Convincing her

The couple spent the weekend having fun together, and fortunately, Jason was sensible enough not to interfere with their alone time after their first night there. Soon enough it was already Monday and Jen was being driven to her university. 

She was sucking on the straw of her boxed juice while she bit into a doughnut as she told Lucas about her schedule for the day. 

"So I'll come to pick you up in the evening?" Lucas asked as he glanced in her direction.

"Sure," Jen confirmed. Since besides her classes, she still had to go to the library. Jen turned and stared at his side profile and got lost in thought. When Lucas peeked at her, he noticed that she was staring at him and a smile appeared on his face.

"Do I look good?" he asked her as he took her hand in his, startling her out of her thoughts.

"Mmmh, you look too good," she answered with a smile and stared at him even more obviously. Lucas laughed at her response as he squeezed the hand he was holding and glanced at her one more time.

"You also look good," he said, a smile still lingering on his lips.

"I'm happy you think so," Jen said and smiled back at him.

"What are you going to be doing today?" Jen asked him after a few minutes of silence.

"I'll drop by the office, then maybe go see mom for a bit," Lucas answered after some thought. It had been a while since he was idle, so he still felt awkward about his situation. 

"Okay, make time to relax, you don't know when else you'll have time to be as free as you are now," Jen said as she was worried that Lucas hadn't had free time for so long that he may have forgotten what to do when he was in leisure.

"Mmmh, I will," Lucas said as he stopped the car in front of the university gates. 

"So I'll see you later?" Jen asked as she started collecting her things.

"Mmmh, I'll bring you lunch later," Lucas said, making Jen raise her eyebrows in surprise. She was not expecting him to do so and was actually planning on skipping it once she met with Leanna and Nancy.

"Okay," Jen said after she got over her surprise.

Lucas leaned over and kissed her lips. After a lingering kiss, he kissed her forehead and rubbed her cheek with his thumb.

"I'll see you later," Lucas said as he looked Jen's dazed expression with a smile.

"You'll make me late for class, I'm going now," Jen said and rushed out of the car. Lucas watched her until her figure disappeared into the crowd of people before he took off for the office.

A few people glanced at Jen after she got off of Lucas' car, but she didn't mind it much. It's not like she did anything wrong, anyway. So with a blank expression on her face, Jen walked to her faculty building.

As she passed the entrance she remembered how Lucas had gotten lectured about illegally parking his car in a place that cars were not even allowed to enter by his professor and a small smile appeared on her face.

It did not feel like it was something that happened too long ago, but at the same time, it felt like it was something that happened ages ago.

When she entered class, she went to sit next to Michael like she normally did, and she noticed that he was furiously typing on his laptop.

"Are you working on the assignment we were given?" Jen asked as she took out her things from her large purse.

"I already finished the assignment, I submitted it last night," Michael answered, his attention still fixed on his laptop. Jen felt her jaw drop when she heard.

"You finished it? Already?" she asked in disbelief. She had only started thinking of the approach she was going to take with it, and she was planning to start her research today. They were given that assignment on Thursday and they had seven weeks to work on it. This boy finished it in three days. 

"I finished it, I asked David to go through it on Saturday during our lunch break, besides a few things it was pretty good, so I spent Sunday reviewing it and submitted it," Michael said finally looking up at Jen.

What he did not say was the tongue lashing he received from David after he read through his paper made him revise most of it, even though it was already a first-class paper David's family was filled with scholars, if he does not find a flaw in your paper then he will have to change his last name.

In short, he was a perfectionist, and that was reflected a lot in his work, so even though Michael did not need to, he still checked with David once in a while with his assignments and was satisfied that the lecturing he got this time was much shorter than it used to be. He could already feel himself improve.

"Huh, I thought he had gotten busier recently," Jen said with a puzzled expression.

"He is busy, it seems the big boss plans to work him to the maximum while Lucas was away," Michael answered her. When she heard him say big boss, she figured that he was talking about Noah.

"And you? Aren't you busy?" Jen asked him. She knew that he was going to be promoted to being a proper assistant once Lucas left, but also that he put in charge of the collaborative work the Lucas' hotels were going to have with her restaurants.

"I am," Michael answered with a cheerful smile. Jen laughed when she saw his cheerful expression. She figured that Lucas had found another workaholic to work with, so things should be a bit easier for him.

"You look happy about it," Jen said after getting her laugh under control.

"I am," Michael answered honestly.

"I hope it's not too hard to work with Alex," Jen said and Michael shook his head with slightly reddened ears, unfortunately, Jen did not notice this abnormality as the lecturer had entered the class and her gaze had been redirected to the front of the class. 

After her two-hour lecture, Jen walked out of class after saying goodbye to Michael and headed for the canteen. She immediately noticed her two friends sitting on their normal spot, so she walked towards their table without a pause.

"Hi girls," she greeted as she sat down next to Leanna.

"Hi," they both answered as they looked at Jen.

"How are you doing? How's the baby?" Jen asked Leanna. It had become a routine question among them, and Leanna always answered it with a lot of excitement.

"We're both fine," Leanna said with a smile and touched her belly. She had only recently started showing, something that made Ethan happier and even more anxious as it was a confirmation that what was happening was real.

"Mmmh, and you," Jen responded and asked Nancy in turn.

"I'm fine, it's just that David got even busier than before," Nancy answered with a pout. She had thought that David had been busy before, but recently he has become even busier. Something that really made her worry.

"I heard, since Lucas will be leaving, he has to take over his tasks as well. When Michael gets better at his job, things will become more relaxed, don't worry too much about it," Jen comforted. She could empathize with Nancy as she has been there before.

"Oh, they came together today?" Nancy exclaimed and both Jen and Leanna turned around only to see Ethan and Lucas walk in together.

Ethan was not a new face because ever since after their honeymoon he always dropped off Leanna at the university, brought her lunch and also came to pick her up after classes. He had even wanted to ask for paternity leave for three years but was dissuaded by his father and lectured by Leanna after she heard about it.

She had been so mad when she heard about it that she had to leave the house to calm down. She knew they would have to make a lot of adjustments once the baby came along, but her husband was already planning on taking three years off of work because of the baby.

As a surgeon, if he goes out of practice, how will he go back to his rhythm? She had had to put her foot down about him working, otherwise, she would really feel guilty. 

What if he took three years for every child they were going to have? Wouldn't that be chaotic? It was something she did not even want to imagine.

She realised that Ethan was a bit more impulsive than she was used to and that she had to be the voice of reason in their household. It was the one thing her mother-in-law had been worried about and had talked to her about.

But after she had spent some time with Leanna, she realised that maybe her son's choice of wife was not as impulsive as she thought it might have been as their characters complimented each other perfectly. As for the involved parties, they were still getting used to each other.

"Did you two come together?" Jen asked once the two of them joined them.

"No, we met outside. He said he knew where the two of you normally sat for lunch so we came together," Lucas explained as he put three lunches on the table. He had thought of everyone when he was buying lunch, he just didn't know that Ethan had the habit of bringing Leanna lunch.

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