Work Text:
Cameron groggily sat up, pulling the covers with her and upsetting the neatly tucked-in sheets on the opposite side of the bed. She glanced at the clock on the nightstand and let out a deep sigh at the numbers staring back at her. It was just past 10:30 am on a Friday and she should have been at work at least two hours ago. She had been on a roll last night while working on new improvements to Mutiny’s platform and not even Joe’s incessant requests for her to come to bed could pull her away from that keyboard. She’d finally come to a stopping point at about 5:00 am and barely made it to Joe’s bed as exhaustion overcame her. Several hours later, she vaguely recalled Joe waking her up to tell her he was leaving for work before she passed out again.
She blindly stared around the sun-drenched room. Seriously considering pulling the covers back over her head and forgetting about work, she begrudgingly remembered that they had a meeting with a potential investor on Monday and they still had to prepare for that. Cameron didn’t particularly mind working over the weekends, but apparently Donna, Gordon, and Bos didn’t agree with her opinion on that, so she’d had to get used to the Monday to Friday, nine to five until a true emergency came along.
Letting out a loud and lengthy sigh, Cameron threw the blankets off of her and placed her feet on the chilly wooden floors of Joe’s bedroom. She stretched her arms above her head until she felt a satisfying crack in her back before padding down the hallway and into the kitchen to make herself some much-needed coffee.
As she waited for the coffee machine to finish brewing and spit out the dark liquid into the pot below, something colorful caught her eye on the dining table. She must have had some serious tunnel vision for that coffee to not notice this until now because this wasn’t something she would have normally walked past without a second glance, at least not in Joe’s spotless apartment.
Sitting on the dining table were several boxes wrapped in a deep red paper and a large, matching gift bag. Stepping closer to the gifts, she also noticed a note in front of it. Her brow furrowed when she recognized the piece of thick paper as belonging to Joe’s stationary. Cameron reached for it and read the short note penned in his familiar scrawl.
Cam,
Happy Valentine’s Day. I know we never talked about doing anything for today, but I thought I’d get you a little something. I also got us reservations at McCoy’s at 7. See you later tonight.
Joe
She stared confusedly at the note before it slowly dawned on her that it was February 14th and it was a day that people in relationships generally celebrated. Never having been with anyone romantically on Valentine’s Day, she hadn’t had much of a reason to acknowledge the holiday. In fact, she found it to be a pretty bogus occasion that was really just used to exploit love for cards and to bring out the false, happy side of a usually dying relationship.
The last time she remembered anything happening on Valentine’s Day was in third grade when an awkward, pudgy boy whom she’d never talked to gave her a handmade card with a mini Tootsie Roll taped to it. He’d drawn a picture of the two of them holding hands on the front, and on the inside, he’d declared that he’d been in love with her since he first saw her and that they should get married. Deeply embarrassed, she’d stuffed the card into the back of the cubby underneath her desk and desperately tried to will away the scarlet that was blooming across her face. She’d thrown away the Tootsie Roll and continued to avoid him to the best of her abilities until she moved to a different school the next year. Luckily, her reaction to Joe’s Valentine’s Day gifts was markedly different, even though she hadn’t opened the packages yet. She was still left upset, but this time it was entirely at herself as opposed to someone else.
Setting the note back where she’d found it, Cameron reached for one of the small red boxes in front of her. Hastily unwrapping it, she found a CD by a band that she’d recently discovered and had been obsessing over the last couple weeks. Their new album had come out earlier that week, but she hadn’t had time to pick it up, and apparently that had been a good thing. Oddly enough, she couldn’t remember even mentioning the band to Joe though, so she was in awe at the CD she held in her hands.
Gently setting down the jewel case, she picked up another similarly shaped package and ripped this one open even quicker than the last. Inside was an anniversary set of a blues band her father had loved. Her breath caught at the sight of it. She had briefly mentioned to Joe a few of the bands her dad had loved and how she’d never actually upgraded most of the cassettes to CDs. She couldn’t believe he remembered this.
