Noticing the train station clock at Liège made everything stop for a beat or two. I will always think of you when I see a Swiss railway clock. It’s time travel, back to that warmest hour in Cannes train station, where you took my hand, admitted to loving these clocks, held on for a minute, as if I might run off too soon, time-checking my pulse reaction to love declarations. In that second, I held your hand more urgently, as if we had not much time left before departure. Motionless we stood, faces and hands synchronised, telling only what needed to be told in that moment. I loved you then for seeing beauty in a station clock, for seeing it in me. Sooner than we could ever have imagined, our time would be up, departures announced, no further delays. Now, I smile, remembering you in innumerable train stations throughout the world, where we ran our hearts as robust, precise and elegant as a Swiss railway clock.
