Your name is the only word. Characters: Happy, Pepper Setting: Happy & Pepper’s apartment, NYC Content: Nothing bad Summary: Happy and Pepper have a belated Valentine’s Day
The apartment was in a rare state- one of silence. There were no sounds of a squalling infant, no ballgame on the tv, just the low hum of a heater and the clatter of cooking from the kitchen. It was a relieving tranquility. Anthony was with Happy’s Ma for the night and Pepper was on her way home from work. Happy was the one scuffling around in the kitchen, making dinner. He’d come home that afternoon to prepare a few surprises for Pepper. They were supposed to go out to dinner the night before but there had been some ridiculous accounting problem with one of S.E.’s contracts and Pepper stayed late to sort out the mess personally. The dinner was rescheduled for tonight but Pepper already sounded like she was already having a pretty difficult day when he called her in the morning, so Happy canceled their reservations and decided they should have a nice evening in.
He dropped off Anthony, picked up groceries, and then returned to clean the entire apartment from top to bottom. A bottle of champagne was cooling in the fridge and the sauce for shrimp linguini simmered on the stove. Candles were lit all around the living room and as soon as Happy got a text that Pepper was heading home, he went into the bathroom to draw her a hot bubble bath so she could relax while he finished cooking dinner. On the bathroom counter a crystal vase held an arrangement of yellow roses and blue orchids and there was another to match it as a centerpiece on the dining room table. As a final touch Happy put on one of Pepper’s favorite albums in the stereo. It was as by-the-book romantic as he could manage and now all that was missing was Pepper herself.