Have we met before?

“Have we met before?” he asked, tapping her shoulder as the distant rumble of a departing train echoed through the station. A knowing grin tugged at his lips. His eyes lingered on her as though he was searching for something he thought he could remember, something just out of reach.

He had been contemplating whether to approach the girl. His usual train home was delayed, and in his search for further information, he had seen her.

Her hair swayed slightly across her face as a nearby train rushed by. Her smile widened as she laughed at something her friend had said. That laugh—he couldn’t look away. It had been the final push. He quickly made his decision.

He wasn’t usually forthcoming, but something about this girl had gotten his interest in a way he couldn’t have foreseen.

Something about her had felt oddly familiar. Like a déjà vu that had followed him into the real world. He couldn’t say from where or when he remembered her. He just knew that they weren’t supposed to be strangers. There was a sort of longing, a pull towards her, perhaps it was this particular feeling that made him ignore his racing heart, walk up, tap her shoulder, and ask. “Have we met before?”

“Have we met before?”

The question cut through the hum of conversation, catching her off guard. Her laugh faltered as she turned to see him, a stranger with a curious grin and searching eyes.

She narrowed her own slightly as she took in the sight of him. She didn’t know whether to be flattered or not, whether she should encourage him, or shoot it down. She braced herself for what she assumed was another clichéd pickup line.

But something about his tone, the slight hesitation, the almost confused curiosity—it made her pause. There was something unsettlingly familiar in his face. She didn’t remember him exactly, but she didn’t not remember him either. It was like he had scratched a part of her brain she didn’t know she had, like a childhood memory coming back to life. She felt her cheeks heat, as she couldn’t recall from where she knew him, but then again, neither could he, so she answered cautiously.

“It seems so?”

His face eased, his smile softening. They stood there for a moment, two people hovering between memory and imagination. They both grinned at each other, and as the conversation grew, so did the hours. The station clock chimed without them hearing, the last train departing without them getting on. A modest bench beside the rails was where their new beginning took root. What began as smalltalk turned into stories of childhood dreams and places they wished to visit. The station emptied, but they stayed; the trains flew by, while they sat. It was as if the world had disappeared around them.

Her laughter had echoed through the empty station, his voice softening as he spoke. Quickly, ideas became reality, wishes became travels, and desires became promises.

Time, as it tends to, moved gently at first, then all at once. The station became a distant memory, and their conversation a story.

They built a life—messy, honest, whole. They built a home, exciting and new at first, warm and familiar later. There were quiet seasons and sudden storms, long days that blurred, and nights that felt like they might last forever. Some moments slipped by unnoticed while others lingered, echoing louder than they had any right to. It was a life filled with laughs and shouts, burnt dinners and surprise Sunday mornings. A life full of memories—good as well as bad—but all of them shared, all of them theirs.

They never did figure out where they knew each other from, but it stopped mattering; all that mattered was that they had found one another.

In a life where love had bloomed, time was their only obstacle—and as it always does, time eventually caught up with them.

“Have we met before?”

His voice was quiet, now tinged with confusion and longing. Stories had been left in the creases around his eyes; etched there by years of smiles, sorrows, and sunlit days.

His gaze found a woman’s, her hair, like his, carried the grace of winter, but her face had a spark, something fascinating, with a certain familiarity to it.

Her eyes reflected the dim light, tears gathering before tracing slowly down her face. He hadn’t meant to upset her, he just wanted to know her. She looked so familiar, like someone from a story once told to him, but he couldn’t place her. He wished he could. He was trying to grasp a memory that felt just beyond his reach.

“Have we met before?”

The question shattered her heart, not because it was cruel, but because it was sincere. He meant it—just as he had all those years ago.

It gave her more pain than he would ever know; the words tore her apart inside and out, and she could not stop the tears filling her eyes. It was the first words that had ever been spoken between them.

She looked into his eyes, but they were searching for something they no longer held. They did not recognize her. Each time she hoped to find what once lived there, but the eyes she had loved for a lifetime stared back without knowing her.

He didn’t remember their laughs. Their fights. The life they had built between those moments.

Though he had forgotten their life together, she thought he would still remember her.

He had, after all, remembered her before they had even met.

She smiled through the tears, reaching for his hand: “It seems so.”

His fingers curled slowly, cautiously around hers.

And as she saw the conversation again dwindle from his memory, quietly slipping from his mind, she gave him a tentative smile.

He looked around the room, taking in their home, before finding her eyes. He blinked, confused. Furrowed his brow and asked once more.

“Have we met before?”