A/N: Just a little moment that popped into my head, and grew into this. Any errors are my fault entirely. The title is from the song of the same name by Ocean Colour Scene. I hope you enjoy, and Merry Christmas!

Summary: It wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that people who do genuinely care for each other, have sustained a relationship for over two years, could handle slightly less than four hours together on a train. Unfortunately Malcolm Tucker and Nicola Murray seem to be a major exception to this rule.

Pair: Malcolm & Nicola, established relationship.

Set: Post series by a couple of years.

Spoilers: El zilcho.

The Day We Caught The Train

by

Tricki

Malcolm Tucker and Nicola Murray are a couple singularly incapable of not fighting, and today is no exception. It wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that people who do genuinely care for each other, have sustained a relationship for over two years, could handle slightly less than four hours together on a train. Unfortunately Malcolm and Nicola seem to be a major exception to this rule.

"We are irredeemably. Fucking. Late." Malcolm snipes quietly under his breath. He is leaning on his hand, his elbow on the thin metal arm separating his undersized train seat from the one next to it.

"And whose fault is that, Malcolm? Could it be the magical elves that stole your BlackBerry?" Nicola's eyebrow is arched, her eyes and lips tight with irritation. It's possible that he finds her most infuriating when she uses that prim all-of-this-is-due-to-your-own-incompetence tone with him.

"Or maybe it was you changing yer fucking outfit for the nineteenth time?" He is managing, barely, to contain the outburst he is longing to unleash on her, purely because the carriage is not as empty as he would like it in order to shout at her.

"I only changed my dress because a) you told me to, and b) I had so much fucking spare time because you couldn't find you sodding BlackBerry!" The way she ticks the list off on her fingers does nothing to diffuse his temper.

She has leant forward to hiss this at him, and tossed herself back into her seat like a petulant child upon her conclusion. Malcolm runs his eyes over her, sitting diagonally opposite from him, tucked into a window seat in a second class carriage because they missed the train they'd booked first class tickets for. She is wearing her neat cobalt wool-crepe dress, and normally he would hardly be able to divert his thoughts from the fact that the zipper at the back runs the entire length of the dress, and makes peeling the dress from her body especially enjoyable. Today he sees it in terms of time penalty. An extra fifteen minutes to change and re-quaff, six and a half more to locate her cream jacket. An extra twenty-one minutes that he could not afford. An extra twenty-one minutes he will never acknowledged would have passed with him searching for his blackberry even if Nicola had been mutely sitting on her suitcase by the front door.

"Besides, we could have flown if you were so worried about the time."

Malcolm is suddenly totally unable to contain his fury. "Oh, yes, that's right. Fucken' remind me, darlin', how Miss Claustrophobia of the Decade, who is so deeply mentally unstable that she can't even bear to go in a shitty little lift can spend hours in a plane. That flies. In the fucking sky. Over oceans and fucking mountains and in which, you may actually fucking die."

"Great, Malcolm. That's just great. Have a go at me for my claustrophobia. That's great. You know, this is exactly how I wanted to spend Boxing Day."

"Yeah, well I definitely wanted to spend yesterday with yer fucking ex-husband in York!" He barks back at her.

"It's not unreasonable to have my children spend Christmas with both of their parents once in a while! I come with a fucking family, Malcolm! You know this - you've always known this. "

"Well so do I! And I'm deeply sorry if it fuckin' inconveniences you, princess, but I like seeing my niece and my fucking sister for Christmas." Now it's Malcolm's turn to toss himself back in his chair grumpily, and anyone observing them would be unable to overlook how similar their mannerisms can be.

"Seeing your family at Christmas isn't the bloody issue, Malcolm, it's the fucking song and dance over the travelling! I have honestly no idea how you managed to spend so long jetting around the world with the bloody Prime Minister and you still have complete apoplexy over catching a fucking train to Dumfries!"

"It's not the travelling that gives me the fucking apoplexy, woman, it's doing it with the least competent woman on the face of Earth. Helen fucking Keller would have a better chance of catching a train on time."

"It wasn't me who lost my fucking BlackBerry!" Nicola barks.

"No, but I'm not the one who is a massive, useless, whey-faced frump!" Malcolm's voice is loud enough to make everyone else in the carriage uncomfortable. The couple nearest to them seem to be relocating. Nicola can feel her face reddening.

"Oh, fuck off." Hisses the brunette, resting her chin on her hand and staring out the window with a deep scowl on her face.

"You fuck off." The Scot retorts, directing his own glare out of the window on the other side of the carriage. Nicola has a book poking out the top of her handbag; it would be easy to retreat into the fictional world contained within its pages, but right now Nicola is too busy fuming at her other half to be able to concentrate on anything else. How is it he still speaks to her like this? How is it one moment there are a cohesive and functional couple, yet under the slightest bit of pressure they revert to the colossal mess they were back in their DoSAC days?

After nine minutes of furious and pointed silence between them, Malcolm sweeps his eyes over his other half, long, spindly fingers pressing against his lips. After a moment, he feels himself soften, his glare shifting settings from death inducing lasers to uncomfortable heat lamps. Nicola's right hand is dangling limply over the edge of the uncomfortable metal arm. Every now and then she drums her fingers once over the cool metal, pinky to index in rapid succession.

Two more minutes of staring at her and Malcolm is not only disarmed, but feeling like a bit of a shit. Without a word he reaches across the narrow gap between them and knots his fingers through hers, running his thumb over the tip of hers. Nicola's eyes flit to their hands before sailing up to his grey blue eyes.

"I'm sorry." The Scot mumbles. Nicola turns her gaze back to the passing scenery, but squeezes his hand tenderly while she turns away.

"Yeah. Yeah, me too." The brunette replies, leaning across the carriage and kissing him softly. She keeps her fingers twined with his while she flops back into her seat and kicks her feet up onto the seat opposite her. Now that peace is restored Nicola feels like the rest of the train ride may actually be preferable to having sharpened bamboo shoots rammed under her fingernails.

"Truce?" He offers, and when she turns back to him there is a wry grin playing about her lips.

"It's a fucking Christmas miracle."