Chapter notes
Please note that though the following chapters have been heavily adapted for an AU context (this being a crack pairing), they do contain some spoilers for A Feast for Crows.
As they entered the Westerlands, the terrain became mountainous; and with the mountains came the rain. It shimmered and crashed down to earth in veils of silk and iron; turning the peaks into towers of deep green and blue while the mist swirled comfortingly around them; their iron becoming freezing warmth.
The weather did not provide much opportunity for conversation, and Arya was glad of it; not because she feared arguing, but because she feared the absence of bitterness and anger that had come to define the way Jaime spoke to her. She deserved bitterness and anger. Perhaps she wanted them.
The morning after they had…tears still came to her eyes just thinking about what she had done…she had stared across the fire at Jaime and watched his face change in understanding of their apartness. The heat of his mouth and the scent of his body still throbbed like fire all over hers; she could still feel herself gasping and crying out as his fingers fucked her harder; and she had been trying to think of something else; anything else; when Jaime had said, quite clearly, 'you remind me of Cersei when you act like this.'
She remembered glaring at him for what had felt like an eternity while horror clawed its way through her chest and up into her throat, and she had snapped something at him…or perhaps she hadn't. But then she had heard the unmistakable sounds of a hunting party nearby, and she had darted off into the trees to steal a horse; almost glad of the opportunity to run away from him for just a little while.
They did not speak of what they had done, or of what he had said, again, but the worst thing, the absolute worst thing, was the way that Jaime treated her after that night: not bitterly, not angrily, but kindly. He treated her like a knight escorting some stupid lady to a tournament: with perfect grace, courtesy, solicitousness, sincere kindness…and distance. It was like he had reverted to something that he'd been taught in his childhood; something that he'd been taught so well that he no longer thought about it: his courtesies. 'A lady's courtesies are her armour,' Sansa had said. Well. Arya didn't care if lords used stupid courtesies for the same purpose; Jaime was the most discourteous person she'd ever had the misfortune to meet, and listening to him engaging in small talk instead of his usual insults was both tedious and devastating. She would have felt infinitely better if he had simply called her a whore and a bitch instead of pretending that he felt otherwise. True, comparing her to Cersei was the next best thing, but why act as though he had never said it; as though he hadn't meant it; as though she didn't deserve it? Each time he turned towards her, she could see the bite marks on his throat from where she had kissed him a little too enthusiastically, and looking at them made her feel horrible. She had branded him like a possession.
The worst thing about this courteous treatment of her, another worst thing in a butchery of worst things, was that he didn't seem to realise he was doing it. When it had first started to rain, he had insisted that she wear his spare cloak; a glorious, all-encompassing blanket of black wool and warmth that was far too big for her, and though she had mumbled something about the average day in Harrenhal being much colder than this, he had draped it over her shoulders in a thoroughly avuncular manner, and told her not to be foolish. On the rare occasions that the rain wasn't sheeting down in floods, he would ask her polite questions about Winterfell, her life in the North, her preferences when it came to horses and books and music; and he always wanted to know if she was warm enough or if she felt poorly. He even called her 'Lady Arya' instead of 'Stark.' She hated it. She hated all of it. It was the worst punishment that he could have come up with. It was like talking to a mask.
And then there was the question of the cold. On their first night in the Westerlands, they had narrowly escaped freezing to death. Nevertheless, it was only when Arya had awoken the next morning with icicles in her hair and the beginnings of frostbite in her right hand that they had made a largely-unspoken accord to sleep huddled close together for warmth; something that they would always initiate in as chaste a manner as possible, but that would inevitably end with Arya awakening the next morning to the feeling of Jaime's nose buried deep in her hair and his cock grinding into her buttocks. The first time it had happened she had gotten up immediately and run into the woods to make water. Each time it had happened after that she would simply close her eyes again and wait for Jaime to wake up first; taking comfort in the fact that the real Jaime was still in there somewhere.
