YOU CAN'T KILL THE SPEW!!!

Today, 7:21 AM Frank You’re not working today?

Mel Oh, no, sorry. I had to call out. Wasn’t feeling good when I woke up. Frank What’s wrong? Do you need anything? Mel I’m fine, just a cold I think. You don’t need to worry about me. 🙂

Frank You’re my friend, I’m always going to worry. I’ll bring you something after work.

Mel You really don’t have to do that. Frank??

Today, 9:32 AM Frank Sorry, trauma got called in. Still bringing you something after work. It’s not a problem.

Mel What happened? Sorry I wasn’t there to help. How much will I owe you?

Frank Degloving accident. Trust me, you’re lucky you didn’t have to see it. And don’t worry about that. You don’t owe me anything.

Mel Oh god. Just the thought makes me feel worse. Fine, but the next time you get sick I’ll do the same for you.

Frank Don’t worry, I’ll bring your favorite food and my brilliant sense of humor. Have you feeling better in no time. Not necessary

Mel Brilliant sense of humor?

Frank Are you trying to say that I’m not funny? Ouch.

Mel No, not at all! I mean, not that you’re not funny I meant no as in I don’t think you’re not funny!

Frank I know, I was just messing with you, Mel 😉

Mel Oh Ha-ha.

Frank I’m going to take that as a genuine, not at all sarcastic laugh. Laughter is the best medicine, after all.

Mel You always make me laugh. You’re funny 🙂

Frank You might actually be the only person besides my kids who thinks so

Mel That can’t be right. I would hope that the doctor who says the best treatment for my cold is laughter is actually funny, so

Frank You’ve got a point You’re also good at boosting my ego

Mel I guess I better be careful with that- wouldn’t want you getting a big head Bigger than it already is, I mean That was a joke

Frank Damn, shots fired, Dr. King Tell me how you really feel

Mel 🙂

Today, 8:26 PM Frank Sorry, got held up. I’ll be there in 30!

“I know we’ve talked about it a little, and you said before that we don’t always get things right the first time, remember?” Frank is down on one knee, holding Mel’s hands while she looks at him owlishly. “And well- they say that when you know, you know, so… I really wanna get things right with you, Mel.”

Is he—? Is he really…?

“Will you marry me?”

Frank’s speech simultaneously tears through her at lightning speed while taking a moment for Mel to fully process. Her eyes start to well far before she even realizes that she’s crying, moving one hand out of Frank’s grasp to cover her mouth.

Mel isn’t known much for her impulsivity, but she surprises even herself how quickly she reaches out for Frank, grabbing him by his shirt and pulling him to his feet to none-too-gracefully crash her lips into his.

She feels Frank’s hand come up to cup the side of her face as he kisses her back and they only pull apart once their lungs are screaming for air. They stay close enough for their noses to brush as they regain their breath, and Mel can’t stop herself from pressing another fleeting peck to Frank’s lips.

“Is that a ‘yes’?” He asks, still breathless, and Mel can hear, rather than see, the smile in his voice.

Mel can’t help it as more tears escape her eyes. Her heart feels like it could burst and a part of her wants to ask if this is real or a dream.

Elation sweeps through her and a broad smile pulls across her lips. Giggles erupt past her lips before she nods enthusiastically and sniffles.

“Yes!”

Frank’s thumbs brush over her cheeks, catching the tears and wiping them away as he closes the distance between them to kiss her again.

@kingdonmicrofic | day 4: sparks | rating: T | word count: 497/342 | cw: n/a | ao3

“Thank you for driving me home,” Mel says, standing at her door with a boba tea in hand, smiling up at Frank.

“Yeah, of course. Thanks for going out with me tonight.”

“Well, I love boba—” Mel had still been surprised when Frank asked her if she wanted to grab a bite to eat after work, “—I just didn’t know that you did.” When he’d told her they could go anywhere she wanted, she hadn’t expected him to agree to go to the little tea shop down the street from the hospital.

“I didn’t either,” Frank admits. “But it was pretty good. Y’know, at first I thought you might’ve only agreed to get a free meal out of me.”

“Wha— no, I wouldn’t— Oh. That was another joke.”

Mel can feel her cheeks burn as Frank grins playfully down at her. She was still getting used to that; the teasing, the jokes, the more playful banter.

