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Two years later

I rubbed my eyes once I woke up and headed out into the hall, the hall of mine and Victoria's house...it still seemed crazy how much had changed in a few years, but with the help of our new jobs as art graduates and Victoria's inheritance...we managed to get together enough money to get ourselves a house, well, it was our house but Margo was a regular resident as she said she needed to make sure we were both okay. I think she just hoped I didn't realise it was an excuse to eat our cookies.

Anyhow, Victoria used her degree to get herself a job in a gallery while I started to draw my own art online, and then by some stroke of luck I got in touch with the head of a book company and ended up creating the illustrations for children's books.

Thinking of which, I often got letters from children who were inspired by those pictures- and they were all equally adorable. I picked up one that I guessed Victoria had left for me to open on the shelf in the hall.

Dear Miss Greene,

I love your work, my daughter Mabel is a huge fan of the Hare and the Bumble bee, thank you for spreading your creativity into the lives of our children.

"Kate!" Victoria called for me downstairs.

Oh.

I remembered that she planned to redecorate her gallery today, and she had some kind of surprise for me...well, I tried to keep up with surprises but I couldn't deny that Victoria's were always so amazing I felt myself defeated by them.

Anyway, her birthday was coming up soon and I would not disappoint then.

"Hey cutie," Victoria's eyes smiled as she saw me enter the kitchen, she then walked over to me and kissed my forehead.

"Hey love," I said, with a smile of my own.

Victoria's smile became apologetic when she walked over to me with a vase filled with flowers.

"You think this will survive the car journey to the gallery?" I asked her.

Victoria's eyes then seemed filled with worry.

"Well...I hope so," she said.

I just nodded, and headed out to the car to put it in the boot.

In addition to the vase there were several canvases wrapped up, and upon closer inspection I noticed they had notes taped to them.

Kate- I love you and everything but if you look at these and ruin my surprise for you then there will be wrath to pay...like, I'll tell Margo where you've been hiding your coconut biscuits - Victoria

Oh no...

Well, I decided it was probably a better choice to turn from the car and head back to help Victoria.

"Great you uh...didn't open the packages right?"

I shook my head and smiled.

"Nope, they're all still intact,"

"Excellent, okay...these two need taking out and then we can get going..." Victoria trailed off when she turned to pet out kitten, Butterscotch.

She was the cutest kitten, you couldn't even argue with that.

"Now...we'll be back soon sweetie," Victoria said...to the cat, and then turned back to me.

"Let's roll on out," she said.

The two of us headed to put the rest of the artwork in the car, and then Victoria began to drive us to her gallery.

I still had no clue what this surprise was, even after doing extensive thinking on the matter.

However, I still had no idea.

After a short drive, it was time to get out of the car and start taking the art in, which didn't take too long, though Victoria still didn't show me the pictures.

Damn, she really was good at surprises.

"Okay, they'll be here in three...two..."

"Victoria!"

"Paulo!" Victoria smiled at her art mentor and uncle.

"Well, let me see the pictures," he said.

"Uh...soon, soon- want some coffee, a tea?"

"Do you have wine?"

"That's exactly what I want to know," said a familiar voice.

The voice of Margo Rodriguez, no other.

She walked over to me and gave me a hug and then turned to Victoria.

"Tori! Kate! Gang's getting back together," she said, and then trailed off, probably thinking about Fox, who was currently getting her wisdom teeth out.

It was bad timing, I couldn't blame her.

I just hoped it wasn't too painful for her...

"So it's happening today?" Margo asked Victoria quietly.

Victoria turned to me and her eyes widened slightly before she looked back to Margo.

"What's happening today?"

Her voice gave away that she was feigning obliviousness, but I looked past it, and continued moving pictures up onto the walls...all pictures apart from the ones that were wrapped up.

The cookie threat was enough to prevent me from looking at them, no matter how curious I was.

As the minutes passed, more and more people entered the gallery excited to look at Victoria's artwork.

Her name had gotten pretty big in the space of a few years, and she frequently travelled so that people could see her art in other places, not without me, of course.

"Okay, Kate, Margo and I are going to hang these last ones up, you stick there, okay?"

"Stuck," I said, with a smile.

Victoria's eyes looked warm as she headed over with Margo to put up the next few paintings.

"Hey Kate,"

I turned around to see Swan.

"Hey!"

Swan walked over and grabbed me into a hug.

Since university, the two of us had become friends, even Victoria and Swan were on friendly terms now.

"So uh...I have news," Swan said.

At the same time, Victoria told me that I could go and see the paintings.

With curiosity on both matters, Victoria turned to Swan with a look of confusion on her face, before Swan broke the news.

"I'm enagaged...surprise," Swan gave a small smile.

"Hey guys," Liam waved.

Victoria and I looked between the two of them with a mirrored expression of surprise.