Chapter Text
The scent of milky coffee wafted comfortably around him in the cafe-come-bookshop, as he tried to remain intent on the article he didn't really care about. Something about how a government official's (entirely theoretical) liaison with an half-aged obscuro of an incontrovertible attraction, and, frankly, not remotely ignoble merit, affected some obviously already fundamentally dysfunctional proposed legislation.
Pfft.
Henry looked away from the paper and back out the window, it's smooth planes condensating softly the chill air, idly tracing the rivulets of light first spring rain with his eyes, as his brain tried to describe to himself why this reading material was so far from the moment.
"Lord" (he never let anyone call him that if he could preempt it) Henry (no one was of close enough acquaintance for 'christian' names to be less than disingenuous) Eddingston (his most common appellation, not always used indifferently) was by most accounts a serious mannered man. But also by many reports an enjoyable conversationalist, given to readily entertaining the turning of whimsical ideals, even if it was only to eventually turn them to serious thought. A good man to present a hypothetical to.
The journalistic habit inherent to his current reading material, however, that of instead turning serious matters to whimsical narratives of controverted ideals, always failed to divert him as intended. Even if there had been theoretical substance, which he would have likely argued against as being rhetorically impossible in most circumstances that the daily paper presented to himself and the rest of it's luckless readers. Journalistic integrity surely remained somewhere, but he often despaired of it ever reaching his eyes. Even at work, where he should have been privy to at least some.
And then...
A tiny sound caught his wandering attention; the barest indication of a sniffle, yet somehow inflected with the varyingly intoned sobs of diverse sorrows. He started to turn and point fully bodily towards the sound, like the instinct of a thoroughbred hunting hound, but caught the act before it became obvious and intrusive in its impropriety.
From the corner of his eye he investigated the source of the microscopic noise. A young woman, looking not at the book resting open and unattended in her lap, but over the top of it into the middle distance above her knees. And whatever she was staring at in her mind's eye was bringing silent tears down her soft cheeks like the rivulets of soft rain down the window.
It was like the old cliche of missing a step in a staircase, and he was frozen mid-fall. She was crying. Suddenly it was the only thing that really mattered anywhere forever, and yet he couldn't seem to act on the thought in any way. Something Had to be done; she was crying, it was overwhelmingly unacceptable, it shouldn't be allowed that this vision, cut so expertly from a crystalline base of raw god, should ever have any reason to weep, it could NOT continue, and yet he remained motionless at a loss for how to prevent it.
How could he Dare do anything? Who was he to intrude in any way upon anything personal to this living starlight? Was there any way he could fail to be offensive to her just by speaking in her presence? A strange man, twice her age at the very least, stuffy-looking and probably well more than a decade behind the fashion, looming from his height down his long nose...
She stirred, and was somehow even more lovely in even slight animation. Too late, he realized it was his gaze that she sensed and was glancing about seeking the source of, and he had no time to compose himself before she looked up to the window that he sat by and caught him staring openly, exactly as he had intended not to. His blood rushed, and he felt sudden waves of heat rising from the neat collar of his classic suit.
"Forgive me," he blurted desperately, heart thundering, "forgive me, I would never wish to intrude, I just, I- I mean, that is to say... Are..." He gulped, steeling himself, "Is everything alright, madam?"
He almost succeeded in keeping the desperate anxious curl all the way off the edge of his tone. Nearly. There was a drum in his ears as his foolish, oaf-worthy words hung in the air for an eternal moment.
And then like the first dawn in the universe, a smile spread over the horizon of her lips, it's edges dimpling her tear glistened cheeks, and was for a moment his whole perfect universe before it disappeared behind her hand with a little laugh that was clearly self deprecating. It had to be: he was certain to his marrow that there was no universe where this creature had a joke at another's expense, even a slight one.
She composed herself and lowered her hand to speak, while Henry almost forgot to listen for joy of the fragments of amusement that lingered in her polite and friendly expression. With a small delicate gesture that seemed to him the most elegant dance ever performed, she indicated the forgotten book in her lap.
"Just-" she suppressed a light resurgent giggle that he would have given anything to hear fully expressed, again hiding her perfect mouth with her perfect hand... He felt delirious in the sight of her. "Just fictional characters, struggling with life," she gave a dismissive shrug and favored him with a small reassuring smile that all was well. He felt all could be well forever if she could be smiling about it. She gave a little shake of her head, jostling the soft waves of her dark subtly curving hair that tumbled over her shoulder from the elegant pinning at the back. "I apologise; I didn't mean to disturb you."
He wanted to jump in front of a double decker rather than let her think she could possibly do such a thing by any human means. Indeed he nearly jumped forward all the way out of his seat in his eager negation, "Not at all, not at all, erm, please, not in the least," he faltered, unable to think of anything to say besides; "I'm um, so sorry to have pried," which, as he said it, he realized was an outright lie. To his shame, he couldn't muster an ounce of regret for intruding, for anything that had made even a second of her life have anything to do with him.
Another of her precious reassuring smiles. He'd never done anything in his life to be worthy, he was sure. "It was very kind of you," she argued, but it couldn't have been, he knew; not when he was this eager and greedy for the flawless sight and sound of her. It must have been selfish.
She absently wiped her tears with another beautifully refined gesture, and gave another little shake her head and self effacing laugh. This time, with one hand marking her page and the other occupied with the diamonds in the corners of her eyes, her laughter remained unhidden, and he had a glimpse of her teeth and the slightly wet gleam of her curving lips. His heart flew. "I didn't mean to make a scene in the coffee line," she demurred.
