The first thing I did when I finished my shift was to call Bryan. He answered me after the third ring.

"Forget about the three months of laundry! You'll have to do it for a whole year!"

Oh boy. "That bad, huh?"

"It was utter hell, Jess."

I reached my car and leaned over it as I asked him, "What happened?"

"Well, I reached Amy's home. Her parents were away for the weekend, so of course your brother and her had the house to themselves." I could totally see him shaking his head at his. "Anyway, I called Seth after I parked the car and he came outside as soon as I got out of the car. I'd never seen him so pale and so bloody worried. Amy was crying on the living room and I had no freaking idea what to do. So I took them to the ER."

My eyes widened. "What! You took them to the hospital?"

"What was I supposed to do? Have a sex education talk with them?"

I tried not to laugh at this, but picturing Seth, Amy and Bryan at the ER was kind of hilarious. I deserved that year of laundry, for sure.

"And?"

Bryan snorted. "You're trying not to laugh, aren't you?" He tried to sound serious, but I knew he was smiling too. His voice sounded amused as well.

A giggle left my lips. "I'm sorry!"

"Whatever."

"So, what happened! You're so bad retelling stuff!"

That made Bryan laugh. "Excuse me for not being a tattletale!"

"Oh my God, just keep going!" I rolled my eyes playfully.

"That's pretty much it. They both talked to some doctors and Amy was much more calmed when she left the hospital."

I frowned. "Wait. What did you tell the doctors?"

"Exactly what happened."

I burst out laughing. "Seth probably died of embarrassment!"

"Well, I know for sure that I won't have a problem winning our video games. Actually, I'm not sure if we'll see him around much. He wouldn't look at me in the eyes when I dropped him off."

I laughed harder. "Thank you so much for doing this, Bryan."

"Yeah, yeah. You owe me."

"I sure do," I shook my head.

"Jess, just come home."

My lips tugged up and my heart fluttered. "Okay. I'm on my way."

Bryan was right, we didn't see Seth for the next three weeks. Even after I invited him over every Friday. Nothing made him change his mind.

"Is he still not coming?" Bryan asked as he entered our kitchen that Friday night. He undid his chef coat and placed it over the backrest of the chair. I shook my head as he stepped closer to me. "Should I talk to him?"

I passed my arms around him. "I think you should, otherwise he won't come over ever again."

Bryan's gaze was soft as he leaned closer and kissed me. "Okay, I will," he said as he pulled away and brushed my cheek with the back of his hand. "But only if you wash my coat."

"What!" I stepped away from him. "Are you for real? I've been doing this for three weeks!"

"You still got a lot more weeks to cover, love."

I narrowed my eyes and crossed my arms. "You're exploiting me."

He laughed. "I'll make you a deal. I'll cook dinner and call your brother while you go put that coat in the washer machine."

"Cook? As in you're going to get us Chinese?"

His smiled widened as he sauntered to me. "You know me too well, Jess." My heart started to flutter as he slowly leaned over, passing both arms around my waist and pulling me to him. I stared at him completely mesmerized. It didn't matter how much time we'd been living together, every day I fell even more for him.

I stood up on my tip-toes and brushed my lips on his. Bryan groaned, grabbed me by the waist, and hoisted me up over the counter. It was a passionate kiss, one that usually led to more, but he pulled away when I was completely out of breath. "You really have to wash that coat, Jess."

I pouted. "You have like a bazillion chef coats; can't you use another?"

Bryan laughed. "No. I need this one because it has the restaurant's logo on it and I have an important meeting tomorrow."

Sighing, I pecked him lightly on the lips before standing up. "Please call Seth. It's been ages since I saw him."

"I will," his hand lingered on my waist and I could see an intense hunger in his eyes before he took a step away.

Frowning, I grabbed the coat and made my way to the laundry room. I hoped that everything was okay between us, we never really fought, other than who would do the dishes, and what to watch on TV, petty stuff like that, but for whatever reason, Bryan seemed like he was trying to contain himself.

I bit my lip as I reached the room. It was all dark, so I lit the light. I unfolded the coat to see if there was any spot that needed more soap or something, but I didn't find any. I heard a cat meow. I looked up, and my breath caught in my chest. In a little basket on top of the laundry machine was a tiny white kitten.

My mouth parted as I stepped closer to it. It was wrapped in a light pink blanket. Softly, I grabbed the kitten and brought it to me. My heart flipped when I saw the little note at the bottom of the basket.

I heard Bryan's steps behind me and I turned to him with tears in my eyes. "You got me a kitten?"

He smiled at me. "Not just that." He came closer to me and touched the little kitten's collar. I hadn't noticed it had a diamond ring.

"Oh my Gosh," I murmured softly as he took it off the little kitten and grabbed my left hand.

"Jessie," my pulse was racing like crazy and my eyes teared up even more, "would you marry me?"

He was about to kneel when I said, "You got me a kitten, that's the least I can do!"

He grinned. That boyish smile that reached his eyes and made my knees feel like jelly. "I knew there was no way you'd say no after the kitty."

I shook my head. "Bryan, I would have said yes without her."

He slid the ring across my finger. "I love you Jessie. I want to spend the rest of my life with you."

My heart soared for him. "I love you, too. So much."

We kissed and the little kitty started to purr. "How are you going to call her?" he asked.

"Spark."

"Why Spark?" he tilted his head as he brushed a thumb over Spark.

"Because when I started to feel sparks for you, my life changed." His sea-blue eyes darkened as they trained on me.

"You didn't feel sparks as soon as you saw me?"

I smiled. "Well, technically, you did make me see sparks when you knocked me over with that door."

His cheeks warmed, and I'd never seen him more adorable than in that very moment. "I don't know what you did to me, Jessie, but I couldn't stop thinking about you ever since I first saw you."

My lips parted. This was news to me. He'd never told me before. "For real?"

"For real."

"You're so sappy, Bryan."

We both laughed. "You make me sappy, Jess. I swear I wasn't like this."

"I love you. Let's be sappy together," I said before putting Spark down.

"Sounds like a plan," he murmured on my ear before wrapping his arms around me and kissing me one more time. 

Awww... I know. I'm the sappy one :)

Love you guys!