The first day of the rest of our lives

As Nick woke up, he laid in bed and let out a loud moan. Today would be interesting to say the least. He had invited over Hitame, the woman he was bound to marry according to the law. It wasn't that he had to marry her, it was that he had to give up the life that he already started for himself. Though he was sure that she had problems of her own because of this, he didn't care about that at the moment. Nick was miserable, and it was evident by the cluttered messy apartment that he stayed in now.

Rising out of bed, Nick threw on a pair of sweatpants and a shirt from the day before. It smelled clean. Looking at the time, it was 1:18. He had invited her over around two. That left him roughly forty minutes to make the place seem less depressing. Opening the curtains and spraying air freshener around the place, Nick decided that was good enough, and flopped down on his couch to play the waiting game.

The day had started out good enough, it was the weekend and that meant that she had free time to do pretty much anything she wanted. Of course that was going to be cut short since she had been invited to Nick's house at around two. The girl had been awake for a while now, though she had remained in bed for a few hours, trying to get some sleep, though she knew it was futile to try to when so many things were on her mind.

She hated being forced into a marriage she didn't want. Who would like that sort of thing? The only reason she hated Purebloods and the way they worked was basically that they were forced into marriages. That's why she always wanted to tell people she was muggleborn, like she had been raised to believe, but once people found out about her parents, it was kind of hard to hide the truth from anyone.

She hated being born into a Pureblood family, but she liked that her parents weren't around because they couldn't force her into a marriage. But now, that was exactly what the Ministry was forcing her and everyone else to do. She admitted, that she had gotten lucky though. She had been matched with someone she kind of knew, but it wasn't the same. It wasn't like she loved this person. No offense to Nick, but Hitame would never grow to love him, she honestly wouldn't let herself.

Besides, she knew that Nick had a girlfriend, she knew Sarah. Maybe she was wrong though, maybe they'd broken up or whatever. The point was, that there was someone else in his life and Hitame wouldn't be the one to separate them. If he wanted to, they could get married but live separately. They weren't obligated to immediately have children, there was a three year spam in which they could do that and it wasn't sure that the law would even be around that long. So there was a chance that she didn't have to get pregnant while she was married with Nick.

Glancing at the clock on her wall, Hitame noticed it was almost time for her to go to Nick's so she stepped out of her bed and walked toward the bathroom to get ready. She sighed softly and within ten minutes she was ready to go. It didn't take long for her to get dressed and apply the little make up she had begun to wear lately, which was only eyeliner and sometimes eyeshadow, and she set out to Nick's home.

When she arrived, Hitame felt herself become uneasy and she stared at the door in front of her for a second before she gathered her strength and knocked lightly on the door. She lowered her arms to her sides and waited for him to open the door for her.

Nick slowly stood up and let Hitame in. ''Come in, come in. Take a seat.'' He said with a fake enthusiasm and motioning to the couch or dining room chairs. He gave her a minute or so to settle in before speaking again. And here dawned the awkwardness. Nick had no clue what to say. ''You look really pretty today.'' He complemented softly, trying to make small talk. It actually looked like she tried to look good, compared to Nick who put no effort whatsoever in his outfit; or anything for that matter. He didn't look as good as he could have, nor did the small apartment that he had. It wasn't dirty or anything, just cramped and cluttered.

''I'm sorry if I ruin your life. I'm just kinda miserable right now is all.'' He explained. Nick had no clue if Hitame had a boyfriend or anything. Sure they had seen each other around school, but they'd never really talked before. She had always seemed like a cool person though.

''So do you have any questions or anything? I honestly have no clue where to start with this. But I'm trying.'' After Nick had said it, it sounded pathetic to him. Man oh man this would be fun.

"Thanks." she responded softly to his compliment. She wasn't sure what to say back to him about anything. She couldn't exactly compliment him because she didn't see anything to compliment. He didn't seem to have tried with his outfit, though she really hadn't either but she had managed to seem somewhat decent. And his apartment was kind of a mess, though it was something she didn't mind.

Hitame sighed and turned to face Nick when he began to speak again. "You won't ruin my life." she stated, after waiting for him to finish what he was saying. "You honestly can't. My life can't get any worse than it already is." she admitted, hating that she was actually the kind of person who could say that. But she was being honest, there was nothing he could do to make her life any worse than it already was. Naomi was still gone, the rest of her family was nowhere, she was struggling with her addiction to Sugar..

