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"The first time we met I was terrified."
"Now, now, can we really even call that our first meeting? After all, we never even spoke to one another."
"Yes. We can. I do. Anyway, I was so terrified, in fact, it wasn't really a meeting at all— you're right about that at least, but it still counts. Don't scoff at me."
"I'm sorry, love, but I really just don't think we can count that as our first meeting. I never even saw you, much to my everlasting disappointment, I must confess."
"Fine, we'll agree to disagree. So, all I had at the time was merely a glimpse through a foggy glass pane window, a fleeting image of sandy hair and a lion inked in black on his wrist. Then someone passed in front of me, blocking my view, and I panicked."
"You needn't have. Though, truthfully, I probably wasn't worthy of you back in those days, just a drunk in a bar and a hoodlum getting into trouble with with my mates. I'd likely have mucked the whole thing up."
"True… But I was standing outside of that bar and all of a sudden it was too much. I was—"
"This part always gets me."
"Quiet. Let me finish. I was afraid of being happy, of moving on and finding love again. I didn't believe I could handle it or what would happen if I let all the anger I was bottling up go. It was all that I had at the time."
"Not to mention you were the queen, might have complicated matters a bit. I doubt your husband would have approved of you taking off with a lowly thief."
"Yes, that was another factor. Not that I really considered it in that moment. But more than anything I was scared. So I ran. And never in a million years did I think I would ever come across my supposed soulmate again..."
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