My first Lie to Me fic, so please be gentle as I test the waters!

This story takes place two years after the series finale.

Standard fanfic disclaimers apply. I don't own these characters. If I did they'd still be on screen.

Feedback, whether good or bad is always valued.

Night Train

Toronto, Canada

Winter

"No bloody way..."

"All flights are now grounded. You'll need to check back tomorrow."

Dr. Cal Lightman gestured to the floor-to-ceiling airport window where the snow was falling more sparsely now. "The snow is letting up! Look at it!"

"I'm sorry..." the young blonde reiterated.

"I sat in this lounge for four-hours waiting for the delayed sign after my flight to change to a departure time, not to a big, fat, red "cancelled"!"

"I'm really sorry."

Lightman leaned on the counter, inching towards her. "No you're not."

Her eyes widened in genuine confusion. "I beg your pardon?"

"You're fed-up, tired and annoyed and you just want this day to be over." He leaned in even closer. "Oh, and I see contempt too. For myself and the two dozen or irritated passengers standing in line behind me. But there's definitely no sympathy and even less empathy."

Her cheeks blushed. Now he saw embarrassment too. Not that he needed to be one of the planet's foremost experts in facial expressions and lie detection to deduct that one.

"Mind you," he conceded. "If I were in your shoes I'd probably feel the same way. So I don't even blame you. But I would appreciate the truth."

"They...they didn't tell me four hours ago whether the flights would be cancelled."

He eyed her face. Full-lips and wide-blue eyes. The only thing that made her less attractive than she should have been was an overabundance of make-up. It was a face for looking, not touching.

"Now that," he paused. "Is the truth."

Then again what the hell did the truth matter? It wouldn't get him on a flight out of Toronto tonight.

He scratched his two-day beard and asked her a final question. You needed thick skin when you could read people as well as he did. When in moments like this, you knew that the woman in front of you wanted nothing more than for him to get out of her pretty face. "Tell me the truth about something else...what are the chances of me getting another flight tomorrow?"

Her lips pursed for just an instant and he caught a shifting in the size of her pupils.

"The weather forecast for tomorrow is calling for..."

He didn't need to hear the rest of her answer.

Slim. His chances were slim.

Later

He sat inside a bus now. A large, packed highway coach with the words Airport Express written in yellow letters on its side. Snow covered a part of his window, obstructing his view of the multi-lane traffic outside which was moving at a snail's pace.

He'd miss the book signing in Winnipeg tomorrow morning. Not that he really minded. He enjoyed those as much as a trip to the dentist and it was a minor financial loss. It was the lecture the next day at the APA conference that he couldn't afford to miss. That one was going to bring in a sizeable pay check.

"Nothin's running on time tonight..." Lightman heard someone behind him say. There was a hint of glee and excitement in his voice. Like the kid who was hoping the weather might lead to a snow day.

"Except for the trains," another one cut in. "My brother's going to Montreal tonight and he just texted me to say it's leaving. On time. Can you believe it?"

"Is there a train to Winnipeg?" Lightman mumbled to no one.

He pulled out his lap tap and decided to take advantage of the free Wi-Fi the bus service advertised on his ticket.

An instant message bubble popped onto his screen almost as soon as he was online. It curled his lips into a smile for the first time tonight.

-Where r u Dad?

-Stuck in Toronto. Snow storm.

-In Canada. In the winter. Imagine that.

His smile broadened. He had a sarcastic kid and knew his genes were entirely to blame.

-Remember who's paying for your fancy education in sunny California

-Love u Dad. Where r u trying to get 2?

He cringed. Texting was the downfall of the English language.

-Winnipeg. APA Conference

-Lemme know when u get there. Have 2 go. Hot date 2nite

He cringed even deeper. Emily did that on purpose. She liked to get a rise out of him. Psychology 101. Maybe he should have sent her to that conference.

Even worse, he was like Pavlov's dog when it came to her efforts. They always worked because the irrational father in him still hoped she'd suddenly decide to forego men until she turned thirty-five.

