/ I don't know you, but I want you all the more for that
words fall through me and always fool me and I can't react
and games that never amount to more than they're meant will play themselves out
take this sinking boat and point it home, we've still got time
raise your hopeful voice, you have a choice, you'll make it now... /

(Once, 'Falling Slowly')

[Full Circle]

At 6:32 on a Thursday evening, a young, impeccably dressed man stood on the platform of the grand Penn station, waiting for the Amtrak Acela Express scheduled to pass through at 6:35. Four months had passed since he'd last taken this trip from New York to Boston, and dressed in pressed black slacks and a thin navy sweater – a starched white shirt and grey tie peeking out beneath the collar – he looked like a wealthy young man hoping to make a good impression on his first date with the girl of his dreams.

(In one hand, he carried a single blue rose. In the other, nothing.)

At 6:35 on the dot, the train streaked into the station. Smoothly, the man stepped into the carriage, his steps a little too purposeful to be simply choosing a seat. A few minutes later, just as the train began to pick up speed, he quietly stepped into Carriage D.

The carriage was almost completely empty, save for a lone occupant in the furthest stall, a young woman whose face was partially hidden behind a long fall of black hair. She did not look up when he entered, too engrossed by the tattered book she held in one hand.

The man's lips twitched.

(It was 'Peter Pan', this time.)

"Excuse me," he said.

The girl froze, her hands clenching convulsively over the pages of her novel at the sound of his voice. Ever-so-slowly, she raised her head, reluctant to meet his gaze. There was a distrustful wariness in her eyes that the man had never seen before, and something that felt suspiciously like remorse shot through him with an intensity that caught him off-guard.

The man gave hesitant smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners in a manner that was as boyish as it was handsome. He gestured to the empty seat opposite hers. "Do you mind if I sit here?"

The girl sighed, setting the book gently on the table in front of her. "…What do you want from me, Arthur?" she asked instead of answering, her voice cool.

(Was his name even Arthur? …She wasn't sure any more. She wasn't sure of anything any more.)

"More information? Another secret?" She laughed bitterly. "I don't know if there's anything that'll beat 'my father is having an affair with my schizophrenic mother's sister' but, please, I'll be happy to oblige." She crossed her arms. "–Well? What do you want?"

The man slid into the seat opposite hers.

"…I was hoping for a second chance," he said quietly. "A wise person once told me that everyone deserves to be given the benefit of doubt."

The girl laughed, the light sound completely devoid of humour. "Was there—" she whispered, a terrible sadness drifting beneath the bright surface of her large brown eyes. "Was there any part that wasn't a lie?"

The man looked away. "I am a cynic," he replied eventually. "I like jazz. And the offer of dinner still stands – without any ulterior motives this time."

Face impassive and carefully inscrutable (she doesn't realise how much she looked like him, then), the girl simply stared at the man for a long, long time. "...I haven't quite forgiven you yet, you know."

"I wouldn't have expected you to."

"And I don't dat—" (briefly the memory of the white rose flashed before her eyes – white for secrecy, white for purity, white for true love) "—befriend criminals, as a matter of principle."

The man raised a brow. "And I don't pursue attachments with a previous Mark, as a matter of principle."

('Yet here I am,' hung unspoken between them.)

The girl's lips parted, shocked at this matter-of-fact confession. As the heartmeltingly sheepish smile that she had only ever seen once, in places imagined, broke out over his serious features, she swore her heart skipped a beat.

Hesitantly, he offered her the rose, its colours too vivid to be found anywhere but in dreams.

"…Maybe we can work out a compromise."

[Finis]