They could have meet in another life.
She would be riding the subway, buried in the music blasting from her favourite headphones; hurrying towards her tattoo shop through the busy morning metro crowd. Maybe she would love rock music, dark colours and strange clothes. Or maybe she would listen to Vivaldi in the morning. On her way to the cafe where she worked as a waitress, would read Richard Bach. Perhaps she would love the sound of rock, rap or pop music, but, in any case, what does it matter? Having grown up in foster care all her life, opposing the world, she would be different, she would be special. That's the way it is.
And he also would ride in a crowded subway carriage, dressed in a perfect dark grey suit; and with interest would study the faces of passengers around him. He'd love to look in their faces for some expressions, some extra special, hidden emotion. Maybe he would be a doctor or the owner of a furniture manufacturing company. Maybe he would be a lawyer or a teacher of mathematics in the country's top university... But what, in essence, is the difference? He'd just been himself.
He would see her sitting in the park eating, ice-cream running down the outer side of her waffle cone. She would lick it off, all the while not looking up from the book lying on her lap. And he would suddenly forget about emergency surgeries and everything else he had to do, and would just stare at her attentive face, centred on the printed lines.
Maybe she'd pushed past him in the subway, running late for the concert of her favourite band. She'd murmur rushed apologies and help to collect the scattered papers off the dirty floor.
And then her heart would freeze, as her gaze met his dark eyes. She would stare up at him through her long clapped eyelashes, and take in his aristocratic features.
He would ask for her phone number; she'd smile coquettishly. Maybe, with a dismissive gesture, she'd shrug him off; or even rudely refuse.
He wouldn't give up, though. And she would agree, finally, to go on a date.
Their first kiss: somewhere under the New Orleans' starry sky, or perhaps in the semi-darkness of the cinema or by the counter in her little cramped kitchen.
They'd had a life; an amazing life. That "happily ever after", their "happily ever after".
"Hayley, are you all right?" Elijah said, for after a brief second of tearing his eyes from his old book, he immediately noticed her dark studying gaze.
"I'm... all right…."
She put her hand on her stomach and closed her eyes.
But everything could be different.