P.T.O.

After another chuckle was exchanged and the air between Laila and Noah had been cleared, if there even was air between them that needed clearing, they each went on to continue their days. Where Noah was trying to get as much done as he could before lunch, when he knew Olivia would be coming to 'surprise' him, Laila got started on a surprise of her own. One that mostly involved yelling the word surprise in order to wake her friend up, who had been sleeping for way too long in Laila's book.

While Laila quietly made her way up the stairs, her plan to wake Maria up with a fright was falling apart well before it could be executed as Maria had finally woken up on her own. Not only that, she was standing just behind her door, frozen to a single spot as she had found Steve's hand-written letter. He had slid his invite to a romantic date under her door, which had ended up just a few inches away from the back legs of her bed. In her still half-asleep state, she ended up stepping on the letter as she was walking to the bedroom, before she even noticed it was there. But when she saw what it was, she was immediately fully awake and her heart was pounding like crazy.

When Laila began her surprise by carefully pressing the handle of Maria's bedroom door in order to not make too much noise, Maria was in the middle of reading said letter in utter shock and silence. Her deep concentration on the single piece of paper and dried up ink, made Maria not notice the door opening and slowly moving her way. It wasn't until Laila tried to tiptoe inside the room and was startled herself by Maria suddenly standing in front of her like a statue, causing her to let out an equally startling shriek, that Maria had found another reason to be surprised. She jumped back from Laila's sudden action and both friends ended up giving their hearts some unwanted exercise.

"You made me jump you stupid pregnant woman, what did you do that for?" As Laila was holding her hand over her rapid beating heart she said, "Well that is far way from calling me princess. And then they say pregnant women change their mind by the minute. All of that over a bit of startling. Besides, I just came to wake you up. You were the one making me jump with your random zoning out in the middle of a room."

Maria quickly skipped over to Laila's side and put her arm around her as she pulled her close and placed two loud kisses on her cheek. "Oh don't say that. Of course you are my princess. No amount of startling will change that. I was just caught by surprise. You know endorphins make people do and say crazy things. So, won't you forgive me? If you do, I will tell you what made met turn into a statue in the first place?"

Though Laila wasn't particularly upset at Maria's reaction and she had only been joking, she wouldn't waste this opportunity to see what was on the note that made her friend freeze up. She also didn't mind getting an apology for the second time in a row without putting in any effort to get it. Both her friend as well as her husband had proven to be people, who are very able at seeing their own mistakes and admitting their wrongs. After pretending to be thinking about her offer, Laila replied with a cheerful "Deal!", after which both of them ended up laughing.

As Laila read the letter Steve had written Maria, telling her again how he felt about her, about how he had enjoyed the time they had spent that morning and how he wished to do it again later tonight. At the bottom of the letter he had written, "If you can't or won't meet me tonight then how about tomorrow?" At the left corner he had written the letters "P.T.O", which stand for 'Please Turn Over'. On the other side of the page there was a long list of checkboxes with just a single sentence behind each box. The first sentence read, "Or the day after tomorrow?".

After that it was just a repeat of the same sentence. Each line reading, "Or the day after that", "Or the day after that", "Or the day after that." This continued until the bottom of the page, with the exception of the last three rows. There he had written, "If you need another page of those, let me know. I will give you however many checkboxes you need. Because even if you pick a day a week from now or a year from now, I know what my answer will be. You just need to name the day and I will be there, feeling the same then as I do now. My days are yours from now until forever and I will be lucky if I get to use any one of them to spend even just an hour with you."