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"Have I mentioned how much I like that dress?" Jaime asked with a grin as he held the door open for Momoko. Because he did. Not that he didn't like Momoko in lots of things, but some dresses just... really worked for her.

"Also, I hope this place is good. I mean, the reviews say it is, but I haven't been here before."

He took a moment to exchange a few words with the hostess about their reservation.

"But if they aren't the best Italian place you've been to this year, don't blame me, okay?"

Tonight was the night. Not like the night when they'd suddenly realized that neither of them knew if there were any condoms in the apartment. And not like the night that Jaime remembered he had an exam in the morning. And not like the time the Horrors of Ig'nix had breached the dimensional barrier just north of Houston. Also not like the time that Oracle had kept Momoko running around east Asia and she'd gone for a 'nap' that meant she slept through dinner, and the rest of the night, too.

No. Tonight was the night, and it was going to be different this time!

Momoko held up their phones as she wandered into the kitchen. She totally didn’t want a repeat of the last time. “Both are on silent. Are you sure it’s okay for Khaji’da to listen in on my Compact as well as your phone? It won’t distract you or anything,right?”

“It better not,” Jaime growled teasingly as he set the dinner plates in the sink. “Not tonight.”

Momoko’s response included a sound of agreement that was mostly a cross between a snort and a chuckle. “Life or death and no other hero is available to answer.” Because while she too would have found it funny if it was happening to two other people... well, it wasn’t very funny.

Maybe this was why other people didn’t plan their first time?

[ooc: Backdated to Wednesday night. THANKS LJ! Link gets NSFW, and is also kinda long. Fair warning. OOC welcome.]

Momoko had been fighting off the last of the flu throughout the week, and that had meant that she and Jaime had been sleeping separately for a while. Given that they'd done that for, well, a long time Jaime would have thought it wouldn't be a big deal, but he'd found he really missed her. Even if he did check in on her every so often to make sure she had water and tissues. And that the selection of flowers in the vase next to her bed had plenty of water.

This morning (like many mornings) she'd woken up and declared that she was all better, but this time Khaji'Da had actually agreed that her immune responses had returned to baseline. So he'd made waffles for breakfast, and then they'd gone out for a walk. It had been nice to just be outside, with the wind in their faces and no coughing or sniffling ruining things. A couple of errands later, a movie, and dinner, and suddenly it was late.

So now they were parked on the couch, Momoko half sprawled on Jaime, as they played Mario Kart. They'd been at it long enough that it wasn't clear who had started using the technique of "nudging" the other person with an elbow when they got too far ahead (Jaime would insist that it was Momoko who'd started the violence), but by now they were doing as much shoving and laughing as they were actual virtual driving.

"I'm on my final lap!" Jaime crowed with a grin as Momoko tried to shove his controller out of his hand.

Jaime was glad that Momoko had actually let him bully her into resting all weekend, and now she was basically over the flu. A few lingering symptoms, but nothing super serious anymore. Which was a relief. He hated seeing her sick like that, especially when all he could do was fuss.

The doorbell rang, and Jaime frowned. They didn't get a lot of visitors, and definitely didn't get visitors on Tuesday afternoons.

"Hey," Jaime called from where he'd answered the front door. "Did you order something to be delivered via Portalocity? Because I totally just signed for a package! Looks like it's from Fandom?"

Last time he'd checked in on her, Momoko was up and doing something with her laptop, so hopefully she was still awake and he wasn't just yelling into thin air?

[ooc: Open if anyone wants to call or whatever.]

Jaime had had a surprisingly busy weekend. Classes had gotten to the point where he had plenty of studying to do on the weekends, and then there'd been a late-night page from the Titans which had resulted in a trip to Singapore that he hadn't gotten back from until ten this morning. He'd managed to grab breakfast and study a bit, but he'd felt himself fading and just barely managed to make it to the couch before passing out.

Sometime during the hours he slept, Moshi had decided to curl up on his chest and join him in sleeping.

Moshi had been something of an adjustment as Jaime had never actually lived with a pet before Momoko moved in, but by this point the two of them had gotten used to each other, and Jaime didn't even stir from his nap as the cat settled down.

