Chapter Text
MONDAY
It was quieter that morning. Luggage wheels rolled across gravel, birds chirped somewhere high in the trees, and voices lingered low, soft, tired and happy. The week had ended, but something about the air still held a little of the magic.
Andy was double-checking Marco’s notes for their train when she spotted Emily by the fountain, inspecting her passport like it might dissolve.
“Do you even remember the last time we weren’t sharing a timezone?” Andy called out as she walked over, hands in the pockets of her light coat.
Emily looked up, mildly exasperated. “Do you remember the last time I wasn’t correcting your time conversions at 3 a.m.?”
“Told you the moon messes with me.”
“That’s not—never mind.”
They stood there, smiling in a way only people who’ve fought and forgiven a thousand times can. Then Andy stepped forward and hugged her, tight and full of gratitude.
“God, I’ll miss you.”
Emily resisted a second, then folded in. “You’re such a sap.”
“You love it,” Andy mumbled into her shoulder.
“I do,” Emily admitted softly. “You idiot.”
They pulled apart, a little misty-eyed but still dry-witted.
“Don’t let Milan chew you up,” Emily said, squeezing Andy’s hand once.
“Don’t let Greece domesticate you.”
Emily laughed, real and open, before Serena’s voice floated from the driveway: “Emily, love, the bags are already in the car, so should we be.”
“Coming!” Emily called. She turned back to Andy, just once. “Don’t disappear again, okay?”
“I won’t. Not this time.”
They bumped foreheads like old times, and then Emily jogged off toward Serena, who waited with a grin and sunglasses already on. Andy watched them go, a sliver of ache rising in her chest, the good kind.
Then a familiar presence emerged behind her. She didn’t need to look to know.
“I wasn’t sure I’d catch you before you left,” Miranda said.
Andy turned to meet her gaze.
Miranda held her poise like armor, but there was something unguarded around the eyes.
“I was hoping you would,” Andy said honestly.
Miranda tilted her head. “I’ll walk you to the car.”
They didn’t say much at first, only their steps were slow and the sound of gravel crunching beneath their shoes can be heard. The air was fresh, a little cool.
“You thanked the brides?” Andy asked.
“I did,” Miranda said. “Though I’ll never forgive them for the seating arrangements.”
Andy laughed. “I think they knew exactly what they were doing.”
They reached the cobbled drive where Marco was loading the last of the bags. He gave Miranda a polite nod, but his eyes were on Andy. Andy smiled reassuringly, and he stepped back to give them space.
Miranda glanced toward the horizon. “I leave for New York in two hours.”
Andy nodded. “And we’re heading back to Milan.”
A beat passed between them and Miranda’s voice dropped, “I hope you know I meant what I said last night.”
“I do.”
Another silence, charged but calm.
Miranda looked at her, “Thank you… for listening.”
Andy smiled, soft and real. “Thank you for saying it.”
She reached for Miranda’s hand for just a moment, fingers brushing. Not a kiss, not a promise.
Just a goodbye, for now.
Miranda watched as Marco opened the car door for her, then held Andy’s gaze one last time.
“I’ll see you soon,” she said quietly.
Andy hesitated, then, “I’m counting on it.”
She got in. Marco closed the door behind her, and moments later, they pulled off down the winding road, back toward the train station, back toward Milan.
Miranda stood there until the car disappeared.
Nigel strolled up a few seconds later, coffee in one hand and an obnoxious sunhat in the other. “So,” he drawled, “on a scale of one to completely, how ruined are you?”
Miranda exhaled, lips twitching. “Utterly.”
“Good,” he said. “Means you’re doing something right.”
And with that, they turned toward their car, the week behind them and something new just beginning.
TUESDAY
The Ampersand Studio in Milan buzzed back to life beneath soft, diffused morning light.
Andy walked in earlier than usual, her steps deliberate, head bowed slightly under the weight of a week still lingering in her chest. Marco was already by his desk, a black espresso beside his laptop, muttering in Italian at a loading screen.
She made it to her office and stopped short.
On her desk sat a vase tall and slender, the crystal so fine it caught every speck of the sun. Nestled within were flowers that seemed handpicked for memory: blush garden roses, white hellebores, pale lilac, and olive sprigs.
It was quiet and elegant at the same time.
Her fingers brushed the envelope tucked delicately within the arrangement.
She unfolded the card. The handwriting was unmistakable.
For you not to wonder,
and for the possibility of us.
—M.
Andy’s throat tightened as she lowered herself slowly into her chair, staring at the bouquet like it might answer the thousand things still unresolved inside her.
From across the studio, Marco didn't say anything, but his eyes flicked up. His expression softened.
"Let me guess,” he called out eventually. “She’s still not subtle.”
Andy turned the card over once more and pressed it against her chest. “Not even a little.”
The rest of the gifts began arriving around lunch.
Serena’s message was the first to arrive…
SERENA: Miranda just extended our honeymoon to another Greek island. I don’t think we’ll ever want to come back to New York now.
EMILY: She remembered the vintage we served at the welcome dinner and sent a damn case of it ahead. Is she trying to kill us softly?
SERENA: If she is, it’s working.
In New York, Nigel’s call came in just after Andy’s second espresso.
“Sweetheart. Your lover sent me a robe softer than a secret and cologne that smells like a five-star scandal. I am beside myself. Also, the note said ‘For your loyalty, and for never letting me get away with too much.’
I may or may not shed a tear over this. Thank her for me, will you? Ciao, dearest.”
Then came Marco’s delivery.
