In the hushed stillness of the old Carnegie Library on 9th Street, where the scent of aged paper and polished oak wrapped around her like the ghost of every unspoken feeling she’d ever buried, Susan gently closed the heavy leather-bound tome with a trembling hand. The final lines of the ancient love story—two women who found each other across centuries—had torn through her defenses. Years of quiet, aching solitude, of loving from afar, now rose in her chest like a tide she could no longer hold back. Tears blurred the last words on the page.

As she slid the book back into its place on the towering shelf, her gaze lifted, and there was Catherine.

Catherine stood motionless at the end of the aisle, dark auburn curls catching the soft amber lamplight like burnished copper, hazel eyes glistening with the same raw vulnerability that had haunted Susan for months. Those eyes had watched her every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon, silent, hopeful, terrified. Now they shimmered with unshed tears.

“That book,” Catherine whispered, voice cracking on the edge of a sob, “it hurts because I’ve lived every word of it. Every time you walked in here, I felt like I was drowning in what I couldn’t say.”

The confession hung between them, fragile and shattering. Susan stepped forward on unsteady legs, heart pounding so violently she thought it might break free. Their fingers brushed—once, twice—then Catherine reached out, cupping Susan’s face with trembling hands, thumbs wiping away the tears that had already begun to fall.

“I’ve been in love with you since the day you asked for that volume of Sappho,” Catherine breathed, voice thick with emotion. “I thought if I stayed quiet, I’d keep you safe from my mess. But God, Susan, it was killing me.”