Hours later the two of them were still there on the couch, breathing almost synchronized as they continued to sleep away.

[ooc: Open if anyone wants to call, text, or whatever.]

Jaime had finished packing the U-haul in the afternoon, ahead of schedule, even. And he and Momoko had their last date in town before he moved to San Antonio. Which was why he was glad his mom was willing to hang out with Kuriko, and keep her entertained, while they were out. He felt kind of bad stealing Momoko from her sister, but not that bad.

"Thanks for this, mom," he said, sipping lemonade at the kitchen table. "Just remember, please, please, please don't let her spend any time with Milagro. I'm sure it'd be a disaster."

"Actually, honey," Bianca said with a shrug. "I just got paged. I'm going to have to go into work, and your father isn't home yet, so I'm afraid that Milagro's going to make sure that Kuriko stays entertained."

Jaime stared at his mother because he had to have misheard that. Right?

But she was grabbing her bag and heading toward the door...

Oh, crap. Maybe it wasn't too late to cancel his date? His last date in town with Momoko? At their favorite place?

Well... maybe it wouldn't end in disaster? Weirder things had happened, after all. Admittedly not much weirder, but it had happened!

And then Milagro bounced into the room smirking. "If you don't hurry up and get ready you're going to keep Momoko waiting when she gets here."

Definitely a disaster.

Jaime felt himself waking up slowly, and slowly extended his arms in a sleepy stretch without opening his eyes. Maybe he could work that kink out of his elbow before the day got started. He was halfway through the careful movement when two things struck him.

First, this was not his bed. Two pillows instead of one, a slightly-too-soft mattress. Oh, and the sheets were too nice. Second? He was not alone in bed. It wasn't that that never happened, but this weekend his wife was on duty at the cave, so...

He turned his head slowly and opened his eyes. Momoko lay there with her back to him, breathing the slow, regular breaths of sleep. Jaime was pretty sure that she wasn't supposed to be there, but he wasn't complaining. In fact, he was reaching out to brush a thick strand of red hair away from her neck so that he could lean over there and gently nuzzle her bare skin.

Dinah and Jaime had gotten up early, and Dinah had helped walk Jaime through an actual plan for investigation. Which was much better than his "plan" of going back out to Orla and "trying to find something helpful".

So they were back out in the desert, driving old, mostly abandoned roads. Jaime didn't have much to say, and Dinah seemed willing to let him think. So the silence drew out between them until they finally arrived. "There's Mrs. Wilson's car," Jaime said as he pulled in behind it and stopped the car. "I found her phone a couple of dozen feet away, just lying on the ground."

"You know, now that I think about it," Jaime said, fingers laced through Momoko's as they walked down the unfamiliar streets, "coming to San Antonio to look at apartments was, like, a terribly unromantic thing to do for Valentine's Day..."

Even if they had seen some nice apartments, and some that might even be within Jaime's budget. If he got that scholarship, anyway.

He glanced over. "Do you think you'll ever forgive me for suggesting it?" Because he did need to see the city, and because he didn't have a lot of weekends free.

Jaime finished the last of his pancakes and leaned back in his chair with a sigh. "I've got to say, this place is pretty good."

He glanced down at his watch, and nodded to himself. He had another five or ten minutes to chat before he had to head down the street to the testing center for the DAT. When Momoko had first suggested that the two of them grab breakfast before the test, he'd been worried that it would be a distraction. Now that they'd done it, though, he was glad. He was a lot less stressed out than he'd been the night before, and this morning when he'd woken up. Somehow, spending time with her seemed to do that.

"And the coffee is pretty good, too." He grinned slightly. "Maybe you could get a job here," he teased.

The Day of the Dead. Every year found Jaime ending his rounds in the same cemetery, at the same grave.

Nadia.

Just like every year, the first thing he did was look to see if anyone else had been by before to leave anything for her. And just like every year, there was nothing. So he knelt in front of the grave marker and lay the small bouquet of cempasúchitl against the granite.

He didn't say anything. Even years later he wasn't sure what to say. He just knelt in silence for a bit, remembering.

Momoko was due back sometime on Monday, but her lease was up today. Fortunately, Jaime had keys to her old place, and Mrs Wilson knew him at her new place, and Paco had let him borrow his pickup truck. Which, to be perfectly honest, was overkill considering how little stuff Momoko owned.