She certainly wasn’t complaining, however.

“Really though,” she insists, “I had a good time.”

“Me too.”

A silence falls over them then, and Mel isn’t sure if she should break it to say goodnight, go into her apartment, and flop face down into her pillow to curse herself for not knowing how to properly end their ‘date’.

She can think of things she’d like to do, but she doesn’t want to push, doesn’t want to make Frank uncomfortable after just getting out of a crumbling marriage. He already has a lot on his plate and she tells herself that the last thing he needs is for her to throw herself at him. She doesn’t know what she’d do anyway with all the inexperience she has.

“Hey, uh…” Frank finally breaks the silence, making Mel’s thoughts screech to a halt. “Would it be okay if I… kissed you?”

“What?” Mel blurts, wanting to kick herself immediately. Her heartbeat is in her ears and she can feel the heat flooding her cheeks. She has half a mind to pinch herself, just to make sure she isn’t dreaming all this up.

“Shit—” Frank curses under his breath, taking a small step back. “I’m sorry, that was inappropriate. We don’t—”

“No—” Mel steps towards him, bringing them back together, staring up at him earnestly. “It’s not inappropriate, I just didn’t think—”

Mel stops, takes a steadying breath, and says, “Yes, you can kiss me.”

Truthfully, Mel hadn’t kissed anyone before; she simply never found the time. School had been her main priority, to the detriment of what some would call ‘important life milestones’. So yes, she was in her late twenties and still hadn’t had her first kiss, but that didn’t matter because Frank wanted to kiss her; he was going to kiss her.

She can feel his fingertips come up to brush along her jaw and her breath hitches, her eyes flutter shut as he moves in, and the moment their lips brush, she can feel sparks.

@kingdonmicrofic | day 3: gala | rating: T | word count: 500/467 | cw: n/a | ao3

“Would you lighten up?” Frank grimaces as Cassie elbows him in the ribs. “You act like someone pissed in your cornflakes.”

“What? Because I’m not going around blowing smoke up all these guys’ asses, there's something wrong with me?”

Admittedly, Frank has had better days; less exhausting ones for sure. Between working 12 hour shifts and dealing with the intricacies of divorce, on top of a very hyperactive Goldendoodle who always wants to play or go on walks or wreck havoc— Yeah, you could say that Frank hasn’t exactly been living the dream. 

He can practically hear the eye roll in Cassie’s voice as she says, “I’m not saying you have to do that, but it wouldn’t kill you to mingle a little, Frank.”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I don’t exactly have the biggest fans around here.” This time, he looks at Cassie and she’s already staring him down with a look he can only imagine Harrison has seen many times. Frank returns it with one of his own, exaggerated looks, and Cassie rolls her eyes again, sighing.

“That’s definitely not true,” she says, matter-of-factly. “So much time has passed since you left and returned that if someone still has a problem with it they need to do a little soul searching.”

Frank crosses his arms and snorts.

“It’s true!” Cassie defends, taking a look out over the throng of guests, talking amongst themselves, some dancing to whatever song is playing over the loudspeakers. When she looks back at Frank, he isn’t sure he likes the coy smile on her lips or the mischievous glint in her eye. “I know at least one person who seems to worship the ground you walk on.”

This time it’s Frank’s turn to roll his eyes and he scoffs out a warning. “Don’t say it.”

Naturally, Cassie discards said warning and says, simply, “Mel.”

“Can we not—”

“I’m just saying! Everyone’s seen it. You should be happy that you have at least one person, besides myself, who’s in your corner.”

As irksome as it is to be teased, Frank knows she’s right, and he is happy to have Mel around; for her to have his back like she does. He just wishes people would quit acting like there’s something more to it than there actually is.

“I am happy,” Frank defends. “I’m just tired of people like you trying to make it all… weird.” 

“People like me?” Cassie scoffs, incredulous. “Trust me, you two make it weird all on your own.”

Frank opens his mouth to retort, but Cassie cuts him off before he can say anything.

“Okay, whatever, look. She’s over there, by herself.” She points to the opposite side of the room and sure enough, there’s Mel, stunning in a sparkling maroon dress. “Go ask her to dance.”

Cassie brushes off Frank’s attempted excuses, giving him an encouraging nudge.

