Author's Note: Friends. It is here. In posting this, I have officially closed the chapter (Damon pun alert) on this book and this incredible journey with all of you. More sentimental ramblings and a tease for what else might be up Nightlight's sleeve await at the end of this chapter but for now, enjoy...

Epilogue

"…and she keeps asking and asking and asking me about every little thing and it's just getting to be a little ridiculous," Caroline says, dabbing at her mouth with her napkin and placing it in her lap before nodding gratefully to Grace, our favorite waitress that we just so happened to score tonight.

Grace catches my eyes with a mischievous look before darting them pointedly to Caroline, who is in the throes of another one of her signature rants. Grace and I share a suppressed giggle before she adds the plate to the gravity-defying pile of licked-clean dinner plates festooning her arms and sashays away.

Caroline is all but yelling in her bid to be heard over the din of the busier-than-usual Friday night crowd here at the Square. The whole gang is here, crowded around two tables shoved together in the middle of the recessed dining floor. None of us were anticipating the crowd tonight, otherwise we might have sent someone to scope out a booth a bit earlier than usual. I suppose it couldn't have hurt us to make a reservation, especially for a special occasion like this one. But our Stefan-seat-saving system is so second-nature none of us even thought about it.

Caroline sends a golden tumble of curls over her shoulder with a haughty flick of her fingertips before continuing. "I mean, just because my name technically falls lower than Little Miss Susanna Script-Stealer on the Michaelson Literary Management Big-Shot Roster doesn't mean she can hound me like I'm her assistant or something."

I dip my head to hide my cheek-aching smile. Her continued grudge against Susanna makes absolutely no rational sense. It feels like a lifetime ago that Klaus reassigned her my Manny Nanny manuscript, and Honest to Goodness outsold it many times over. But, that aside, I have to admit it warms my heart. Her loyalty to me apparently knows no bounds. Not even, it seems, the bounds of logic.

"Because, hello," Caroline sing songs, barreling on, "I'm Elena's assistant, which might make me even more of a big deal at the office than she is since Elena is pretty much the bread, butter, and toast of Michealson Literary Management right now."

I can't help but blush. I open my mouth to counter her exaggeration when I am rudely interrupted.

"Thanks to me," Damon says smugly, holding his hands up and looking around the table expectantly, as though waiting for applause to break out and roses to be thrown. Not surprisingly, rather than obliging him, half the table groans and everyone but Stefan rolls their eyes. Instead, he wears the good-natured, tolerant smirk of a man who knows better than to give Damon exactly the reaction he was hoping for.

And even though I know better, too, as Damon's girlfriend of almost a year now, I'm pretty sure it's in my job description to throw the man a bone every once and awhile.

"Oh yeah cause it has nothing to do with Elena, right, Damon?" Caroline says sarcastically.

Damon says nothing to assuage Caroline but offers me a conspiratorial wink on the sly, clasping my hand in his under the table. I sigh with a combination of mild exasperation and contentedness. Riling his sister-in-law up has become something of a favorite hobby of his.

"Ten bucks says you told Susanna you would help her with her wedding, Caroline," Ric's gruff voice pipes up as he tips the neck of his beer knowingly in her direction, wearing a stubble-darkened half-smile. I chuckle, knowing it is almost certainly true.

But even as I do, I can't help but notice that the relaxed set of Ric's mouth doesn't quite match his eyes, which seem bright with too much awareness, anxiety even. They dart compulsively to Damon, and a stone sinks in my stomach. It seemed like forever before he finally forgave himself for what he'd done, long after he and Damon had hashed everything out and Ric had apologized, long after all of us had agreed to let bygones be bygones and move on.

But things had been going smoothly for some time now—or so I thought. Did something happen to bring back the tension between them? Did the guys talk and Damon forget to tell me?

"I second that," Damon chimes in, looking pointedly at Caroline and wearing a lazy smirk that I have learned makes both her and me crazy for drastically different reasons.

"No harm in admitting you're having wedding withdrawals, sister. You can just become a wedding planner if you're that desperate. No need to start stalking your coworkers' left hands for who to drop hints in front of."

"I did no such thing!" Caroline exclaims, a little too emphatically. I dip my head and let my hair shield my face, snickering at a spot of stray balsamic on the tablecloth in front of me in hopes of delaying the wrath that will be inevitably headed my way when she figures out how hilarious I think all of this is. Caroline's preoccupation with weddings hasn't even slowed—let alone stopped—since hers ended, and the only person who hasn't noticed is Caroline herself.

