Chapter Text
She’s never liked trains.
Not when they kept her up late into the night on the freight line running outside her window at the orphanage and not when she was older and accustomed to travelling in the sort of comfort that her money afforded her. But for this journey, where she isn't entirely sure what she’s going to find at the end, she wanted to pace herself.
It's not an urge that she’s used to, but when it came to booking the flights she’d felt— hesitant. Another feeling she isn't used to. So she’d googled it and as it turns out Paris to Moscow can be done with relative ease by train, and now here she is. First class of course, because, well because she’s not completely lost sense who she is despite— everything.
It's not airline first class but, she concedes, it's not entirely terrible and she sips an acceptable cup of coffee whilst staring out from her seat onto the platform at Gare Du Nord.
She’s missed France she realises. Barcelona has the sun and the buildings and the women, sure, but there's something about Paris with all of its elegance seeped in dirt and grime. It’s always suited her. So it probably makes sense that the journey back to Russia should start here.
It was that stupid baby that got her thinking about it. That stupid baby and all its stupid family so overjoyed to see it again. She’d scoffed at the melodrama of it all and then wondered about whether anyone had ever been that full of happiness and love at the thought of seeing her.
It was a stupid trail of thought to start down because all thoughts of love and any of that shit inevitably lead to her.
And she is not thinking about her.
This isn't about her, she sniffs dismissively. So much of her life now has been overrun by Eve, but not this. She doesn’t get to have this, not if Villanelle doesn't want to give it to her. Which she doesn’t. Obviously.
Paris has Eve smeared across it of course and she shifts in her seat at the memory. But her family doesn't belong to Eve, all that misery is hers and hers alone. Who knows, maybe she’ll arrive at the house where they are living now and she’ll have remembered everything wrong, maybe they’ll be glad to see her. Maybe there was a reason why she was— left. Her chest feels tight in a way that has become familiar, a souvenir from Rome she’s rationalised. She wasn’t like this before, Eve might have left with a bullet wound but she isn't the only one to bear scars.
She breathes out slowly to calm the feeling and takes another sip of coffee.
There’s some movement at the head of the carriage. Her eyes scan the crowd in the way that has become natural. A man with a suitcase which seems light for its size, a woman with good shoes and an average bag. Nothing remotely interesting.
A man walks down the aisle next to her reeking of smoke. She thinks of Eve, of the lighter she had found in that awful little flat, and tries to remember whether the smell had clung to her clothes as she’d lent down over her on the bus right before—
She puts down her cup on the table in front of her.
It's hard to know what to feel about that kiss. Annoyingly at the time she’d all but swooned. She rubs her fingers impatiently across her forehead at the memory, God she hopes Eve hadn’t seen that because now she’s had time to think about it she’s— she’s actually kind of pissed off about it.
She’d gone there to show Eve that what happened in Rome was behind her. She’d put it behind her. Eve and her stupid theories about what Villanelle understands or doesn’t. All those times she had closed her eyes and seen a body in the dust only to find her chest constricted leaving her fighting to keep her breathing steady. All of that was gone. She doesn’t think about it any more. Eve had brought it on herself.
The tightness in her chest is back but she pushes past it, reminds herself that she was a victim that day too. It doesn’t matter anyway, she doesn’t think about it anymore and she’s fine. Completely fine.
Fine until Eve had charged at her all fury and fists, and suddenly she was on top of Eve and then that stupid too rushed kiss and too rough headbut and Villanelle had— swooned.
She cringes at the thought of it.
Eve had kissed her. A shit kiss but a kiss nonetheless. Eve will tell herself it was nothing more than a distraction obviously, but that would be bullshit and Villanelle knows it now. She knew it before Rome too, she forgot for a while after….. what happened, but now she knows it again.
Eve feels something for her.
Ok, so maybe there is a small part of her which still finds that knowledge swoon worthy. But the other part, the part she tries to bring to the fore now is pissed off that Eve would never just do that without being able to blame it on something else. She’s been there before of course, confessions on a bed in Paris posed as a tool to lower her guard, jealousy in London palmed off as professional distaste and now a kiss on a bus but only as a distraction. Please.
She exhales through her nose and reminds herself that she isn’t thinking about Eve, this is meant to be about her.
She checks her phone, and stretches her legs into the footwell of the seat opposite her. A trick she had learnt from Konstantin, don’t want to sit next to someone? Just buy the seats around you and enjoy the solitude. He’s not an extravagant man, but she’d never known him to tolerate discomfort while travelling. A habit she’d inherited from him.
Can you inherit behaviour from people who don’t share your blood?
Knowing her luck that would be a thing and she’ll end up with a penchant for too big overcoats. She shudders at the thought. But if she’s stuck with a genetic inheritance afforded by blood she’s started to wonder who it might have come from. It’s the first time in a long time she’s thought about it; the root of these parts of herself which set her apart from other people.
It’s something else she has not thought about often, the reason why killing used to be so much fun was mostly irrelevant. It just was. A rush of power and the supreme satisfaction that comes when you are really good at something. She’d never cared if this came from her Mother, Father or a distant grandparent who chopped limbs instead of wood. It was just in her and that was how it was, so why bother questioning it? But on her way back there now, she indulges herself a little and wonders whether she’ll arrive at the house and find that there’s someone else who might just get it, someone who is the same.
She thinks of Eve and then immediately stops herself.
When she focuses again on the world outside the window she’s surprised she hadn't noticed the train pulling from the station. The tower blocks of the parisian suburbs whip past the window and she relaxes back into her seat.
There’s some movement behind her, the carriage door sliding open, she continues to stare out the window. The hurried sound of steps approaching from behind that slow when they near her.
She can see in the reflection on the window who it is.
There’s the usual twist in her chest, excitement and apprehension indistinguishable when it comes to her. Annoyance too of course, this wasn’t meant to be about her, but when has there ever been a part of herself that Eve hasn’t wanted to dissect and possess. Not that she’d ever admit to the possession, but without that what could be the point of knowing another person in the way she said she wanted to?
Presumably she knows what this journey is? Or maybe not. Maybe she wants more public transportation based kissing? Villanelle concedes that’s probably less likely. Oh well.
Eve stands, still slightly behind her but makes no attempt to get Villanelle’s attention, she imagines Eve’s pursuit to find her full of rush but little thought or planning and now faced with Villanelle again she is unsure how to hit the right tone. But Villanelle is feeling impatient and not in the least inclined to let Eve dictate the terms. Again.
She thinks of her trip planned with solitude and introspection (and Netflix) and sighs.
Fine, whatever.
“Hi Eve.”
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