Hey all! Next chapter up here — another one that went in a much different direction than I anticipated, but that I also like. I hope you do too!

I've noticed (and it appears that it's general malaise in the fandom, since it's been so long since we've had new episodes), but the latest updates have had a lot less feedback. To those who are still reading, thanks so much! I really appreciate it.

August

"Sloan, come on, the staff's ready for rundown," Jim says, knocking on her door.

"Oh. Right," Sloan says, glancing at the clock and realizing she's four minutes late to her own meeting.

"Everything OK?"

"Peachy," she says, getting up. "If you were to surprise Maggie with something for a special occasion, what would it be?" Somewhere in the back of her mind, she realizes that it's a little demented to be asking the guy who broke up her husband's relationship with his ex-girlfriend for relationship advice, but hey, she's progressive. And a workaholic who forgot to keep in touch with a lot of her married friends. And a little desperate.

"Uh," Jim searches. "We've been dating for two months. Her birthday is in March. What anniversary did I miss? Is three months a thing?"

"Only if you're sixteen," Sloan replies disdainfully. "No, for me and Don. You know, since our first anniversary is coming up in a couple weeks? Of our marriage, not of when we smiled at each other at our lockers."

"Oh," Jim says sheepishly, scraping at the nape of his neck. He does that a lot when he's nervous. "I, uh, dunno. Do you want to …. go somewhere?"

"I don't really care," Sloan says. "But you know what Don is sneakily great at? Surprises. And gifts. He took me back to the diner where we had our first date on the anniversary of that date. He planned a surprise New Year's-slash-my-birthday trip to Aruba last year. He took me to the Standard for our third date. He —"

"He's good at dates, I get it," Jim says.

"Not just dates. He remembered my mother wanted a NutriBullet ten months after she mentioned it and got it for her birthday. Do you know how fucking annoying that is? I want to win this one."

"You know, you two are usually …"

"What?"

He shrugs. "Smug about the whole partnership thing."

"The whole 'partnership' thing?"

"You're all, you know, 'low drama,' and 'supportive,' and 'equal' —"

"How are any of those bad, and how do any of those relate to wanting to kick his ass at anniversaries?"

"You don't think they're a little … mutually incompatible?"

She stares at him. "Of course not."

"Alright then," Jim says. "Rundown?"

"Yes," she walks into the conference room as eight producers and bookers wait expectantly. "If anyone has ever received a fantastic birthday gift, anniversary gift, or holiday gift that can be easily adapted so that I can win my anniversary, please shoot me an email by five P.M. today. Winner will win … something. That is fabulous."

"Sloan," Jim groans, his hand on his face.

"Oh. Right, and obviously, something that a four-months-pregnant woman can do. So no skydiving. But the prize. Is fabulous. Obviously it has to stay under wraps since I don't want to start a scrum of jealousy, but rest assured, it's pretty awesome."

"The news, people!" Jim says. "We're going to start with chemical weapons and Syria —"

Later that night, she's in the makeup room getting prepped when Don walks in with a cucumber-melon smoothie. "For the record, this beverage is disgusting," he says as he hands it to her.

"For the record, it's full of antioxidants and nutrients that will grow your kid," she parries back. "What's up?"

"Word on the street is you're trying to win the anniversary," Don says, trying to suppress a shit-eating grin.

Her mouth drops. "Who told? I will fire them."

He snorts. "You can't fire them."

"Money on them not knowing that."

"It was Jim."

"Oh. I can't fire Jim."

"And he knows that."

"I hate having a smart EP."

"He was telling Maggie and Mac and I overheard."

"Well," she says, standing, "consider the gauntlet thrown. This anniversary is yours to lose, mister."

He kisses her lightly. "Bring it on."

"I have no idea how I'm going to win this anniversary," she admits to Kenzie the next morning as they're working with Sven, their new trainer, in the ACN gym.

"I really don't know why you are trying," Kenzie acknowledges.

"I mean, I got him a fucking watch for our first Christmas together. A fucking watch. That's not romantic!" she says.

"Is there anything he's mentioned lately that he's wanted?"

"No," she huffs. "He hates spending money on anything but trips. I'm lucky I got the kitchen renovated before he realized how much it cost."

"Ladies, let's focus," Sven reprimands, then says, "Just give him a great fuck. Preferably on a beach."