@kingdonmicrofic | day 2: champagne | rating: G | word count: 436/158 | cw: n/a | ao3

She can’t remember how she got here, doomscrolling Frank’s Instagram feed as she takes a moment to herself in the breakroom, but it’s hard to stop. At the start, there had been many, many photo dumps—random pictures he’d taken of his surroundings; flower bushes, the sky, buildings, and random selfies coupled with a few pictures of himself with his kids—but the further she scrolled, she noticed how infrequently he used the app.

There are some large gaps in timestamps, going from a post a week ago to one month all the way to six. Somehow, she ends up going from 2026 to 2023, long before they ever met. Mel is careful with her movements, lest she accidentally ‘like’ one of the posts and subject herself to the drastic measures of fleeing the country.

Instead, her thumb hovers, along with her intent gaze, on a photo of a woman she’s never seen. She’s quite beautiful, Mel notes, taking in her dark brunette hair that’s cropped just above her shoulders, warm chestnut colored eyes, perfect smile, and olive skin with a smattering of freckles across her cheeks.

In the photo, she’s wearing a champagne colored dress that perfectly suits her skin tone, making her seemingly glow and Mel does her best to temper the jealousy she feels creeping into her chest. She doesn’t even have to venture a guess over who this ‘mystery woman’ is before she reads the caption.

‘Happy Anniversary to my beautiful wife, @abby.langdon_! Here’s to many more years together! Love you! <3’

The jealousy Mel feels inside her chest is in full bloom now; a reminder that no matter how much she might like Frank, he is, indeed, married, and she doesn’t stand a chance. She knows it’s silly to be jealous over her coworker’s wife, anyway. Truthfully, she knows that she should just be happy that they are friends. That should be enough.

It should. 

She lets out a slightly frustrated sigh at herself, and against her better judgment, returns to her doomscrolling. Just as she comes upon another old photo, this one being a selfie of Frank and Abby smiling broadly at the camera, the breakroom door opens.

“Mel, Trauma 2; you in?” Frank calls, making Mel nearly chuck her phone across the room. Instead, she fumbles with it, nearly dropping it in her attempt to exit out of Instagram and shove it back into her pocket.

Thankfully, if Frank notices the awkward display, he doesn’t comment on it. Mel thanks her lucky stars and rises to her feet, forcing a smile as she moves to follow him.

Mel King has never felt more out of her element. Her eyes drift across the room til they land on the sliding glass door leading into the Langdons' backyard—the area where most everyone is. 

The area where she should be. 

When Frank had invited her to celebrate Tanner’s sixth birthday she hadn’t known what to expect. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been to a birthday party and in retrospect, she should’ve known that the chances of an elementary school aged child having a small, quiet get together would be slim to none.

Mel likes having fun and being around people; she has a soft spot for children and babies especially. At least children say what they mean and don’t sugarcoat anything, but it had been an oversight on Mel’s part to forget that they also have a tendency to be loud. 

Thus, she finds herself sitting on a loveseat in the corner of the Langdons’ living room, decompressing. She has half a mind to pull out her phone and bring up one of her meditation apps, only thinking better of it when she considers the thought of someone seeing her and getting a bad first impression.

She can hear it now: ‘Did you see that Frank’s new girlfriend spent all of her time inside on her phone?’ 

So instead, she self-soothes by rolling her shoulders and wringing her hands together, focusing on her breathing and—

“Hey, you okay?”

Mel feels herself start slightly, head snapping up to see Frank coming back in from the backyard. He has bits of confetti in his hair and rosy cheeks, telltale signs of playful roughhousing with his kids.

“Oh, um, I’m fine,” Mel says, straightening up, eyes following Frank as he approaches to sit next to her. “Just…”

“Overwhelmed?” Frank finishes for her and she nods lightly.

“Sorry—” She shakes her head, “—I won’t be long, I just needed a breather.”

“You don’t have to apologize.” Frank reaches out to lightly graze his fingers over Mel’s hands and she can feel herself relaxing a bit under his touch. “You can take as long as you need. I just wanted to make sure you were alright. I know this is kind of a lot. Abby’s always liked going all out for birthdays.”

Mel looks up at him, eyes catching once more on the pieces of confetti still clinging for dear life in his hair. A smile pulls at the corners of her lips as she moves one of her hands to gently tug one of the tiny pieces free.