Akihito gives his head a small shake. "It can be. Some people date in the hope of finding someone to marry, but a lot of us date just to date. Like, courtship where the courtship is the only point. If I find someone I want to marry along the way, then great, but that's not really what I'm looking for. I'm not really ready to get married yet. I'm just looking for someone to not be alone with for a little while." And he highly doubts his date was looking at him as a potential marriage candidate.

"If he drove me home, you might not be here," he says softly, meant more for himself than for Atreyun. He wouldn't have gotten attacked, but that means he also wouldn't have prayed to Atreyun for help. It's possible that it would've just happened another time instead, or that someone else would've stumbled across his name, but it's also possible that he would've gone on being completely forgotten.