"That's honestly not the worst idea he's had. Certainly better than those dangling sit-ups," Kenzie points out later. Sloan can't help but agree with her.

It's not that she wants to win, like it's a competition. It's just, he's so … casually effortless, when it comes to being romantic. He asked her to move in with me for nearly half a year and brings her drinks when he notices she looks tired on air; he makes her dance in the kitchen late at night and buys books he thinks she might like whenever he's at a bookstore. He is the undisputed king of surprise weekends away; when he's bored at work he sends her Spotify playlists of the Magnetic Zeros and the Civil Wars and Kanye West and the Talking Heads and the Smiths (though that might be because he's not impressed with her taste in music, which even she has to admit is pretty limited). Don is all long walks holding her hand and sweet Post-Its on her interview notes and flowers-just-because-its-Tuesday and warm silences on phone calls when they're in different cities. Sometimes she worries; that he thinks he needs to win her over again and again with these romantic gestures, that he's Bill Murray and she's Andie MacDowell. She doesn't want him to think that.

But for the most part it's genuine, it's natural. It's also a little surprising, because when she met him, when he was a short fuse with a chip on his shoulder and an attitude problem and a boatload of ambition and arrogance, when she started to fall for him, she never would have predicted this. She liked him almost against her will; she would have enjoyed this and them anyways, would have been satisfied with having his assistant reminding him of anniversaries and generic red roses on Valentine's Day and her birthday.

This is … much better, but also much harder. Because she's not romantic. She's literal. She blurts things like because you never asked me out and I love you waitnoItakethatback out. She has terrible timing and worse phrasing. She loves him fiercely — which should be obvious, since they are having a child together less than two years after getting together — but besides just being there, she has little idea how to express that. This should be entirely unsurprising; she got her dad socks for twenty-three straight Christmases. She wants to make this memorable.

"I can't just take him to a beach and fuck him though. I'm not a frat boy."

"You could make him something, if he doesn't want you to buy anything?"

"Yes, Kenzie, because the first thing people say when they think of me is, That Sloan Sabbith — she's pretty crafty."

Kenzie shrugs, then squints. "Buy something off Itsy-Bitsy?"

"Etsy?"

"Excuse you, too," Kenzie says.

Don seems to sense her stress, because that night over a split bowl of leftover ramen in bed, he says, "I think we should lay some ground rules."

"What?" she asks, snatching the last piece of pork belly with her chopsticks.

"For the anniversary. I don't want to be in a situation where we both pick a restaurant or plan something, and then we get in an argument, and then we don't have sex. Let's be honest, Sloan, that's the most important part of our anniversary."

"That we have sex? We have sex all the time. Or do you think this is an immaculate conception?" She gestures to the four-month bump, which is so blatant she'd had to announce the pregnancy on air and respond to thousands of congratulations on Twitter a few weeks ago. She wasn't wholly opposed to the entire ordeal — if she hadn't known what she was getting into when she started at ACN, she certainly knew when she agreed to the new show and the higher profile — but she thinks she will always find this public side to her job, which she otherwise considers sensible and serious, almost bizarre.

"Yes, but anniversary sex is different."

"With all your experiences having anniversary sex?"

"I have very high expectations," he grins wolfishly. Hmm. Maybe she can role-play her way to winning this anniversary. "Anyways," he changes tone. "It's all yours. Everything. It's yours."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I'll buy you something — obviously — but restaurant, dinner, dress code, whether or not we end up in Vermont at a syrup farm — it's all up to you. You're stressed, and I don't like that, but more importantly, I've been a dick and hoarded occasions. That's antifeminist, and I am too progressive for that. The anniversary is yours. It's all on you. We'll use your credit card, too."

"That gives me an unfair advantage and is a terrible way to win," she complains. "No way."

"Nope. I'm withdrawing. It's all yours, Sabbith."

She puts the plastic ramen bowl to the side and kisses him. "This is because you're intimidated, right?"

He lifts her on his lap. "Absolutely," he promises, only half-facetiously. Grinning, she pushes his boxes down over his hips.

