The train station smelled like sea salt and old metal.
Elio stepped off the carriage, one hand in his coat pocket, the other clutching a small book — The Little Prince, her favorite.
He didn't bring flowers. Didn't prepare a speech. Didn't even tell her he was coming.
He simply followed the sketch she sent.
Two cups.
One full.
One waiting.
And something about it said:
Come.
---
Aurélie stood behind the counter of the bookstore that afternoon, helping a boy choose his first poetry book.
She smiled at his shyness, remembered what it was like to be fourteen and afraid of your own voice.
When he left, the bell above the door jingled again.
She looked up.
And time cracked.
Elio stood there.
Not like a knight with roses or a fool with desperation.
Just… him.
A little tired.
A little thinner.
But holding her name in his eyes like a prayer.
---
They didn't run to each other.
Didn't kiss.
Didn't say, Finally.
They just stood in the middle of the room — surrounded by books, and dust, and possibilities — and breathed the same air again.
It was enough.
---
"Coffee?" she asked, after a long silence.
Elio nodded. "Only if you still take yours with cinnamon."
She smiled. "Only if you still hate sugar."
---
They walked to the pier where the sky hung low over the water, soft and golden like melted honey.
Aurélie sat on the edge, feet dangling, while Elio stood behind her, letting the wind brush through his thoughts.
"You didn't write back after my last letter," she said, quietly.
"I didn't know how," he replied. "It felt like the right words hadn't been invented yet."
She nodded.
"Did you come here for answers?"
"No," he said. "I came to ask a question."
She looked up.
He sat beside her, pulling The Little Prince from his coat.
"I reread it last night," he said. "The fox part."
Her heart trembled.
"You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed."
"I'm not here to tame you," he said. "Not to trap you, or hold you, or even take you back."
He opened the book to a torn page and handed it to her.
It wasn't the fox quote.
It was this one:
> "And when your sorrow is comforted… you'll be content that you have known me."
She read it twice.
Then looked at him.
"I'm not content," she whispered.
"I don't want to be."
---
They didn't talk for a while after that.
The water below moved gently, like a sleeping creature breathing.
Birds flew overhead.
The sky turned bluer than it had been in days.
And then, almost without meaning to, she reached out her hand.
Elio took it.
Not as a claim.
Not as a victory.
Just… as a beginning.
---
Later, at her apartment, he noticed the drawings on the wall.
New ones.
Paintings of storms and fields and faceless boys with galaxies in their chests.
He didn't ask who they were.
He just said, "Your lines have changed."
She nodded. "So have my hands."
"And your heart?"
Aurélie walked to the windowsill, where a single potted lily bloomed — delicate, stubborn, and somehow still alive.
She turned to him.
"I didn't want to come back to you half-built," she said.
"You didn't."
"I wanted to find out who I was without you — before finding out who I could be with you."
"And?" he asked.
She took a deep breath.
"I'm still learning. But now I want you in the picture."
---
That night, they didn't sleep together.
They didn't fall into bed or into some reckless replay of passion.
They made tea.
Sat on the floor.
Talked about everything and nothing.
And at one point, when the sky outside started turning purple, she said, "I kept your mug."
He smiled. "I kept your scarf."
They laughed.
And cried.
But it wasn't a sad kind of crying.
It was the kind that washes old dust off the soul.
---
In the days that followed, they didn't rush anything.
They didn't announce anything to the world.
They went to the farmer's market.
They read to each other on the grass.
They painted — separately, but in the same room.
And every now and then, one would catch the other looking, smiling softly, as if trying to memorize a moment that wasn't asking to be remembered — only lived.
---
One evening, Margaux (the old woman who owned the bookstore) asked Elio, "Are you the one who made her stop crying at sunsets?"
He looked up from a stack of books. "I don't know. Maybe."
Margaux nodded. "Then stay a while. She paints better when you're near."
---
Elio never asked if she loved him again.
And Aurélie never asked if he waited for her.
Some truths didn't need repeating.
Some love, once weathered, didn't need proving.
Only tending.
Like a garden after winter.
---
They sat by the fireplace one night, knees touching, hands quietly brushing between page turns.
Aurélie closed her book. Looked at him.
"Do you think the worst is over?"
Elio shook his head.
"I think we just survived the prologue."
She smiled. "I like that."
"Me too."
Then, softly: "Do you want to stay?"
He met her gaze.
"I never really left."
---
The sky outside swirled in blues and silvers.
And for the first time in a long time, they stopped trying to define what they were.
They simply were.
And it was more than enough.