Suddenly, she felt horrible for a new reason. Just a couple nights ago she had accused him of not paying attention to what she was saying, albeit in a joking matter, but it held some truth to it, at least she had thought so at the time. It turns out she couldn’t have been more wrong.
Placing the CD set on top of the other plastic case, she reached for the final gift. She was almost afraid that it was another thing that would fill her to the brim with guilt. Yanking the neatly placed tissue paper out of the bag, she found several large packs of candy, but they weren’t the typical Valentine’s Day chocolates. Instead, there were some of her favorites: Good & Plenty, Atomic Fireballs, Red Vines, and Sour Patch Kids. She grinned widely. Cameron figured she wasn’t even slightly subtle when it came to her taste in candy, so these were probably the easiest of the gifts to come up with, but nevertheless, it was touching that he knew she’d prefer these over chocolate creams or almond clusters in a heart shaped box.
However, the feeling of guilt wracked through her again. She couldn’t even remember the day enough to at least get him a generic card? She was positive that this gave her the award for ‘Shittiest Girlfriend’. What shocked her even more was that this bothered her so much. The Cameron of ’83 would have just laughed and told him it was a stupid holiday that she refused to partake in, but now she felt guilt that was on par with the time she sabotaged Joe at the Westgroup conference.
The coffee that had just finished brewing didn’t hold the same excitement that it had just a few minutes ago. The strong scent did nothing but churn her stomach.
There was still time to fix this. She just needed to come up with something great…except she had no idea what that ‘great’ idea was. How was she going to come up with something even remotely significant in just a few hours? She was going to have a long day ahead of her.
Cameron sat in front of her computer, staring at the screen as though it were a black hole. She still couldn’t think of a thing to get Joe, especially last minute. She’d logged into Community under an alias username and asked some people in the ‘Relationships’ forum for gift ideas. All of them were the stereotypical chocolates and a nice card advice. A few of the commenters had made her feel even more guilty with comments like, “Shouldn’t you know what to get him since you’re his girlfriend?” and “Maybe you should have thought about this before Valentine’s Day was here.”
Defeated, she had logged out and opened up the project she had been working on last night. However, it just didn’t light that same spark in her, not after all of this. Pulling out a writing pad from under the pile of books and papers on her desk, she scribbled “Gift Ideas” at the top and underlined it several times. Cameron stared blankly around her office, tapping her pen against the notepad as she wracked her brain for ideas. She wasn’t necessarily the best gift-giver, but she usually wasn’t this bad.
Standing up, she made her way out of her office. She needed some real advice.
“Hey,” Cameron said as she pushed and knocked on Donna’s office door simultaneously.
“Oh, hey! I almost have everything ready for the meeting on Monday with Dave. Just give me a few more hours and we can go over everything.”
“Oh, uh, this isn’t about that. This is…um…kind of a weird thing to ask, but what did you get Gordon for Valentine’s Day?”
Donna seemed taken about by the random question, her eyebrows knitting together. After a moment, she collected herself and answered, “We honestly don’t do much for Valentine’s Day anymore. We get each other cards and chocolates, and usually go out for dinner. Why? What did you get Joe?”
Cameron left out a self-deprecating laugh. “I, uh, didn’t get him anything. I completely forgot about Valentine’s Day until I woke up to a note and a few gifts from him.”
Donna chuckled, though she didn’t seem very surprised, which irritated Cameron more than it should have. “Oh, well. You still have time to get him something, right?”
“Yeah, but I have no idea what to get him. A teddy bear and a heart-shaped box of chocolates don’t exactly scream ‘Joe MacMillan,’ do they?”
“No, you’re right.” Cameron looked at Donna imploringly, hoping she’d solve this issue in a minute flat. Donna let out a sigh. “I don’t know, Cameron. He’s a tough one, to be honest.”
Not ready to give up, Cameron persisted. “Okay, well, what were some things that you got Gordon when you were first together?”
“Everything I remember getting him were related to computers. He’s a tech guy, remember? I’m not sure how many of my previous gifts would work for Joe.”
“I seriously can’t believe I forgot this… Like, how does someone forget about a holiday? But we never even talked about doing anything! It would have been nice to have gotten a reminder from him!” Cameron was deflecting the blame now, but she couldn’t help it.