Despite Don's caving to logic and her awesomeness, she's still searching for something to get him. Don, as she told Kenzie, is terribly hard to buy for: He hates spending money and will dopily say something like, You're everything I need if she asks what he might like. Her associate producer suggests a Broadway show and dinner at Tavern on the Green, and it takes everything in Sloan not to fire the girl on the spot. She orders Jim to come up with something and threatens to fire him with insubordination when he doesn't, but Charlie tells her HR won't allow that (like he can talk about HR violations). Don, for his part, looks absolutely smug most of the time — he has her gift figured out.

She needs help. "What do you think of Quebec?" she asks Will during her segment one night. She doesn't appear every night on NewsNight; just when there is an important economics story. Which is pretty frequently.

"I think it's damn far away from New York," he grouses.

"What did you do for your first anniversary with Kenzie? The first time around. Or even the second."

"When was there a second time around that's not the time we're currently on?"

"When she came back to NewsNight and was your producer?"

"We weren't dating then. You think I celebrated our anniversary of not-dating?"

"I wouldn't put it past you," she thinks for a second. "The party! At your place. The night we killed Osama. When Don and Elliot and I were stuck on the tarmac?"

"That wasn't for Mac."

"She made you throw it. She made you be social."

"I am perfectly social."

"What if I threw a party? The wedding reception we never had?"

"You two did a housewarming in April."

"Will, you need to help meeeee," she whines, banging lightly on the desk. They have another minute. "He's impossible to plan for."

"For Christ's sake, Sloan, you're smart, and the two of you are married and having a kid. You know the guy. Keep it simple. And yes, he's as simple as you think he is — he just wants to be with you, Sloan," Will finally says. "He'll forget what it's like to skydive and getting a tattoo will be bullshit in time. All he wants to do is spend time with you. He asked you to marry him about sixty-two times; he actually meant it."

That gives her her first idea.

An email from her mother gives her the second.

The file comes innocuously enough, between Market Wrap Up and Starting Line (her mother has an incredibly annoying habit of emailing when she's at the busiest part of her day.). There's no subject (also an annoying habit) and a quick note: Sloan — I forgot Sutton had this. Thought you and Don would enjoy. Looking forward to seeing you both soon. Love Mom.

She taps on the file and waits impatiently as it loads. Suddenly, she's watching herself put the finishing touches on her makeup right before her wedding. Her jaw drops. She moves the cursor to check the video length: forty-six minutes and twenty-three seconds. She calls her mom. "What am I looking at?"

"I don't know, Sloan, I'm in San Francisco. At work," Nami says. "Why don't you tell me what you are looking at?"

"The video. That you sent?"

"Oh. That's your wedding day, Sloan."

"I know that," Sloan replies. Her mother's archness used to fluster her, but now it's more of a mild annoyance. "I didn't know that anyone filmed it, and I'm asking to know more about its general existence."

"Oh. Well, given the short notice you gave us — which, as I have said a thousand times, I am fine with, Sloan, please don't start with the wounded routine again — I wanted to make sure it was documented. For you two, of course, but also in case nobody believed me."

"You put it in the New York Times, Mom."

"Well, I didn't know that would happen at the time. Anyways, Sutton and Sawyer offered to film it, and together they got most of the ceremony and some of the reception. Don's brother got quite a bit too, and sent it to them. Brent edited it all together and gave it to Sutton, but Harvard Med apparently admitted a flake, as did the Peace Corps and Brown University. She forgot to send it to me until last week. I just thought you and Don would appreciate it."

"I … do," she says, suddenly speechless.

"I'm glad," her mother says. "You should call your sisters, tell them that, OK?"

"I will," she promises. "I have to go. But … thanks, Mom. That was a really good idea."

"I know," Nami smiles. "Tell Don hi, OK? And how're you doing?"

"I'm fine. Everything's normal, it's good. We have an ultrasound next week; I'll email you guys all photos, OK?"

They hang up, and Sloan drops prep to watch. Brent has somehow set it to music, and it takes her a few minutes to realize that the music is Will — he'd brought his guitar and provided the music. At the reception he'd had a fantastic time, playing You are the Best Thing for their first dance, and Your Song and God Only Knows and In My Life and I Will and Make You Feel My Love and a dozen others with the house band backing him, before dropping the guitar in favor of waltzing Kenzie around the dance floor. She's incredibly impressed with the quality of the recording.

