Lin could easily have waited in Yeh's office as she usually did. When Yeh returned, she could have simply asked casually, "Where did you go?" and treated the whole thing like any ordinary moment between them.
But she stood rooted to the spot, her fingers resting lightly on the edge of her phone, and found she no longer wanted to do that.
In that moment, she understood clearly: if she walked back in there as if nothing had happened, she would have to pretend that the scene she had witnessed at the café entrance didn't exist at all. And that was something she could not do.
She looked down and opened their chat window.
The cursor blinked in the text box. She paused for several seconds, weighing her words, trying to gauge exactly where this message would lead them.
Then, slowly, she typed:
I saw you downstairs just now.
She hit send.
She didn't put the phone away immediately. Instead, she stared almost compulsively at the screen, waiting for an explanation that might make sense of what she had seen.
Yeh didn't reply.
Those few minutes stretched out, heavy and slow.
Eventually, a message appeared.
"Yeah. Just had coffee with a friend."
It was brief. No elaboration, no emotion, no opening for further conversation. It was phrased exactly as if answering a question about the most ordinary thing in the world.
Lin stared at the words for two seconds, her fingers hovering over the glass before typing again.
"You looked like you were having a really good time."
As she sent it, she couldn't quite define the tone—was it testing? Seeking confirmation? Or simply revealing a care she wasn't ready to admit to?
This time, Yeh took even longer to reply. It felt as though she had read the message but hesitated over how to answer.
That silence was far more unsettling than before. It lasted so long that Lin began to wonder if she had said too much, if she should have left it alone.
Just as she was about to lower the phone, the screen lit up.
"It was fine. We have known each other for years."
Lin's gaze fixed on those words:for years. They were light enough, yet carried a heavy weight, anchoring the rest of the sentence in a way that made everything seem inevitable, natural, and beyond question.
Her grip tightened instinctively. Almost against her will, she typed again:
"Are you close? I've never heard you mention her before."
Once sent, the screen fell silent again.
Outside, Yeh had just stepped out of the café. Alice waved goodbye from the doorway; she nodded in return and turned toward the elevators, her phone growing warm in her palm.
She looked at the question and paused.
It wasn't that she didn't know what to say—it was that she knew too well: every possible answer carried meaning.
Only when the elevator doors slid shut did Yeh begin to type.
"Yeah. She's the kind of friend that we talk about absolutely anything. I have a few close friends I haven't had a chance to introduce to you yet."
She hit send. She added nothing more, offered no further explanation.
She had deliberately ended it there—positioned perfectly: not suggestive, not distant, yet leaving behind a gap that could not be ignored.
Lin read the reply. She repeated the phrase silently in her mind.
It felt bitterly ironic.
She thought back to the moments between them: sitting together in the car late at night, conversations breaking off halfway, thoughts left hanging in the dark night; those silences that she believed was enough for understanding; and all those times she had assumed closeness existed without need to be confirmed.
She had believed that quiet understanding was something unique to them.
Now she realised—
Perhaps it wasn't. At the very least, it wasn't theirs alone.
She sent no reply.
The conversation ended there. There was no argument, no outburst of feeling; on the surface, everything remained polite and calm. Yet it was precisely that calmness that pushed the distance between them one step further back, in total silence.