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"So, er..." Frank grins at Amy over his crab cakes. They're at the same table together, just like they were the first time when they met. If Amy didn't know any better, she'd say that it was fate. "Second time around, eh?"
Amy laughs. "I suppose so. How were the, uh..." She gestures. "The last ones."
"Oh, dreadful." Frank leans back in his seat and frowns. "Sometimes I think the System has no idea what the fuck it's doing, right? It broke me up with you and then saddled me with another nine women. Sorry to be crass over dinner..."
"No, please, go ahead." Amy appreciates this about Frank. It's nice to be around someone who's able to speak his mind.
"Waiting for them to get their periods was awful." Frank takes a gulp of wine. "And you? How was your lot?"
Amy's smile falters slightly. "I was with a bloke for three months."
"Oh?" Frank raises an eyebrow before the truth hits him. His eyes widen, and he reaches his hands out across the table. "Oh, Amy, I'm so sorry."
She holds his hand. It is warm and comforting in a way that she hasn't felt in nearly a year. "It's all right. The System doesn't make mistakes, right? This is just how it was meant to be." She snorts. "We're supposed to learn something from everything the system puts us through."
Frank frowns. "And... what sort of lesson could you have learned from that?"
Amy shrugs. "I guess I don't know yet."
~*~
Amy's gotten used to the rhythm by now. Once the System has picked out a suitable mate for you, you're supposed to go at it until either you get pregnant or you menstruate, confirmed by their personal matchmaking assistants. It felt a bit shocking to Amy at first, but it almost becomes mundane the more that she does it.
Being with Frank doesn't feel mundane. Maybe it's a cliche thing to say, but banging Frank doesn't feel just like fucking. There's a connection between them. She thinks the System might have it wrong; who cares if they weren't able to conceive together on their first go? Biological compatibility isn't the only reason to be a couple, despite the System's insistence. It's much nicer to be around Frank than it was to be with any of the other men that Amy has slept with since she entered the System. They just... work together in a way that Amy can't exactly explain, but she thinks that Frank is her One True Match. Nothing else makes sense.
So, she cries quietly in frustration on the toilet when she sees blood in her underwear at the end of their month together. She hates that she's going to be ripped from Frank once again.
Frank walks in on her and gently rubs her shoulder. "Hey, it's... it's okay," he says unconvincingly. "They put us together once before. Maybe this is part of the System's plan, somehow?"
"The System is full of bullshit." Amy sniffles and wipes her face. "God, I just wanted this to work."
Frank sighs. "Want to tear off the band-aid or want to wait a bit?"
Amy shakes her head. "Nah, let's get this over with." She stands and hugs Frank tightly, breathing in his scent. "We'll at least have until the end of today, right?"
He rubs her back. "Yeah." They both take out their personal matchmaking assistants and press their index fingers to the biological sensor inputs.
There's an unusually long period of silence. Frank glances at Amy nervously.
"Congratulations," the assistants say in unison. "Match successful."
Frank blinks. "That... can't be right?"
"Maybe," Amy says. "I heard sometimes you bleed a little at the beginning - I wouldn't really know, but - "
Frank hugs Amy tightly and spins her around. "Amy, I'm so happy!"
Amy smiles down at Frank, letting her bewilderment melt away into bliss, and kisses him on the mouth.
~*~
"There must be some kind of mistake," Amy says a month later. She's bleeding again. Implantation bleeding should only happen once... and this doesn't feel like her previous miscarriage.
"They haven't broken us up yet," Frank says while eating a bland bowl of rice. He can't seem to stomach anything spicy lately - extremely uncharacteristic of him. "And we do daily check-ins and everything. They must like how we carry on together if you aren't pregnant; can't think of any other reason that they'd keep us together."
"I haven't heard of anybody staying together just because the System thinks they're a good couple, though," Amy muses. "Not unless they've already had a baby together."
"Well," Frank says, gulping down a glass of water, "everything happens for a reason, right? The System doesn't make mistakes."
"Mistake or not," Amy says, cuddling next to Frank on the couch, "I'm glad that we're together."
"Yeah." Frank nuzzles the top of her hair. "Let's enjoy it while it lasts, eh? Even if it is a glitch in the System, I'd much rather spend every moment I can with you."
~*~
Several months pass. Things keep going on as they always should have. Amy presses and prods at her own stomach every day by the fifth month - nothing. Her uterus doesn't peek up over her pelvis, and her stomach is still completely flat. Women can carry differently from each other, this is true, but she thinks that she should be showing at least a little if she was pregnant.
Frank, however, seems to be getting a bit of a belly. Amy can forgive it; he hasn't been feeling well as of late and can pretty much only keep down carbs. She'd much rather him gain a bit of weight rather than become a stick. His color has been getting better of late, though, and he gags less when she puts on strong-smelling perfume.
"You look better today, love," she tells him one morning over breakfast. He's finally able to stomach eggs, so she's fried some and served them with toast and tomatoes.
"And you look as radiant as always." He grins up at her.
She tilts her head and watches him as he eats. "You know... if I didn't know any better, I'd think that you started wearing foundation. Your skin glows lately."
"Does it?" Frank takes a large bite of toast, yolk running down his chin. "You must be rubbing off on me," he says, mouth half-full.
Amy digs in to her own toast, pouring over the book laying in front of her. "Seems kind of silly to look for colors to set up a nursery when I'm not pregnant, but..." There's a small cling as Frank's toast hits his plate. Amy looks up and sees Frank with his eyes wide, confusion spread across his face. "Something wrong?"
"Er, Amy, mind coming over here?"
Amy scoots her chair back and hugs Frank from behind. "What is it?" Wordlessly, Frank takes Amy's wrist and moves it down his chest, lower, lower, to his small, slightly-rounded belly. "You concerned about that?" Amy asks. She kisses his hair. "I really don't mind. You're still really sexy, you know. Probably the sexiest man I've ever - "
She feels it.
Frank looks up at her. "I didn't imagine that, right?"
Amy's brows furrow. "... Huh." She lifts up Frank's sweater and shirt, exposing his stomach. She realizes for the first time that there's a line trailing down underneath his navel, darker than his lightly colored pubic hair. She places her hand back on his stomach and closes her eyes.
She feels it again, clearer this time. An elbow jabs against her hand.
"Everything happens for a reason, eh?" Frank says, dumbfounded.
Amy drops to her knees and kisses his belly, warmth spreading through her body. "I guess it isn't silly to pick out colors for the nursery," she says, the curve of her smile arching against the proof of her love.