START SOMETHING REAL

Her mouth twists. “You’d pay me to marry you?”

“I...” when she says it like that it sounds bad. “It would be what we’re already doing. But longer. Better.”

She looks down at her coffee, thinking.

I wait.

“What happens if after a year, we want to extend it?” she asks.

My heart leaps. “Then we extend it,” I say, casually. “As long as it’s beneficial for both parties.”

Nicole chews her lip. Then she slowly shakes her head. “Nathan, I don’t know if this is a good idea...”

Crap. I’m losing her. I asked for a shadow of what I really want, and she’s still turning me down.

I imagine my life without Nicole’s color, without her warmth, without her voice, but it all feels gray, cold, quiet.

I can’t lose her. I can’t.

I pull out the napkin contract and add each of the new terms I’m proposing to our original contract. My normally confident scrawl feels cramped. I’m running out of room on this goddamn napkin.

I sign it, date it, and slide it across the kitchen island to Nicole. “Just think about it