She's forgotten so much of the day: the trouble they had with the zipper of the above-knee classic lace Amsale dress; the fact that they forgot the flowers and she had to stop at a florist's (who gave them to her for free); the rush to make it to City Hall at the appointed time because of said emergency stop. She learns new things: Don apparently was so nervous he couldn't tie his tie, and Mitch had pretended to lose the rings, which caused a mini-eruption. Whoops.

She watches herself walk in — nervous but also confident, her shoulder back her gait steady and her eyes clear — to Will playing Maybe I'm Amazed (McCartney's version, obviously). She makes it to the front, where Bloomberg is waiting, and as they start to say her vows, she gets her second idea.

"So what's the game plan?" Don asks her on the day of their anniversary, after a vigorously fun round of morning anniversary sex (Don was right; it's pretty freaking awesome). "What should I wear? What type of shoes?"

"A suit, and I'll even let you pick the shoes," she smirks, then kisses him. "Happy anniversary, husband." She smiles. "I actually want to talk to you about that."

"What?" his face drops.

"What? Oh! No. That came out wrong."

"Uh, can you correct that, then?" He's two seconds away from a heart attack, so she moves quickly.

"The husband thing … Your last name," she pauses. "I want to change my last name. Not professionally — I'll still write and anchor and speak under Sabbith — but … Keefer for the other stuff. Driver's licenses, investment accounts, IRS forms … School-enrollment paperwork. That kind of stuff."

He takes in a deep breath. "Sloan … You don't have to. I don't need you too."

"But you want me to?"

"I don't care if you do," he says honestly. "We've been ... married for a year, and we've talked about it, what, once? If that?"

"OK," she shrugs. "I want to."

"You do?"

"Yeah."

"You sure?"

"Yes," she says, then hits him. "Do you not want me to?"

"No, I … Of course, if that's what you want to do."

"That's not what I asked," she shifts down, resting her head on her palm.

"I don't want you to want to do it for me. If you want to do it I want you to do it."

"Now we're just arguing semantics," she flops sideways.

"No, I … I guess, yes, I want it. But do I need it? No. Me, you, we, us — we're a family," he smooths a hand over her gently distended stomach. "Already. We are. I don't care who has whose last name. I don't care if the bean's last name is hyphenated or mine or yours. But if you want to? Yes. Of course. I'd love that." He presses her back into the mattress confidently and is suddenly everywhere — tickling her hip, ghosting his lips over her breasts, rocking into her.

At seven-thirty, they're ready to go, Don practically bouncing on his heels. "Where to first?"

"Wait and see," she chides with a smile. Being in charge of the anniversary is fun. She's got a car waiting, so dinner's location is sufficiently a surprise, and the look on his face when they arrive at the Boathouse — where their wedding dinner was — is sufficiently worth it. He twirls her around, actually picking her up, and makes her squeal with surprise.

They settle into a quiet, tucked-in table with a view of the lake, and eat and drink water liberally. The waitress discreetly drops her oversized gift by the table. After a main course of branzino and lamb, she slides the bag over to him. He pulls a flat package — clearly jewelry — out of the inside pocket of his suit. "Before you open that," he says, "I just want to say — this year has been way more fucking eventful than I could have ever imagined. It's been a lot harder. It's been more unexpected. Elections, hurricanes, lawsuits, a new show, Sandy Hook, Boston. The baby. The fucking renovation." They both snort. "But it's also been … better, and more fun, than anything I could've imagined. And I'm so glad that I've gotten to be with you, and do all of this, with you," he thumbs her knuckles. "So thank you. For being here through this year. And … I love you. And I'm so excited for everything that comes next."

She leans forward to kiss him, and he meets her halfway. Once they split, she slides her finger under the wrapping paper and exposes the jewelry box. Cracking it open, she finds a gold necklace with a simple diamond solitaire. "One year, one baby en route …" he explains. "Flip it over." On the back of the casing, she can faintly make out their anniversary engraved on it. "The necklace, you can add a stone underneath it to make a chain. So when the bean and any … hypothetical future bean … comes along, we can add a stone."

She stares at it for another second. "It's beautiful, Don. Thank you." She kisses him again, then fumbles to put the necklace on.

His gift is wrapped and in a bag, and he pulls it out next. "Any preface?" he checks, holding up the gift. It's huge. She didn't realize how big it was when she ordered it.

