"In all the time I've known you, when have you shown the slightest interest in a girl?" Amy leans in closer as she questions him and Rory's heart is in his stomach.

"Penny in the air" Melody rolls her eyes as she lies on Amy's bed and fiddles with a small cardboard tardis.

The room begins to spins around Rory as voices fill his head...

-Tell her, you idiot

-Don't say a word

-If you don't say something now...

-Don't you dare say a word...

-Is it getting hot in here?

Unable to take it any longer; Rory runs out of Amy's room, down the stairs and out the front door.

"RORY!" he can hear Amy calling out to him as he shuts the front door and quickly begins walking away. He gets about two feet from his car before a violent tug at his backpack stops him in his tracks.

"Rory Arthur Williams! You turn around and you explain yourself right this instant." Amy scolds him as slowly spins around to face her with a forlorn expression draped across his face. Her finger wagging in his face Amy continues "You wipe that stupid, sad puppy look off your face and snap out of your whiny nonsense right now and tell me what your problem is"

Rory feels his face flush and grow hot with a volatile mixture or crippling fear and full blown rage. "YOU ARE!" Rory blurts out. Both he and Amy are taken aback by the outburst.

"I'm your problem?" Amy scoffs as she places her hands on her hips.

"No! I mean... ugh!" Rory quickly tries to take it back. He looks up at the darkening sky overhead as dusk gave way to night. Maybe up there he'd find his words. "There's never been another girl... because it's you" his voice dims into a whisper as his gaze moves from the sky and down to the asphalt beneath his feet. "I've never loved anyone but you."

Amy's jaw drops in amazement but not long enough for anyone to notice she was going soft of course. "Rory!" she grabs his backpack off his shoulder and hits him with it. "How dare you!"

"What?! Ouch!" he flinches waiting for the next death-by-backpack attack.

"You're telling me that all this time you just sat by and watched me date all these ridiculous boyfriends and you didn't even once try to stop me?" her voice begins to shift from angry to playful "Have you MET some of the jerks I've dated?"

"Yeah, I have ..." Rory rolled his eyes "And I have tried to stop you on multiple occasions, by the way"

"No you have not" Amy crosses her arms.

"Ok, fine. For example, remember when you started dating Justin and I..." Rory is interrupted.

"Which Justin?" Amy asks. There has to be at least three she can think of off the top of her head.

"Blonde, always carrying a guitar on his back, wrote all these sickeningly melodramatic love song for you. Love songs that you felt the need to share with me by the way" which Rory did not appreciate.

"When did you try and stop me from dating him?" Amy raises an eyebrow as she questions him.

"I specifically remember us sitting on your front steps and I said 'I don't like that Justin guy. He gives me the creeps'. You don't remember that?" Rory asked.

Amy smiles, "Well, no I don't remember that but it's true he turned out to be a little creepy. I tried not to notice when he kept doodling 666 on all this notebooks in history class. I just had to call it off when he invited me to that book burning. That was just a little frightening."

"A little!?" Rory laughs at her nonchalance.

"I do remember you not liking Richard." her smile grows a little serious. "You were right." Now dead serious she adds. "He was cheating on me just like you said he was."

"I'm sorry." Rory is genuinely sorry as he runs a comforting hand from Amy's shoulder down to her hand. Their fingers lace together.

"Rory, why didn't you tell me this before?" Amy asks; her voice now growing soft and melancholy.

Rory's head fills with voices again.

Because I thought you'd laugh...

you'd hate me...

you'd never want to speak to me again...

or see me again...

take your pick...

"You never seemed interested so..." he shrugs "I figured you just liked me as a friend... I mean... I'm always invisible when some new mysterious, handsome stranger appears and I'm obviously not that guy. I'm not very interesting and I'm not very good-looking. I mean... look at me..."

Amy looks.

"And look at you." Rory looks.

A sharp silence falls around them; their gazes glued to each others eyes. Amy takes a breath and a step back realizing how long she'd been looking and quickly snaps back into her playful, not-a-care-in-the-world self.

"Well, I'll see you tomorrow then." Amy smiles.

"Yeah" Rory's heart is still in his stomach.

"I expect you to pick me up around six and I expect you to show me a good time." Amy demands.

Rory eyes her suspiciously. "Is this a date?" he leans in close and whispers the question for fear saying it too loudly would break the fragile state of this too-good-to-be-true moment.

"That's entirely up to you." Amy playfully rolls her eyes and smiles.

Rory's heart is definitely back in his chest. He can feel it banging away against his rib cage trying to make a getaway. A meek "ok" is all Rory's mouth can muster.

He walks to his car and after dropping his keys and missing the keyhole a few times from the blissful dizziness that had suddenly overcome him; he manages to get in the driver seat of his little red mini cooper.

Amy pops her head in the the driver side window. "And don't you dare keep me waiting."

"Right, 6 o'clock, tomorrow" Rory grips the steering wheel with both hand for fear he might lose his grasp on this conversation.

"Dinner" she adds

"Check" he nods

"Movie" she demands

"Check" he's still gripping the steering wheel.

"Big tub of popcorn" Amy taps on the hood of his car to signal the conversation has reached it's end and he's free to go.

"Big tub of popcorn" he repeats to himself as he secures his seat belt and begins to drive off. He sees Amy waving happily at him from his rear view mirror "This is actually happening, isn't it?" he can't help but laugh "It's actually happening."