Welcome! Or in some, likely most, cases, welcome back! I am SO excited to share the sequel for "The Neutron-Vortex Rules for a Mutually Beneficial Friendship". I suppose you don't HAVE to read the first story if you've never heard of that title, but there will likely be allusions to it and I'm sure you don't want to feel left out. So to be safe, I suggest giving it a read. I hear it's lots of fun.

To avoid confusion, I'll let you know that this starts off and takes place approximately two weeks after the end of the previous story, so a little time jump occurs. Won't give any more details away so it looks like you'll just have to read the story to find out more.

Jimmy's POV

Everything has to be perfect for tonight.

I've never really been one to say or think that, but considering who this is going to be for and the occasion, I want it to be just right.

Today is Cindy and mine's one month anniversary, or I suppose, to be technical, it's tonight.

It seems as unreal to me as it does to the next guy but it's true: Cindy and I have been together for a month and it's made up of the best thirty-one days of my life.

The night we got together is unforgettable so I knew there would be no way that this was going to be a regular old, passive day. Cindy, of course, probably thinks I forgot about it. Although really, there's a higher chance that she herself forgot.

As much as I knew this had to be both observed and celebrated, I wasn't really sure what we could do. She's never been one to take surprises lightly and with how long I've known her, you'd think me planning something wouldn't be so difficult. Granted, prior to us becoming a couple, we weren't overly concerned about spending our time together by talking more in depthly about our interests. So aside from the obvious things that pretty much everyone that's gone to school with her would know, there isn't really much I know.

Except for one prominent factor.

I suppose it's kind of inevitable considering where we live and all but discovering Cindy's love for Mexican food, buffalo chicken tacos in particular, was truly surprising.

With that in mind it wasn't overly difficult to figure out what I wanted to do.

Her restaurant of choice which sells this delicacy is about three hours away and due to its proximity, I'm not entirely sure how she went about going enough times to establish it as her favorite. So instead of making the long drive out there I figured the next best alternative would be to recreate the meal.

I've never been much of a whiz in the kitchen but I'm willing to try for Cindy.

Besides, how hard could it possibly be?

In a way, this is sort of fitting. Cindy and I having dinner alone is something that hasn't been done before. So by doing this it would technically be our first date since, in getting to the place we're currently in, we skipped that step entirely.

I told Cindy to come on over at six this evening without really giving her much of a motive. I didn't even wish her a happy first month while I was on the phone with her. As far as she knows, this may just be one of our casual hang outs.

However, the environment in my house was anything but.

My parents did me the huge favor of going out to dinner tonight, leaving the house all to ourselves in the process. But this came after they helped me tidy up the place and do any part of the cooking that would have resulted in the house burning down had I done it. All of that was obviously extremely helpful. So much so that once they left, all I had to do was make myself presentable.

I wouldn't say I was cutting it close if it weren't for the fact that my doorbell rang at exactly six PM, signaling Cindy's ever so prompt arrival.

Even if she wasn't aware of what a special night this was, I still felt it was appropriate to dress up. If anything, the light blue dress shirt I had on would give her some clue that something was going on.

"Hey." I said coolly as I opened the door for her, completely hiding the rose in my hand from her sight.

"You're awfully dressed up." She replied in greeting. She was, as she usually always is, wearing a dress. Nothing too fancy and definitely something that I can recall her wearing -and not wearing- in the past.

Instead of answering verbally, I smiled and held the door open wider for her. From my front door, it was a direct sight to my dining room where Goddard had just lit up candles on either end of the table. As soon as she walked in, it would be nearly impossible for her not to see it.

I knew that she had when she suddenly stopped walking.

Closing the door behind her, I smiled to myself.

"Happy one month." I spoke before kissing her on the cheek and handing her the rose.

With a growing smile, she took the flower and turned to face me.

"That is tonight, isn't it?" Chuckling because I was right about her forgetting, I took her hand and guided her to the dining room.

Our meal was protected by mesh covers and I knew she would be able to see it before I made the big reveal. Despite that, I still did it quite dramatically.

"Jimmy...," she spoke after she got a good look at them. "You did not have to go all the way over there. It's too much-."

"I didn't go anywhere. They're homemade."

"No, they aren't." She said incredulously after a pause.

"Well, not by me. My parents helped but yeah. I know how much you like them so I thought it would be a nice gestu- oh!"

I was cut off by her kissing me and I knew then that she loved it.

"This is great." She whispered once she pulled away. "I love it and I love you." She spoke with one of her wider smiles. "Just please tell me you marinated the chicken in the barbeque sauce and didn't just spread it on after you cooked it."

"Why, of course."

With a little jump, she walked over to one end of the table where there was a plate set and sat down excitedly.