The box was wrapped in heavy slate-gray paper, the kind Andy recognized from Miranda’s stationary vendor. Inside was a vintage Montblanc fountain pen, a rare, autographed print of a 1972 Runway Italia cover, and a note.
For your loyalty, your patience, and for telling her what I never could.
Marco stared at it for a long time before folding the card and slipping it back into the envelope like it was something sacred.
“Wow,” he muttered.
Andy looked over. “Are you crying?”
“Am not.”
“You get a pen and a Runway cover and a direct thank-you from Miranda Priestly. That’s practically a knighthood.”
He huffed, but there was a touch of red to his ears. “If she breaks your heart again, I’m burning this pen.”
Andy smiled and said, “I wouldn’t have expected less.”
Back at her desk, she reread her own note one last time, fingers ghosting over Miranda’s words.
For you not to wonder. For the possibility of us.
It wasn’t a promise. It wasn’t an apology. But it was something.
And today, it was enough.
WEDNESDAY
The sky over Milan held the sleepy gray of a city between rains. At the Ampersand Studio, the windows misted slightly, and inside, the air smelled faintly of espresso, printer ink, and yesterday’s flowers.
Andy arrived later than usual, a croissant clutched in one hand and her phone in the other, thumb scrolling through an article she wasn’t really reading. Marco glanced up as she passed, lifting a brow, but didn’t comment.
She hadn’t slept much.
Tuesday’s bouquet still stood proud and fragrant in her office, the petals just beginning to relax at the edges. Andy paused by her desk, set her things down and stilled.
Another vase.
This one was different: rounder, shorter, and etched with a fine silver trim. Inside were soft white ranunculus, delicate sprigs of lily of the valley, and early stems of forget-me-nots.
A more subdued palette, almost bashful in its elegance. Like a whisper, like someone testing the ground beneath their feet.
Her heart thudded. She found the card tucked into a pale silk ribbon wound around the neck of the vase.
I know I left the door closed.
May I try knocking, this time?
—M.
Andy sat down slowly, card between her fingers. Her breath caught on a quiet laugh, the kind that surprised her from the chest. The note was barely six words. But God, didn’t they say enough?
Across the room, Marco peeked over his laptop. “Wednesday,” he said, tapping his watchless wrist. “Right on schedule.”
Andy didn’t answer right away. She just stared at the flowers, touched a thumb to one of the shy blue blooms.
Then, without looking up, she murmured, “I think she’s nervous.”
Marco blinked. “Miranda Priestly?”
“She’s being careful. Can’t you tell?”
He leaned back, studying her. “And how do you feel about that?”
Andy thought about it, her fingers toyed with the edge of the card.
“Seen,” she said finally. “I feel seen.”
And maybe a little exposed.
She turned her chair slightly to better face the window, watching as a soft drizzle began to fall. Behind her, the studio hummed on, but she kept her eyes on the flowers, and on the note she’d tucked back into her palm.
Knocking.
It was so unlike Miranda to ask for entry.
And yet... wasn’t that the point?
Andy exhaled, lips twitching upward.
Thursday was tomorrow.
She was already wondering.
THURSDAY
The morning unfolded slowly. Milan was quieter today, the streets still damp from yesterday’s rain. Inside Ampersand, the rhythm of the day had taken on a certain gentle cadence. Familiar and steady, but not for Andy.
She kept glancing at the clock.
She wouldn’t admit it, not to Marco, not to herself, but every time the elevator dinged or footsteps echoed in the hallway, she paused. Just for a second, just in case.
The flowers arrived after ten.
This time, they were in a low, wide bowl of smoky glass, with blooms arranged like a conversation: peonies the color of soft coral, tender cream tulips, blue muscari like little thoughts in the margins. There were jasmine vines threaded between the stems, scenting the air faintly.
The card was there, almost tucked away beneath the bowl as if to say, you don’t have to read it. But Andy did, of course.
I have rehearsed every version of what I should’ve said that morning.
None of them were braver than silence. But I’m trying.
—M.
Andy closed her eyes.
Her fingers curled gently around the edge of her desk as something bloomed beneath her ribs. It wasn’t joy, not yet, but something very close to ache, soft and deep and aching to be met halfway.
She read the card again, slower.
Miranda’s words always cut clean. But this was a kind of softness Andy had only imagined. Here it was, not as a plea, but as a quiet truth: I’m trying.
From the doorway, Marco cleared his throat.
Andy looked up, caught. “What?”
He held up a mug of coffee in offering, then nodded toward the new arrangement. “That jasmine’s going to make your office smell like heartbreak.”
Andy took the mug with a sheepish smile. “It smells like… memory.”
Marco made a noncommittal noise and perched on the edge of her desk. “Do you think she’s building up to something?”
Andy leaned back in her chair. “She’s not the type to build up.”
“She sent four bouquets in three days. Since we got back from Lake Como.”
Andy looked down at the note again. Her thumb moved over the ink, the pen stroke heavy in places like Miranda had pressed too hard. Like it mattered.
“She’s not rebuilding,” Andy said quietly. “She’s revealing. Little by little.”
Marco blinked. “That’s intimate.”
Andy smiled into her coffee. “It is.”
She tucked the card into the drawer beside the others, Tuesday’s olive sprigs, Wednesday’s forget-me-nots, her private archive of a conversation they still hadn’t had aloud.
But it was happening all the same.
Friday was coming.
And the space between what was and what could be had never felt closer.
FRIDAY
By ten, no flowers had arrived.
By noon, Andy told herself it didn’t matter.
By two, she was actively trying not to refresh her inbox, her texts, or glance at the elevator like it owed her something.
