"Rose"

For a moment it doesn't register, the voice behind her. She's been someone else for so long now that the instinctive reaction to her name has been erased. Perhaps not erased, just muted. Her head is tightly wrapped up in the book she is studying. She's always studying, reading absorbing all that she can, anything to pass the time. If she isn't reading she's running.

So to hear her name, on a bench by the Seine is such an unusual and unexpected prospect naturally it takes a repetition to sink in.

"Rose." A little more insistent and her head jerks up, eyes scanning around her in all directions, seeing nothing, everything all at once, before focussing on the figure in front of her. It's the blue that catches her attention first. The exact shade of a ship whose name she has banned from her conscious thoughts. Her breath leaves her in a rush.

"James."

His smile is strained, a little crooked and as her gaze searches him she can see his fists are clenched, his posture tense.

Her first thought is one of puzzlement and then her eyes widen as the implications as to his presence becomes clear.

"Oh." She stands jerkily, her text book falling to her feet as her legs push her towards him. Traffic races behind her, but her focus upon him is total. "How have you been?" As she struggles to dispel the roiling tension her mind does a quick calculation and she recalls the memory of arguments and frustration clouding her time with him. She nods, answering her own question. "Of course. She knows."

He seems to ignore her words as he studies her face. "I'd forgotten." His eyes stare through her, past her, into a place she can't, refuses to follow. "If your eyes..." James trails off and steps closer. "You'd never know."

"S'just a phase. Stick with me." She offers a crooked grin of her own, knowing it's no consolation, knowing the complete unfairness of it all. He glances away and shoves his hand through his hair, a gesture so familiar that she almost stops breathing.

"It's time." He's considers the floor and he wonders briefly how he ever thought that this had been tamed.

"All ready?" There are two questions in her simple words and he can't help but meet her stare.

"I need to know you're..." He tails off, eyes tearing from hers again.

"Gone?" There's no bitterness, she understands, completely.

His head jerks, a savage reflex action that shows he still has problems doing this, domestic. His hand raises and in his grip is the large silver and yellow button, the source of so many bad dreams. Her hand reaches out to take it from him, too late she realises his intention and she's in his arms, hands clasped tight around her back, face buried in her neck.

"Rose." Her name is a whisper and she shudders even as she returns his embrace, arms reaching for his neck, hands tangling in his hair.

"He doesn't deserve you." His voice is low and truculent and unbelievably she's smiling.

"No."

She feels his lips twitch against her hair and she can feel him relax slightly his grip softening.

"River is nice." His voice is still truculent but touched with grudging admiration. Her grin widens and she pulls back to grin up into his reluctant face. His own features slide into solemnity and her grin fades a little.

"I don't want to say goodbye."

"You don't have to." Truth, perfect truth, she'll stand by him, watch him settle for second best, she won't begrudge him what she won't accept. Not that he's inferior, she just can't lose him again, not again. She was so naïve to think that it would hurt just the same.

"Don't take no for an answer." He's stern now, reassurance for her comfort, her security desperate in his tone.

"I won't" It brings tears to her eyes and that parting at Krop Tor flashes vividly in her mind. As if hearing her thoughts he brings his lips to her forehead and presses a gentle kiss there. To a casual observer they would just be another entranced couple enjoying the romance of Paris. The sound of two hearts breaking is almost inaudible; it's only evidence in her hitching breath and his low growl.

"Go." He pushes her from him roughly and turns away, eyes raking over the view as if he could find solace in its wintry golden glow. He turns, quickly, regret making him stumble, but for once she's listened to him. She's gone; the only sign of her departure is the faint smell of electric hazing the air.

James pulled back those forbidden words that trembled restlessly on his tongue and let this new knowledge sink in. If he squinted enough he could almost see the relief he thought her absence would bring. The world spins under his feet and it doesn't affect him quite how it did once. He swallows the rough lump in his throat and blinks the glaze from his eyes. He'll move on now, with Rose, and with River and he'll be content.

As he turns to leave one last memory rises unbidden before his eyes, her face, his Rose, a shining goddess in the vortex. When he releases his breath it shudders slightly.

He hadn't thought it would be quite this sharp, but he'd forgotten the truth in her eyes. He always forgot.

And it was always his undoing.