"So where did the idea to do this come from?" she asked as I put down two tacos to start her off with in front of her.

"Well, I know it's your favorite food. But in general I realized that us having dinner together is really overdue. It's about time we did it too seeing as we're a couple but we've never actually officially gone on a date."

"We did seem to skip that part. And instead just jump to some others." Cindy replied in agreement. "I love this though. It's...incredibly thoughtful. Thank you."

Cindy's POV

You'd think I hadn't eaten all day with the amount of tacos I just consumed. But they really were that good.

And I do have to admit: Neutron sure knows how to impress a girl, especially on a first date.

I should have known something was going on when I saw him standing in his threshold in a dress shirt and black slacks. No way would he have looked like that if we really were just "hanging out" as he put it over the phone. Even though it didn't take me very long to find out, a part of me twinged in discomfort.

While it didn't seem to matter at all to him, there was something about tonight that I couldn't forget about. Essentially, it's the reason for this happening in the first place.

I had forgotten that tonight marked our first month of being a couple.

Obviously, it's not that I don't care. It just wasn't really a date that I thought he would want observed. Most guys don't even pay attention to things like that. Although I really should have known better with Jimmy.

I don't even suppose that it's that I forgot. More that I didn't really notice. Impossible not to though since it's been exactly a month since prom, pretty much the day everything changed in Jimmy and mine's relationship.

But besides spending nearly every day with him, I've had a lot on my mind too.

I've finally finished handling everything I need to do before moving into Columbia at the end of the summer and set up a 4-year plan that pretty much guarantees I will not lose my scholarship. It's been a few hectic but crucial days for me. I also can't deny that worrying about my own academic future is helping to take my mind off the fact that Jimmy will be leaving for his sooner than I will.

In all, it's been a busy couple of weeks. Or at least enough to distract myself from the small but significant milestone I've made with my boyfriend.

As horrible as I'm feeling about it, and I'm sure he's not feeling all that happy either, I swear to make it up to him.

"That was incredible. Best ones I've ever tasted." I spoke once I swallowed the last bit.

"You're just saying that because you feel bad that you forgot about today." I knew he was kidding, but if it really didn't bother him, he wouldn't have mentioned it at all.

"I'm not. Really." There was a change in my tone. "And I'm sorry for forgetting. I've had a lot on my mind, but I really didn't think it mattered that much to you."

"Well, you matter the world to me so..."

Ugh, why did he have to say that?

"We're not going to fight about this, are we?" I knew it was better to say that and clear any potential discomfort than to have it hover over us.

"No, of course not. Wouldn't want our first date to end in our first fight, would we?" He replied.

He was right about that as well.

Had we let that go on, this would have become our first official boyfriend/girlfriend fight, not at all including our little teases to one another. Considering our past, it's almost a surprise that it hasn't occurred yet. But I'm sure we're both hoping to avoid it for as long as possible.

"That's right." I smiled as I got up out of my chair and walked over to where he was sitting across from me. As I sat on his lap and placed my arms around his neck, I gazed at him. "Have I told you today how much I love you?"

"Couple times, I think." Barely letting him finish, I pressed my lips against his. It only took a few short seconds until we were lost in each other. Just as we were running out of breath, he moved his lips to my neck and nibbled on a spot he discovered early on in our relationship, not referring to the one that started a month ago. We were both reminded of how much I enjoyed that spot in particular when I shakely let out a breath.

"Do you want to?" He spoke so softly into my ear but I knew exactly what he meant. Pulling away and our remembering our current and partially pretend situation, I spoke.

"On the first date? What kind of girl do you think I am Mr. Neutron?" Playing along as well, he playfully rolled his eyes as he smiled. "Not tonight." I said honestly. "Plus, we had all those tacos-."

"You had all those tacos." He clarified.

"Yes, okay." I answered back as we both laughed. "Let's just take it easy tonight?"

"Of course. Anything you want." By looking directly at him, I hope it made him realize that any and everything I wanted was right in front of me.

*sighs* These two.

So now that I have your attention (hopefully), I want to explain how the sequel is going to work.

While the first story was very much a linear, continuous story, this one will be a little different. While I plan to keep it as properly sequential as I can, this one just won't seem as flowy the first one. The best way to think about it would be consider the first story as a movie and this as collection of episodes from the TV show adaptation that have an ongoing pace to them. In other words, the way this fandom turned out.

Of course, if one chapter seems to start a story arc, I'll go with that and there may be times where a chapter will have two parts. It may seem a little confusing still but I'm hoping it will make more sense to why it's like this when Jimmy and Cindy go off to college (which yes, we will explore).

Oh but don't think this means you'll be getting an update every week like you would on TV. Nice try.

Thank you for reading and please review if you can!