She had made it through the day on little rituals: a strong espresso, a meeting with the design team, a review of pitch decks. But underneath all of it was that stubborn ache, the kind that pressed in when anticipation turned too sharply into silence.
Marco didn’t ask, he didn’t need to. He glanced at her just once, longer than usual, and when she didn’t look back, he said nothing.
By five-thirty, she’d told herself she was being ridiculous. Maybe Miranda had stopped. Maybe Thursday’s note had been her final word. Maybe Andy had read too much into every flower, every careful line of ink, every name she’d dared to hope was said with want instead of regret.
She was packing her laptop into her bag when the call came from reception.
“There’s a delivery for Ms. Sachs,” the receptionist said, her voice light with curiosity. “Just arrived.”
Andy’s heart stuttered.
She moved down the hallway without thinking and there it was, held delicately by the same courier from days before, this time with a small apologetic smile.
“Traffic from Florence,” he explained, handing her the box. “Worth the wait, I think.”
The arrangement was quieter today.
A soft gathering of dried lunaria with creamy ranunculus and faint lilac asters. There were bits of smoke bush, almost like dusk captured in leaves. It was autumnal in palette and fragile in mood. As though someone had tried to bottle the hour just before twilight.
Taped gently to the side was a smaller note than the rest. Not a card, just a folded square of paper, Miranda’s handwriting rushed this time, a little uneven.
I almost didn’t send these.
I thought maybe you’d had enough.
But I haven’t.
—M.
Andy stood still. There, in the doorway of her own studio, she felt her breath catch.
This one, this note, felt the most like her.
Because hadn’t she told herself that very thing, moments ago? Hadn’t she wondered if she’d had enough? Hadn’t she almost let go of the possibility?
But Miranda hadn’t. Not yet.
Back in her office, Andy set the arrangement down with unusual care. She didn't sit. She stood there, her fingertips resting on the vase like it might ground her.
She didn’t cry. Not quite.
But the relief was a kind of unraveling.
In the end, she didn’t reply. Not with a text, not with a call.
She simply placed the new note into the drawer with the others, where Miranda’s voice had begun to gather into a paper-lit path.
Tomorrow was Saturday.
And Andy would be here.
Still waiting. Still hoping.
SATURDAY
She wasn’t meant to be in the office.
Saturday was supposed to be for sleep, laundry, a market run for figs and burrata, maybe even a long aimless walk around Navigli if the weather held. But the week had been chaotic and the deadlines unrelenting, and if Andy was being honest, she didn’t mind the silence the studio offered when no one else was around.
It was nearly eleven when she let herself in. The halls were dim and cool, her heels echoing faintly as she passed the darkened meeting rooms. No Marco, no team, no noise. Just the stillness of a space waiting to be filled.
She left her phone in her bag. She made herself a slow cappuccino. She turned on just one desk lamp and opened her laptop, determined to lose herself in layouts and copy drafts.
And that’s when she saw it.
She hadn’t heard the elevator. Hadn’t registered any knock.
But there it was, a small arrangement sitting neatly in the center of her desk, as though it had always belonged there.
This time, the flowers were understated, almost hesitant. A low, wide ceramic bowl instead of a tall vase. Inside were white sweet peas, pearl-green hydrangea, dried snowberries, and faint blush scabiosa.
There was barely any scent, not even bold colors. Just softness, like the hush before an apology, or the breath before a truth.
Andy reached for the card slowly.
It wasn’t a note, not exactly. It was just a single line, written in Miranda’s handwriting
I didn’t know you’d be here. But I hoped.
Andy sat down. The chair creaked under her, her gaze flicked across the flowers, then to the note again, her thumb brushing the edge of the vellum as if she could somehow warm the ink still lingering there.
She didn’t know how Miranda did it. How she managed to land her words right on the bone.
Because Andy hadn’t meant to be here.
And she had been pulling away, just a little, after yesterday’s late arrival, trying to guard against the ache that had begun to curl around the edges of each delivery.
But this one… This one unraveled her.
She slipped the card into the same drawer as the others and whispered aloud, “You’re not playing fair anymore.”
No one answered. Only the soft rustle of sweet peas when the air stirred.
Andy stared at them for a long time before opening her laptop again.
For the next hour, she didn’t really work.
But she stayed.
As if part of her had been waiting to be found.
SUNDAY
Andrea wasn’t expecting anything.
But she was hoping. Stupidly, selfishly hoping.
It was nearly nine, and the city was quiet outside her loft windows. She’d left her phone on the coffee table and tried to pretend she wasn’t looking at it every few minutes. Dinner sat untouched on her plate, a simple caprese she’d made out of habit, not hunger. The speaker played something low and easy, a record she couldn’t name but kept flipping back to whenever she needed company that didn’t talk back.
She hadn’t received anything today. Not at the studio. Not at all. And after five days of flowers, after five days of wondering and what ifs, today’s silence had felt a little like loss.
She was telling herself to stop spiraling, to be rational about it, when a soft knock at the door made her jolt.
Andrea froze.
No one ever visited this late on a Sunday. Not unannounced. It wouldn’t have been Marco, he’d only barge in using his spare key. It couldn’t be her other friends, they’re on their honeymoon in God-knows-what-island now.
She crossed the room barefoot, pulse suddenly high in her throat. She didn’t dare hope, but there it was. A now-familiar box in the hands of a delivery man who greeted her by name, as if the whole week had simply shifted delivery addresses like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“Sign here, please.”
She scribbled something that resembled her signature and shut the door slowly behind her.