She grew to be afraid of her own mind, and of her memories, because she could not hide from them when he was with her; even like this. They resembled a slipstream lurking just below her consciousness that would pull her into it and drown her each time she failed to concentrate on the here and now. But she could not concentrate on the here and now, because she was so much in her mind that she could no longer countenance why she had a body at all. Her head would become unbearably heavy, and it was only the thought of Jaime once again asking her if she felt poorly that prevented her from leaning forward and sleeping against her horse's neck. Her eyes and throat burned constantly from the threat of tears, and they would spill silently over onto her face each time the slipstream pulled her down into its depths: Tywin smiling softly and murmuring 'you resemble her,' a nightmare vision of thousands of black rats tearing flesh from Mother, Robb and Sansa's bodies while Arya slipped in the blood on the floor and screamed and couldn't help them, Jaime kneeling beside her on her chamber floor, cradling her prostrate form against his chest and murmuring 'I am so sorry, my love,' Bran and Rickon screaming as their beautiful young flesh burned and charred like firewood, the sound, that sound of the blade coming down before the Great Sept of Baelor, a sound that she would never forget as long as she lived, and Yoren's fingers digging painfully into her skin as she bellowed at him to let her go and Joffrey, that little fuck, clawing at the front of his doublet and choking on his own vomit, and 'the revenge you want will be yours in time,' and then…nothing. Nothing had changed. She had had her revenge and it hadn't changed a fucking thing, it hadn't made her feel better; why hadn't it, how couldn't it, how long could it go on, how long can it go on, do I have to die myself before it will end?
Jaqen had taught her every weak spot in the human body. All she would need to do was open a vein one night and let her life bleed out of her. Her slaughtered pack would leave her in peace, then, and so would guilt, and love, or was it the same thing; Father and Jaime facing each other across the throne room while the Mad King lay dead in a pool of his blood, hating each other, not knowing each other, not knowing that one day, she would exist, and love each of them for reasons that the other could not see.
Why didn't Jaime tell anyone? she thought, why didn't he?
On the sixth day, the country began to flatten again, and by the seventh day, they were staring out across the plains beneath Casterly Rock. It was the most colossal thing that Arya had ever seen; greater even than Harrenhal because it was alive, especially by night; every blazing window seeming to pierce the dark sea below as the smell of salt filled her mouth; raw, and delicious.
'I still think this is a bad idea,' Arya remarked coldly, the night as dark as her stupid borrowed cloak.
'My uncle will almost certainly have news from the capital,' Jaime replied with equal aloofness.
Arya glared at him.
'We can get that same news just as easily at the local tavern, and at a far lesser risk.'
Jaime did not glare back at her.
'There is little or no danger. I've told him to use the Lord's solar.'
Arya rolled her eyes. She'd already taken a considerable risk by riding round to the servant's entrance earlier that day with a message for Ser Kevan; and choosing one meeting place over another did not convince her that another such risk was at all justified.
'Does the Lord's solar have some magical ability to escape being spied upon?' Arya snorted provocatively.
'Yes, in a way,' Jaime replied breezily, still not rising to the bait, 'the rooms above it, below it and on either side of it, are filled with sand.'
'Clever. Whose idea was that?'
'My father's.'
Of course it was.
'I still don't think this is safe,' she insisted.
'You are welcome, of course, to remain here,' he replied, inclining his head respectfully, 'I'll be back as soon as I can.'
Arya watched him go, tempted to throw a knife at his back. But he hadn't galloped ten yards before she followed him, grinding her teeth and growling to herself.
'You're a stupid little fool.'
'I hope you two realise what an incredibly stupid thing you've done in coming here,' Kevan declared, taking in the sight of the two travelers standing side by side on the hearth rug.
He knew Jaime well enough to believe him capable of any kind of recklessness, but he was disappointed in Lady Arya. He had never met the girl himself, but Tywin had always assured him that she was made of more sensible stuff than most people. His first instinct, therefore, was to glare at her in disapproval, but he found his glare softening somewhat as he took in the undisguised misery and dejectedness of her demeanour.
The girl swiftly sensed his gaze, and glared fearlessly back at him.
'Don't look at me, Ser,' she said blandly, glancing sideways at Jaime, 'there was absolutely nothing I could do.'
'You'd better sit down, then,' Kevan invited, warily observing the stubborn determination on Jaime's face as they all took their seats.
'What news from the capital, Uncle?' Jaime asked.
'Tell me you didn't take such an enormous risk just to ask me that?' Kevan inquired in disbelief, once again looking instinctively at Lady Arya for confirmation of this insanity.
When the girl simply shrugged in reply, he almost smiled at how well she knew his nephew's stubbornness.
Then he remembered that he was meant to be answering a question.
