In this world, Wyatt meets Lucy when flying cross country, heading to an assignment at the Pentagon. She's been hired at the Library of Congress as a historian, and they talk on the five-hour flight about everything, about family and friends, hopes and dreams. He winks as they get off the flight, tells her that they should try to meet up, them living in the same city and all. She nods, laughs slightly and tells him she'll think about it. His number ends up in the river two weeks later when a drunk driver hits her, sending her careening into the Potomac. He doesn't cross her mind until a week after she wakes from her coma. She can't remember his name, and by then she puts it behind her, focusing on relearning how to speak, to walk. She doesn't have time for romance, especially one that has no way of occurring.
She crosses his mind often, but he doesn't want to seem like a creep by looking up her phone number, and he doesn't know her last name anyway (never mind that he knows that her sister Amy is her best friend, that she considers herself to be extremely practical but also pretty spiritual, and that she's always had a slight crush on Harry Houdini). He waits for her to call, and when she doesn't, he gives up. He has good luck with girls, but never with ones that truly intrigue him.
They cross paths once more when they're both in the airport, this time flying to different places. She sees him in the line for security and almost says hello, but she can't remember his name, hasn't been able to since the accident, and is too embarrassed about that and the scar cutting across her cheek to go over and start a conversation. He glances her as she sits at her gate, but her face is stuck in a book and she looks content, too content to be bothered by someone she met a lifetime ago for just a few hours.
Her plane home crashes that day, and her last thought is of his name, a sudden reminder of life before the accident. She's not sure why he stuck in her mind, but he did. She thinks the name fits him. Wyatt.