“I’m a scholar, I specifically mind the whys,” she countered, adamantly, but his wiles already did the trick. The glossiness of prospective tears already faded from her eyes, replaced by the expression that looked much more natural on her: a mix between skeptical and determined. “Wouldn’t you wish to spend your time during this gala speaking with someone a bit more–” Appropriate? Marriageable? Amicable? Though before Ida could settle on the word, she heard the couple from earlier making their way down the path.

With a start she withdrew her hands from Mister Greengrass’s, wrapping them around herself and tipping her body away from him to face the path. You have to be careful, his sentiment bounced around in her brain. Both about what she told him, of course, but then there’s the issue of how how they could be seen– Ida suddenly felt lucky the couple was no one she recognized. They ambled past, seemingly too enamored with each other based on their lovey-dovey eyes and hands and giggles to notice the two of them standing there. Ida waited until their footsteps faded anyway, because Mister Greengrass asked… an interesting question.

“Well yes, I only just met her tonight,” she observed. Technically they haven’t even met, but that was neither here nor there for Mister Greengrass. “I suppose you could say it was sudden. I thought that’s how love happens, though? Like you look at someone, and–” she snapped her fingers, “--you know. Anyway, I’ve had… interests,” she blushed faintly to even be talking about this so frankly, but he asked, which meant she put her thorough investigative lens over it, “But nothing is strong as this. Why?” She looked at him, even more curious now. Because the way he asked it, seemed to suggest he thought something more about this phenomenon that he hadn’t shared. “Does duration matter?”

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