She met him at the train station. She had left half an hour early in case of early arrivals (although there really was little chance of that with their rail system) and so had spent the intervening time with one of her law textbooks, studying alternative dispute resolution in the civil justice process. Now, she thought with a little thrill, there was even an outside chance it all might come in useful one day.
She quickly became absorbed and by the time she looked up he was already there. Finally there.
" 'Ello Allison." He said softly, almost reverently and she laughed and stood up, clumsily shoving the book back into her shoulder bag.
"Hello to you too."
They grinned shiftily at each other for a few moments. He seemed taller than she remembered and his hair was now even shorter, cut nearly all the way back to the scalp. There was something else too, the slight relaxation in the muscles in his shoulders, the lack of heaviness in his step. Not to mention the mustard-yellow shirt with matching tie under his old battered jacket. Allison, however, cared about none of this. It was still Tom.
She realised too late that they should have initiated physical contact, the barriers loosened by the joy of the moment had sprung up again, leaving them bound to formalities and awkwardness for a while. Conversation it would have to be then, until they got back to the house at any rate.
"So… " she began, nodding towards the appropriate exit. "Fill me in. Properly if you please, I know you haven't had much time to write recently…"
"Tha's one way of puttin' it." He replied grimly, before pausing and faintly shaking his head "Sorry tha' were rude. Just dunno what to say really. S'not very nice what's been 'appening, until this week. A-and I'm sorry but even when I were writing I didn't say everythin'… wasn' sure you really wanted t' know."
She frowned at him, feeling faintly hurt. "But of course I do! Why would you think that?"
Tom sighed and kicked at a pebble. " Y'seemed so upset about Annie an' Eve an' Alex an' that… "
Allison stopped moving and squinted at him. " Of course I was. They were nice people, and that poor little girl, and they died. You were upset about them too… weren't you?"
He mumbled something indistinct, but he was deliberately looking the other way and his hands were deep in his pockets. She hesitated. This felt wrong, it was not the way things were supposed to go at all. They were meant to meet and smile and kiss and catch up and talk about anything and everything and then go back to her empty house and be, well, and boy and a girl together in an empty house. And now she was standing here almost-arguing with someone who looked a bit like Tom, growing more afraid every moment that she had got it all wrong, got him wrong.
She felt one of those surges of bravery that she'd barely experienced outside debating championships before she had met him, and stepped forward into his line of vision, at the same time taking hold of both his wrists. As she did so a corner of something white was nudged out of his pocket, and she automatically tugged it free. A small, white, very crumpled flannel bib.
"Tom?" She looked up to search his face, sadness and some relief coursing through her, and was surprised to see tears in his eyes. So abruptly she hugged him.
After a little while she felt his arms tighten around her, and his face burying in her hair where his uneven breaths tickled her. She gently kneaded his back with her thumbs and swayed a little on the spot in a lulling motion until the rise and fall of his chest was regular again. They must seem an interesting spectacle to passers-by, she thought, right in the middle of the pavement and surrounded by fallen luggage with me pressed against him like a limpet. She let out what she thought was a suppressed chuckle, only to feel him stiffen.
"What?"
She loosened her hold and looked up at him, the bridge of her nose brushing the bottom on his chin.
"Nothing. Nothing important. Sorry. D-do you want to go somewhere and talk? Properly?"
He nodded so she bent to pick up her bag before winding her left arm around his right one to steer him in the direction of the park.
They both sat down on the most secluded bench available, Allison's first choice had been occupied by a kissing couple, and her second turned out to be in the dripping range of a cracked pipe leading to the WCs, but this one behind the bandstand actually felt more private than the other two, even though they were geographically closer to the "get fit" class that used the park on Weekends.
She realised she still had the bib in her hand and folded it up neatly before handing it back. Tom carefully replaced it in his pocket.
"Come on then, tell me."
" S'long story ..."
"Well I have…" she checked her supplies. "Two disposable rain macs, a torch, a packet of Oreos and a fully functioning set of ears. We're reasonably well set up for it."
He smiled despite himself. "I do love ya Allison."
She felt herself turning scarlet and spluttered slightly. Her heart was singing but this wasn't the right time or place, and he'd probably meant it jestingly anyway. She schooled her expression into one of pleased bemusement, slowly resuming into earnestness.