"No harm in it, Care. You really would make a fantastic wedding planner," Jenna says simply, the twinkle in her eyes belying the intended humor behind her dry delivery.

"Now hold on, you two…" Stefan starts, getting ready to defend his wife.

"All I said," Caroline cuts in, sitting up straighter in her chair and smoothing her napkin in her lap with a dignified air, the effect of which is somewhat ruined by her crimson red ears-to-chest blush, "was that if she wanted them, I'd be happy to give her names and numbers of the best wedding vendors in the area since I'd just been through planning a wedding myself and was very happy with the results."

"So you were bragging," Jenna says flatly, as though she were announcing whiskey is wet.

"No, I was not bragging!" Caroline insists, her face so flushed she looks dangerously close to damaging blood vessels.

"She was bragging," Stefan confirms matter-of-factly to Jenna before leaning back in his chair, suppressing the playful smirk he sometimes tries on that will now only ever truly be Damon's to me.

Caroline gasps. "Stefan!" she says in a tone that is somewhere between whining and smacking Stefan's shoulder. Ric guffaws his big bear laugh and everybody else in the proverbial peanut gallery is helpless to follow suit.

"Aww c'mon babe, we're just kidding," Stefan says once he's recovered. He lifts her hand to kiss it, wisely laying the contrite charm on thickly. "Besides, even if you were bragging—"

"I wasn't!"

"You would have every right to," Stefan continues, undeterred. He reaches up to tuck a glossy curl behind her bright red ear. "You worked harder on that wedding than even that ridiculously expensive wedding coordinator Francesca insisted on hiring—"

"Hey, I liked Bonnie!"

"Yeah, she was awesome," I agree.

"Of course she was," Stefan soothes, looking to me with a tiny flare of his eyes, silently begging me not to encourage her before his eyes return to his wife. I attempt to oblige him, though when I bite back my smile it is with only moderate success.

"But my point is," he continues, "you masterminded almost every detail and it was absolutely perfect."

Caroline lifts her chin and wiggles uncomfortably in her seat as she pretends to still be upset but I see her coming down already, her shoulders dropping as her face begins to resemble something closer to its normal shade.

"It was obviously the best day of my life," he says, kissing her hand again before dropping another two in a trail up her forearm. "Not to mention the best wedding anyone here has been to in recent memory," he adds. By the time he reaches the crook of her elbow, she doesn't bother to hide her delighted albeit tentative smile.

"Hear, hear," Damon agrees heartily, slinging an arm around me in a possessive gesture more akin to that of a caveman than a gentleman. I turn to gasp in shock at his forwardness, but he surprises me by catching me in a kiss, his lips firm and playful against mine for a long moment before they melt compulsively into something softer, more pliable and tender. I feel rather than hear him exhale a contented sigh against my cheek.

"There they go again," I hear Ric mumble under his breath.

Jenna starts singing, "'Lena and Damon sitting by the pond, K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes love, then comes…everyone-being-pissed-at-you…" I hear Stefan chuckle at Jenna's hastily improvised lyrics.

Damon smiles against my lips and I can't help but follow suit. I am already preparing for the disappointment of his pulling away when he surprises me again by angling his head and parting his lips to fit them more softly against mine, drawing me deeper into the delicious haze of his kiss.

A small, sensation-addled part of my brain knows that I should be tsking and rolling my eyes at his obvious attempt to rankle our table of witnesses. But it's hard to muster up the will to stop, since Damon's lips anywhere on my body have proven to be my brain's cue to surrender control to less rational aspects of my nature.

"Sheesh Damon you might want to tone it down or you're going to end up skipping 'marriage' and going straight for the 'baby carriage,'" Caroline teases good-naturedly.

Damon doesn't even flinch.

"Do you think they hear us?" Jenna muses contemplatively to everyone and no one.

"Who knows?" Caroline answers, sounding effervescently weary in that way only she can.

Damon finally releases me, a satisfied sigh catching in his throat before he lets me go, turning to our spectators with a lazy smirk. I avert my eyes in belated embarrassment, reaching for my ice water. My face is burning hot and my body is running even hotter, every nerve ending sizzling and throbbing with energy.

