There was no wedding board.
No Pinterest frenzy.
No checklist of extravagant plans.
They didn't need a cathedral, a guest list in the hundreds, or a televised proposal to make it real.
They needed only this:A table between them.A cup of tea in her hands.His name written on the edge of an envelope she didn't realize she'd been tracing with her thumb.
"You're thinking," Leon said from across the table.
Aria glanced up, blinking. "Always."
"What about this time?"
She hesitated.
Then lifted her hand, showing him the envelope.
His name was printed neatly on the return address: Leon Castellan.
She tapped it once.
"I don't know if I want to change my name."
Leon leaned back, face unreadable.
Then:
"Okay."
"Just okay?"
"I want you to be you," he said. "Whatever name that comes with."
She swallowed.
"I thought I'd feel different after I said yes. Like it would be obvious."
"Was it obvious when you fell in love with me?"
"No," she admitted.
"But it felt right?"
She smiled.
"Exactly."
"Then you'll know what to do."
Later, as she folded laundry, she found herself whispering the names out loud.
"Aria Rousseau."
"Aria Castellan."
"Aria Rousseau-Castellan."
She paused, then laughed. "That one sounds like I'm founding a law firm."
Leon appeared in the doorway, towel over his shoulder.
"I'd hire you."
"You'd sleep with me."
"Same thing."
She threw a sock at him.
He caught it one-handed.
They didn't finalize anything that day.
Or the next.
But Aria began to notice the small things.
The way his name looked beside hers on coffee receipts.
The way people introduced them together now — not as strangers orbiting the same table, but as something tethered.
The way her own signature felt softer when it carried choice.
A week later, she walked into the registry office alone.
No press.
No makeup.
Just a pen in her hand and clarity in her chest.
She signed the form quietly.
And when the clerk asked, "Would you like to hyphenate?"Aria smiled.
"No. Just the last name, thanks."
Castellan.
Not because she had to.
But because it wasn't about erasing who she'd been.
It was about carrying it forward, wrapped inside something new.
Leon didn't ask what she'd chosen.
Not right away.
When she handed him the envelope with the updated documents, he opened it slowly.
Read the name.
Looked up.
His voice, when it came, was almost a whisper.
"You took it."
Aria nodded. "I wanted to."
He didn't say anything more.
Just reached for her hand, brought it to his lips, and kissed her fingers like they were a vow.
Later that night, when she logged into her work email and saw her name reflected back at her—
Aria Castellan, Principal Photographer.
—she didn't feel smaller.
She felt seen.
Rooted.
Like two parts of her life had finally stopped fighting.