#2 In The Dark

Chap. 2_twisted minds and James Arkwright?

Sarah Stark had found a small bench in the station and was staring off into the distance, thinking far too hard.

She was thinking about Frank, and his betrayal; and then Riley and her betrayal. She'd seen them flirting and holding hands outside the station, exactly where Frank had told her to meet him. It was like he'd planned it all. And he'd done it just to humiliate her, to send her a message, to send her away.

She'd pinned each and every hope on Frank, and they'd bled together. Bled out their differences, in the harshest way possible.

She couldn't be overthinking, could she? Maybe they knew each other? Maybe they were related or something, or close friends and they hadn't seen each other in a while. In any case, it was far too intimate for anything like that, and Sarah didn't like it.

She'd stopped crying though. She'd cried far too much in the last couple of days and she'd promised herself to stop. Or, at least, to stop doing it so often.

So she was being strong. She was remaining composed, until she got back home, where she could be alone again; the safest place she felt at the moment.

She sat there thinking, taking in background noise. The whistles of conductors, the chatter of the great mob of unobservant rail-goers, the inexplicable tinkle of the street performers on the piano. All of it helped her think, and as she blocked it all into one noise in her head, she closed her eyes and let her thoughts take her miles away, to wherever it wanted.

Sitting free from the world, however hard it may try, was simply wonderful. And she laughed, once but hard. She laughed away the fear.

Which is why Sarah Stark wasn't expecting a comforting hand on her shoulder. She felt it, soft and smooth, slowly caress her skin and, despite resulting in further relaxation, it jolted her from her thoughts' liberty and back into the sad real world.

She opened her eyes, and the lighted knifed its way into her view bitterly, before regaining a certain level of exposure. She turned to her consoler.

And what met her were the sad, brown eyes of Frank Matthews.

She'd loved his eyes since they first caught sight of each other.

Have you ever seen brown eyes in the sun? You'll not notice it at first but you'll soon see that 'brown' no longer describes them. They melt into golden rays, circling an eclipse. There's nothing boring about brown eyes, not even when the later hours encroach; they just turn into a sunset of their own.

She'd thought about those eyes for such a long time, since they'd last met. And now that they'd come together once more, she remembered why.

"Frank," she spoke softly, nearly choking.

And before she could ask him anything, he returned with some words that she'd needed to hear.

"I'm here," he replied calmly, "I'm always here for you, Sarah Stark. And I will never not be anywhere but by your side for as long as you want me."

He paused and, filling the silence, Sarah let out a stifled sob. But he soon continued.

"Because it's you. It's been you since the moment we started to talk. It's you at 2am or it's you at 6pm. It's you when I eat, it's you when I sleep, it's you when I'm working. You are everything and everywhere. It's you. It's always been you. You. You..."

And he took one last deep breath.

"... You."

The two talked from there on. They stayed and chatted for over an hour, Sarah curled up with her head on Frank's shoulder, hand on his rapidly beating chest.