She could damn well make any size of scene anywhere she liked, and Henry, who had never hurt a living thing in his life, and been something of a coward in his brief term as a soldier, would kill anyone who took issue, with his bare hands. "No no no, my fault I'm sure, certainly you were so-" he frantically groped for a word. None in any vernacular was up to the task of applying to her. He gave up, hating himself more than ever in his life, "- unobtrusive; I shouldn't have called attention. Forgive me, dear lady," and he very nearly kept all the roiling desperation out of that one too. Nearly.
This smile was warmer, and he felt he'd been frozen his whole life in the face of it. "For inquiring after tears? Only if you insist, Mr...?"
It took him an embarrassing half second to remember what he was supposed to say and do next; "Eddingston," he replied, manners kicking into autopilot and finding himself already out of his seat to offer his hand, for one such as her to touch, almighty decorum driving him to where his heart wouldn't have dared. "Henry Eddingston," he supplied, belatedly remembering that he had more than one, like most people. And with an honesty unusual to the phrase, he added "At your service, -" his eyes flicked to her ring finger and his stomach flipped to find it empty, "- miss...?"
She took his hand, and any shred of composure he still had almost broke at the softness of her skin. The overwhelming privilege of it sat a tremendous guilt in him, and he did not dare to bend and lay a courteous kiss upon it, even though her presence made him feel the least of lords attending upon the queen of queens. Instead they shook, politely.
"Soleya Artram," she told him, and as she gave him a polite smile he found himself returning it, cringing inwardly at his audacity even as he celebrated the unexpected fortune of an introduction.
"A pleasure," Henry considered this possibly the understatement of his lifetime.
Soleya gave another little laugh as she pulled back her hand to wipe a remaining droplet from the corner of her eye, her elegant additions to the gesture contriving to comment on the irony of saying this when meeting a woman crying in public. But she said "Likewise," and, indicating his other hand, "I hope I haven't taken you away from anything terribly interesting."
He looked down to find out what she was talking about, to find the forgotten wretched article in his hand. He'd been completely oblivious that he was still holding the offending thing, unfolded and hanging from his mindless grasp. "Um... Well, er... Actually..." Henry chuckled apprehensively. He didn't want to describe this drivel to that goddess, one so clearly invested in a worthy narrative as he sat and slogged through this rot. It would instantly inspire him to excuses.
In a fit of fancy, he tore the paper in half, and then as Soleya burst into peals of bright gay laughter, he tore the pieces in half again, just to prolong the joke received so unexpectedly well. He nearly got carried away and tossed them over his shoulder just to clown for her, but manners prevailed and he placed them back down on his table.
He placed his hands behind his back and looked down, half suppressing a massive grin as the fit of giggles she hid with her hand died down. He was half embarrassed at his outburst, but still, he couldn't deny, quite pleased with himself.
"Perhaps you could recommend something," he heard himself say, and had to hold his fist tightly behind him to keep from stuffing it into his mouth in regret. He quickly tried to cover his too-forward direct interest, "Something more-" gesturing to her and her book, feeling gangly and awkward in motion compared to her grace, "... Engaging."
Why in the name of god had he chosen that word???? Henry had a sudden desperate wish to melt into the ground and spend eternity as an inert flooring tile.
But of course he was not surprised to find Miss Artram to be all the good he suspected of her, and she indulged an old man such as himself in conversation. "Well, this one will be lovely; if the ending turns out right, that is," she looked down at the book held in her lap with the air of a parent warning their child 'not to worry me like that again, you cheeky bugger'.
"That's important, then?" He felt a burke for contributing so little, but his desire to draw her out into saying anything, anything at all, had him slipping into his rhetoric-mode of speaking.
"Oh, of course," the gaze turned warm, as if fondly imagining the aforementioned child all grown up, then her eyes came up to his, glowing with a golden warmth of hope and a gleaming golden shade of light brown. He could imagine a creator making that shade just to suit her perfection. "After all," she grinned, and he felt shot-through with the honest, innocent exuberance of the sight of it, full and uncovered, "Doesn't everyone want a happy ending?"
Images flashed trying to conjure a happy ending of hers which could possibly be worthy of receiving the happy ending of such a privilege in return. How handsome and strong and good of a husband, how beautiful and brilliant and loving of children, how great and lauded and beneficent a success, how scenic and suited and cozy a home, how grand and precious and personal of treasures.
He had none of this to give her, but with disgust at his own nerve he found himself thinking that it was just possible there was space in the background of these pictures for an unobtrusive old gentleman acquaintance, occasionally indulged to meet for coffee and discuss literally matters, who could perhaps politely inquire after her affairs and see to it that any impediment to her desires is... Well.. is... Is damn well being intervened with somehow. Somehow, something, anything, to ensure she got it, whatever it was, the happy ending whose thought sourced the purity of that beaming smile, greatest treasure of all those he had collected today to covet in his memory, even if he never saw her again.
"Perhaps something with a happy ending, then."
Soleya's eyes twinkled. She gave a little nod and indicated the seat opposite hers, his emotions rioting at the unbargained-for invitation, tucking her cafe receipt into her page and trading her book for another from her bag, " If you don't mind a little sadness along the way, this one turns out really lovely..."