"Only that I love you," she lifts one shoulder. "And that this year has been unexpected. And great. And we made it through … So I know we can make it through whatever happens next. And," she shrugs, "I'm excited to see what that might be."

She squeezes his hand, and he tears the paper off. Once he realizes what it is, his jaw drops. "Sloan …"

"The first anniversary is traditionally paper," she explains. "So I found a typographer and printmaker in Brooklyn, and I had him make it." It's a framed poster, 24x36 inches, a list printed out in a blocky typewriter font against a silver-gray background. A second set of text is calligraphed in white underneath, just slightly more prominent than a watermark.

"Is this —"

"If I'm doing the math correctly, you asked me to move in with you one hundred and seventeen times, from the time we started talking about it until I said yes," she says. "So … yes."

"One, after the argument Mac inadvertently started; two, while brushing our teeth; three, in your office before Elliot's show; four, right before I fell asleep; fourteen, at your mom's house; thirty-seven, in the hammock in Costa Rica; seventy-eight, after the Journey performance at the RNC convention; one hundred and eleven, on a coffee run after the Genoa broadcast …" he scans down. "And the time I finally said yes. You remembered all one hundred and seventeen times?"

"I … think so," she says. "I had to go through my schedule and the broadcasts, a few email chains with Kenzie, to remember what I was doing every day … And I don't think they're in the right order, necessarily —"

"This is amazing. Sloan. This is perfect."

"You like it?" she checks, a warm feeling spreading over her.

"Are you shitting me? I love it. We should hang this in the hallway. What's printed underneath it?"

"Look closely."

"Shit," he says, as he begins to figure it out.

"You like it?"

"Yes," he says emphatically, sitting back. "Are these—"

"Our vows, yes."

"How did you — I didn't write these down anywhere. How did you remember? Are you an autodidact?"

"No," she laughs. "My sisters apparently made a video of the wedding, and then forgot to send it to me until last week. Since I know I didn't have a copy, I thought … This would be nice."

"This is perfect." He looks them over, and then begins to quote from his. "'I promise to always let you have the business section and crosswords first, to always remember to add the milk when I bring you coffee, to not back down from an argument but to never go to bed angry. I love you, but I'm not marrying you because I love you — I'm marrying because I want a life with you. I want the fights over how best to pack a suitcase, the negotiations over dishes versus vacuuming, the Saturdays at soccer games, and the stupid inside jokes that carry on for ten years,'" he grins. "These are pretty good."

"I like the part where you talk about the major stories and the forgotten stories," she says. "And partnership." Unsurprisingly, he'd written really great vows.

He reads hers over too. "I really give you confidence?"

"Yes. Of course," she says.

His eyes search hers for a second, and she's reminded how fragile — how precious, how precarious — this whole relationship is and can be. A year is nothing, in the scheme of things. She's beginning to realize that. Stressful days at work, unplanned pregnancies, salary negotiations, all of those things are minor. Neither of them are easy; this is not easy. But she's convinced it's worth it. "Thank you," he finally says.

They split a chocolate-raspberry tart for dessert, and then it's back home, where new lingerie brings out Don's assertive, adventurous side (something she's been sorely missing since the pregnancy made him start being more cautious). After she rolls off him and settles down, she realizes she's forgotten one final thing. She grabs the impractical lace teddy and runs into the kitchen, grabbing the plate and two forks from the drawer. Back in the bedroom, Don, his hair perfectly sex-mussed and his chest bare, is still waiting.

"What's that?" he asks with a yawn.

"The top layer of our cake," she explains, settling next to him and handing him a fork. "Happy anniversary."

They tuck into the vanilla-hazelnut cake, and, since Don hasn't seen it, cue up Sutton's homemade video on the flatscreen. She gets bored halfway through — beautiful as it is, it's also fairly predictable — and starts scratching a pattern on Don's chest, then stomach, and finally dipping lower. Despite the teasing and touching he manages to stay half-focused on the video through the end, but then immediately pulls her onto his lap.

"Good anniversary?" she checks as she starts kissing his neck.

"The best," he affirms, his voice thick and disarmingly genuine. She pulls back, studies him critically. He stares back at her, his eyes bold and unapologetically worshipful — and then grins.

And she grins back.