'I've been in almost daily correspondence with your brother,' Kevan said, 'and the things he tells me are quite alarming. Cersei is constantly engaging vastly unrealistic numbers of troops to search both for you and for the Lady Sansa, whom she persists in blaming for Joffrey's death. Tyrion is stalling her as best he can, but he might not be able to do so forever. The other day he had to talk her out of declaring war on Casterly Rock.'
Jaime snorted.
'I only wish she would declare war.'
'Don't be such a child, Jaime,' Kevan snapped in reply, 'the last thing we need is more war.'
His nephew had the good grace to look ashamed of himself before continuing.
'I don't suppose my sweet sister has the slightest idea where Sansa is?'
'No. Wherever the girl is, she has covered her tracks uncommonly well.'
Jaime shifted slightly in his chair, glanced sideways at Lady Arya, who stubbornly persisted in examining the opposite wall, and cleared his throat.
'We're going –'
'Do not– tell me where you are going,' Kevan interjected crossly, 'I do not wish to know.'
'Of course not, Uncle, forgive me,' Jaime replied, looking both harassed and annoyed, 'sneaking around like a common foot soldier is relatively new to me. Is there any other news that we ought to know about?'
Kevan noted, with some concern, that Lady Arya was leaning heavily on the arm of her chair; her eyes tightly closed and her fingers digging into her hair. He also remembered that his wife sometimes did the same when she was about to burst into tears, and he began to feel worried.
'Tyrion,' Kevan said, trying to turn his mind back to the discussion at hand, 'has deployed increasingly large numbers of troops to deal with the siege of Riverrun, which seems to have descended into absolute chaos despite Cousin Daven's best efforts. The Frey troops and the Stark loyalists seem to be engaged in some sort of competition as to who can make the biggest fools of themselves. The scores are far from even.'
The poor child really does look quite awful, Kevan thought, once again glancing at Lady Arya, her body is here, but her mind is elsewhere.
Jaime was attempting to remedy the girl's detachment by making idiotic and characteristically vague observations about the family tree.
'Ser Daven Lannister is my cousin, Lady Arya,' his nephew said unhelpfully.
'I know who he is…Ser Jaime,' she remarked in return, her voice clipped and hollow.
Kevan stared at them in bewilderment.
Lady Arya? Ser Jaime? What in seven hells is going on?
Kevan already knew, thanks to Tyrion, that the girl had broken off their engagement some time ago (for obvious reasons), but he had thought that chasing off together after Lady Sansa represented at least some renewal of their understanding. When they had entered the room and taken their seats, he had still thought it, because everything about their demeanour suggested it. Each looked first to the other before moving at all; each seeming to act as anchor to the other. But then Jaime had begun to speak, and Kevan had begun to speak, and the girl had persisted in saying nothing; and Kevan had observed the looking at each other and the not looking at each other, the brightness and the sadness, the reaching out and the pushing away. And even then he had not been overly concerned. Lovers fought. It was a fact of life, and it was in the family. Jaime was his mother's son in a great many ways, and Kevan had never known Joanna to be capable of having anything resembling a conversation with Tywin without transforming it into an argument of some sort.
But then that unnatural difference of address occurred; the almost cruelly-enunciated 'Lady Arya' and 'Ser Jaime,' and Kevan knew that something had happened; something infinitely more serious than a bad fight. His nephew was hiding behind a wall of courtesy, and Lady Arya was hiding behind anything that she could pull in front of her.
Don't interfere, old man. This is none of your business.
'I'd recommend that you give Riverrun a wide berth if you want to avoid getting into trouble,' Kevan told Jaime, breaking the silence in as obviously jovial a tone as he could, 'as Warden of the West you'll almost certainly be roped into the dispute and that's only if you don't get arrested.'
'Who commands the Tully armies at Riverrun?' Jaime asked, with equal obviousness.
'The Blackfish is their commander,' Kevan replied, 'apparently it's become a daily ritual for him to stand laughing on the walls while we half-heartedly threaten to speed up Edmure Tully's departure from this world.'
'How very disobliging of him,' Jaime laughed coldly.
'I only met Uncle Edmure once,' Lady Arya added blandly, 'and even I understand the impulse. He's fearfully dull.'
'Lady Stark,' Kevan chided, 'please do not speak ill of your own blood; it makes me so very low.'
