. I would have done the same in your position." She shifted on her feet. "So, why were you stopped looking at that bracelet if you're here for an engagement ring? Nervous?"

He laughed. "No, not at all. At least, not anymore. I'm actually pretty excited now. Maya and I have been together for a really long time and it finally feels right."

"Well then, let's take a look," she said as she headed behind one of the glass cases. "What kind of jewelry does she like?"

He'd been paying a lot of attention to Maya's jewelry preferences lately, but in doing so he realized that Maya didn't really wear any jewelry aside from her magatama necklace. She'd caught him at one point standing at their dresser and digging through an old jewelry box that was on top of it, but all he'd found in it was a hidden stash of sour gummy candies. When she questioned what he was doing the only thing he could think to do was blurt out how he'd lost his watch and was wondering if she'd put it in with her jewelry. She'd pointed out that he was wearing his watch, then looked at him funny as he pretended to be surprised at finding his watch around his own wrist.

He sighed. "Ah, she doesn't really wear any jewelry so I'm not quite sure. But I think she'd like something unique, like her. Maya is the furthest from boring that you can get, if she could pick it out she'd probably choose something other than a regular diamond, just to be different."

Adrian looked thoughtful for a moment. "Just a minute. I'm sure I have a pamphlet around here somewhere with different types of gemstones. There are a lot of different types you can order in if you don't want to go for a traditional diamond ring."

She bent down behind the counter and opened a cupboard. She dug through it for a moment and then emerged with a booklet in her hand. She slid it onto the table and turned it toward him. "It tells you the different gemstones as well as their meanings, in case that interests you."

He flipped it open and flicked through the pages. There were a few that caught his eye. Aquamarine, emerald, malachite, rose quartz and sapphires. They were all quite beautiful, but he stopped and turned back a page when he saw amethyst flip by. It was a pretty purple colour, and the information underneath stated that amethysts increased spirituality and enhanced intuition and psychic powers. He wasn't sure how much he actually believed that a pretty rock had special powers, which would have seemed hypocritical had he thought about it further, but the meaning behind the stone as well as its colour seemed to match Maya perfectly.

He turned the booklet back towards Adrian and pointed at it. "What about this? Does that work for engagement rings?"

"Certainly. It's still a precious gemstone, so it's not considered 'cheap', and see here how it says that the stone is a 7 on the Mohs scale?" she said, pointing to a part of the information printed at the side of the picture. "That means that it's just as hard as that quartz you can get in fake diamond rings, so it won't break that easily either. It's not as strong as a diamond, but you won't find it cracking or breaking apart."

"Are they all this colour?"

"Yes, but the intensity can vary. The deeper purple it is, the more expensive they are."

"What about the cuts?"

She seemed impressed. "You've been doing your research I see."

He shrugged. "Yeah, I've been looking stuff up online a lot. It's a big purchase, you know?"

"That's a good thing. Most men who come in here certainly care about the purchase but they don't come so prepared."

"I've been thinking about this for a long time so I couldn't help myself. I've spent way too much time on the internet recently."

She nodded politely. "Well, a lot of times they're done in an emerald cut," she said, pointing to one of the diamond rings in the case to indicate the rectangular shape of the emerald cut. "It can be cut however you'd like though. We can look at different types and then decide on the band as well."

"Alright. Let's do it."


April 12th, 2029, 3:00 PM
Wright Anything Agency

Once the ring was ordered, he went about planning the rest of the proposal. It wasn't going to be some big event, just something simple between he and Maya, but he still wanted it to be special. She deserved that. The first person he called was Klavier Gavin. They had never really been friends, but Phoenix had forgiven him a long time ago for his part in his disbarment, and he knew Klavier and Apollo were close. So he had a little favour to ask, and he figured Klavier owed him.

"Herr Wright?" Klavier sounded groggy, like he'd just been woken up, despite it being three in the afternoon.

"Hi Prosecutor Gavin."

"To what do I owe the pleasure of your phone call?" Klavier asked, and Phoenix noted just a hint of sarcasm in his voice. Maybe he really had just woken up.

"I have a favour to ask of you."

"Hmm? A favour? What sort of favour?"

"You're a musician, right?" Of course he knew, he wasn't so far out of the loop that he hadn't heard of the Gavinners. Trucy still had pictures of Klavier on her bedroom wall. "You're a singer and guitar player and all of that? Do you play any other instruments?"