“To be fair, Cameron, it is a pretty well-known holiday and it is your first Valentine’s together.”
Cameron glared at her. “Thanks, Donna. That helps.”
Donna laughed at that, but not in a mocking way. “Hey, I’m just saying that he probably didn’t think you had forgotten that Valentine’s Day existed. You can’t blame Joe for everything.”
“So, you’re siding with him now?” Cameron snapped. She knew Donna was just giving her shit for her forgetfulness in anything unrelated to computers, but Cameron’s nerves had been frayed since she’d opened Joe’s gifts.
“Really, though, it doesn’t matter what you get him, it’s the thought that counts. I’m sure he’d love that giant teddy bear just because you got it for him. It’s just a holiday, not the end of the world.”
Donna’s advice was far from convincing. Cameron highly doubted that Joe would be okay with a stuffed animal after all the trouble he had gone through. She supposed she could hit up Gordon for suggestions.
“All right. Well, thanks. I guess I’ll head out to the mall or something soon,” Cameron said in defeat.
“Don’t forget to be back in time for our—”
“For our run-through for the meeting. I know.”
“Good luck!” Pity lined Donna’s voice as Cameron moved towards the door.
“God, I hate this stupid holiday,” Cameron mumbled as she left the office.
“Wait a minute, you forgot about Valentine’s Day?” A bellowing laugh punctuated Gordon’s words. “The coders have been complaining about not finding dates for it for the last two weeks. You seriously didn’t catch on to a single word? Shows how involved you are in your employees’ lives…”
“Shut up. Seriously, what should I get him? What kind of things have you gotten Donna?” Cameron asked grumpily, her arms folded as she stood next to the desk Gordon sat at. He had been fixing an issue with their rickety old mainframe.
“Man, I can’t believe you forgot about Valentine’s Day. Joe’s gonna kill you when he finds out…”
“Gordon, please don’t tell him that I forgot about this. Seriously. You can tell him tomorrow or any day after that, but if you beat me to the punch on this one, so help me god…” She stepped closer to him, hoping it was threatening enough to make him shut his mouth.
“Relax, Cameron. I’m not going to tell him anything. What did he get you?” Gordon asked as he leaned back in his chair
Quickly listing the gifts that Joe had left for her this morning, she irritably waited as he took off his glasses and cleaned them with the end of his shirt. As he put them back on, she expected some genius response to come out of his mouth but was sorely mistaken.
“I don’t know. You could get him a new baseball bat or something made of glass. We know he likes those things,” he suggested with a satisfied smirk.
Cameron scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Come on, Gordon. You’re his closest friend. You have to have some idea of what he’d want.”
“Aren’t you his girlfriend? Shouldn’t you have some idea of what he would want?” His words echoed those of the users on Community, but his stung more than the thoughts of some random person online. Not that she let him know that, of course.
Letting out another annoyed sigh, Cameron remarked, “Jesus, you’re no help.”
Spinning on her heel, she walked out of his workspace and stomped up the stairs to the main floor. Bos was out for lunch right now, so she supposed she could ask the coders. Though in all honesty, she wasn’t sure how much help they would be with matters that didn’t involve a computer.
“Hey, guys. Sorry I’ve been a little M.I.A. from your lives recently. So, um, any plans for tonight?” All the coders pulled puzzled looks at her awkward and out-of-character attempt at conversing with them.
Yo-Yo was the first one to snap out of the strange moment. “I think Lev and Arki do, and of course Carl’s been dating Jen for a while.”
“That’s cool, so did—wait, Arki has a date?”
Everyone laughed at this, but she was genuinely surprised because he wasn’t exactly a hit with the ladies.
“Yes, she’s very cool and hip! I met her on Community!” Arki exclaimed in his thick Russian accent, apparently missing the jab Cameron had just taken at him. Cameron tried her hardest not to laugh at his excitement.
“Well, congrats Arki. Hope you have fun! So, did you three get these girls gifts?”
“What’s with the twenty questions?” Lev asked, clearly more suspicious than the others.
