Darling,

The department that Mal and Dom work for is called the Department for Active and Lucid Dream Research, or as it’s more formally called by the government, Project Somnacin (named after the drug that is used as the vehicle to enable dream-sharing). It’s meant to be used as a method for soldiers to train, for them to get real field experience without actually being in any kind of physical danger. A handy concept, but it’s a little tricky, to say the least. When they first started work on this project, it was notoriously unstable, far too liable to collapse to realistically use.

That’s where Mal and Dom come in. It’s the two of them and just a few other top researchers, and it’s their job to work out all the kinks, the bugs, to make it as safe as possible. They’ve made incredible progress so far, but of course, there’s always more work to be done, and the amount of work going on is proving to be too much for their small department, especially because Mal has recently discovered that she’s pregnant and will inevitably need to go on maternity leave in some months’ time. They’re hiring more researchers. Arthur is to be one of them.

Arthur starts his work a few days after arriving in Los Angeles, and he immediately loves it. It’s being able to manipulate space, being able to bend the laws of physics to do impossible things, it’s all the control and power the experienced dreamer has over the dream, this is what draws Arthur in almost right away. Mal and Dom tell him he needs more experience under his belt before he can go under as a dreamer, as the inexperienced dreamer’s emotions get in the way of the dreamscape too easily, and it will be a while before he has a chance to construct his own dream, but that doesn’t make this any less thrilling and exciting.

At the moment, Arthur is doing sidelines work, monitoring the others as they go under, making sure their vitals are all as they should. He works alongside a chemist to figure out the ideal dosage of Somnacin to provide a deep enough slumber to induce dreams, but not so much that it’s poisonous to the mind and body.

He’s also working with a couple technicians on the project to develop a portable machine that will inject that proper amount of Somnacin into the bloodstream, as currently, the only places in which dream-sharing can occur are labs such as this one at the university. It’s full of large, complex machines that are nowhere near small enough to be practically used. The mechanisms need to be condensed, sized down, to the size of a briefcase, if possible. It’s a terribly difficult process because the parts are all so small and they need to be so precisely manufactured and placed so that the machine will function properly, and Arthur is sure it’ll be a while before it’s ready to be used, but the hours of meticulous research and tinkering he needs to do are right up his alley.

Arthur loves every second spent working on dream research. He can’t imagine how he ever felt like his life ever had purpose before this.

Arthur manages to find an apartment for himself perhaps a couple weeks after taking up the job as a researcher. It’s ridiculously hard to find an apartment to rent in Los Angeles, especially one that meets his standards, but he eventually finds a lovely little two-bedroom apartment about twenty minutes from Mal and Dom’s house (though really, that second bedroom isn’t all that big at all and probably won’t be used for anything other than storage). It’s cozy, with a little patio attached to the living room, stainless steel fixtures in the kitchen, and a nice, open home office with built-in bookshelves.

He settles in nicely, easily, and before long, this new apartment feels just as much like a home as his old one did in Boston. The boxes get unpacked and stowed away, suitcases hoisted up on the top shelf of his closet, clothes all hanging neatly in rows. His refrigerator is well-stocked with an assortment of foods and is humming quietly in the corner of his kitchen. After receiving his first paycheck, he goes to IKEA and fills his apartment with all of the necessary furniture, as well as some rather unnecessary things (well, he reasons, his apartment needs a little more color anyways).

“You should have a housewarming party,” Mal says to him one day over lunch.

Arthur shrugs and picks at his salad, saying that he’s not sure he will, since he doesn’t know all that many people here, but Mal and Dom can come visit anytime if they want. Mal smiles at him like she wants to try to persuade him out of that idea but knows that he won’t budge.

“Can we come over this Saturday for dinner?” she asks.

Arthur smiles and tells her of course. He then proceeds to freak out that night when he gets home because everyone who even remotely knows him knows that he can’t cook to anything more complicated than cup ramen, but eventually decides to just get take out. They know how he is, he thinks to himself, they won’t mind.