The box was a little heavier tonight. Cooler even, still wrapped in the same pale ribbon, sealed with the same script on the card. She carried it to the kitchen counter like it might break… or she might.
When she lifted the lid, she had to sit down.
White peonies. Creamy cymbidium orchids. Slender eucalyptus. All delicate and deliberate, but something about this arrangement felt less formal. It was softer, more intimate. Like a whisper instead of a statement.
She reached for the card with careful hands.
Hoping you're available tonight.
No signature. Not even initials. But Andy already knew. She didn’t hesitate this time. Her phone was already in her hand.
Andrea: Where are you?
Three dots. Then four words came in.
Miranda: Bulgari Hotel. Room 906.
Andrea stared at the screen, her heart climbing into her throat.
Milan. Miranda was in Milan. Tonight.
Andrea stood outside the door, nerves humming low and constant beneath her skin. Her knuckles hovered near the wood. She hadn't messaged again after Miranda replied with the hotel and room number. She didn't even know what she expected, maybe that the moment would pass, that she'd come to her senses.
But here she was. A single orchid in hand. Wearing her uncertainty like perfume.
Before she could knock, the door opened.
Miranda stood before her.
Dressed in a soft silk robe the color of dusk and barefoot. Her expression was unreadable, but there was something quieter in her eyes, like she was surprised too, even though she was the one who’d sent the note.
Andrea blinked, “You’re really here.”
“I am,” Miranda said simply. “I wasn’t sure you’d come.”
Andrea gave a soft, nervous laugh and held up the flower. “I wasn’t sure either.”
Miranda’s gaze flicked to the orchid. She reached for it, fingers brushing Andrea’s. “It’s beautiful.”
“You sent me six arrangements this week. I thought I’d return the favor.”
Miranda stepped aside, and Andrea walked into the room. It was warm and understated, bathed in amber lighting and that unmistakable quiet that comes with late evening. The curtains were pulled open, the Milan skyline visible through the window. Andrea took it all in, then turned back to Miranda, who had closed the door gently behind her.
“I thought maybe you'd come to the loft,” Andrea said, folding her arms without meaning to. “If you were in Milan.”
“I didn’t want to impose,” Miranda said, walking past her toward the sitting area. “It was already… presumptuous, the note.”
Andrea followed her slowly. “It was bold,” she admitted. “But I’m not complaining.”
“I wasn’t sure if I should send it,” Miranda said, settling into the armrest of the sofa. “Or if you’d think I was overstepping. We haven’t exactly defined anything.”
Andrea stayed standing, her hands sliding into her coat pockets. “I didn’t know I was going to come here. I read the note and just walked out the door.”
“Impulse.”
“Or habit,” Andrea said softly, meeting her gaze. “You sent flowers, and I came running.”
That made Miranda smile, faint but genuine. “It wasn’t a trap.”
“I know.”
“But I did want to see you,” Miranda added. “Not just text. Not just phone calls. And if I was going to be in Milan, I thought…”
She trailed off.
Andrea stepped closer. “You thought maybe I’d show up.”
“I hoped.”
There was a pause then. Neither of them reached. They were just two women suspended in the quiet between hope and fear.
Andrea sat down beside her, slowly. “I’m glad you sent the note.”
Miranda looked over at her. “I’m glad you answered it.”
And for a moment, the distance between cities, between years, between what had once gone unsaid and now hovered just beneath their voices all fell quiet.
Only the flower remained between them, tucked between palms, a single bloom that might as well have been a question neither of them had the courage to ask.
Not yet. But maybe tonight was for not rushing the answers.
Andy barely had time to take in the warmth radiating between them before Miranda put the flower down and closed their space. There was no preamble, no witty lines. Just the pull of something long-restrained and no longer willing to behave.
Their mouths met like a promise broken and remade. This kiss was not for testing the waters, it was a plunge.
Miranda tasted like expensive wine and a week’s worth of sleepless longing. Andy gasped into her mouth, her back meeting the inside of the door, Miranda’s body pinning her at the seat like she was making sure neither one of them would disappear.
“You’re really here,” Andy murmured against her jaw, voice low, almost angry with relief. “You didn’t vanish this time.”
“I’m here, we’re here,” Miranda whispered.
Their clothes came off in pieces. Andy’s blazer dropped to the floor, followed by Miranda’s robe. Somewhere between the seating area and the bedroom, Miranda pressed Andy up against the hallway mirror, her reflection wild-eyed and flushed, hair messy, mouth open in a silent moan as Miranda’s hand slid up her thigh, over her hip, and pulled her in closer.
Andy hooked a leg around Miranda's waist, grounding herself on the arch of Miranda’s thigh. She gripped her shoulders like she couldn’t believe this was happening. That the woman she’d mourned for years was kissing down her neck like she’d never left, like she was hers.
“You never wrote,” Andy panted as Miranda’s mouth moved lower, teeth grazing the underside of her breast. “You just left.”
“I know,” Miranda said, her voice dark with regret and want. “And I’ve paid for it. Every night or every year.”
Andy pulled her up, kissed her like it could undo the ache. Their mouths clashed, hot and desperate. She dragged Miranda to the bed like she’d done it a thousand times in dreams, Miranda falling back against the pillows in a tangle of pale limbs.
Andy straddled her, bare skin brushing bare skin, the heat of it dizzying. Miranda looked up at her like a prayer answered too late but just in time. Hands wandered, tracing every inch of Andy’s body.
When Miranda touched her—really touched her—Andy cried out, hips stuttering forward. “God—Miranda.”
“Let me,” Miranda breathed, with her voice sharp. “Let me make you forget every second I wasn’t there.”
