For a while, Jack didn't want to respond. It wasn't so much an active decision that it was simply he got lost in his own thoughts. The past, how things were. He'd done a lot not to think of that time. Tried hard; he simply couldn't at times. It was hard, and it was painful.

And it made him feel just that little more alone, when he recalled how for a while he was something almost happy.

But then the realisation dawned, the question she'd asked him, and so he spoke, answering but only indirectly.

"I couldn't say it back. I wasn't ready to let him..."