I meant to keep that promise...I wanted more than anything to catch you there in time.

James pined after the memory quietly, as he sat with his harmonica to his lips by the window of Miss Amberflaw's little apartment, quietly watching the cold afternoon rain chime against the glass.

Emily paused at her hemming of James's new Target trousers.

The wailing of her sewing machine coming to a gradual stop when the soft airy notes of James's harmonica broke her deep concentration.

Captivated by the first few notes of a song she'd heard before, but had never heard it played with so much heart, that it sounded almost hauntingly intimate for her.

Nearer, my God, to Thee

Nearer to Thee

E'en though it be a cross

That raiseth me

And the slow, beautiful way James made his harmonica sing the dark timbre of those melancholy notes made something in her heartsick, as she looked up from her work to listen to him.

Realizing James still hadn't moved an inch from her sliding door since an hour ago.

The officer dressed casually in a cozy alabaster henley on top of dark navy dress trousers. Leaning his back against her bookcase, as he quietly looked out her sliding door at the gray late morning outside. His morning "cuppa" left untouched and chilled near his navy socked feet. And knowing what meticulous attention James Moody always paid to his personal grooming, his bare feet struck Millie as-

'Odd...No fancy shoes today?'

In fact, it seemed James wasn't his usual basket of cheer since hot coco last night.

Besides a quiet "Good morning to you, miss" and a "Fancy a cuppa, love?" James hadn't said much else to her, once he found that spot by her sliding door.

"I know that song," Emily said to him gently, once his harmonica had gone silent again. "Do you remember where you heard it?"

"The last one, it was," James answered her distantly. "Just before she went down that night."

And feeling so sorry that there was nothing she could say to make him forget the memory of it again, or bring Titanic back, Emily did the only thing she knew best in that moment.

Dragging the thread she was working on through the sewing machine's thread cutter, and gathering up a thimble, needle, and navy spool to continue her work by hand. Walking over to the sliding door and joining the officer cross-legged on the floor beside him, as she watched the rain fall silently out their window view.

"I'm not used to you being so quiet like this," she said to him. "I love hearing you talk. Tell me more about 1912."

"What do you fancy hearing, miss?"

"Anything. I don't really care what," Emily said. "Everything always sounds so glamourous and simple where you're from. Definitely a lot easier than the way things are here."

"Not everything, miss," James answered her quietly.

"I'm just surprised you haven't asked me more questions yet."

"How do you mean?" James asked her. "I love asking you questions. Had I my way about it, I'd hear you talk about even water for hours on end. There's not a question I wouldn't like to ask you, if it gave me another chance to listen to ye explain plain and simple things."

"Well, more about the future, I mean," she said. "Isn't that what anyone else would ask? Don't you want to know what happened 10 or 20 years after Titanic sank? Lottery numbers? World Wars? Women's rights? That kind of thing?"

"Oh, right," James nodded. "No, miss, I can't say I'd like to know any of what the future holds-or once held, I should say, after I was gone."

"Is that so?" Millie found herself more intrigued by his answer. "You're not even a little curious about what to expect, if you ever figure out how to go back there."

"Of course, as anyone would be," James admitted, as he absently toyed with his harmonica in one hand. "But I'd rather go on not knowing, I suppose."

"Aren't you tempted?"

"Well, look at me, miss. I am proof that in only a blink of an eye, the future can change unexpectedly," he explained. "And so, I feel it really would serve no good knowing what's to come in the world, had I lived after Titanic. Because the only thing that matters to me now is how I treasure all that is my present. And I should say, I rather like the way it's all going for me now."

"Hm," Emily nodded, pushing her sewing needle back into his hem. "I guess you're right, James."

James turned back to the window, his blue eyes taking on a grayer shade in the light of the cloudy overcast.

"Perhaps it's for the best that you called off today," he told her. "I'd only worry for you...walking alone in this storm with no one to accompany you."

"Why would you?" Millie asked him, drawing out her needle from another stitch. "I've walked alone through plenty of storms before."

"Aye, of course you have, stout as you are," he finally gave into a smile. "Even so...how does it rain so often here?"

"It's not always this bad, trust me," Millie assured him, cutting the last thread. "Just ever since you showed up here. It's like you brought all the rain from Scarborough with you. I'm ok with that, though. I like it better when it rains."

"It's rather melancholy, I'd say."

"How so?"

"Not the rain itself, that is,' James said. "It just reminds me so much of home."

"Is that what's been on your mind all day? Home?"

"Suppose a part of me will always miss that old life of mine," James confessed. "I can't ever put it into words."

Millie looked thoughtfully out at the rain, trying to imagine for herself that place that he loved so dearly.

"I'm grateful to you though, miss," James broke the silence again. "You're as good at listening as you are at explaining things."

Millie smiled back at him.

"Don't worry, James," she assured the officer. "The sun will come back again."

And how could he go on feeling so mardy, when she smiled so much like the sunlight he was missing?

"Anno it must," he answered the Miss lightly. "And when it does, I'll be here waiting."

And watching Millie neatly fold away his freshly hemmed trousers, another idea struck James.

"Do tell me one thing about the future though," James said to her. "Are there anymore colored moving pictures like your historical dramas?"

"I'm glad you asked," Millie told him. "I was just thinking it's about time we got out of this gloomy apartment. Walk with me?"