Jaime hadn't ever really thought about it before, until he'd started going through her apartment, but Momoko didn't really have that much stuff. A small table with a few chairs that sort of stood in for a real dining room table, her futon, a small bookshelf mostly taken up with her DVDs, the various posters hung on her walls, and some kitchen appliances... All of that had been easy to move. Even by himself, it had been pretty straightforward. The only awkward bits, in fact, had been the aquarium, with its crabs (at least it wasn't filled with fish and water), and Momoko's batsudan. Jaime almost hadn't moved that, not wanting to mess anything up, but thinking back over how Momoko had explained things to him, he'd figured it all out.

Somehow it felt... strange. Knowing that this was everything Momoko owned in this world. It had taken him barely an hour to get it all into the back of the truck. Her heart had always struck him as so big, her personality so rich, that it was strange to remember that she owned so little. His eyes swept across the room again, confirming that he hadn't left anything, and then he took a deep breath and prepared to do the hardest part.

He set the cat carrier on the floor and opened the door. "Come on, Moshi," he called, trying to sound calm and reasonable. "It's just a short ride. It's no big deal..."

Somehow he was sure that this was going to end up with him bleeding all over Momoko's apartment. And having to clean up again.

Jaime didn't go to Momoko's apartment to watch anything big, like World Cup games. Not because he didn't like Momoko's place, as tiny as it was, but because she didn't have a proper TV. Just a laptop. But for some things, the laptop was pretty much perfect. Like when Momoko had an Introduction to Film homework assignment to watch some movie from 1940, and he had a rare afternoon free... Well, they had to sit awfully close together, Momoko practically in his lap, to both see the little screen properly. Not something Jaime was going to complain about at all.

As the final scene faded out, Jaime glanced over at Momoko. Her attention was on the screen, and she had a relaxed smile on her face as she shifted slightly, snuggling closer against him. She looked content. And beautiful.

He leaned his head against hers, and murmured the cheesy line from the film. "Even ten minutes is a long time to be away from you."

Saturday morning cartoons started way too early. Milagro "wasn't into that kiddy stuff", but she was still up early enough to watch some shows from that time block. Which meant she was up before Jaime. Which meant that there was no way he could sneak out of the house without her noticing that something really weird had happened over night.

He knew because he'd tried.

Unfortunately, girl!him was shorter than boy!him. And had a different center of gravity. And that had been enough to cause him (her?) to misjudge how easy it would be to step over the pile Milagro's stuff had made on the floor when she tossed it there after school on Friday, and falling down was loud enough to hear even over the corny-joke-and-laughter that signaled the end of whatever episode Milagro was watching.

Once she'd finally stopped laughing, Jaime had managed to swear her to secrecy, but she'd managed to extract some pretty extravagant promises for it. It would be worth the price if she didn't mention this whole episode to anyone, though.

With Milagro's silence purchased, all that was left to do was to dash off a quick note to his (her?) mother that he (she?, ugh, this was confusing) was heading over to Momoko's for the weekend to deal with some weirdness that had arisen, possibly connected to Fandom.

Not too much later there was a knock on the door of Momoko's apartment, and the person doing the knocking wore baggy pants, a shirt that was clearly too large (neither of which managed to conceal that said person was female), and an expression that practically dared anyone to laugh. Or even smile in amusement.

[Available for calls or texts or whatever, if people like.]

Jaime finished the last bite of fish and leaned back in his chair with a satisfied sigh. "That was pretty good," he told his dinner companion with a smile. "I didn't know you could fry fish so well." Not to mention the salad. Which hadn't been anything special, but had been very nice.

He took a moment to just appreciate it, then looked across the table. "So... you want dessert now, or do you need to digest first?" He'd brought a cake. Too big for two people, honestly, but he rather suspected that, given Momoko, that wouldn't really be a problem. Either they'd eat it all tonight, or she'd have some for later.

