Her bitter words had less bite and Percy found himself at a loss how to explain without angering her further. He had wanted to tell her that it was okay, that she could call him Percy despite all that happened, that he was happy to see her. But then she’d gone and apologized, had turned from him as if she wished for no further conversation when all he had wanted was to see her smile, to find something to say that would travel over the distance of a decade.

As he considered this a silence fell between, each for a moment lost in their own thoughts. Maggie’s words tripped between them and for the first time he looked at Maggie. Took in her black dress, her drawn features, the look of almost… desperation and sadness. What had happened to her? He wondered, already feeling for her despite knowing those years were gone.

“I don’t know.” He answered truthfully, the words falling like stones into a pond, each a splash punctuating their present. For a moment he let that linger, searching her face to see how she would react, he owed her more of an explanation than that.

With a sigh he pushed himself off the wall and stood before her. “I thought-” Percy found himself already stumbling over his words. He tried again, “I thought when you apologized that you wished to remain as strangers.” He shrugged, one hand in his pocket, the other on his cane. “I never wished you harm.” The words were almost a whisper, the tender whisper of a lover left behind.