Andy nodded, choking on the yes, the please, the finally .
They moved like they’d never stopped knowing each other. Like years hadn’t passed. Like that kiss on the wedding night had only been the fuse. Andy pressed Miranda down into the sheets, kissed her with teeth and tongue, mapped her body like it was familiar terrain she could walk blindfolded.
Miranda’s hair spilled across the pillows like silver fire, her fingers clutched at Andy’s back, her breath coming in broken moans. “More,” she whispered, breathless. “Don’t stop.”
She didn’t.
Andy moved against her, with her. Both of them climbing toward something desperate with years overdue. Their cries filled the room, the kind of heat that had no shame, only release. The kind that could only come after waiting, hurting, and hoping.
When it hit, Andy broke apart in Miranda’s arms, trembling, her face buried in Miranda’s neck. And Miranda followed, soft and shuddering, with Andy’s name on her lips like it was the only language she still remembered.
They didn’t sleep.
After the high, after the stillness, Miranda kissed Andy again. Languid at first, then deeper, hungrier, like she couldn’t bear the taste of distance on Andy’s lips.
Andy rolled over her without hesitation, already greedy again, her hands finding Miranda’s breasts, her thigh between her legs as Miranda arched beneath her with a breathless, “Don’t stop, please—”
It wasn’t just one time. It wasn’t even two.
There was no neat crescendo, no tidy resolution. They kept finding each other with shaking hands and open mouths, over and over, like their bodies had been waiting in the shadows of their lives for this exact night.
They ended up in the shower when their bodies were too sticky with sweat and scent.
Andy guided Miranda backward into the glass-walled stall, water pouring over them as if to cool the flame that refused to die. But it only made it worse. Andy pinned Miranda to the tile, water running down the curve of her back, between her breasts, down her stomach.
Miranda gasped as Andy sank to her knees.
The sounds. God, the sounds. Soft groans, the slap of water, Miranda’s head thudding lightly against the marble as her hand tangled in Andy’s hair. “Andrea—oh my God—”
Andy worshipped her, lips and tongue and fingers moving like prayer, like confession. She didn’t stop until Miranda came undone with a broken sound, her hips twitching, her hand flying up to cover her mouth in a vain attempt to be quiet. Andy caught her, held her through it, tasting every second.
And still it wasn’t enough.
When Miranda held Andy up and kissed her again, it was with something feral behind it. Years of being too composed, too silent, too careful. She backed Andy into the opposite wall, hands sliding around her waist, gripping her ass as she lifted her. Andy’s legs wrapped around her like instinct, head dropping back as Miranda kissed a wet path down her neck, her collarbone, across the swell of her breast.
“I thought I forgot,” Miranda murmured, breath hot against her skin. “But my body remembers you, Andrea. Every part of you.”
Andy could barely breathe. “Then show me.”
She did.
The water ran cold before they even realized it, and by then neither of them cared.
They dried off in silence, both trembling from too much pleasure and not enough time. Andy sat at the edge of the bed, watching Miranda comb through her wet hair with her fingers, her profile soft in the pale light filtering through the curtains.
“You didn’t have to book a hotel,” Andy said quietly, still breathless, her voice raw with something deeper than exhaustion.
“I didn’t want to impose.” Miranda didn’t look at her. “Your loft felt too personal. Too much of a risk.”
“And this wasn’t?”
Miranda finally turned. “It was the only thing I had the courage for.”
Andy stood, bare and open, and walked to her. She slid her arms around Miranda’s waist, forehead resting against hers.
“You were always welcome,” she whispered. “Even after everything.”
Miranda’s hands clutched her tightly, too tightly, as if she needed to feel the bones beneath Andy’s skin to believe she was real.
Neither of them said “I love you.” Not yet. But the words lived in their silence. In the night they stole back. In the bruises that would bloom by morning.
And when Miranda finally fell asleep beside Andy, her arm draped across her hip, their legs tangled under the comforter, she didn’t dream of regret. Only of the woman who finally came back.
MONDAY
Morning light poured into the suite through a crack in the blackout curtains. The air was still warm with the remnants of skin-on-skin, of gasps and whispers and hours made wordless by want.
Miranda stirred slowly.
Her body ached in a way that reminded her she had been thoroughly touched, held, taken. There was a dull pulse in her thighs, a pleasant soreness between her legs, a fading imprint of lips along her ribs and shoulder.
Her neck was marked. Her wrists remembered fingers. And the faint scent of Andrea clung to the pillow beside her.
But the space was empty.
Miranda blinked.
The sheets were cool where Andrea should’ve been, tucked on her side, mouth slightly open in that deep sleep she used to fall into after. Miranda’s hand drifted over the space, as if she might feel some lingering warmth, but it was gone. There was nothing but the faint memory of weight.
No sound from the bathroom. No rustling in the suite. No shadow under the door.
Gone.
Miranda sat up slowly, the ache inside her hollowing. Her hand came to her chest before she could stop it, pressing down as if the weight might anchor her back to calm.
But there was none. Andrea had left.
And with that realization came the cold, creeping flood of something sharp, something ancient and familiar and entirely earned.
This was what Andrea had felt, wasn’t it?
That morning in London. The quiet that felt like punishment. The disbelief, the denial, the way the bed still smelled of the woman who’d walked away too soon. The ache of waking from something perfect, only to find it had unraveled while you slept.
She had done this to Andrea.
Years ago. Without thinking, without staying, without explanation.
She had slipped out, like a coward, trying to keep her world clean and intact while Andrea was left with nothing but the echo of her.