He rests his arm on the back of my chair instead of pulling it away, giving my arm a little squeeze as I lean into the muscle padding his shoulder, trying with only moderate success not to imagine what it looks like once I've removed his shirt, the way his skin tastes under my tongue, the way it flexes as he moves over me.

I gulp down the last of my water.

"Honestly, Caroline?" Damon asks her, as he turns lazily in her direction. "Do you know how many times I've had to watch you and my brother attacking each other like the world was two tics from the apocalypse?" he asks, picking up his beer and using it to motion between the two of them before taking a gulp. "With all due respect, if you have a problem with me showing some affection to my girlfriend in public, you are welcome to kiss my ass. Pun intended."

"Yes, Damon," Stefan says dryly, "We could tell the pun was intended because you emphasized the word kiss within an inch of its life."

Ric chuckles and takes a swig of his beer.

"Hmm. Interesting hearing that word coming out of your mouth, Stefan. It sounds familiar somehow," Damon says, pretending to think, the enthusiastic twinkle in his narrowed eyes a mere hand-wring away from maniacal.

Oh, no. He is not bringing this up.

Stefan groans ruefully.

"Don't you think so, Ric?" he asks. But Ric's only reply is to burst out laughing.

"Did you mean to say, "kiss," or did you mean to say 'kiiisss?'" This time it has the pitch of an all-too-familiar melody.

Oh my God poor Stefan, I think to myself.

Right before I unsuccessfully attempt to stop a laugh from exploding out of my traitor mouth.

"OhmyGodohmyGodohmyGod, yesss!" Jenna says, catching on, her hand swinging out to grab Ric's arm excitedly. But Ric is already getting into character, squinting his eyes and squinching his nose as he starts singing in a tragically piss-poor impersonation of Prince's signature falsetto.

"You don't have to be beautiful, to turn me on…"

Stefan groans even louder than before, dropping his head into both hands.

"I just need your body, baby, from dusk till dawn…" Damon continues, winking at me before tickling his fingers into my ribs, making me gasp and squeal as my waning giggle fit kicks back up into full-fledged Side-Stitch Mode.

Caroline just shakes her head with pursed lips, trying to keep it together out of solidarity with Stefan but her eyes are watering with the effort of holding back her own laughter.

"You don't need experience to blah blah blah…what are those lyric anyways?" Jenna looks at me but I just hold my hands up, at a total loss. "Stefan? Care to enlighten us?"

"You guys…please…" Stefan pleads.

"You ju-ust leave it a-all up to me," Caroline bursts out in, the only one even remotely on key. The mischievous gleam in her eyes tells me that Stefan is officially on his own. "I'm gonna show you what it's all about…" She lifts her hands up, rising in her chair just enough to pop her hips from side to side in time with the imaginary beat.

"Caroline!" Stefan exclaims, his voice all embarrassed desperation as his last advocate turns on him. "C'mon, babe, you're supposed to be on my side here!"

But Caroline just gives him a sly smile and leads the entire table—with the exception of Stefan—into the chorus.

"You don't have to be rich, to be my girl

You don't have to be cool to rule my world

Ain't no particular sign I'm more compatible with

I just want your extra time and your—" The table erupts in a chorus of exaggerated kissing sounds before everybody sing-yells in unison, "Kiss!"

The table dissolves into laughter as Stefan buries his face in his crossed arms where they rest on the table. Some patrons seated at the tables around us clap appreciatively, and Caroline offers them a little bow before taking her seat once more.

"Aww, brother, don't be shy," Damon says, "You've done the world a favor, really. A good striptease is hard to come by, these days," Damon adds, his eyes slipping away from Stefan to lick up and down my body with so much heat I have to squirm in my chair.

I only tried it once, and the only reason it happened in the first place was because it had started out as a joke.

But by the time all of my clothes were off, neither of us were laughing.

"You had some pretty damn good moves, Stef," Ric adds. "I was turned on," he says with an offhanded shrug, his eyes twinkling with the effort of maintaining his dry delivery instead of bursting into laughter all over again.

"Yeah, babe, you were hot," Caroline says, scratching at the air with cat claws before leaning over to smoosh an enthusiastic peck against his cheek.

Acquiring the video had been easy enough for Damon, who now has a black belt in snooping thanks to my bad influence, but it was Stefan's mistake to bet against Damon when his video being texted to all his friends was on the line. At least Damon had mercy on him by limiting his definition of "friends" to our little family instead of expanding it to include his coworkers. I'm pretty sure that would have made a dent in his respectability around the office and Damon definitely owed him one in that department.

