Amara is thirty-four now. Seren had calculated it. She looked the same as Seren remembered and also entirely different, the way a place looks different when you return to it and realize that what has changed is you.
Her hair was pulled back. She was wearing a dark green blouse, and she had one hand on the windowsill, not leaning, just resting. As if she needed to feel the solidity of it.
She did not turn around when Seren came in.
Seren stopped a few feet inside the door. She did not sit down. She held her notebook in front of her with both hands, not because she planned to read from it, but because she needed to hold something.
"I didn't know it was you, Seren," Amara said. Not a question. Not warmly. Just a fact laid down carefully, like something that might break.
"Yes," Seren said. Silence. Outside, a car alarm started and then stopped.