And now, Miranda sat in a hotel bed in Milan, her skin still marked by last night’s fire, and understood, finally, what she had done.
The heartbreak wasn’t loud. No, it didn’t scream nor wail.
It just settled, like a stone sinking in her chest, pulling everything beneath the surface.
She didn’t cry. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t. But God, she wanted to.
The bed felt colder the longer she sat in it. Miranda drew the sheet up around her chest, her hands still, her face unreadable. But something inside her had begun to crack.
She exhaled, then moved.
A practiced elegance carried her to the edge of the bed where her robe was half draped over an armchair. She slipped it on, cinched it tight around her waist. Her fingers shook only once, but she hid it, even from herself.
She walked to the bathroom, turned on the tap, and rinsed her face with water that stung from how cold it was. She patted dry with a white towel, then caught her own reflection in the mirror.
She looked undone.
For a moment, Miranda stared at herself and thought: You look like a woman who’s just been left.
She shut the light off.
In the bedroom, she started to dress. Not her usual wardrobe but the ones she wears only for travel. The practical coat she kept in the closet for days when comfort won out over sharpness. She folded her jewelry into her travel pouch, pressed the lid closed with a snap. Then she zipped her suitcase with finality.
Maybe it was payback. Maybe it was symmetry. Maybe it was the universe coming full circle.
She had left Andrea years ago, heart racing, mind spinning, desperate to protect the empire she had built from a night that had felt too true . She hadn’t looked back.
And now, Andrea had done the same.
No note. No goodbye. Just absence.
Miranda sat down again, this time on the edge of the bed, her eyes burned, but she refused to cry. It wasn’t just pride. It was grief, old and new, taking root like thorns around her ribs.
Perhaps it had always been inevitable. Perhaps what was broken once only ever pretends to heal.
She pressed her fingers to her lips. They still tingled from last night’s kiss.
God, if this was revenge, if this was Andrea finally reclaiming the dignity Miranda had stolen that morning in London, then fine. She would carry it. She deserved to. But it didn’t make it hurt less. It didn’t make the silence easier. It didn’t erase the truth of what had passed between them in the hours before the sun rose.
Her phone lit up on the nightstand.
She didn’t move. She couldn’t.
The ache inside her had thickened into a weight. And Miranda Priestly, brilliant and formidable, sat alone in a quiet suite in Milan, clutching the handle of her suitcase and bracing herself to leave for good, without knowing if Andrea would ever look back.
Then a key clicked in the lock.
Miranda didn’t flinch this time.
And then—
“Yes, Marco, I read the memo. Of course I did, I signed it,” Andrea’s voice breezed in ahead of her, light and professional. “And yes, I still want the moodboard ready by Wednesday or you’ll get another haunting in your inbox.”
Miranda turned.
Andy stepped in backward, cradling a small box of pastries, a coffee tray with two to-go cups, and her phone balanced on her shoulder. She was radiant, flushed from the morning air, grinning into the call.
“No, I didn’t forget the updated layouts. I just—hold on—”
She turned around fully, mid-sentence, eyes meeting Miranda’s, and stilled. The grin dropped, but the amusement didn’t.
“Oh,” she said, tone shifting. Her gaze fell to the packed suitcase. “She thinks I left.”
Into the phone: “Marco, I have to go. Tell the team to chill. Or lie. Just something with fewer notifications. Don’t call.”
She hung up.
Miranda stood frozen, lips parted slightly, hands still by her sides, betraying nothing except the faint tremor in her right hand.
Andy tilted her head, walking over with slow, infuriating ease, setting the pastries down on the table before slipping the coffee into Miranda’s hand like a peace offering.
Then, softly: “You thought I left.”
Miranda’s mouth tightened. “You were gone.”
“For coffee and sugar.” Andy leaned closer, the barest hint of mischief pulling at her mouth. “I didn’t know I was dating such a dramatist. Should I have left a trail of rose petals to the bakery and back?”
Miranda narrowed her eyes. “You weren’t here. There was no note, no call.”
“You were sleeping.” Andy brushed a strand of Miranda’s hair behind her ear. “And I didn’t want to wake you. You looked… peaceful. Soft even.”
Miranda scowled at that. “I am never soft.”
Andy leaned in, whispering against her ear. “You were last night.”
Miranda flushed, but didn’t retreat.
Then Andy’s arms were around her waist, warm and smug. “You really thought I’d disappear after last night? After everything?”
“It would have been poetic,” Miranda murmured, hating how hollow her voice sounded. “Cruel. But poetic.”
Andy kissed the tip of her nose. “Then thank God I’m more annoying than poetic.”
“I got your favorite,” she added. “Or what I hope will be your favorite. Sfogliatelle from Maré. It’s warm and ridiculously flaky. Like me.”
Miranda stared at her, still too shaken to smile. “You’re an impossible woman.”
Andy grinned. “Yeah, but I came back. That’s what counts, right?”
Miranda tilted her head, something cool and assessing creeping back into her gaze. “Hm.”
Andy raised an eyebrow. “What?”
“You said we were dating.”
Andy blinked. “I said what?”
“You didn’t know you were dating a dramatist,” Miranda recited, sipping the coffee Andrea had just handed her. “Past tense would’ve sufficed. But you went with are. Present. Active.”
Andy’s breath caught. “That—oh, I meant—”
“Did you?”
A beat.
Andrea shifted her weight, suddenly too warm in her oversized sweater and too aware of how close they were next to each other.
“I mean,” she tried, “I just—after last night, and the flowers, and the whole—thing—we’re kind of... something. Right?”
Miranda didn’t speak.
She only arched one of those infernal, elegant brows.