"My favorite was when he attempts the sexy walk, but then trips a little bit…" Jenna offers excitedly.

A laugh bursts out of me. "Ooh, and the come hither finger crook," I add, acting it out as I beckon Jenna, contorting my face into the very best pouty lipped, squinty-eyed duck face I can manage before succumbing to the giggle fit tugging on the last thread of my composure.

Stefan is such a vibrant shade of red he looks like he is on the verge of bursting into flames.

"Can we please just let this go?" Stefan begs. "I never should have let Damon trick me into that bet."

"No, what you should have done is made your wife change her phone's passcode before she took it with her to Father's house for family dinner," Damon corrects. Didn't you learn anything from that wedding shower video we made you?" Damon asks, motioning to me. "People in this family cannot be trusted to behave themselves around personal electronics. Even Ric is a snoop, lest we forget that whole debacle…" he trails off.

"Shut up," Ric says, without heat, punching Damon on the shoulder before settling back in his chair with a smirk. Relief expands in my chest. If I had any reason to doubt that this was the reason for Ric's more subdued behavior or anxious demeanor this evening, it is officially out the window now.

So what was that all about then?

"Okay, okay," Caroline says, leaning in with her arms out in peacemaker mode, right on cue. "Let's all agree to Fort Knox-ify our phones so these crazy privacy-invading snoop junkies won't be tempted. And while we're at it, let's all let my poor husband of the hook, why don't we? I'm sure if I had looser morals I would be in the possession of many a damning video of each of you doing things you'd rather everyone not see. So let's not get all high and mighty now, okay?"

"Speaking of loose morals," I say, lifting my half-empty martini glass in salute. "The person we should really be focusing on humiliating right now is Jenna. She's the reason we are all here in the first place, after all."

Jenna pretends to be scandalized, gasping theatrically as she reaches out to whack my arm, catching my free hand instead when I put it up to shield myself.

"Hear, hear," Stefan says, raising his glass with mine.

"To humiliating Jenna on her birthday!" I say.

"To humiliating Jenna," everyone repeats dutifully.

And after some indiscernible muttering and a compulsory eye-roll, even Jenna drinks along with us.

Right on cue, Grace arrives at our table, trailed by a gaggle of some our most familiar and beloved members of The Square wait staff. There are so many of them, almost everyone on the floor tonight. Grace is holding Jenna's favorite dessert, a glorious oreo-crusted, mocha ice-cream layered, whip-cream-topped Mud Pie crowned with a single glowing candle.

They begin the familiar Birthday Song refrain, and I don't know if it's because we are smack dab in the middle of the restaurant, or if the patrons are still tuned into us because of our impromptu Prince number, but almost the entire restaurant joins in, raising a chorus of "Happy Birthday to you…" that hits me straight in the chest like a fist, raising goosebumps on my arms and the downy hairs on the back of my neck.

Grace holds the cake high, her eyes shining with emotion that seems a little over the top for a casual birthday celebration, but hey, I won't judge. I'm definitely feeling a little caught up in the strange magic of the un-namable thing happening in this restaurant right now as well.

Familiar faces keep popping up behind others, and it dawns on me that I don't think I've ever seen so many members of the wait-staff visit a table to sing happy birthday. Even Jamie the hostess abandoned her post at the door. And is that Kyle grinning at the back of the group?

Hold on.

I look to Damon, who is singing along, looking much too smug to be up to nothing. And when I follow the trajectory of his line of sight I see that he is looking at Ric, who looks alarmingly close to losing his dinner, his complexion pale and eyes wide as they stare unseeingly at the tablecloth in front of him. He wipes his hands and mouth with his napkin shakily before I see him gulp, resigning himself to something before taking a deep breath.

His eyes remain closed for another second longer, but just as the song is about to end, his eyelids fly open without warning and he shoots to his feet, knocking his chair down behind him with a loud clatter. A woman gasps as the chair knocks into the back of hers on its way down.

And then the entire restaurant is silent.

And suddenly, every eye in The Square is on one man: Alaric Saltzman.