And they don’t mind, though they do take the liberty of teasing Arthur when they arrive. Of course Arthur would be the one to serve his guests take out, they say. And then Arthur counters that he didn’t exactly invite them over, that Mal kind of invited the two of them over for him, and Mal and Dom laugh. Mal’s eyes glitter happily and Dom’s eyes crinkle at the edges, and even though they’re both generally very cheery, lively people to begin with, Arthur has known them for a long time and he can tell, something’s going on, something has changed.

And sure enough, he doesn’t even have to ask. Mal brings it up herself, all wide eyes and excited smiles.

“Guess what we just found out today,” she gushes in a way that would have sounded much like a schoolgirl gossiping had it not been for the sophisticated air her accent gives her and the elegant way she holds herself.

“Hm?” Arthur raises an eyebrow at her to prompt her to continue.

Mal and Dom exchange a look and Arthur guesses before either of them even look back his way that this is something about the baby.

“I had a doctor’s appointment this morning,” she tells Arthur, words coming out in an animated rush. “And they checked, and it’s a girl.”

Arthur smiles, a real, one-hundred-percent heartwarming smile. He doesn’t smile like this often, with such sincere emotion (he’s too guarded for that) but when he does, the effect is profound.

“Congratulations,” he says, with feeling. He knows that Mal always wanted a daughter and Dom just wants whatever makes Mal happy.

“We want you to be her godfather,” Dom says and Arthur just raises his eyebrows at that.

“Why me?” he wonders aloud. He’s not sure he’s even all that great with kids, not that he’s been in the position to find out or anything. It’s just a hunch, really, but he’s a little apprehensive about it.

“Because, Arthur,” Mal says with fond exasperation. It’s so like Arthur to want everything explained to him before he makes his decision. “You’re our best friend. We trust you and love you dearly. We want you to be her godfather.”

Arthur’s straight face cracks into a smile he’d been holding back all along (meaning yes, he was just trying to be difficult; he does that every so often, plays jokes, that is). He accepts, of course, and Mal and Dom are very happy. Arthur asks them if they’ve started thinking about names, and Mal says not yet; they wanted to know whether the baby’s going to be a boy or a girl before beginning to think about things like that.

When they leave that night, Arthur sits for a long time on his sun-warmed patio, staring out at the glowing city around him. He lights up a cigarette and contemplatively inhales the toxic smoke. He feels rather strange, he thinks, after the conversation over dinner with Mal and Dom. He felt this way years before when Mal and Dom got married, after they’d flown away to go on their honeymoon. It’s an odd sort of empty, lonely almost, only not quite because he likes being on his own.

He supposes it’s just seeing them settling down and starting a family together, the happiness and love that just seems to be oozing from every pore of their beings. It all seems so effortless for them, this way that everything seems to go just right. Sometimes, he feels like they’re so wrapped up in each other and the life they share that they forget about him. Sometimes, he has to remind himself that they’re a good five years older than him, that they’ve been doing this, been living and loving and breathing five years longer than him, that he shouldn’t feel like he’s falling behind, because he’s younger, because he hasn’t seen as much, hasn’t had a chance to give it a go yet.

Arthur brings his cigarette up to his lips and takes a deep breath, letting the smoke curl out of his mouth in wispy tendrils that melt into the air. He lies back on the tiled patio surface, which is still warm from the hours of sunlight beating down on it, and closes his eyes, letting the heat melt away the stiffness in his body.

He’s thinking too hard, he scolds himself. Isn’t this what Mal always picks at him for? He’s always thinking and overthinking every last thing and all it ends up doing is knotting all this unnecessary tension into his body. It’s not really that he doesn’t know his limits; it’s that he doesn’t know when to stop. What he really needs is to learn when enough is enough and to just let things go. But see that’s the thing. Once Arthur learns something, he never forgets. It comes in handy with exams and with this research he’s doing, but when it refuses to leave his mind, especially when he’s trying to fall asleep at night, when his mind is, strangely enough, the clearest; that’s when it gets annoying.

Arthur sighs softly to himself and stands, flicking his spent cigarette over the patio railing. It’s still early, but he thinks that now might be a good time to sleep.