-I hate him and he's not good enough for you

Two could play this game.

-LOL Bye dad. Luv u.

Lightman sighed as the pop-up bubble disappeared from his screen and along with it his one genuine bond with another human being. 'Love you too...'

The bus was going even slower now. Inching along the congested highway.

He went on a search engine to find train time-tables out of Toronto.

"Well, look at that..."

There was a train to Winnipeg. Leaving tonight still.

He clicked on the availability and ticket prices until he noticed the arrival time.

"Bloody hell..."

If it left on time, the train would depart Toronto at 10pm tonight and arrive in Winnipeg not tomorrow, but the day after at 8am.

But his lecture wasn't until the day after tomorrow. At 1pm.

And it meant he'd be moving instead of waiting, while risking the chance of not going anywhere.

"Plus, it's not as though I've got a one good reason to stay in Toronto..."

Before he gave himself the chance to change his mind, he went through the process of purchasing a ticket for the night train. To Winnipeg.

Union Station, Toronto

The airport bus dropped him off right across from the train station, at an enormous turn-of the century hotel. The kind that that had a hand-painted ceiling and photos of the Royal Family in the lobby.

That's where he settled into a deep, plush chair in a lounge called the Library Bar and had two stiff drinks, one right after another, served to him with quiet efficiency by a waiter wearing a bow tie.

He felt better and warmer by the time he clumsily wheeled his carry-on case across the street to the train station. Even the fact that the slush on the streets were no match for his leather shoes didn't bother him anymore.

Cal wiped a few fresh flakes of snow off his forehead when he entered the station. According to the giant departures screen in the middle of the grand hall, his train was leaving on time.

"Take that Air Canada," he mumbled.

He took an escalator onto a nearly empty platform and let a porter help him hoist his one piece of luggage into the train. "Your seat is in car three," a smiling attendant greeted him.

Cal walked down a corridor full of sleeping cabins and suddenly regretted not paying extra for one. All he had was a seat.

'What the hell was I thinking?'

Maybe if one of them was unoccupied he'd sweet-talk the smiling attendant into letting him use it.

In the meantime, he flung his suitcase onto a luggage rack at the rear of the car where his seat was.

The compartment was only half full and given that it was less than twenty-minutes before departure time, Cal figured that was as full as it was going to get.

Most of the travelers he saw at first glance were young. Everything about them screamed "up-for-an-adventure-and-on-a-budget." Who else travelled across Canada in the middle of winter and didn't book a sleeping berth? Most of them had back-packs and wore thick wool sweaters and jeans.

He was the only fool in a suit and tie.

Aside from the young Europeans on their North American adventure, he spotted a couple of Native families too. As well as a guy in his sixties, wearing a bandana and holding a guitar on his lap. Then there was a woman, probably in her mid-thirties, who looked sickly and was hunched over in her seat, eyes half closed already.

Cal ignored the seat number on his ticket and sat down on the first pair of unoccupied seats he found. Furthest away from the kids and the guitar player. With a little luck, no one else would sit down next to him. Two seats would make do for a bed.

He fidgeted in those two seats until the train started moving, ignoring the stares of a young couple two seats down.

Cal exhaled. The two seats were his and he was spared having to make small-talk with a stranger and pretending not to see right through their white lies.

A voice on the intercom welcomed them aboard. Letting them that the next stop was seven hours from now in Sudbury, which was barely halfway through the province. Coming from a country where pretty much everything was within a few hours drive, the sheer scope of the distances on this continent still baffled him sometimes. The announcer's voice repeated everything in French and then let them know the dining car would be open for two next two hours.

'Good idea.'

He hadn't eaten since lunch and figured he'd nurse another drink in said dining car until it closed and they made him return to his seat.

The train quickly picked up speed once it left the station and Cal felt like a fish out of water as he stumbled down the corridor to the dining car. Or maybe it was the after-effects of the two drinks he'd had in the hotel lounge earlier.

He sat down at the first table he spotted and when he saw who was seated at the table diagonally across from him, he almost did a double-take.

"Foster?"