“No reason, just catching up with you guys and seeing what you’re up to tonight.”
Lev sneered at that before sarcastically asking, “What? Did you forget to get a Valentine’s Gift or something?”
Cameron didn’t say anything for a second too long, which was enough confirmation for him. “Oh, my god. You totally forgot! Admiral Eyebrows isn’t going to like this one…”
Before Cameron could snap at him for the nickname, Bodie asked, “Wait, were you the person who posted about forgetting Valentine’s Day on Community? Because that was my much needed laugh for the morning.”
Cameron’s mouth hung open slightly at that and a flush lit up her face. Had she really been that transparent? The bellowing laughs coming from the coders was enough of an answer.
“You could always get him some tweezers,” Lev joked.
“Okay, Lev, I swear to god, if you make a joke about that one more time—”
“I know, I know. Fired, smoked out of my house, and what was the other thing? Oh, yeah, castrated. Am I the only one who’s had these threats? Because I’m pretty sure this is abuse.” he joked, standing up and looking around at the coders.
“No, I definitely have,” Carl said, raising his hand.
“Okay. Shut up. Do you guys have any real suggestions or not?” Cameron said, her true colors coming back.
“I think we’re all just trying to snag some last minute dates. Sorry, man,” Yo-Yo said with a shrug before turning back to his computer.
With a loud sigh and a roll of her eyes, Cameron marched back to her office and left the coders to their unsuccessful attempts at dating.
“Oh, darlin’. You don’t have to go to the ends of the earth to get him somethin’. He’ll love whatever you get him, I promise,” Bos said, looking at her with the pitiful eyes of a loving father.
As soon as he had come back from lunch, she had ambushed him, telling him about her morning and the thoughtful gifts Joe had gotten her. A few months ago, she never would have asked him for gift advice when it came to Joe, but Bos was surprisingly warming up to him, so she felt out of everyone, he might have the most sound advice to give.
“That’s what Donna said, but Bos, I told you what he got me. I can’t swoop in with a box of shitty chocolates and a cheesy card. He deserves more than that, and not just because of my presents.” She could feel the beginning prickle of tears hitting the back of her eyes and she blinked rapidly to try to stem them. Her frustration was starting to get the best of her, but she had no intentions to let the waterworks start.
“What all have you come up with?” Bos asked.
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing. What did you used to get Ginny for Valentine’s Day?” Cameron asked, hating to bring up his ex-wife, but she figured he wouldn’t hold it against her.
A little surprised at the mention of Ginny, he paused before saying, “Oh, well, you know I’m an old-school romantic. A card and a box of chocolates were all I needed to get my point across. That may not be the way to Joe’s heart, but he would love it either way.”
“Yeah, I doubt that,” she said before she let out a whine and pulled at her hair.
Bos walked around his desk and put his hands on her arms. “Cam, why don’t you go to the mall or go for a walk and see if inspiration strikes you somewhere. You’re an idea gal, through and through. You’ll find somethin’ in that brilliant head of yours, I know it.”
She looked back at him hopelessly, silently pleading with him to give her a great idea. All he did was nod his head in encouragement.
“Now, go on. Get out of here. I don’t want to see you back here until you have that idea!”
“But the—”
“I’ll hold off the run-through for the meeting until you’re back. Now go!” he said, clearly expecting his pep talk to work on her. And it did, just slightly.
Cameron nodded and turned towards the door. Before she exited, she spun around and asked, “Oh, Bos, I didn’t ask, do you have any plans for Valentine’s?”
Bos’ smile was all she needed. “I might. I’ll tell you when you get back. Now go!”
Cameron grinned, happy that at least someone was going to have a good night.
Cameron walked into the large bookstore. She wasn’t really sure why she’d even stopped in here; she highly doubted she was going to find Joe’s gift on a bookshelf. She’d gone to the mall as Bos had suggested and zip, nada. She couldn’t find a thing. If anything, it just left her less inspired and she was pretty sure she’d lost a few brain cells looking at all the Valentine’s Day sales ads in the store windows.
