I should start with a general thanks to
artisticmuddle. She has listened to me whine and complain more than any one human had ought to. She held my hand through this process, encouraged me, flailed over my story, and has been a wonderful friend to me in general. On top of all that, she went above and beyond by making two pieces of art to accompany my story.
As stated in the summary, Patrick and Mikey meet working together at a grocery store. I love how they're surreptitiously watching each other here as they stock the shelves.
artisticmuddle described this as "a gay pride grocery store" because of the various brightly colored boxes on the shelves. I was tickled that she put them in Aisle 3 because I had jokingly given this story a working title of "Love on Aisle 3." She remembered that.
In the story, Patrick and Mikey spend a fair amount of time playing Halo. I'm really in love with the way they're holding their controllers here, especially because Patrick looks like he's turning the controller to make his avatar move, which is something my fic version of Patrick would absolutely do.
artisticmuddle put these together on a whim at the 11th hour and she did a wonderful job. I appreciate her efforts and her friendship more than I can possibly express. Please comment to let her know what you think.