I love seeing the turtles act like the brothers that they are. Mallory and I walked into the lair, somehow unnoticed by the brothers, and I can't help but smile to see that all the brothers are in the front room, playing video games together. I love catching them hanging out voluntarily just because they're brothers.

Mallory and I glance over at each other and try as quietly as we can to sneak around them. Leo keeps sticking his hand into Mikey's popcorn bowl, but Mikey keeps pushing away.

"Leo!" Mikey whines, trying to dodge Leo's hand. "This is my popcorn."

"May I have some of your popcorn, Mikey?"

"No."

There's a silence, and then Leo catches Mikey off guard by reaching over again into Mikey's popcorn bowl.

"Leo!" Mikey exclaims. "What was the point of asking if you were gonna take some anyway?"

"To be polite." Leo grins. "C'mon, Mike. You don't need all that popcorn."

"Well neither do you," Mikey mutters. He raises his eye ridges at Leo. "If you ask me, you've been gaining a bit of a belly."

Mallory and I blow our cover by letting out laughs at that.

"Hey girls," Donnie greets, pausing his section of the game to come greet us. We both groan and turn towards each other. "What?"

"You guys were working together so well," I say, crossing my arms. "We didn't want to break the moment." Leo chuckles and pauses his portion of the game too.

"You interrupted nothing more than a conflict about the rightful owner of the popcorn," he says, shaking his head.

"Which is me!" Mikey reminds. "And I have a feeling that that conflict never would've been solved thanks to Leo and his selfishness."

"And it's not like we never spend time with each other," he defends. "We do things like this all the time; you guys just aren't here to see."

"Exactly," Mallory says, as Raph pauses his game. "We never get to see it, so we wanted to let the moment last."

Mikey groans when the last of his brothers gets up and leaves.

"Come on!" he whines. "Someone play with me." Mallory jumps onto the couch and snatches a controller.

"Get ready to cry, Michelangelo..." she teases, as she starts the game. I chuckle and head back towards the turtles.

Leo locks eyes with me and smiles a bit. Donnie departs, saying that he needs to work on one of his blueprints, and Raph sits next to Mallory. Leo casually takes my hand.

"I want to show you something," he says quietly. I tilt my head curiously, but follow him down the hall. We enter the dojo and he pulls out his sketch book from a corner of the room. He hands it to me and I take it, sitting on the ground. He smiles and takes a seat in front of me.

"I drew some new pictures and I thought that since you're so interested, you might want to see them."

I grin and flip through the pages gently as I can. One of the newer pictures is a drawing of a waterfall. It's crazy accurate. I turn the page and see another drawing, but this time it's of Mikey playing video games.

"Mikey wanted me to draw something," Leo explains. "He said I could draw anything but he wanted me to draw it for him. Do you think he'll like it?" The details are very accurate from the video games to the expression on Mikey's face. I grin and nod.

"He's going to love it," I say, turning the page. Page after page, amazing drawing after amazing drawing...and I get to the last one. It's a drawing of he and I, but tape on the side is a picture that we'd taken at the Farm House. It was when our friendship had first begun to grow. In the picture, I have one arm around him and I'm grinning a ridiculous, amusing grin. He's laughing in the picture.

"Leo..." I mumble, stroking the drawing with my fingertips, as if the action will bring the picture back to life. "This is so beautiful. It's perfect." I look up at him and he's already looking at me. His eyes find mine and I realize I could live a thousand lives inside those eyes and never want it to end.

"Lexi, you have changed my life so much. I really could never tell you that enough." He pauses and cups my face with his hand. His touch sparks my skin and lights my heart. "And I'm sorry that this isn't the most creative way, but Lexi, will you be my girlfriend?" The look on his face breaks my heart - he looks afraid that I'm going to say no.

I step closer, take his face into my hands and pull him into a kiss. He immediately melts into me and slides his hands around my waist with no hesitation. When we pull away, I remain close to him. I feel his warmth and know that he is mine.

"Leo, of course I will be your girlfriend." I lean close so our foreheads are against each other's. "Of course."

Life sucks. But Leonardo has made life suck a lot less.

Leo's POV:

"Come on in, guys," Emmeline says, opening up the window. "Lexi's almost done with the food." It's a Friday summer evening so naturally, as good family friends, we want to spend some time with one another.

As we walk in, the instant smell of potatoes and chicken sifts through the room. Benj sits on the couch with Mallory, and they are watching Spongebob. Mikey instantly joins them. Donnie takes a seat on the couch and begins talking to Rose a bit. Raph seems a bit awkward since the only people he generally is really good friends with are Lexi and Mallory. The table is nicely set, but there isn't any silverware set yet.

"I can get the silverware if you want," I offer, glancing over at Emmeline. She smiles and sets down the pot of flowers that she has been carrying.

"Thanks, Leo." As I head towards the kitchen, I notice that the door and windows that lead to the kitchen are completely shut. I glance over at Emmeline, and she simply waves her hand in dismissal.

"Don't mind the closed doors," she says. "Lexi wanted to be able to cook without anyone bothering her."

I nod my head and open up the door, shutting it behind me. I open up the drawer and scoop out enough silverware for everyone. I find Lexi near the sink, chopping celery to put in the salad. The food smells even more amazing here in the kitchen, since it's where the food is initially being prepared.

I smile as I watch her sing along to the music she's playing. Coming up from behind her, I wrap my arms around her waist.

"Hey, love." Turning around, she laughs and sets down the celery. She pecks me on the lips and wraps her arms around my neck for a hug.

"Hey you," she says, smiling as she pulls away. "Man, you'd think by the shut doors and windows that visitors are unwelcome in this kitchen."