Yeah, there was no way he could make her life worse.

"You have a girlfriend don't you?" she asked suddenly. "Sarah Nesbitt?" she said the name, acting like she was struggling to remember, just in case she was wrong. "If you want to be with her, I'll make you a deal." she said, her eyes on his, searching for any sign of agreement to her words.

Hearing her mention Sarah, tears came to Nick's eyes. ''No. We had an argument and things happened, and she's probably happy with her new husband now.'' Nick paused for a moment and thought about what to say next. He didn't want to just dump everything on her. ''To sum it up, she took the house, our daughters, and left me alone.'' He left it at that. More would come out eventually, but as of now that was it.

''So if your life can't get much worse, then that means we'll just have to make it better right?'' He said with a sense of enthusiasm. Nick decided that the marriage wouldn't have to be bad. If he could, which he doubted he would, but if he could make her happy then he would. She deserved that didn't she? Maybe one day he might be able to love her too.

Hitame sighed and looked down. So much for that plan. SHe shook her head and looked back up at Nick. "What if she isn't?" she asked him. "What if she hasn't even gotten married yet? Wouldn't you want to fix things with her and get her and your daughters back?" she asked, lowering her gaze. She must sound like she was completely uninterested in him and she wanted to get rid of him so she wouldn't have to marry him.

"You guys should be together as a family already." she added. "And if you don't want to marry me, it's fine. You could have just petitioned to change your match. Make something up and we would have been rematched." she told him. "But since you didn't, we can get married and we won't have to be together in any way. We would have to live together, but not do anything intimate. We could live our lives like we weren't married." she said.

"We have three years to actually have children, and I don't really think the law will be around that long. They'll realize they're being stupid at some point." she said with a hint of hope in her voice and she lifted her eyes to meet his again, hands playing with the fabric of her shirt as she shifted in her seat somewhat uncomfortably.

''Or what if we got married and tried to be happy?'' He asked. It was apparent that Hitame didn't want anything to do with Nick, but in all actuality Nick wouldn't mind being with Hitame. ''We don't have to have children or anything for a while, but being together wouldn't be so bad.'' He told her softly. ''There's no reason the marriage law has to be bad. All we have to do is try to accept each other.'' He looked at her and he could only imagine what she would feel after hearing this. Would she be mad, angry, even more stubborn? Or would she try to be with Nick?

I don't love you.

Hitame didn't know what else she could do to tell Nick that she didn't love him, besides actually telling him that she didn't and that she probably never would. Her hands tightened into fists and she sighed, lowering her head and putting her hands on the sides of her face. "Nick, I can't." she told him finally.

She couldn't lie, or give him hope.

"I can't do that. If we get married, it'll only be so neither of us goes to Azkaban. But I won't love you. I can't. I already like someone else." she finally explained. She didn't know what else she was supposed to do. She just hoped he didn't ask who it was that she liked, because she was sure he wouldn't like who it was.

Especially since that person didn't like him one bit.

Besides everything that had happened with the mother of his children - or mothers she should say - Hitame didn't want to end up having kids with him and then him saying he was going to leave. The law would eventually be repealed, she hoped, and she didn't want to end up hurt if he left. It wasn't like he wasn't going to be able to.

Nick sighed, he couldn't do anything right. "I'm just trying to follow the rules, I'm trying to just move past everything at start over, but I don't know how." He tried to explain. This was to complicated, and stressful for Nick to handle. Nick reached for a nearby bottle of Scotch and took a drink before speaking again. "I know that you don't love me, I know that you probably never will. But we have to be married and probably have a child. We can push the child off as long as possible, but we do have to be married. And if the law is repelled, then we can get a divorce and you can go be happy with whoever." He said. Nick didn't know what else to say or do, he wanted to give up.

This would be so much easier if you had actually stayed with Sarah and your kids.

Hitame was done. She didn't want to hear Nick anymore. He would only continue trying to convince her that the two of them getting married would be the easiest thing to do. It probably was, but Hitame was never one to take the easy road through something. She looked at Nick with narrowed eyes and sighed.

"Instead of trying to convince me that getting married is the best option, you should go and try to make up with the mother of your children." she almost hissed at him. "I think we're done for today Nick. I'll see you later." She stood up and walked to the door. They were already having problems and they weren't even married.. yet.

Hopefully he decides to look for Sarah and make things right with her. That way he'll petition to go with her and I can just be left alone.. she thought to herself.