A/N: For the prompt "diary" from february's one word prompt list: Henry and Elizabeth's respective diary entries from one very specific day in 1989. Short and sweet for this one :)

Henry / January, 1989

As I'm writing this, it's almost midnight. I have to be up early and I really shouldn't be taking the time to do this at all, but I can't go to sleep without documenting it somewhere.

So I'm saying it here. I'm going to marry Elizabeth Adams.

I know- I haven't even known her that long, but I always thought that maybe when it was right, I would just know. Maybe it's God, or maybe it's just how the heart works. I wish I could understand it better, but I also think that maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe it's one of the mysteries of the world that I can't understand. Maybe it's stronger for it.

But- wherever it comes from- I just know. As soon as I met her, I knew that she was special. That she was beautiful and smart, that she was going to change the world, that she was a remarkable woman. But tonight, I came to know that it was more than that, that no matter how soon it might be, she's it for me.

When I was a kid, probably ten or eleven, my dad dragged me to this union meeting. It was always dead boring and I hated it, but on this particular night there was another guy there who I guess took pity on me, and tried to entertain me while my dad left me to my own devices. And he told me this joke that just struck me as hilarious, and it stuck with me all this time. It's corny but I break it out anytime I can, just because it's always a good icebreaker, even if it doesn't play well.

Anyway- tonight I took Elizabeth to this ROTC dinner. I didn't even want to go- I always find these things so stuffy and awkward- but I broke out my old favorite joke at the table to try and break some of the tension. And when I got to the punchline, the table was silent. Except for Elizabeth.

She laughed like it was the funniest thing she'd ever heard, even though the rest of the group clearly either hated it or just didn't get it, and it felt like- you know that moment when a storm breaks very suddenly, and the sun comes shining through the clouds, so golden and brilliant that you can't even imagine how it was dark only moments ago?

Nobody has ever laughed so hard at that stupid joke before. When I watched her laugh like that, I just- knew. None of the rest of the table mattered to me anymore, I didn't care that we were at this stupid dinner- there was just Elizabeth, and that laugh she has that makes me feel like the world is shifting and the sun is coming out.

It hit me so suddenly, and with such force, that I had to check my watch. I had to- somehow remember, commemorate, this moment when I first knew with total certainty that I was going to marry her.

8:22 pm.

She didn't stop laughing until 8:25. I think she's spectacular.

Maybe someday I'll be able to tell her about this night. Maybe if- when- we get married, I'll be able to tell her that I've known since this exact moment. Maybe it'll be a story to tell my children. Our children, I hope. It feels somehow sacred to hold this knowledge, to look at her across a white tablecloth and to be so sure that she's the woman I want to spend forever with. I don't know exactly what the future is going to look like, and it's still as scary as ever. There are so many challenges that could stand in the way of what I want with Elizabeth- my career and hers, not to mention the usual things that face young couples. But even in the fear, there is some peace to be found in certainty.

It feels bigger than myself. Bigger than flying, bigger than religion, bigger than fear. Bigger than whatever might stand in the way.

It's after midnight now. You might think I'd regret this in the morning, and maybe I would, if it were for anything else. But not for Elizabeth. Maybe that's a precursor- I don't think I could ever regret losing sleep or sanity for Elizabeth. I hope that I have a long time and countless reasons to do so.

I hope there are countless 8:22 pms with her and I hope I get to tell her that joke until we're too old to remember the punchline.

Elizabeth / January 1989

I'm not much of the journaling type- I guess that much was obvious by the fact that the last entry in this was two and a half years ago, and also the part where I'm already getting bored of writing my own thoughts out like this. There was a grief counselour that Will and I saw for a little while who said it would help, and it really did not, so I guess that's where my disdain for it comes from. Take that, psychology.

Or maybe not, because I am currently writing in a journal and that does undermine my point a little. But this is- at the risk of sounding even more cliche- different.

I went out with Henry tonight. This is not a sappy diary entry about my date with a handsome boy- although he is, very. It's about a moment.

My mom used to tell me that someday I would meet someone and I would know in my heart that he was the one for me. I thought it was ridiculous, but she insisted that she'd known that about my dad. I haven't thought about that in so long. Not even when Henry and I started going out. Not until tonight.

Henry was telling this joke- I can't explain it, both because it requires a prop and because if I try to, I think I'll start laughing again and I won't be able to get through this. But trust me when I say that it was absolutely hysterical, and I thought it was really strange that nobody else laughed at it. But I guess that was part of the thing- here we were, at this completely boring ROTC dinner; I mean, very boring. And Henry told this joke- I think he was trying to liven things up- and nobody else laughed, but it just didn't matter. Henry and I were laughing, and it felt like us against the world. Like nothing else really existed. And he was looking at me in a way that-

All of a sudden, while I was laughing at this joke, I remembered what my mom had said. So clearly, like she was right there telling it to me all over again. And I realized- I want to marry Henry. I mean, I really, really want to marry Henry, and I felt it so clearly and obviously that it sort of took my breath away.

So much so that I even checked the time. 8:22 pm. I just wanted to be able to remember the moment that it came to me. And I guess that's why I dug out this journal after two and a half years.

I've spent so much time trying to forget things, because they're painful to remember. But this, I want to remember. For the first time in so long, I want to remember. I want to be able to tell Henry, someday, when it's not so soon, that this was the exact moment that things changed for me. I think that's maybe what my mom meant- that there would be a shift, a moment when I felt different. Not unlike myself, but maybe more like myself. Like Henry telling that joke brought out a piece of me that I was keeping hidden.

How's that for psychology?

Anyway. I absolutely refuse to speculate on what he's thinking in terms of our relationship, because that really would be a sappy diary entry about a handsome boy, but- I hope someday I get to tell him about this night. Maybe someday we'll be old and it'll be a sweet story. Maybe someday, we'll be old and I'll still laugh at that joke.

I hope I get to hear him tell it forever. Is that sappy enough?