"Fair warning," Jaime said, glancing over at Momoko, and grinning in spite of himself. "I haven't been to one of these before, so if it's totally lame, you can't blame me." He wasn't entirely sure what had possessed him to invite Momoko to come to the shindig that the Student Association had put together. He wasn't even entirely sure how he'd noticed it was coming up, considering how often the Student Association put together shindigs which he totally missed. But whatever the reason, he'd found out about it, and he'd suggested that Momoko and he could go out and try to have fun away from their usual haunts. A change of pace or something.

Of course, he hadn't been sure what one wore to a school-approved student party, so he'd gone with sort of dressy casual, giving up his jeans for a pair of khakis, and going with a button-down shirt. Looking around at the other students he saw, his shoulders relaxed a bit. It seemed like he hadn't guessed too wrong, after all.

So. Date night. Jaime took a deep breath, then reached out and knocked lightly on Momoko's door.

He wasn't dressed up, precisely. He was wearing khakis instead of jeans, but he did that sometimes, so it wasn't anything special. And, sure, he'd combed his hair on the way over, but... that wasn't a big deal. Sometimes he did that. And he wasn't nervous. After all, he and Momoko had hung out numerous times since she'd moved to El Paso. And even since they'd had their little talk... So, yeah, no reason to be nervous.

It suddenly occurred to Jaime that he'd been standing at Momoko's door for a while. And her place wasn't that big, so it's not like she had to walk far to let him in. Maybe she hadn't heard him?

He knocked louder, but there still wasn't any response.

Jaime definitely wasn't nervous now. No. He was worried.

He ordered Khaji'Da to do a full-spectrum sweep of the premises, just to see if she was somewhere nearby injured, and the result was... that she was in her apartment? No major new injuries? Sleeping?

On date night?

Given her enthusiasm when they'd planned this all out, that seemed odd. Jaime frowned, then decided to try one more time, knocking especially loud this time.

If she didn't wake up from that, he'd just... write the night off. She probably needed the sleep, after all.

Jaime hadn't taken Momoko to a regular hospital. He'd called his mother and told her that he was going to the small STAR Labs facility just outside of town. They'd be better equipped to deal with injuries to someone with Blossom's abilities.

He couldn't think of anything he'd done recently that was harder than relinquishing that broken, bleeding body into the hands of strangers, but they'd eventually managed to convince him to do so. After which he'd paced for hours, and sat in the waiting room for more hours, and eventually fallen into a fitful doze waiting for news. Any news.

When a doctor had eventually woken him up to tell him that Blossom was out of immediate danger, Khaji Da informed him that it had been over eight hours.

Jaime had thanked the doctor and immediately headed to Momoko's room. He'd pulled a chair over to be right next to her bed, and sat down. He couldn't keep himself from reaching up and brushing back her hair, not sure what he was supposed to do about the fitful murmurs and slight sounds of pain she made as she shifted in her sleep. He wanted to make them go away somehow, but... that was beyond him.

So he just sat there, hand lightly stroking her forehead, trying to make her better by sheer force of will.

The doorbell rang for the second time, and Jaime looked up from his desk with a scowl. "Milagro!" he yelled, knowing his voice would carry down the hallway, "get the door!"

"Get it yourself!" she yelled back.

"I'm busy!"

"So am I!"

"Don't be a brat!"

"You're the brat!"

( Ugh. Sisters... )

[Open for calls if anyone's interested, though I'll be out for a good chunk of the afternoon/evening, so expect SP.]

Jaime yawned and sat back at his desk, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

He didn't actually have any homework for tomorrow. It turned out that Dr. Townsend was quite a generous professor. Not something you tended to expect when signing up for Molecular Biology. But she had said that, given the romantic occasion, and it's extra importance for hormone-ruled college students, she wasn't going to bother assigning reading or a lab.

Still... you could never spend too much studying, right? That was totally why Jaime was in his room, a half-eaten sandwich he'd thrown together for dinner sat forgotten on the corner of his desk. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that Amanda was working (Valentine's was a big day for celebrity-look-alike telegrams), or that Paco and Brenda weren't interested in a third wheel even if they would have let him tag along. It didn't have anything to do with the fact that the holiday held so many memories, many of them bright and beautiful made bittersweet. And it certainly didn't have anything to do with the way that he'd spent most of the day dwelling on those memories and needed a break from them.

Nope.

He just needed to study.