The girl shrugged with an admirable lack of emotion and took to examining the ceiling with far more interest than it deserved; her fingers gripping the arms of her chair, and the position of her head not quite succeeding in hiding the fact that she was fighting back tears. Kevan noted that his nephew was taking special care not to look at her, and decided to intervene immediately.
'Jaime,' Kevan remarked, 'the men have just completed work on your lord father's sarcophagus in the Hall of Heroes.'
Jaime looked at him blankly.
'Perhaps you would care to pay your respects while I have a word with Lady Stark?' Kevan continued.
'Why in seven hells would I want to see the old bastard's sarcophagus at this time of night?' Jaime demanded.
'Get out, Jaime.'
'Yes, Uncle.'
Kevan smiled fondly as Jaime grudgingly left the room and banged the door behind him.
'I trust that you are well, my lady,' he began tentatively.
'Perfectly well, I thank you, Ser Kevan,' she replied with admirable composure and politeness, even making a concerted effort to look him in the eye, 'how are you?'
No sooner had she met his eyes that she looked desperately down into her lap again; her hands clasping cruelly together like iron.
'My dear,' Kevan said kindly, trying hard not to sound patronising, 'please do not take this the wrong way, but you look so...unhappy.'
The girl looked up at him, the grief in her large grey eyes unbearable to look upon. She tried to speak several times; opening her mouth and closing it again with obvious difficulty, but no words came out, and for a while there was silence between them as Kevan watched her try to formulate a response, or decide whether she wanted to give one at all.
She burst into tears instead of doing either.
It happened so abruptly and with such fervour that Kevan felt himself jump in surprise, but the shock left him as he watched her bend almost double and cry and cry and cry without trying to stop herself; and when he crossed the room and put a tentative arm around her, she only cried harder, sobbing against his chest as though she would never stop again. The feeling of her tears was horrific; like shaking sickness, only worse, because she was so miserable and so horribly thin that the mere act of holding her made him want to sob. The pain that came tearing out of her young voice was indescribable; unholy, unnatural, un-right; not right for a person so young. Her sobs soon became cries, then wails, then howls; and soon she was screaming her heart out as she cried, while Kevan shushed her and rocked her and did not even bother asking what the matter was, because the answer was so obvious it was painful.
Then she began to talk, rapidly and painfully, and he held her as she babbled; trying to say as little as possible.
'It hurts,' Arya sobbed, 'it hurts, it hurts, it hurts so much; I can see them, I can see them standing around me and judging me and hating me, and –'
'Whom do you mean, child?' Kevan interrupted.
'My pack, my pack…' she cried, and descended into another fit of crying while Kevan thought of Tywin and cursed him to the seven hells for causing this.
'Every time I close my eyes, I see them,' Arya wept, 'I see them hating me and wanting me dead, and sometimes I want to be dead myself if it would just –'
'My dear, they are your family,' Kevan interjected as gently as he could, shocked that she could think such a thing, 'they would never hate you or wish you dead –'
'Oh yes they would; oh yes they bloody would; because that's what I would do if I was dead in the ground with them, if I had a daughter like me; someone who could just forget them and move on because of…what? Of course they hate me! They hate me because the North remembers, the North remembers.'
Kevan was horrified by the depth of the hatred that pulsed through her voice, by the depth of her hatred of herself, and by the way she spoke of the Starks as though they were alive and beside her; beside her and tormenting her rather than comforting her.
'I tried to stop it,' Arya was sobbing, holding him so tightly that she hurt him, 'I tried to fix it, I did; I did; I sent him away because I couldn't stay with him after that; I couldn't after all that death, I…I saw no one but Tywin each time I looked at him; or even at myself, you do believe me, don't you?'
'Of course I do,' Kevan said reassuringly.
Seven hells she is a child; what is Jaime thinking of?
'– but then I allowed him to come with me,' she continued, her voice becoming muffled as she pressed her face into his doublet, 'I allowed him to come with me anyway when I shouldn't have; I shouldn't have because he can't fight with his hand and because of everything. But he was so bloody stubborn – he is bloody stubborn, don't you think?'
'I certainly do.'
' - but I thought that it would work, that I could deal with it, that I was strong, that I could go away inside, that my family would make me strong if I wasn't, and do you know what happened? I fucked Jaime before twenty-four hours had passed, and I let him fuck me when I knew that it was wrong, and I enjoyed it, I enjoyed it…'
'Of course you did, my dear,' Kevan whispered, holding her tighter, 'you love him.'