Listlessly wandering around, her hands passed over random books on tables, not really taking in any of their subjects. The sense of defeat was overwhelming at this point, and she didn’t even know why she kept venturing further into the store, it was all just a blur of colors and letters at this point. Well, at least she could still do that nature walk that Bos had suggested…
Her hand brushed over a set of books related to computers on one large table. On closer inspection, she noticed that they were mostly beginner’s books to software coding and hardware development. One of the books caught her eye and she immediately recognized it as one of the coding books in Joe’s apartment. He had been desperately trying to learn how to code before they had gotten back together, and while his interest had diminished a bit, she’d occasionally catch him taking a stab at it again.
Glancing to her left, she saw an aisle stocked full of tech books. As she walked over and looked at the titles of each book, she recalled seeing at least ten of them around Joe’s apartment.
Suddenly, it dawned on her. She knew what she was going to get him—or make him, rather. She pulled a notebook out of her bag and started quickly scribbling down the book titles and briefly sketching the cover of each one.
Cameron searched for a clock hanging in the bookstore. Once she finally located one, she noted she only had a six hours before she needed to be back at his place for dinner, and she needed to make every one of those minutes’ count.
“Hey, are you okay? You’ve been quiet since you got home and you’re picking at your fingers, which you only do when you’re anxious,” Joe said, worry tinting his voice.
Cameron looked up at him. She was a little surprised that he had picked up on that habit of hers because she wasn’t entirely sure she’d noticed it as being a side effect of her anxiety. The only thing today had truly succeeded in was making her realize that he’s much more observant than she gives him credit for.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just tired from last night.”
Joe chuckled before picking up his wine glass and swirling the red liquid around in it. “Well, that wasn’t for a lack of trying on my part.” He took a sip of the wine, and she watched as he savored the taste and swallowed it.
“Yeah, I know. Sorry. You know how I get when an idea hits me.”
“Of course I do. You don’t have to apologize. Despite what others think, I actually like your infuriating quirks."
She glared and gave him a mocking shake of her head. They sat in an elegant restaurant situated along the San Francisco coast; the lights from Golden Gate bridge across the way shone through the enormous windows, bathing the restaurant in romantic light. Cameron usually left the restaurant choices up to Joe because he was generally less than impressed with the hole-in-the-wall places she lazily suggested they go to. He never disappointed with his decisions, though, so she never put up a fight. Tonight was most certainly not an exception.
“Are you ready for your presentation on Monday?” he asked as he poured more wine into both of their glasses.
“Hmm? Oh, yeah. We went over it all really quick today. It seems pretty solid. I left most of it in Donna’s hands, though, because she doesn’t trust me after that last fiasco,” she said with a shrug. Joe laughed loudly at that.
Cameron, Donna, Gordon, and Bos had decided it might be a good idea to hit up another investor for a bit of backup money for the project they were hoping to launch soon but when the potential investor started getting snarky and interrupted their presentation, Cameron snapped and told them exactly where they could shove their money, among other things. She thought it had been relatively professional, given the circumstances, but Donna thoroughly disagreed as she marched Cameron out of the building and proceeded to loudly lecture her the entire ride back to Mutiny.
“Well, that will be good. They’ll invest. They’d be fools not to,” he said, shooting Cameron a lopsided grin.
She rolled her eyes, but flushed a little at his thinly-veiled compliment. Praising her work was much more of a compliment than talking about her appearance, and he knew it. She was usually good at blowing off his comments, but she wasn’t doing so well with it right now. It didn’t exactly help that he looked incredible tonight. He’d forgone his glasses and the black shirt he was wearing under his suit jacket was unbuttoned to a rather enticing level (and she fully planned to take advantage of that after this whole ordeal was over). She definitely paled in comparison to him. She’d tried to tame her hair, and she’d even put on one of the two dresses she owned, but after her incredibly stressful day, she wasn’t sure she could make herself look anymore presentable than her current state. Joe hadn’t seemed disappointed, so she could at least take that as a good sign.
