It's been just more than a week since Robin received Regina's letter, and a week later, he still has no idea how to reply to it—hell, he wasn't even sure he knew how to read it.

John was more convinced than ever that Regina had met someone else and the letter had been either her way of easing him into a break up or to make the breakup his choice. He speculated that Regina might also be trying to keep her options open or that she felt obligated toward him because he's paid her passage. And though he could easily see how John reached the conclusions that he did, none of them sat right with Robin. Regina never had a problem being direct. She didn't have a problem explaining what she wanted, and when she wanted something to conceal, she'd never show her hand. No, if Regina had met someone else—someone she was interested in in some way, someone who could offer her something that he could not—she wouldn't tell him unless she was sure of what she wanted. She'd never be as coy as she'd been in that letter.

Staring down at the blank page before him, he draws in a breath, and as he touches his pen to the paper, he has no idea what he's about to write...

August 3, 1928

Dear Regina—

To say your letter took me by surprise was an understatement.

The thought of "someone else" hadn't occurred to me, and to be honest, I was surprised that it occurred to you.

For days now, I've been going over your letter trying to understand it, trying to garner some meaning from it. And frankly, I can't.

You know my personal life better than most, and so you know that since Marian, you've been the only woman who I've dared love, and I cannot imagine loving another. That said, I realize the deep limitations to what I have to offer. I'm not deluded in thinking that love is enough. If that were true, I think both our lives would've gone in different directions.

He pauses and considers scratching out the digression—it's true though, had either Marian or Daniel lived, he wouldn't be writing this letter now. He leaves it, deciding he likes the point it makes, the way it gives gravity to their relationship.

I've never been a big believer in fate. I don't think many of our generation can say that they are, I don't think many have a reason to or are capable of it, truthfully. And yet, in the months we spent together, I started to feel like we were a part of a bigger scheme, like our paths converged for a reason. Before you, I wasn't interested in love. I claimed I didn't have time for it, but in actuality, I was afraid of it. After Marian, how could I not be? The same, I can assume, is true for you.

He holds onto that thought for a moment, weighing it against John's assumptions. He remembers the first time he and Regina spoke—how he'd gone into that conversation with his own assumptions and how she'd taken him to ask for it in only one curt sentence—and how unsettled he'd been afterward. It hadn't occurred to him that they had anything in common, it hadn't occurred to him that she'd been living behind a facade, that her heart was broken and she didn't see any way that it could be mended.

You say that you want us to keep our options open, and I suppose that's fair enough. I think you and I are proof of that age-old saying "you never know what's going to happen." And yet, I can't wrap my head around ever feeling about another as I do for you, I can't imagine a better option coming along.

John tells me "options" or "opportunities" can mean a lot of things, and sure, they can. I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss waking up with someone warm beside me, just as I'd be lying as if I didn't wake up every morning wishing that warm someone beside me was you.

He scoffs at that, wondering if she's simply giving him permission to sleep with someone else, wondering if she's simply giving herself permission to do the same. Maybe it'd work out for her, but for five years now, he's been trying to wrap his head around the notion of bringing someone home—just once giving into temptation, giving into the sometimes gnawing need—but his situation doesn't allow him to do much more than think about it because at the end of the day he wasn't a bachelor. He was a father who shared a room with his six-year-old son, and he couldn't change that.

Nor did he want to; after all, his son would only be a child for so long.

There would come a day when Roland would no longer need him—when the small two-bedroom apartment they shared with John would be too small, when he wouldn't wake up from a nightmare and want comfort, when he'd crawl into his father's bed during thunderstorms or when he didn't feel well—and there would come a day when he'd look back and miss the days when his son was small. And that day was closer than he cared to acknowledge.

We might not be able to be what the other truly needs, but right now, I can't imagine wanting another. I can't imagine someone else making me feel the sort of glee I feel when I receive one of your letters. I can't imagine wanting to share bits and pieces of my life with someone else nor can I see someone else responding with the enthusiasm I've felt from you. I know what we have is far from perfect and I miss you more than my words can adequately express. And yet, what's between us is exactly what I need at this point in my life.

Perhaps one day it'll change. Perhaps for you it already has changed.

If it has—or when it does—I hope that you'll just come out with it because as much as I hate to think of my life without our correspondence, the thought of holding you back is doubly painful.

For a moment, he stops and stares at that last sentence. His eyes close and his heart aches a little at the thought of giving her an out—an out that she just may take. And yet, he means it. He doesn't want to hold her back. If she's truly trying to let him down easy, if John's right and there is someone else in his life, then he'd have to accept it—but in order for him to do that, she'd have to be honest with him. She'd have to come right out and say. She couldn't be coy and let him wonder.

Until then, I'd prefer to go on as we were… whatever that means… if that's what you want, too.

All my love,

Robin

Swallowing hard, he sets down his pen and reads over what he's written—and then, before he over thinks it or loses his nerve, he folds it and stuffs it into the envelope he'd addressed days before. He hesitates momentarily before he rises and walks the letter down to the post box—then his stomach flops knowing he'll have to wait at least three weeks for her reply.