Page 1 of Healing Hearts on Thistledown Lane, Part #4

The last thing Fraser expected to see on the concourse of Euston station was a face from school.

It was a week before Christmas, the Met Office had issued a weather warning for imminent snow, and there was a feverish buzz hanging over the jostling crowds scanning the departure boards.

Some trains had been cancelled, others were delayed, and it seemed to Fraser as though half of London was trying to escape the city before the blizzard began.

Judging from the tense expressions of those around him, there would be a stampede when the whirring boards eventually revealed the platform of the Edinburgh train.

Elbows would be deployed. Every upturned face was grim with the expectation of battle.

The only person not staring upwards was a dark-haired girl of around Fraser’s age, who stood a few metres away with her nose in a book, seemingly oblivious to the simmering tension among her fellow travellers.

He recognised her instantly – until the summer, they’d attended the same school.

How many times had he seen her through the window of the art block, as he’d passed by on his way to the drama studio?

They’d shared some classes too, before study choices had sent them in different directions.

And now here she was, out of place but with the same otherworldly serenity that had so often caught his eye at school, her head bowed as she read.

Her stillness stood out even more among the grumbling and muttering of the Euston crowd.

Fraser guessed she must be waiting for the same train he was, probably heading back to Edinburgh for Christmas after her first term at uni. He hadn’t known she was in London.

He was just debating whether to disturb her when the departures board began to rattle.

An expectant rustling joined the clickety-clack, like the soft hiss of a brush on the snare beneath the louder percussion in an orchestra, as the assembled travellers got ready to move.

For a second or two, everyone held their breath.

Fraser’s own attention switched momentarily upwards.

And then the whirring stopped and the spell broke.

Several hundred people seemed to sigh, moving as one towards platform 15.

Fraser went with them, glancing over his shoulder to see if the girl was near, but there was no sign of her.

By the time he located the correct carriage and settled into his seat, he was beginning to wonder whether he’d imagined her.

It had often been that way at school – a fleeting glimpse that had ensnared him for a heartbeat or two and then let go.

If the train hadn’t been so busy, he could have tried to find her, but he knew the aisles would be too full to allow that.

He might run into her at Waverley station, once the train reached Edinburgh, but he didn’t hold much hope.

She was a will-o’-the-wisp, there one moment and vanished the next, a glimmering girl always tantalisingly beyond his reach, even when they’d shared the same classroom.

And who was to say she’d have known him, had she looked up from her book to see him among the crowd?

He suspected she would simply have frowned, wondering at this vaguely familiar stranger with the tentative smile, before returning to her book with the same gentle indifference she’d shown throughout their school years.

As the train jolted and rumbled out of London, Fraser pulled out his battered study copy of Henry V , determined to force the encounter from his thoughts.

He was heading home for Christmas, where the old St Ignatius crowd would be waiting to catch up and celebrate the festive season.

There was a faint possibility she would be there, he realised, although he couldn’t recall her hanging out at the Strawberry in the past.

With a sigh, he turned his attention to the highlighted passage of the text and silently ran through the lines for next term’s assignment.

By the time the train reached Watford, the dark-haired girl had slipped away once more.