Klavier hummed. "I do play some piano. I suppose it'd be strange if I didn't, given what my parents decided to name me. I've dabbled in drumming and bass too."

"Great! I need some piano lessons."

"But Herr Forehead told me you used to be a pianist. Can't you already play piano?"

"Heh, no not really. Besides it's been a few years now so I'm even rustier than ever. Can you write music too?"

"Yes…"

"I need some help with that too."

"What are you up to, Herr Wright? You need to write a song?"

"Yes. Just the music, for the piano that you're going to teach me."

Klavier sighed. "Okay, I guess. I do owe you after all."

"Thank you!" Phoenix said sincerely. "You're the only person I know who can help me with something like this now. Trust me, it's for a good reason."

"Ja, ja. Let me know your schedule, we'll work out some times to meet. You'll probably want to come to my office at the Prosecutor's Offices. I've got all the stuff we'll need there."

"Sounds good, Prosecutor Gavin. Thanks a lot."

When they'd hung up, he went to his computer next to bring up the local movie theatre's website. Maya had been going on and on about the new Plumed Punisher movie that was finally coming to select theatres in the United States. Apparently it was doing so well in Khura'in that they decided to dub it and bring it to America, and she'd been bugging him nonstop to buy tickets for it. The closest theatre that had it was almost an hour's drive away, but it would be worth it to bring her. He purchased the tickets for the 20th right away and printed them out, then stuck them in an envelope to bring home.

They didn't have a set "anniversary" date, but they usually celebrated it on April 20th. It was the day he was disbarred almost ten years ago now. They both knew full well that they hadn't gotten together until much later, but since they'd fallen into a relationship and didn't have a particular day they considered their anniversary, Maya had insisted they celebrate it on April 20th, so he could make new memories with her on that day, instead of thinking about the bad ones.

She was right, of course. Nowadays he had good memories of their times together, particularly on April 20th. Now that he had his job back his disbarment didn't seem like such a big deal, but during the years he'd been playing poker in the dingy basement of the Borscht Bowl Club, it had helped him tremendously. He even found himself looking forward to that day each year instead of dreading it. Adrian let him know before he left the shop that day that the ring he ordered should be available to pick up before the 20th, so he planned on asking during their outing that night.

After slipping the envelope into his suitcase he said goodbye to Athena and headed down to walk to the nearest flower shop. He was grateful the office was in the middle of the city, almost anything he needed was within walking distance. There he picked up a bouquet of multi-coloured daisies. They had no special meaning, but they were pretty and he'd already done roses on Valentine's Day. He grabbed a silly card to put the tickets inside of and went back outside to grab a taxi home.

When he arrived at the house, Maya was already home from Kurain. He found her in the kitchen attempting to bake something, he couldn't even tell what it was. When she turned around from the counter to greet him and saw the bouquet of flowers, she grinned.

"Hey Maya." He held out the bouquet for her. The card was placed between a few of the stiff flower stems. "These are for you."

She put her hands on her hips, but her smile stayed in place. "What did you do, Nick?"

He pretended to act hurt. "Can't a guy get his girlfriend flowers for no reason?"

She came forward and took them from him, then stood up on her tip toes to kiss his cheek. "Thank you. But seriously, what did you do?"

"Nothing, I swear... Consider it an early anniversary gift. There's a card."

"That's still a week away," she said absently as she sat on one of the stools at the island. She placed the flowers gently on the counter and took the card, ripping it open eagerly. On the outside was a picture of a puppy with "Happy Anniversary" written on it. She flipped it open, but couldn't even read the inscribed "I ruff you" before her eyes fell on the tickets. He could see the glee on her face before she even looked up.

"Niiiiick!" She put everything down on the counter and jumped off her stool to hug him. She squeezed him tightly around the waist. "I love you!"

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I know, I'm great."

She pulled away to look at the tickets again. "You got them for the 20th too! Best anniversary gift ever."

"Really?" He said, finally pulling off his jacket. "I thought that one time I brought you to that restaurant that served foot wide hamburgers was the best?" Maya was easy to please.

She was still holding the tickets. "This trumps that. You finally one upped yourself. I can't wait!" She hurried over to the fridge and used a magnet to place the tickets on it. She went to the cupboard next to pull out a glass vase which she then filled with water to place the bouquet in. "I'm going to put these in the living room."

He gestured at the bowl of what he thought was dough. "What about all this?"