Andy gave up. “You are in Milan,” she added, defensively. “You sent six arrangements. This is most definitely giving dating behavior.”
Miranda set the coffee down, then scooted forward until there was barely space between them.
“I see,” she said, voice low and dry. “So your standards for commitment begin with seduction, escalated gifting, and intercontinental travel.”
Andrea, face flushed, tried to hold her ground. “Well, yeah—”
But Miranda kissed her. Just once, the kind of kiss that says you walked into this one.
Then she pulled back. “In that case, yes. We’re dating.”
Andrea looked mildly horrified. “I walked into a trap.”
“You did.” Miranda leaned in again, whispering against her lips, “But you did bring pastries.”
They begin cautiously, as if afraid the sound of each other’s voice might undo them.
The first few weeks are measured. A call every Sunday, sometimes a Wednesday, if time and chaos permit. Miranda rings from the backseat of her town car. Other times she calls from dressing rooms lit with soft bulbs, gowns rustling in the background, some assistant whispering about a missing brooch.
Andy, on her end, picks up from the couch in Marco’s office, her laptop perched on her knees, papers scattered like fallen leaves around her. Ink smudges the edge of her thumb. There’s always something half-finished—a storyboard, a grant proposal, a campaign brief—but she puts it down when Miranda’s name flashes across the screen.
Their conversations start polite. Then soften and then sink.
Sometimes, one of them falls asleep mid-call. Once, Andy wakes to the muffled sound of Miranda breathing, steady and close, the phone forgotten on the pillow. She doesn’t hang up.
Another night, after a long day of back-to-back meetings, Andy sends a photo: a crumpled napkin from a café in Milan, marked with a lipstick print. Just one line in the message: "Thought of you."
A week later, a small, carefully wrapped box arrives at the studio. Inside is a silk scarf in the exact same shade of wine red. No note, just that.
They fight, too.
One Sunday, Miranda misses their call. Then another. No explanation, just silence.
Andy doesn’t text. Not for three days, not until her anger crusts into something colder.
When they finally speak again, it’s nearing 2 a.m. in Milan. Andy is exhausted, her voice dry with restraint. Miranda, sharper than usual, says something brittle, something meant to deflect but cuts instead.
Andy hangs up without a word.
For seven days, there was nothing. Not even a receipt of delivery. Milan turns colder, New York doesn’t answer.
Even Marco felt it, the way the warmth drained out of the room every time Andy entered. She no longer lingered at the espresso machine in the mornings. No offhand comments, no bursts of laughter during edit screenings. Only static silence. An ache she wouldn’t name.
On the third day, Marco tried knocking on her office door. “Want lunch?”
Andy didn’t look up from her screen. “No appetite.”
By day five, he cracked and called Emily. “I haven't seen her like this. Like she's about to light anything on fire,” he whispered into the phone. “She’s sharper and meaner and only eating almonds. Two associates cried just today.”
Emily, being Emily, sighed dramatically. “God help us. Fine, give me until tonight.”
That evening, the newlywed appeared at a particular townhouse in a coat far too elegant for someone merely dropping by. She breezed past the twins with a tight smile and made her way upstairs, unannounced and uninvited.
Whatever was said behind that closed door between Emily Alves-Charlton and Miranda Priestly remains between them.
Then, on the eighth day, a courier delivers a package.
It isn’t flowers, not this time, no. Just a single book, worn at the edges, soft from use: The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion. Inside, Miranda’s handwriting bleeds along the margins, thoughtful and almost apologetic. Notes upon notes. Her voice, tucked between the lines.
Andy reads it cover to cover, twice. Then calls her the next night. The first words she says are barely above a whisper. “Don’t do that again.”
And Miranda, quiet for a beat too long, says, “I won’t.”
They aren’t perfect. They never pretend to be.
There are missed calls, delays, weeks where work swallows them whole. Jealousy, not of other people, but of time, how it always slips away. There were also silences that stretched just a little too long.
But there are also Sunday mornings where they do the crossword puzzle together over video, Andy curled up on the rug with coffee in hand, Miranda reading clues with glasses sliding down her nose.
There are books mailed back and forth across the ocean, their favorite lines underlined, entire pages dog-eared.
There are voicemails, long and winding, ending in a sigh and a soft, “I miss you.”
The distance never disappears. But it changes. It doesn’t shrink, but it no longer feels like a wall. More like a fabric stretched between them. Fragile, yes, but woven now with intention.
They stop pretending it’s not hard. They stop pretending at all.
Instead, they build something else, not around the distance, but through it. A language of soft rituals and sharp honesty. A space that belongs only to them.
It works, not because they fit perfectly, but because they choose to try, again and again. Because when it’s late and the silence creeps in, one of them always reaches back.
The calls still come, the scarf still smells faintly of perfume, and somewhere on Miranda’s nightstand in New York, a café napkin remains folded in a drawer.
They know it’s not forever like this, but they’ve made something out of the in-between.
And somehow, that’s enough. For now.
A FEW MONTHS LATER
It began with a warning. The kind Andrea Sachs was prone to giving. Vague, teasing, and entirely insufficient for the emotional landslide it would cause.
They were on a call one night, late for Milan, mid-evening in New York. Andy was lying belly-down on her bed, hair still damp from the shower, cheek pressed against her forearm as her phone rested beside her ear.
“You should check the business section next week,” she said, feigning nonchalance. “Specifically… Tuesday.”
Miranda, across the ocean, looked up from her tablet. “You’re warning me about the news?”
“Just preparing you,” Andy said, tone lilting. “Don’t say I didn’t.”
