In compartment seven sat a man with a box of cakes and a woman with shoes wrapped in paper. The train was forty minutes late, then another twenty. The woman was named Una. The man introduced himself as Mirza and offered a cake before asking whether the window seat was free. Una took the smallest, the one whose decoration had already fallen off.
She was traveling to her sister. That was true, but incomplete. She was supposed to be the maid of honor at a wedding canceled the previous night. Her sister had realized she did not want the marriage, and the family was still trying to change her mind before the meat came out of cold storage. Una carried formal shoes because she had packed before the news and lacked the energy to open her suitcase.
Mirza was traveling to his own canceled wedding. The cakes were a gift from colleagues who had not heard in time that his fiancee had changed her mind. He needed to return the rented hall's keys and divide the costs. At first he told Una he was going to a family celebration. When the conductor announced another delay, he looked at the box and admitted there was no celebration. Una placed the shoes on the empty seat and said hers was uncertain too.
They talked for a long time, but not like people who instantly knew the cure for each other. Mirza was angry. Una did not tell him it was good he had learned the truth in time. She said her sister currently sounded both brave and cruel, depending on who listened. Mirza admitted he had ignored questions for months whose answers he now wanted in one sentence.
The train stopped at a small station. They bought coffee from a machine, too sweet and lukewarm, then walked along the permitted section of the platform while waiting to depart. Mirza made Una laugh about learning a wedding dance from a reversed video. She showed him her grazed knee from falling during her sister's choreography rehearsal. For the first time that day the canceled weddings did not occupy all the space between them.
At their destination they exchanged numbers without promising immediate contact. Mirza said he was not currently good material for a new beginning. Una replied that she was not looking for a project either. A month later he sent a photograph of the empty cake box and asked whether she wanted coffee that did not come from a machine. She agreed. They met without suitcases, in ordinary shoes, and spent the first half hour discussing everything except weddings.