Their food came and they passed the time eating with occasional small talk. She was incredibly glad that something eventful had happened at MacMillan Utility today so she could just listen and not have to come up with something meaningless to talk about. He shockingly hadn’t even hinted at the fact that she hadn’t gotten him a gift, not even when she’d graciously thanked him for his presents when she’d gotten home. Though, she doubted that was going to last much longer…
After they finally made their way back to Joe’s apartment via a silent (and awkward, on her part) drive home, she finally accepted the fact that she had to give him his present or she’d essentially have nothing but the box of chocolates she’d picked up as an afterthought in case this failed.
She walked over to her backpack leaning up against his couch and fished out the floppy disk containing the present she had slaved over all afternoon. Taking a deep breath, she spun around and walked back over to him.
“Okay, so this is it. It’s not the greatest, but I, uh, hope you like it,” Cameron said awkwardly as she handed him the floppy disk. He gave it a puzzled look, but nonetheless took it over to his computer, turned the machine on, and inserted the disk. She started chewing on her thumbnail as she anxiously waited for the computer to boot it up.
Cameron watched as Joe’s eyes scanned across the brief instructions she had laid out before him. The game was simple enough. A complex maze (that she had drawn up at least five times) held all of his clues. His goal was to find every book in the maze and each book would give him a piece of binary code that he had to decipher. She had placed a physical binary code dictionary in front of his keyboard before they’d left for dinner, because while he wasn’t actually horrendous at coding, she didn’t want to deal with the possibility of him forgetting any of it. Once he decoded each symbol, he’d place them in the empty boxes at the bottom of the screen until it spelled out the phrase. A little like Wheel of Fortune, she belatedly realized.
He glanced at her and gave her a knowing smile at the first book he had run across. Luckily, he recognized it, but he seemed deeply confused as to why she’d put it there. The books didn’t necessarily have anything to do with the object of the game, but she thought it was a nice personal touch, even if it was corny.
Feeling lightheaded, she sat down on the window seat behind his desk, worried she might pass out if this turned out to be a complete and utter failure, which very well could happen. Sitting at the edge, she had just enough of a view of his face and the computer screen to gauge what was happening.
Joe’s eyebrows were knitted in concentration as he flipped open the binary code book in front of him. Her heart leapt in her throat and a wave of nausea rushed through her when she heard a single click from the keyboard. He had typed an ‘m’ which meant that he had at least gotten the first letter right. Suddenly, she didn’t want him to figure all of this out; she wanted to rush over to the computer, eject the disk, and throw it out the window. What had she been thinking giving this to him?
She couldn’t very well stop him, though, so she kept her mouth shut and watched as he proceeded through the maze. That look of determined frustration that had always been incredibly endearing to her whenever she watched him code was the only thing that was keeping her from vomiting all over his pristine floor.
Silence rang through the apartment. The only sound was the click-clack of the arrow keys and the occasional letter when he’d deciphered his new clue.
He hadn’t said anything or turned to her in defeat, so maybe it wasn’t going as poorly as she’d anticipated? Well, that was until he actually finished the game and discovered what she’d written…
By the time he had two letters left, it should have been obvious what it said, but he was so concentrated on finishing it properly that he hadn’t even tried to guess it. He seemed incredibly frustrated at this point. He was leaning forward and his eyebrows looked like they were going to remain permanently stuck together. She probably should have made that maze less complicated…
Her anxiety couldn’t take it anymore, so she abandoned the window seat and stood at the side of his desk. He was still missing the second letter and she was becoming concerned that he wouldn’t find the remaining book.
“No clue on this one?” he jokingly asked as he finally broke the silence. Frustration clouded the laugh he let out, though she could tell he was trying to reign it in.
“Umm… Go right. Then down. Right again. Left,” she nervously instructed. She wasn’t going to tell him exactly how to get there, but her nerves couldn’t take this anymore.
“Thank god,” he said with a relieved laugh when he came across the final book a couple minutes later. He studiously returned his attention to the binary code dictionary.
She watched as decoded that final clue, inserted the final letter, and exited out the book. As he did, a large “YES/NO” illuminated the screen.