Once again her sobs became like screams against his chest, and he felt her nodding desperately and mumbling something inaudible about Cersei as her anguish seemed to pierce every inch of her from the inside out; each needle of it growing sharper and more painful in its desire to escape, and making her cry harder and more desperately as years and years of sadness came tearing out of her and turning her red as blood; like the voice of every friendless orphan created by this miserable war.
Kevan could not tell how long they sat there, but eventually, minute by shivering minute, he felt her quietening down and growing still as the numbness took over; the detachment; the disbelief that always came after tears.
'I hate him,' she whispered.
'Jaime?'
'Tywin.'
Kevan sighed in relief; his chest aching as he once again remembered that his brother was gone.
'I am incapable of blaming you for that, child,' he said.
The girl's voice was hoarse as she continued to speak.
'How could he do…how could he let...how could he be everything…how could he give me so much…and then take everything away?'
'Tywin spent most of his life doing awful things to the people he loved,' Kevan murmured.
I miss him.
'That's…horrible,' the girl mumbled.
'The best part of him died when Joanna did,' Kevan replied, 'after that, he had no one to tell him no; no one to tell him enough.'
He felt her tense up in anger.
'I am in no way attempting to justify the horror he has inflicted on your House, my dear,' Kevan said calmly, trying to soothe her wrath before it emerged, 'only to tell you that in spite of what he has done, his regard for you was no act.'
'Wasn't it?'
There is hope in her voice, Kevan realised, if I ever meet Tywin in the afterlife, I'll kill him again for this.
'It certainly wasn't,' he continued, 'if anything, it was rather infuriating. 'The girl says this, the girl says the other, the girl is rather bright, you know.''
She gave a small laugh, which he took as an invitation to continue.
'I know that telling you this will be scant comfort now,' Kevan said, 'I only do so because I know, I really do know, that in time, the knowledge will lessen the agony of what you feel.'
She gave a strangled sob.
'I can't feel…anything…anymore.'
'On the contrary; you feel too much. It is very easy to confuse the two.'
Arya sniffled slightly, and pulled gently away from him, wiping her eyes and colouring in embarrassment.
'I'm sorry for this,' she mumbled, 'for being so stupid; I don't even know you - '
'I have four children, my dear,' Kevan replied breezily, 'my youngest is six. I'm used to it.'
The girl gave him a small smile that was vastly appealing by virtue of its obvious rarity.
I can see what Jaime sees in her.
'On that note,' Kevan continued gravely, carefully enunciating each of his words so that she wouldn't forget them, 'I can tell you that no parent on earth is capable of despising their own child, or of wishing unhappiness or death upon them. Ever. Not under any circumstances. Parents want their children to be happy. When you have children of your own, you'll understand.'
'Ser Kevan, I'm not going to have children,' Arya sniffled.
'Of course not,' Kevan agreed, trying hard not to smile, 'my mistake. But please take a moment to think about what I have told you. Because neither Jaime, nor yourself, had any part to play in the Red Wedding, or in the fall of your House. Neither of you is guilty of anything.'
'But –'
'The Red Wedding; the fate of your House…both these things are testaments: testaments to the fact that we live in a ghastly world. Do you not agree?'
'Yes.'
'Good. Then you'll also agree that being happy in spite of the general ghastliness of things is a rare and prodigious achievement.'
'Yes, but –'
'Good. Now listen to me. No parent, alive or dead, would wish such happiness away from their own child because of an unfortunate accident of birth.'
The girl was regarding him with a respectful kind of ridicule.
'That's all very pretty, Ser Kevan,' she said, 'I didn't know it was possible to be a Lannister and an idealist. Thousands of parents hurt their children every day. Parents beat their children. They sell them. They rape them. Sometimes they eat them.'
'Did your parents commit any such atrocities?'
'No. But being happy doesn't make me any less of a traitor to…to the memory of my family and the memory my House.'
'That would only be true if you were in love with Tywin, my dear. Which I sincerely hope was not the case. I won't deny that the old bastard was still uncommonly attractive for his age, but –'
'Ser Kevan!'
The girl was smiling at him now, but he could tell that he had not convinced her.
