City Hall is the worst. No one wants to be there so everyone is in a bad mood, even the workers. The monthly trek from my apartment to the large, gray, domed structure sucks. It's raining today. You shouldn't have to go to city hall when it rains. But bureaucracy doesn't care about the weather I guess.

Rhapsody in blue plays from my pocket as I step on the train. I answer my phone in an attempt to make the other passengers stop staring at me, a five year old with a finger in his nose freaks me out the most.

"Hey Fiona." The singsong voice of my friend Mandy comes through the phone.

"Hi Fi!" Camryn chimes in a little too loudly. It sounds like I have speakerphone on when I don't.

"Hey gals. What's up?" I ask, turning away from the nose-picker and come face to face with a Chihuahua in a sweater. The dog snips at me and I slide as far away from it as I can.

"Where are we going for brunch today?" Mandy asks.

"I want pancakes and French fries." Camryn says eagerly. I wonder where she gets all that energy from.

"Sorry gals can we push brunch back an hour? I have my monthly at city hall." I say.

"Boo!" Mandy says in the deepest voice she can muster.

"Monthlies aren't so bad." Camryn says.

"Camryn I thought you hated government regulation of marriage." I say.

"I did back when I thought I was gonna get engaged to a man no matter what. But my co-worker Julia got engaged to a woman recently so I'm optimistic." Camryn says.

"Let me call you later. The train is stopping." I say before hanging up.

Angel Bonameade is my marriage officer. Don't let the name fool you. She's no Angel. She takes delight in drawing out the delivery of my monthly marriage status. Every time she pretends to look through various papers on her desk when she could just search my results on the computer. Once she finds the info she reads it as slowly as she can. I think it's because she is fifty and has never been engaged.

"We regret to inform you that you have been engaged. We wish you the best of luck with your new spouse." She says methodically. Although she says it slowly it doesn't sink in.

"Excuse me what?" I ask. Angel doesn't repeat herself. She hands me a gold ring and a folder full of papers.

"Put that on your left hand." She says, pointing at the ring. "And here is your nuptial itinerary." She hands me the folder.

I'm speechless. Since I reached the age of marriage at twenty I've been coming to my monthly appointments at city hall. It's always been a confirmation of my single status every month. Now, at twenty-six, I sit here engaged.

I exit city hall in a trance. It's an odd feeling. Marriage was always going to happen for me. Everyone goes to city hall on a monthly basis to find out if they have been engaged or not. I shouldn't be confused or shocked but I'm currently feeling both emotions. Is this how everyone feels when they are first told of their engagement?

The high pitched squeak of breaking train wheels on the track notifies me that I've reached my destination. I don't even remember getting on the train. As I step off into the train station that is a block from my apartment, I look at my watch. It's half past ten, almost time to meet my friends and I accidentally travelled to the wrong side of town. I need to call them.

"Brunch time!" Camryn yells into the phone before saying hello.

"Sorry girlie, no-can-do." I reply.

"What? No? Why no?" Mandy asks.

"Brunch will have to happen another day. I just got engaged."

"Oh congratulations! That's not a reason to cancel brunch. It's a reason to celebrate by eating eggs benedict and drinking mimosas." Camryn says, continuing to speak in her overly loud voice.

"I would celebrate except I'm worried." I say. I have to start yelling into the phone because I walk by a construction site.

"What worries you? Marriage is normal. We're all going to be told of our engagement one day. All of our parents have been happily married since their engagements. There's no need for worry." Mandy says.

"It's not the marriage that scares me, it's how my marriage officer announced the news."

"What did that Debbie Downer do?" Mandy asks. She and I both have Angel as our marriage officer so she's accustomed to the woman's rudeness.

"You know the customary engagement phrase?" I ask.

"Congratulations you are engaged! Enjoy a prosperous future with your spouse." Mandy and Camryn say in unison.

"Yeah that one. Angel didn't say that to me. Instead she said 'We regret to inform you that you have been engaged. We wish you the best of luck with your new spouse.'" I do the best impression of Angel that I can muster.

"We all know that your MO is deranged. She probably said that just to get under your skin." Mandy says. I nod at the phone without actually saying anything.

"Or......." Camryn begins to speak but lets her words trail off. She's speaking quieter which makes me nervous. Camryn only gets quiet when she's got something bad to say. Don't get me wrong she's not whispering or anything. She's just talking softer than she normally would which means she's now at the volume level of a regular speaking voice.

"Or what?" I ask, a little freaked out.

"I was on this Reddit thread yesterday called Weddings Gone wrong. People post their engagement horror stories there. At first I thought it was gonna be people fussing about not getting the wedding venue they were hoping for or getting stuck with a bad date for their wedding like Christmas or something. Turns out it was much worse than that. One guy said his sister stabbed her fiancé in the neck at their wedding. A girl posted that she and her fiancé got into a fist fight at their first meeting. She said that 2% of all engagements are horrendous flops in which the spouses hate each other." Camryn spoke like she was telling a story around a campfire.