She waved a hand. "I'll finish it in a bit." Then she was gone, running happily down the hall. He smiled. One thing that hadn't changed about Maya even after all these years was her childlike enthusiasm over things that most adults might roll their eyes at. Even he was guilty of it, particularly in their early days, when he thought she was too old to be so obsessed with Samurai shows. But now that he himself was getting older, he appreciated that about her. Her excitement over something as simple as a TV show or movie made him feel younger too, and it was nice to forget that he was only a few years away from 40.

He grabbed some saran wrap from one of the kitchen drawers and used it to cover her bowl, then stuck it in the fridge so it wouldn't go bad. Knowing Maya she would forget about it until hours later and have to start again on whatever it was she was trying to make. When he was finished he followed her into the living room where he found her situating the flowers in the vase, making sure all the prettiest ones were on display.

"These are so pretty, Nick! Thank you!"

"You're welcome," he said, heading around the couch to sit. She came over and sat beside him, leaning in to plant multiple kisses on his face, each one punctuated with a "mwah" sound.

"Alright, alright," he said, laughing and giving her a playful push. "So… I haven't seen any of the Plumed Punisher show yet."

She gasped. "You're right! You haven't!"

"I figured I should probably watch some before I see the movie with you, so…"

"Nick! You want to watch it with me?!" She jumped off the couch and ran towards the TV stand where their collection of DVDs were. Her multiple Samurai spin-offs and her imported Khura'inese Plumed Punisher DVDs were set up so they were on display to anyone who came through the living room. "These have subtitles! You're okay with that, right?"

"Well, I can't speak Khura'inese, so unless you're going to translate it for me…"

"Subtitles it is!" She put the first DVD in and waited for the menu to pop up. The familiar, very Steel Samurai sounding theme song filled the living room. "I'm gonna go make popcorn and get some ice cream before I start it. Do you want some?" she said.

He got up. "I'll come with you to look. You know Pearls told me a few weeks ago that I need to cut back on the potato chips because I might get fat?"

Maya snorted. "She must've been in a bad mood that day."

"She said that because you told her you like my muscles so she didn't think you'd appreciate a fat boyfriend." He ran his hands down the front of his shirt. "I'm not getting chubby am I? I did cut back on snacks and I've been walking a lot more lately…"

Maya laughed. "Nick, don't let Pearly's idealizations make you self-conscious. I admit it, I do like how… strong you are…"

"Yeah?"

She stared up through her eyelashes. "Mhmm." She walked her fingers up his chest. "The way you can just pin me down underneath of you with hardly any effort, or carry me off somewhere if you wanted… It's kind of exciting. Except you're too nice and would never do that so it's all really just a fantasy of mine."

"You mean… like this?" He bent quickly and wrapped his arms around her waist, hoisting her onto his shoulder. She squeaked in surprise. "This is one of your fantasies? Maya, after all this time you still manage to surprise me."

She growled in frustration and swatted at his back. "Put me doooown, Nick."

"But you're so light even I can carry you like this without hurting my back. Besides it's one of your fantasies."

"Hmph!" She went limp across his shoulder, putting her dead weight on him as he carried her down to the kitchen. "If you're not carrying me upstairs to bed, there's no point."

He laughed. "Anyway Maya, you didn't really answer my question. Am I getting tubby or not?"

She rolled her eyes, not that he could see her. "You're not getting chubby." He bent to set her back on her feet once they were in the kitchen. She fixed her robes as she eyed him. "Besides if you did get a little chubby it would just make you more huggable and cuddly, so I wouldn't mind," she said, poking his stomach for emphasis. She suddenly looked very seriously at him. "Just like you won't mind if suddenly my bad eating habits catch up to me and I get super fat, right?"

He snorted laughter. "Of course not. So hey, let's go get that ice cream."

"Okay!"


Two and a half hours later, Maya was snoozing with her head on his shoulder as Phoenix watched the end of the fifth Plumed Punisher episode. It wasn't half bad. It really did remind him an awful lot of all those old Steel Samurai episodes Maya forced him to watch, so it was almost nostalgic in a way, except the special effects and costumes were way better now and even the writing wasn't too corny. He reached forward for the remote as the episode ended, readying to start the next, but Maya shifted against him and let out a low groan.

"Stop moving around so much, Nick," she mumbled. "I'm trying to sleep."

He sat back. "You're not going to be able to sleep through the night if you sleep any longer now. You're missing your show."

"I've already seen all of the episodes though," she said, lifting her head from his shoulder and letting it roll onto the back of the couch instead. "Do you get what's going on? Do you like it?"