"Tell me." She repeated simply.
And he told her. It was indeed a very long story, even with Tom's frank, to-the-point way of telling it. It also would have confounded belief if she hadn't known the narrator so well, and if it didn't fit so resoundingly into all the little mysteries that had appeared in the last year. She felt ashamed and stupid when he talked about, in few words but feelingly, loosing another friend and the baby that had as been as close to his as anyone's. Clearing out her nursery, easing Alex into the messed up supernatural world and recuperating Hal all at the same time. She chortled at the idea of the employee of the month competition, resisted with difficulty asking what exactly Alex had seen on George.R.R. Martin's laptop and when it came to "Natasha" she felt a lot less jealous than she thought should be right, more just terribly sad for her, and Tom.
It was dark by the time he'd finished and after such a long rhythm of steady speech the silence seemed to echo weirdly, it made her shiver.
"So killing that… whatever it was, is what made us all human?"
Tom shrugged. "Tha's what Hal reckons anyway. Does sorta make sense…"
She laughed "It doesn't make sense at all, but since when has that stopped anything happening? And I'd really have liked a chat with that Rook fellow too, I mean where was he when we needed him last year?"
"He were alrigh' in the end though."
"Yes" She conceded. "What he did was, sounded like it was, incredibly brave."
There was another short silence, in which she could just feel him watching her.
" You ok?"
She smiled, pushing her glasses back more firmly up her nose. "Fine. Are … are you alright?" It was a stupid question and she knew it, but "I know you're not alright and that's alright" would have just been presumptuous. And badly worded.
"Well… " Tom let out a puff of breath and spread his arms out along the back of the bench. "That all did 'appen. But Hal and Alex are safe at 'ome. And I'm still 'ere. And you're 'ere. We're 'ere together."
"mmm. So we are." She inched herself closer towards him on the bench, then froze as he took a distinctive "I'm about to say something important" breath.
"Allison, just wanted ya to know tha' you don't have to do this. I mean without all the werewolf stuff tyin' ya down… ya got yer degree and yer future and I'm just- "
"Hey hey hey, where's all this coming from? I mean the "werewolf stuff" did bring us together in the first place but then it was just an excuse… and you are not "just" anything Tom. You're you. That's already everything I want. And if you don't know that by now then- "
He kissed her, properly. His lips were so soft and she could feel the leather of his jacket under her fingers and his arms cradling her against him, then she lost track of any coherent thought for a while. They were still both inexperienced but less clumsy than before, and it meant so much more this time.
She moved to softly kiss his temple, and then flopped her head down on his shoulder with a contented little sigh. "Case and point. This is it. "
He chuckled and slipped an arm around her waist. "This is it alrigh'."
The next morning she woke up in a tangle of sheets on the floor (the single bed had proved to be too single) feeling vaguely achy but absolutely content. Judging by the quality of sunlight filtering through the curtains it seemed to be early still, much too early to start worrying about her parent's return, and Tom was a little way to her left, quietly snoring with an expression that seemed completely at peace with the world. She grabbed her glasses from the nightstand , propped herself up on one arm and watched him for a while, then poked him in the ribs, praying that it wouldn't send him into vampire attack overdrive.
"Guess what?"
"mmmmmph?"
"I love you too."
He smiled sleepily and the word came out half muffled through the pillow
"Danke"
A bubble of sublime joy rose in her chest, but some echo from her upbringing stopped her from letting it show too much in her voice, which strayed to teasing.
"Maybe danke will be our always"
"Ya what?"
She laughed and settled down into the hollow of his shoulder, practising old piano scales across his chest.
"Just something out of a book, doesn't matter, back to sleep soldier."
Author's note: Not beta-d and I know it's really wordy, but that was semi on purpose to get inside Allison's head anyway.
Oh and I just couldnt resist the almost quote at the end, it's been in my head for weeks and I was going to make some sort of post about it on Tumblr but decided not enough people ship them seriously enough to get it. But I get how it could be annoying so sorry if it annoyed you! (also John Green if you ever read this by a bizarre twist of fate)
Being Human has slightly invaded all my imaginings, and I don't think I'll ever get tired of Allison and Tom, so more fics may be on the way.