Grace puts the mud pie down in front of Jenna with a muffled scuff on the tablecloth, but Jenna is facing in the exact opposite direction of it, looking quizzically and even a bit worriedly at Ric instead. Following an irrational panic that all of that delicious pie is going to melt while Ric has whatever ill-timed meltdown he is apparently having right now, I glance impulsively down to check on it. And then everything starts to move in slow motion.

Because there is a diamond ring encircling the candle.

Ric clears his throat awkwardly, his eyes darting anxiously from Jenna's face to those of the members of the audience surrounding him. It's just a guess, but my money is on the fact that whatever he and Damon had in mind for this evening, it definitely didn't include having to say what he is planning to say in front of the entire restaurant. He glances anxiously to Damon, who offers him an encouraging nod. Ric takes a deep breath.

And then he begins to speak.

"Jenna," he says, but his voice breaks like a puberty-stricken teenager. He clears his throat as his eyes dart back to the faces around the room, his skin a bright shade of red under his seemingly perpetual stubble. The restaurant waits.

"I knew…when I very first met you." He tries again. "I mean, the first time…when we met," he stutters, his Adam's apple bobbing once between breaths. "I knew you were different. That I would feel…different. About you…someday."

"What I'm trying to say is that I knew…from the minute I laid you—laid eyes on you…" he corrects swiftly as a handful of snickers move through the crowd. Ric's eye go wide, his face freezing for a brief but terrible moment into the horrified expression it was wearing when I walked in on him buck-naked in my kitchen.

He sighs with frustration and shakes his head. "Damn it, Jenna, I'm just not saying this right," he confesses, glancing desperately at all of the people listening intently to his every word.

He clears his throat again and my stomach flips unpleasantly. He is going to hate this even if Jenna loves it, and if history is any indicator, we will never hear the end of his cantankerous grousing.

But then, he pauses, closing his eyes tightly and sucking in another deep inhale. And this time when he opens them and locks them on Jenna's bewildered face, my goosebumps flare anew because I can see it: Determination instead of trepidation, impassioned intention where the singed remains of fear used to be.

When he speaks again, his voice is steady and sure.

"Jennifer Elaine Sommers, I'm fucking crazy about you," he declares passionately. A smile tugging at his lips, and I watch as Jenna's follow suit. "You're like this…rush of fresh air and sunlight and life, and I don't want to live without it…without you. I don't ever want to stop feeling how damn awake you make me feel," he says, the uncharacteristic rawness of his entire demeanor making my chest constrict tightly, my heart thundering in my chest for what I know is coming next.

"It's just you, Jenna," he says, his usually gruff and sarcastic voice more tender than I've ever heard it. "You're all I want. You're all I'll ever want."

And he drops to one knee before her, taking her hand in his. Jenna gasps as tears begin to stream down her face.

"Be my wife, Jenna?" he asks, his hand coming up to cradle her face, his thumb running gently through the tracks of her joyful tears.

Jenna looks deeply into his eyes for a long moment. But when she opens her mouth to give her reply, all the air sucks out of the restaurant.

"Nope," she says firmly, shaking her head as she pulls away. She sniffs and averts her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest.

Alaric turns ashen.

I catch my breath in shock, blood thundering in my ears as my mind races through memories of my recent interactions with Jenna, searching for some hint I might have missed that this could have led to this outcome. Stunned silence expands in the room, the air heavy enough to dice with a machete. But then I see Jenna's nose twitch, and I almost laugh out loud with relief because I know that look.

She is barely keeping it together.

Her eyes start watering again as one side of her mouth quirks up and then, thank God, one of her trademark guffaws explodes out of her mouth with a rude noise as she drops the charade.

She grabs Ric's bewildered face in both hands. "Ric, are you kidding me? Hells fucking yes, I'll marry you!"

She jumps up out of her chair and practically onto Ric, who has to put a hand down for balance before he rights himself. Jenna presses herself against him from knee to chest in a crushing-fierce hug and Ric buries his head in her neck, his back expanding and contracting along with his heavy, no doubt adrenaline-laced breaths. He lingers for a long moment before pulling back and kissing her with so much heat I have a moment of legitimate worry that they'll forgot where they were and started stripping each other. With that, the silence breaks and the whole restaurant explodes with uproarious applause, whooping and whistling with excitement and congratulations.

I sigh in happy relief, my chest aching with the effort of holding in all of the happiness that is threatening to burst out of it. Jenna is engaged. Jenna is going to be Alaric's wife.

