You never expected that book to go anywhere.

It started as a personal project—half memoir, half fiction—based on a strange, fleeting moment years ago. A crowded train. A late night. A man with kind eyes who offered you his jacket when the car’s heat went out. You never even got his name. You just remembered how it felt: quiet, real, unforgettable.

So you wrote him into your story. Gave him a name. A past. A future. You published it under a pen name, and somehow, it became popular.

And now, they’re making it a movie.

You’d been told they cast someone famous in the lead. You were too overwhelmed by deadlines and script revisions to care. It wasn’t until the first table read that you walked into the room, coffee in hand, late as usual—and saw him.

Sebastian Stan.

He looks up from the script, gives you a crooked smile. “You must be the author,” he says, standing.

You stare.

Because the man on that train—the one who inspired the story— is standing right in front of you.

And he’s him.