What Little Worlds

Thirty

Boston winters were impossible to walk in.

Amelie had relished her walk to work all summer, so she had not considered that the location of her apartment might have a downside. That was until she started having to take the train to work.

Between the two transfers and wait times, she spent longer taking public transport than simply walking to work. Her lab was a twenty minute walk and a thirty minute ride on the T. She had tried to brave the walk for a few weeks but each time ended up conceding to her frozen fingers and each by either huddling in a cafe mid-way for warmth, or finding a T stop.

She should have considered Boston winter transport when scouting for apartments.

The past month, she had followed a monotonous routine in the morning. Wake up at 6:35; roll in the sheets with Adrien; get ready; kiss Adrien goodbye. Then, walk to the T stop, catch the 7:23 train; transfer at the next station and catch the 7:39 train; walk six minutes to her building and clock in at exactly 7:54. She had unconsciously started counting her footsteps again like she did as a kid and could not seem to shake the habit.

The rest of her day followed a well-worn pattern as well. Work all morning; occasionally entertain Jesse; eat lunch alone in the work kitchen unless Charlotte was in town; hide from her boss and work all afternoon; come home to Adrien; cook dinner with Adrien; watch TV; go to bed. Repeat.

Sometimes Brooks came over for dinner and she would try to laugh like old friends, but each time he came over she found it harder and harder to let go and laugh. Adrien was tense about The Grey Man and whatever political strife was occurring in Moore, and she echoed his tension. She saw that Brooks noticed—he had started staring at her for long periods of time, like he was studying her face— but she did not have the energy to put up a friendly front.

The only positive part of taking the train home was that she no longer had to take a long route home to avoid the coffee shop where she had shaken The Gray Man.

At first, she went to the gym with Adrien after work, but she had grown tired of learning silly magic tricks like making bubbles float. In her first week back she had asked him again to teach her defensive magic and he had sighed and asked if she could just give it a little more time to adjust to her being a part of the world before she learned if she wanted to be a warrior.

Adrien assumed that she was still there simply for fun. He somehow missed her waking up with nightmares; oftentimes of The Grey Man, or simply an unknown shadow chasing her, holding her down. Sometimes the shadow morphed into Adrien himself. When those dreams shook her awake in the middle of the night, she normally woke the real Adrien so he would comfort her.

Comforting her seemed to be his favorite thing to do. She sometimes wondered if a small part of the reason he was resisting her learning to defend herself was that he relished feeling like her protector.

Although Amelie was frustrated with Adrien's insistence that she not learn defensive magic, she also wanted to respect his opinion for the sake of their relationship. She tried to wait like he suggested. She had avoided going to the gym at lunch time like she had that summer. Even going just to practice silly tricks was too similar to what had caused their fight about Theo.

No that would not happen again if she could stop it. Amelie wanted to do her part to rebuild their trust in each other so she would wait until he agreed that she should go.

Adrien had been trying too. He had taken her to a meeting he had with a Rentré from Moore who was investigating her parentage. The man had not known anything, but Amelie was happy to finally be included in the conversation.