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Summary
'It is heady, is it not, the affection of Andromache the Scythian?' Quỳnh asks.
It really is, Nile thinks as she taps an unsteady pattern along the edge of her mug. The tension grows in the quiet morning air, awkward and unwieldy and Nile feels it as a physical itch against her skin.
'The weight of being seen by the oldest woman on earth, of being held by her --' Quỳnh says it matter of factly with perhaps a hint of reverence and Nile cannot detect any anger or jealousy. That's somehow worse, the surety of it. As if the small fragile stem and tendrils of love (she can't lie to herself, she knew what it was, what it could have been) would be crushed by the centuries of emotion between Andy and Quỳnh, choked and overshadowed and insignificant.
Quỳnh's sudden return upends the blossoming feelings between Nile and Andy. When faced with the overwhelming depth of emotions between the oldest women on Earth, Nile accepts the inevitable. Except Quỳnh is not what Nile expects and perhaps there is a way forward; for Andy and Nile, for Nile and Quỳnh, and, most surprisingly, for them all.