"Surprisingly, I'm enjoying it."

She opened her eyes sleepily to look at him. "Please, you've always secretly enjoyed the Samurai series. Just admit it already."

"Never. I only do it for you, because I love you."

"Pfft. Such a romantic."

"You know it."

She moved her hand to one of his and ran her fingers over his knuckles. "Do you wanna go to bed now?" she asked.

He leaned down to nuzzle her hair. It smelled like green apple shampoo. "Are you tired? Or did you have something else in mind?"

She moved back to smile at him but shook her head. "No… I just want to go to sleep. I'm tired tonight."

A look of concern passed over his face. It was only just after 9 pm. Maya never went to bed early, and she was certainly never the first one to suggest they turn off anything TV related just to go to bed. "Are you okay? You're not sick are you?"

"No. I just had an early day today. And I appreciate the flowers and the tickets and everything, I'm just… not in the mood now."

"Hey, that's fine," he said, turning his hand to entwine fingers with hers. "Bed it is. I have to go to the Prosecutor's Office tomorrow anyway so I should probably make it an early night too."

She got up and stretched. "Are you going to visit Edgeworth?"

"Uh, yeah, Edgeworth."

"Hm. That's nice. Maybe I should come with, I haven't seen him for a while."

"No!"

She scrunched her eyebrows together. "What? Why not?"

"Just uh… you know… we talk about… guy stuff." He stood up and began following her up the stairs to the bedroom.

Maya snorted. "No offense, Nick, but you and Edgeworth aren't exactly the most manly of men. What 'guy stuff' do you two talk about? Don't you sit and drink tea and try to beat him at chess?"

"Hey, I am manly. Edgeworth, not so much. I just do what he wants to do. If he wanted to sit around and talk about cars or women or whatever, we would."

"You don't know anything about cars." She turned to raise an eyebrow at him. "And women? Really?"

"Well, maybe not women. I mean of course I would talk about you to him," he said, flashing her a grin. "But the only girl in Edgeworth's life is his dog."

Maya gasped. "We should get a dog, Nick!"

"No," he said right away, holding the door to the bedroom open for her and then closing it behind them. "I said no to Trucy's rabbits, I said no to Pearl's kitten, and I'm saying no to your dog."

"Aaaw, but Nick—"

"Nu uh, no animals. Besides we're trying to have a baby. We shouldn't get a pet while we're trying to have a kid."

She huffed and dropped onto the edge of the bed. "Yeah, if I ever manage to get pregnant," she mumbled.

He stopped in the middle of unbuttoning his shirt and furrowed his eyebrows at her. She was casually going about untying her robes for bed. "Maya. What do you mean by that?"

She slipped her robes from her shoulders and walked across the room in just her bra and panties to pick a nightgown out of her drawer. She took her bra off with her back to him and slipped the nightgown over her head. "Nothing. Never mind." She sighed. "I guess I just thought it'd be easier," she said, sitting back down on the bed.

He sat down beside her and put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey. I haven't told you this yet but… I've been reading up on pregnancy a lot lately, you know, to prepare, because I don't want you to go through it alone. And all the books I've read say it can take up to a year to get pregnant once you start trying. It's only been a few months for us, so don't worry about it, okay?"

"Really?"

"Yeah. It'll happen. Try not to stress about it, that'll only make it worse."

"Do you think I could borrow whatever books you were reading? It might make me feel better."

"Of course. I'll go back to the library tomorrow and check them out again. And Maya, please don't keep stuff like this to yourself. You can talk to me if there's anything bothering you, you know."

She leaned over to kiss him lightly, bringing up her hand and running her fingers along his chest through his open shirt. "Thanks, Nick."

He smiled against her kiss when her fingers moved to unbutton the rest of his shirt. "I thought you said you were tired?"

"Maybe I'm not so tired after all."


I do believe the next chapter will probably be way longer and also take me a while to write. But in the meantime I'm always working on drabbles and have two other fics to write now (Relationship Status and I promise I haven't abandoned The Years Before) so look out for those. I just sort of write whatever I have inspiration for so I can't say which will be updated first or when, but they will be!

Also fun fact, I was so close to having Lotta as the jewelry salesperson instead. I had half the chapter written when I decided it totally didn't match her and was way more an Adrian thing, pfft. I love cameos of old characters.

Last but not least, to all my guest reviewers lately: Thank you and I'm glad you're enjoying this!