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The sun was shining, the sky was blue - it was a beautiful spring day, but Sandor Clegane was miserable.
To be fair, he was usually miserable, but today was worse, much worse. It was bad enough that he was being forced to go to therapy as part of the diversion program after the incident in the bar, but now that bleeding-heart therapist wanted him to try an experiment.
So what if he’d beat up some cunt who had it coming; why should he be punished for that? Just because he happened to be drunk at the time didn’t mean he was wrong. Still, he said he’d do the therapy and Sandor was a man of his word.
The therapist, E.B., was impossible to hate, and god knows he’d tried. Nothing could shake the man’s serenity, not Sandor’s sullenness, nor anger, nor insults, nor silence; the guy was immovable. And so, here he was on this beautiful day, listening to the birds singing and sitting on a bench in the park as happy people walked by or sat on blankets and ate picnic food, and children laughed and played. It was torture.
“The whole world hates me,” he’d told E.B., and the man had just smiled - smiled - at him.
“It seems to me that you hate the world,” he replied. Sandor grunted.
“Life shit on me first,” said Sandor. “I’m just paying it back.”
“Are you sure about that?” countered E.B. “Seems to me you’re just perpetuating that cycle by staying mad.”
Sandor had narrowed his eyes and folded his arms across his chest but said nothing.
“I want you to try something this weekend. An experiment of sorts,” said the therapist. “Can you do that?”
“Whatever,” grumbled Sandor. “What do I have to do?”
E.B. smiled in that way that made Sandor want to wring his neck.
“Try smiling,” he said. “Just smile at people and see what happens. You don’t even have to talk to them. Report back to me at our session next week.”
With that the session ended and Sandor stumped out to his motorcycle and went home. Riding was the one time when he felt truly free, and the place where he was best able to think. He thought about what E.B. had said. Maybe he was right. It was worth a shot, at least.
That was Wednesday; today was Saturday and he’d been sitting on this stupid hard bench for an hour already, smiling like a fool at anyone who looked his way. So far he’d gotten confusion, alarm, a dog barking at him and three little kids who cried.
So much for the experiment, he thought. He could go back to therapy on Wednesday and tell that smiley cunt he’d been wrong - it wasn’t Sandor, the world really did hate him.
He got up off the bench and was about to leave and abandon this experiment gone wrong when something caught his eye - the sun glinting off the reddest hair he’d ever seen. He stopped in his tracks and stared as a tall, curvy woman with blue eyes, fair skin, and that gorgeous hair stooped over to smell a daffodil. Her long hair slipped forward over one shoulder, framing her face like some kind of goddess in a painting.
The woman closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of the flower, and a warm, gentle smile graced her lips. Sandor was so absorbed in the scene before him that he didn’t even realize he was smiling his first genuine smile all day, maybe ever.
The redhead straightened up and opened her eyes. When she saw him she smiled even wider and shrugged as if to say ‘Spring, what can you do?’ She tilted her head and seemed to study him for a moment before walking toward him. Sandor felt panic beginning to well up in his chest, but then she was sticking out her hand to shake and introducing herself and he responded without thinking.
“Good afternoon! Beautiful day, isn’t it?” she said. “I’m Sansa.”
Sandor reached out and took her hand, looking down at their clasped hands for a moment before raising his eyes to her face. She was smiling up at him and he smiled back.
“Sandor,” he replied, giving her hand a gentle squeeze. “The most beautiful I’ve ever seen.”