My vision blurs, and I almost startle when I feel Damon's finger brush against my cheek, wiping away tears I didn't even know I was crying. I look at him, chuckling with embarrassment as I dab at the bottom of my eyes with a corner of my napkin.

When he finally comes into focus, I see that the smirk he is wearing looks more intense than I expected it to, the edges of his playfully smug expression breaking with gentle wonder.

Is it possible he's thinking what I think he is? I feel warmth pouring into my scalp and running down into my toes at the mere possibility that he could be wearing that look on his face imagining us in a similar situation, asking and answering a similar question.

One of the busboys who had joined the table-side pie delivery rights Ric's chair behind him as Ric gets to his feet, reaching his hand down to help Jenna to standing.

"You forgot to blow out your birthday candle," he says, his voice rough and his face beaming with an ear-to-ear grin.

Jenna turns to the mess of melted cake and candle wax that used to be her birthday candle and gasps, catching the glint of the diamond and platinum band still sticking out of it.

"Oh, Ric," she breathes, her eyes shining as she turns back to him in awestruck disbelief. "It's beautiful."

"Make a wish," Ric says huskily.

She holds his eyes for a long moment. And then without warning she grabs his chin and mouth in a roughly possessive gesture and plants an aggressive kiss on his stunned lips. When she pulls away, and turns to her cake, Ric is left wearing the bewildered look of a man who doesn't know what hit him and loves it, and I am reminded for the hundredth time how perfect they are for each other, how very happy they are going to be.

She takes out what's left of the tiny stub of a flame still lighting the candle with a decisive blow.

"There's nothing left to wish for. I have everything I've ever wanted," she says, looking back to Ric, before looking around the table at each of us.

My eyes stray impulsively to Damon, and I see that he is already looking at me too, smiling like he knows what I'm thinking, like he agrees.

"So do I."

But then I turn from Damon and watch as Jenna pulls her ring out of the melting ice cream, licking it clean before she slips it on her finger.

And the flutter I feel in my heart that tells me that, if I'm truly honest with myself, I may need to provide an addendum to my earlier assertion.

"Almost."

Damon reaches for my hand and I start, meeting his eyes guiltily. There's no way he didn't catch me staring at the ring. I start to blush, but rethink my embarrassment when I see the way the way his eyes have turned bright and soft, fathomless and clear. He holds my gaze for a long moment, searching my eyes before very purposely looking down at the third finger of my left hand. He lifts it to his lips, watching me as he presses a tender kiss exactly where a ring would be.

There is no trace of trepidation in his expression, no echo of the questioning fear that used to linger at its edges. Finally, there is only certainty. Only the assurance of what has always been true, even if he has only recently begun to believe it.

He is accepted. He is worthy.

He is loved.

He nods once, so subtly I almost wonder if I imagined it. But then he follows it with a wink and his trademark smirk and I know I didn't. That he meant for me to see.

And it dawns on me how very convenient it is that Caroline happens to be so wonderfully fixated on wedding planning.

Author's Note: Friends, what do we think? It's over! *sniff, sniff.* How are we feeling right now? Are you guys going to miss me as much as I'll miss you? *wipes tears.* PLEASE leave me a REVIEW! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE. It won't be complete until I hear from you all one last time!

Now, don't think I don't hear what some of you are saying. "But Nightlight, we had our hearts set on Delena sexy times! Wilt thou leave us so unsatisfied?" And to that I say, FUNNY YOU SHOULD MENTION DELENA SEXY TIMES. I may just so happen to have a CITRUSY ONE-SHOT already in the works and it MAY OR MAY NOT have a secret twist that many of you have been BEGGING for.

So for all of you who were putting it off after the last chapter, NOW IS THE TIME. AUTHOR FOLLOW AND (if you so desire) FAVORITE, FRIENDS. DO IT. Don't miss out on all the fun in store for our raggle-taggle family as they ride off into the sunset together!

And of course, banner-waving, sky-writing, bullhorn-yelling thanks to Trogdor19, whose friendship, and of course beta prowess, literally changed my life. Here's to writing together when we are in our 80's, to eating indefensible amounts of glutenous desserts on spa vacations, and to, just...well, YOU.

Well friends. That's all for now. I hope to see all of you again SOON. It was a pleasure and a privilege to ride this river to the ocean with you—one that I will not soon forget. Thank you, all of you.

Until we meet again, lovies,

XOXO,

Nightlightbright