"That can't be right. The government engagement system has been around since forever. It's based on science or something right? Our DNA has the map to our perfect match written in it. That's what they're always saying." I say as I look over my shoulders. Camryn's story is freaking me out. There's no one following me and the other people on the street couldn't care less about what I'm doing.

"You know what the say. There's a thin line between love and hate. Maybe our DNA maps don't know how to walk the line." Camryn says.

"Has anyone on the Reddit thread heard the same engagement phrase from their MO that Fiona did?" Mandy asks.

"I don't know. I'll ask." Camryn says. A loud rustling can be heard from her end alone with some furious beeping.

"Wow my post already got a reply." Camryn says after a few minutes.

"What does it say?" I ask, now whispering myself. My change in volume isn't because I have bad news to share like Camryn. It's because I've reached home and don't want to be heard.

I don't live with my parents. I promise I don't. I live in my own apartment. That apartment just happens to be the renovated top floor of my parents' house. They have to ring the bell if they want to come in to my apartment. Just because I have to walk through their house to get to mine doesn't mean anything. My parents' house is basically like the lobby of any apartment building that only has one apartment. If such a thing exists.

"This user Grunflips says that they were told the same phrase. They got engaged at eighteen and it turns out that their fiancé was a guy thirty years older than them." Camryn says.

"So you're telling me I'm either about to marry a grandpa or someone who wants to stab me?" I ask.

"Sounds like there's a third option. You could want to stab your fiancé." Camryn says calmly. It's the same tone she would use to tell me the weather or ask to borrow an eyeliner pencil.

"That's not funny." I hiss into the phone. I manage to make it up the stairs without disturbing my parents.

"It's kind of funny." Camryn says.

"When is your first meeting with your fiancé?" Mandy asks. I open my nuptial info packet and pull out the itinerary. It's stuffed behind all of my fiance's personal information.

"Oh crap it's today! In two hours!" I exclaim as I put my phone on speaker and throw it down on the bed. "What am I going to wear!?"

"Calm down. You're already dressed aren't you?" Camryn says.

"I'm dressed for my monthly, not to make a first impression on the person I will spend the rest of my life with!" I look down at my tank top and sweat pants shaking my head.

"Yeah Camryn, not everyone is dressed for the runway every second of the day." Mandy says.

"I'm definitely dressed for the gym, not......" I take another look at the itinerary, "The Velvet Snake Charmer." I add after finding the name of the restaurant where we are to meet.

"Wow that's fancy." Mandy says.

"Fancy and hipster. I still don't think you should change though. Your fiancé should meet you as you are." Camryn says. I love that girl but sometimes her view of the world is just too.......her.

"Look I have to go. I'll call you after the meeting." I say. They both say their goodbyes and I hang up the phone. Then I turn on the jets. I've never been to The Velvet Snake Charmer but I'm sure it's more of a nice blouse than a tank top type of place. Once I'm finally dressed I grab my messenger bag and race down the stairs.

My parents are together in the den when I get downstairs. I don't have the time nor the want to talk to them about marriage so I just run through the front door and onto the sidewalk. It's still raining but I forgot my umbrella inside. My fro will just have to act as an umbrella today, the perks of natural hair.

The Velvet Snake Room is like a mix between a 1920s speakeasy and the inside of the lamp from I Dream of Jeannie. The Velvet floor to ceiling curtains are a pale purple color. In the center of the restaurant is a circular bar. Behind the bar are four bartenders sporting handlebar mustaches, ascots, and suit vests. I'm wearing a nice blouse and skirt but I still feel underdressed.

I walk up to the maitre d podium and state my name and reason for being there. Apparently we have a reservation. It makes sense. The government wouldn't tell us to meet at a place that we couldn't get in to. The maitre d shows me to an empty table. After taking my drink order, water with lots of lemon wedges, he walks off.

Sitting alone at this table for two reminds me that I haven't read up on my fiancé at all. I open the nuptial folder and pull out the packet of personal information. I wish it included a picture. Sadly it doesn't. What it does include is my spouse's name, Charles Milburn II; his occupation, lawyer; and a list of his likes and dislikes. He likes chocolate ice cream but hates chocolate chips in his ice cream. That's an interesting distinction to make. His phone number is also included in the packet.

While I'm combing through his information, I notice a figure walking up to me. He seems older than me by at least ten years. He's sporting the bald head with beard combo that most black men resort to when they start going bald. His beard has some salt and pepper to it that really shows his age. I find myself internally wishing that he's not my fiancé. I'm only twenty-six. I don't want to marry someone in their late thirties/early forties.

I hope against hope that he just happens to be walking in my direction and that he's not actually walking toward me. My hopes get crushed when he reaches my table and takes a seat.