Give it time. Give her time to think.
'Will you be alright?' he asked, with genuine concern.
'Yes,' she nodded, her head bobbing up and down, 'and thank you…thanks for…'
Kevan took her hand and squeezed it.
'Don't mention it, child,' he said matter-of-factly, suddenly embarrassed, 'now. I advise that you fetch my nephew from the Hall of Heroes and get as far away from here as possible. Varys' little birds will not sleep forever.'
She stood up and wiped her nose on her sleeve.
'How do I get there?'
'Straight to the bottom of the grand staircase and through the intimidating-looking door.'
'Right…thank you.'
She paused for a moment more, then walked to the door and opened it. Every step she took looked like an agony.
'Arya.'
She stopped, and turned to face him.
'Yes?'
'You said you fucked Jaime when you knew that it was wrong.'
She blushed, but didn't reply.
He continued.
'Fucking is only wrong where there is no love.'
She looked at him for a long moment…and closed the door behind her.
The Hall of Heroes was immense, rising up from marble floors to a distant stone ceiling painted with scenes that were impossible to identify with the dark and the space in the way. Arya could not see where the Hall ended, the rows and rows of tombs seeming to stretch out forever and disappear into the black, and though the room did not remotely resemble the humidity and the cold of the crypts beneath Winterfell, its opposite-ness was comforting. All that space above and below her, all that air: it made her feel tiny and insignificant as the dust beneath her feet, and the sensation was very pleasing. There was comfort in being so small: it made one's own fears and griefs seem miniscule and unimportant; diminutive in the face of all that space and air; that freedom.
She found Jaime sitting on his haunches in front of a sarcophagus as rigid and austere as its occupant. It stood like an insult among the elaborately-carved sepulchers that surrounded it: a simple block of pristine white marble, unmarked and undecorated.
Only jesters and singers require applause.
Jaime did not move, or turn around as she approached him from behind, and when she laid a reluctant hand on his shoulder, he jumped, as though he hadn't heard her at all.
'Sorry,' Arya mumbled.
He didn't shrug her hand away.
'I don't feel anything, Stark,' Jaime said, 'is that normal?'
The joy she felt at his words was preposterous. He had called her Stark.
Her hand slipped off his shoulder as he rose to his feet and faced her, the bones of his face sharp and beautiful in the half-light.
'You've been crying,' he observed softly.
'Just a bit,' she responded, trying to sound as unaffected as possible.
There was silence, but it was comfortable rather than awkward. He was looking at her plainly and without pretense, as though the past week of smoke, mirrors and knightly masks had never taken place. She was terrified to move, or even to speak, in case her words made him lock himself up again.
Jaime gestured faintly to the tomb behind him.
'Do you want to –'
'No.'
Someday, maybe. But no. I can't now.
She couldn't look at his face, so she looked at his throat instead, her eyes falling on the place where she had bitten him in her passion.
Guilt twisted her stomach as she reached out and touched him there.
'I'm sorry I marked you like I owned you.'
Jaime stared at her.
'You're sorry for what?'
Arya's stomach churned. Was he being stupid on purpose?
'I'm sorry for acting like I owned you,' she repeated, prodding the bite marks with her index finger.
'Are you apologising for biting me?' Jaime asked, looking thoroughly amused.
'Yes,' Arya persisted, hating him, 'and for being like – '
Jaime folded his arms and cut her off.
'I don't think I can accept your apology, Stark,' he muttered gravely.
Her heart sank horribly.
'Oh.'
'Not when I enjoyed it so much.'
She stared at him, and watched in fury as he bit on his lip to keep from smiling.
'You bastard!' she exclaimed, punching him in one shoulder, and then in the other when he responded by bursting out laughing.
She stood pouting and glowering at him as he guffawed, cursing how disarmingly and ethereally beautiful the smug, irritating son of a bitch could be when he put his mind to it, and she thought of the past week, and the armour and the mask and I've missed him I've missed him I've missed him so much.
'I missed you too, Stark,' Jaime said nonchalantly, 'may all the gods help me. Now let's go before we wake up Varys' little birds. I find that being home does not appeal to me.'
He took hold of her shoulder, spun her around and pushed her, and as they walked away into the dark, bickering every step of the way, Arya realised that she hadn't once said 'I missed you' out loud.
He'd known that she was thinking it.