Miranda raised a perfectly arched brow. “Andrea.”
Andy only grinned. “Goodnight, darling,” she whispered, and hung up.
Not even two full days after Andy’s warning, the issue arrived on Miranda’s desk by 7:00 AM, delivered with the rest of her curated stack of publications. She almost didn’t notice it, not until the Ampersand logo caught her eye. Stark and elegant against the muted greys of the Financial Times cover.
Then she saw the headline.
AMPERSAND MEDIA LAUNCHES NEW YORK SATELLITE OFFICE
Andrea Sachs to Head Expansion, Bridging Milan to Manhattan
She froze.
It wasn’t the headline, not exactly. It was the photograph: Andrea on a rooftop in Tribeca, hair swept by wind, one hand in the pocket of her high-waisted slacks, the other holding her phone. She looked powerful, confident, certain, and at home.
Miranda’s breath caught in her throat.
Her eyes dropped to the featured pull quote: “New York was always the city I loved most. This time, I get to return on my own terms.”
A silence settled in her office, sudden and private. The city stirred beyond the glass walls, but Miranda stayed still. Her fingers grazed the page, as though it might vanish if she moved too quickly.
She read it three more times.
That evening, she asked Roy to take her to the small, inconspicuous shop in SoHo that specialized in engraving antique keys.
A townhouse key. The second of only four copies.
A day after, Andrea’s Milan loft was in shambles with boxes half-packed, cables coiled like snakes, and stacks of papers clipped and labeled for customs.
She’d just finished her final team dinner (Marco may or may not have cried) when her buzzer rang.
A delivery. Just a black box, no note. Just her name written in that familiar, sharp script.
Inside was a single object: a townhouse key.
Longer than modern ones, cool and brass in her palm.
And beneath it, folded in thick white stationery, was Miranda’s note: Welcome home.
Andrea sank into the couch, legs folding beneath her, key gripped in both hands like something sacred. It was a gesture so Miranda and yet it said everything.
She didn’t text, didn’t call.
Instead, she spent the rest of the night choosing which keychain to attach it to. She settled on the oldest one she owned—cracked leather, initials long faded—from her first New York apartment.
She booked her flight two days early.
Miranda was in the living room when she heard the door.
It clicked once, not the buzzer, not a knock. The soft, certain turn of someone who belonged.
She stood, unsure whether to wait or walk toward it, when Andrea stepped inside. Hoodie on, hair in a messy bun, duffel sliding off her shoulder. She looked exhausted and radiant. She looked real.
She held up her hand.
“Look what I used,” she said, flashing the key.
Miranda crossed the floor before she could overthink it.
They didn’t kiss right away.
Andrea dropped her bag. Miranda reached for her face. There was a moment, suspended in the hush of the townhouse, where neither of them said anything.
Then Miranda’s thumb brushed beneath Andy’s eye.
“You came early,” she whispered.
“You invited me home,” Andy said.
And there it was, not a grand declaration, not even a conversation. Just a quiet understanding passing between two people who’d waited years to arrive at the same place, finally, with no one walking away this time.
That weekend, Emily, Serena, Nigel and Marco were invited to the townhouse, with the twins interrogating Marco.
The townhouse glowed warmer than it had in years. The twins were already home for the weekend, though they had barely dropped their bags before ambushing the guests. Caroline had assumed the role of lead interrogator with all the poise of her mother, and Cassidy flanked her with the mischievous charm of someone who enjoyed watching people squirm.
“So,” Caroline said, arching a perfectly unimpressed brow as she passed Marco a breadstick. “You’re the infamous Marco.”
Marco, caught mid-sip of Barolo, sputtered slightly but recovered with a sheepish smile. “Guilty as charged.”
Cassidy leaned forward with a scoff, her tone dry. “Please. Half the internet thought you two were secretly married when Ampersand launched. What was the story behind that, anyway?”
Across the room, Emily and Serena were already halfway through their second glass of wine. Emily, heels off and hair swept into an elegant low bun, looked more relaxed than usual. “I did warn Miranda, you know,” she told Serena with a smirk. “When you ghost someone like Andrea Sachs, the universe finds a way to bite back. Or deliver her to your doorstep holding a duffel bag and a key.”
Serena laughed, hand on Emily’s knee. “And here we are. God knows how many years, one wedding, and an Italian rebrand later.”
Nigel arrived fashionably late in a silk scarf and a fresh gossip reel. “You will not believe who got Botox from a street doctor in Montmartre,” he said by way of greeting, kissing Miranda once on each cheek. But as soon as he spotted Andy nestled comfortably at the edge of the living room couch, her feet curled beneath her and a glass of red in hand, his face shifted.
“Well, if it isn’t the prodigal girl herself.”
Andy stood, grinning. “In the flesh.”
He hugged her without pretense. “About damn time.”
Miranda watched the room with something close to disbelief. How seamlessly it had all come together.
And Andrea, right there beside her, not just surviving the night, thriving in it. One arm slung over the back of the couch, easy and unbothered as if this had always been her home. At some point, Miranda passed behind her and rested a hand lightly on her shoulder.
Andy looked up.
They didn’t say anything. They didn’t need to.
Much later, when the plates had been scraped clean and Cassidy had fallen asleep with a throw pillow over her head, Miranda stood at the kitchen sink while Andy dried the last wine glass beside her.
“You didn’t have to come early,” Miranda said quietly.
Andy smiled as she toweled the stem. “You didn’t have to wait for me.”
And so it ended where it began, in celebration and chaos, with too much wine and not enough words.
Except this time, they stayed.
— Wedding Week