"Am I an unwanted visitor?" I ask, tilting my head in curiosity. She laughs and shakes her head.

"No," she says. "You're always wanted. It's just video game boy that was bothering me." She's referring to her brother.

"He's not exactly playing video games anymore," I explain. "Everyone's watching Spongebob."

Her mouth drops open.

"Wow..." she mutters. "Everyone waits until I'm gone to actually do something fun." I chuckle and she begins to chop the celery again. I look at her for a moment and then tilt my head.

"What was he doing anyway?"

She sighs and puts the celery down for a minute. She puts a hand on her hip and looks at me for a moment.

"They're getting suspicious," she says quietly, looking down.

"About what? Us?"

"Yeah." She picks the celery pieces up and sprinkles them all over the salad. "I mean, apparently we've been acting 'more couple like' whatever that means. Why don't we just tell them?"

"Okay, how would we make the announcement? Just walk out there and announce, 'Hey, by the way, we're dating if any of you wanted to know,'" I say, and she laughs a bit.

"I know..." she mumbles. "But...it's weird, you know? We still haven't told anybody."

"We'll find the right time..." I say. "I promise. Now I gotta get out of here—I kind of said that I was coming in here to get silverware and nothing else. Do you want me to come back to talk to you some more? I'm sure you get kind of lonely in here..."

She waves her hand in dismissal.

"Naw, you go on ahead. I've got my music." I can tell by her voice that she is slightly disappointed. She doesn't want to be keeping a secret like this from her family—and neither do I with mine. And in some ways, I'm confused at myself for not telling them. What's the point of hiding it now?

"Don't worry," I say. "We'll tell them soon, I promise."

She smiles and I lean in for a kiss. The kiss is short and sweet and I hold her chin with one hand. When we pull away, she ushers me out.

"Get on out now," she says. "Shoo, shoo."

I roll my eyes. "Pushy girlfriend..."

As I exit, I'm surprised to find Rose standing directly outside of the kitchen. I flinch back when I shut the door and see her there, standing so close to the door.

"Um...hi."

"Leo and Lexi are dating!" she shrieks. Everyone's heads look up, wide eyed.

"Wait, what?" Benj and Mikey both exclaim.

"What?" I say, turning back towards Rose.

"Don't act like you don't know," she says, pushing me. "I saw you two kiss just now! I went in there to ask if dinner was ready soon and I saw you share a little smooch." She pushes me teasingly away and I shove her away.

"Stop it."

"Nope! I saw it with my own two eyes!" she says, turning towards everyone. "Leo and Lexi are dating!" She then turns back to me and pushes me again. "How long have you been hiding this from us for?" I shift my gaze from the crowd of eyes that are looking at us in anticipation, to Rose, who is looking with satisfaction.

I make an abrupt turn and open up the door to the kitchen.

"Lexi?" I say, and she turns around to face me.

"Yes?"

"The people know."

"We know your precious secret!" Rose shouts. "Come out and confess!"

"I'm making a salad!" Lexi shouts back. "I'll talk about my love life later."

"So how long has it been?" Emmeline asks, grinning.

"Since Wednesday," Lexi says, coming out of the kitchen with plates of food. "Now can somebody help me with the food?"

"By somebody she means you Leo," Mikey teases.

"Fly away my little birdy," Rose exclaims, shoving me. I almost fall off the couch, but I catch myself. I shoot a glare at her, but I help my girlfriend with the plates full of delicious looking foods. Rose fakes a sniffle and wipes away a pretend tear. She turns to Master Splinter and puts a hand to her heart.

"They grow up so fast don't they, Master Splinter?"

Splinter smiles and nods. "They do, Rosalie. I remember when Leonardo was simply a young child going through garage bins and finding empty toilet paper rolls. He brought them home and used them as swords."

"Master Splinter..." I mumble, my face heating up. Lexi laughs along with Rose.

"Awww!" Lexi coos, pinching my cheeks. "Little Leo's first set of katanas were toilet paper rolls? That's so cute!"

I wave her hands away and mutter a, "Whatever." She rolls her eyes and sets the last plates of food on the table.

After Emmeline says a prayer on the food, we all dig in. Lexi has cooked scalloped potatoes and chicken. The salad she has made has been poured into the biggest bowl I've ever seen.

"Why is there so much salad?" Raph asks with a mouth full of food. Master Splinter shoots him a look that clearly says to use his manners. He swallows his food, but that doesn't last long because soon enough, he's stuffing his mouth again.

"Why not?" Rose asks, passing the salad down. Lexi takes a seat right across from me and dumps some salad onto her plate.

"No one likes salad," Mikey complains, rolling his eyes. Lexi whacks him and glares.

"Excuse me but lots of people like salad," she points out, pouring a bit of dressing onto hers.

"What's so good about a bunch of leafy greens?" Raph asks. He stuffs some more potatoes into his mouth. I watch Splinter sigh in embarrassment for my brother. I scoop a generous amount of salad onto my plate and pass it on.

"Do you think that Leo is only eating the salad because Lexi made it and he now feels obligated to?" Mikey asks.

Lexi scoffs. "Leo was obligated to eat my salads even when we were just friends. Nothing has changed."

"Not to mention, I actually really like your salads," I defend, taking another bite of the salad.

"That's exactly what someone obligated to like her salads would say," Mikey points out, shaking his head. "You're a prisoner now, bro."

"His heart is held captive and he wouldn't rather it be any other way," Rose says in an overdramatic voice.

Lexi throws her head up into the air in laughter. "Why do you guys have to make our romance into a John Green book?"

"Lexi, I have read every single John Green book and I really don't think there were any mutant turtles as love interests." Rose laughs and shakes her head. "You guys are your own genre."