Realization dawned on his face, from what she could see of his profile, and he fully turned to her. The phrase “moveinwithme?” filled in the squares at the bottom of the monitor.
It was something he’d asked her at least ten times, but she’d continuously brushed it off. She didn’t want to rush things and valued her personal space, especially after living with the Clarks and the Mutiny crowd. But something had dawned on her once she’d started the outline of the game. She hardly spent any time at her own apartment anymore, and if she did, he was usually with her. They’d been together for almost a year now and things had been going surprisingly smoothly. When she seriously thought about living with him, she wasn’t filled with dread, but an overwhelming sense of contentment. She’d known exactly what the phrase was going to be right then.
“Well?” she asked nervously, afraid that he’d changed his mind about moving in with her now that she was all in.
Joe quickly pushed back his chair and walked over to her. He grabbed her face before pressing his lips against hers. She smiled into his kiss as he tilted his head and deepened it. Her hands came up to rest on his chest as relief washed over her. She hadn’t actually failed at this, and he still wanted to live with her. She really couldn’t ask for a better end to this wretched day.
“So, is that a yes or a no?” she jokingly asked as she pulled back.
He turned to his computer and tabbed up to the “YES” before hitting the ‘enter’ key, where the word took over the screen.
“Better?” he asked with a grin as he brought her face back to his for another kiss. Cameron wrapped her arms around his neck and drew him in for another deep kiss before she pulled back and jumped up into his arms. They both laughed as he walked them back to the bedroom, fully intent on christening their now joint living quarters
Later that night, they both sat on the couch, snuggled under a blanket and decidedly void of clothes. They had turned on a random movie from his VHS collection, but they were hardly paying attention to it, instead sharing kisses and talking quietly about everything and nothing. She had clearly nailed it with the Valentine’s Day gifts—well, almost.
“Damn. These chocolates are terrible, Cam,” he said with a disgusted look on his face as he put a half-bitten piece of nougat back into the heart-shaped box resting atop the blanket.
“Excuse me, but this was my backup gift in case the game went over terribly,” she said with mock offence, putting a hand over her chest.
“Well, you better be glad the game was a hit because…” he took the box and placed it on the table in front of them.
After a moment’s hesitation, he turned to her and asked slowly, “You didn’t know it was Valentine’s Day until this morning, did you?”
“How did you—”
Joe cut her off. “Come on, Cam. I think I can read you by now. You were fine last night and you were quiet as could be at dinner tonight. You don’t exactly keep work-related stuff from me either.” He really didn’t seem upset. If anything, he was…amused.
“I—yeah, I’m sorry. I guess I’ve just never had to think about Valentine’s Day before,” she admitted in defeat.
“Well, like I said, it was incredible. Really, you didn’t have to go through all that trouble for me, Cam. I would have been happy just to get this terrible box of chocolates from you. But that game means the world to me. Thank you,” he said with a grin before brushing his lips against hers.
“Thank you for those CDs. I still don’t know how you even remembered those. I definitely wouldn’t have considering I can’t even remember major holidays,” she said.
“Thank god I’m here, right?” he said hotly, pride lighting up his face.
She reached forward, carefully avoiding their wine glasses, as she grabbed the bag of Sour Patch Kids he’d gotten her. Digging a piece out, she shoved it into Joe’s mouth, howling with laughter as he pushed her away.
Joe reached forward and pulled an Atomic Fireball out of it’s container and popped it in Cameron’s mouth. He doubled over with laughter as she coughed, thrown off as she was in her fit of giggles that she’d almost choked on the damn thing.
She pulled the hard candy out of her mouth and tossed it in the heart-shaped chocolate box before turning to him and saying softly, “I love you.”
He gave her one of his beautiful smiles that he saved only for her before echoing, “I love you.”
Joe pressed his lips to hers and they shared a slow and meaningful kiss. He pulled back slightly and said, “Hey, Cam. Happy Valentine’s Day.”
Cameron definitely knew she’d made the right choice when it came to moving in with him. It wasn’t going to be perfect, but damn if she wasn’t going to love it.
She had a feeling she wouldn’t be forgetting Valentine’s Day anytime soon.