---
Monday morning, *Haziq* was at his desk before I arrived.
Not extraordinary — *Haziq* was always early, I had known that since the first week. But this morning he had two cups of coffee on his desk, one on his side and one on the other, and when I placed my bag in my chair he slid the cup toward me without looking up from his screen.
"Guess how you knew I'd want coffee this morning," I said.
"Everyone wants coffee on Monday morning." He typed something. "That's not a guess. That's statistics."
I sat. Took the cup. Tasted coffee that was already at the right temperature — not too hot, not too warm, in the way of coffee prepared by someone who knew the coffee would reach the person's hands within a certain amount of time and calculated accordingly.
"Do you remember how many minutes it takes me from the parking to here?" I asked.
"Eight minutes." He glanced at me briefly. "Coffee went in at eight minutes."
I looked at him.
He looked back at his screen with a face that had nothing on it.
And I laughed — not because it was funny, but because there was something in the way *Haziq* existed that made the world feel smaller and more manageable than it had felt before.
---
At noon, Zayriel had an external meeting.
The office was different when Zayriel wasn't there — not quiet, not tense, just different in the way the air felt when a certain pressure was absent. *Syahmi* made jokes he wouldn't make if Zayriel were there. *Hana* laughed louder. *Dina* who was always quiet said two more sentences than usual.
I noticed the difference.
Noticed the way everyone's shoulders dropped slightly.
Noticed the way I myself breathed differently.
*Haziq* and I had lunch in the pantry — not planned, it just happened the way things that are always in the same space eventually happen. He brought a packed meal, I bought from the shop downstairs, we sat at the pantry table with food in front of us and a conversation that started about work and then wasn't about work anymore.
"Farhana," I said at one point.
*Haziq* stopped chewing for a moment.
"Your friend who left," I continued. "Was his name also Farhana?"
*Haziq* swallowed. Put down his spoon. "No. My friend's name is Ridhwan." He looked at me. "Why?"
"Farhana — *En.* Zayriel's old PA — *Syahmi* said she's not the resting type." I looked at my food container. "Your Ridhwan isn't the tired type either. You said that."
A brief silence.
"Two people," *Haziq* said slowly. "Two different sentences."
"One same thing in them."
*Haziq* leaned back in his chair. Looked at the table for a moment in the way of someone arranging something in their head — not quickly, not hurriedly, in the way of someone in IT who was used to problems that needed to be thought about from the right angle first before they could be solved.
"Ridhwan left in August last year," he said finally. "He didn't tell me much. Said he was tired, said he wanted to take some time. But Ridhwan — he's the type who says things directly if there's a problem. He doesn't go quiet."
"But he went quiet."
"He went quiet." *Haziq* nodded slowly. "After he left I tried calling a few times. He answered, he was okay, he said he was fine. But there was something in the way he spoke that — " he stopped. Looking for words. "Like he was speaking from somewhere far away. Like he was there but not really there."
I looked at *Haziq*.
"Farhana, two years and three months," I said. "Ridhwan, four months."
"Two people with different durations." *Haziq* looked at me. "But the same pattern after leaving."
We sat with that thing between us — not heavy, not frightening yet, but there. Something two people were seeing from different angles and had just realised they were seeing the same thing.
"Is there a way to trace Farhana?" *Haziq* asked.
"I have her full name from the file." I thought. "Nur Farhana binti Azman. But I don't know what to do with that name."
*Haziq* nodded slowly. Then — "Your file — Farhana's file in the system — is it complete?"
I looked at him. "Why?"
"Because Ridhwan's file in the old system I had — there was one page missing. I remember because I was the one who scanned the documents." He looked at the table. "The last page. The exit interview section."
I sat with that for a moment.
Then stood. "One second."
I left the pantry, went to my desk, opened Farhana's file in the system. Scrolled down — onboarding notes, work records, annual reviews, resignation letter —
Exit interview.
Empty.
Not empty like it hadn't been filled in. Empty like something that should have been there wasn't — in the way of a space left after something had been removed, not a space that had never been filled.
I brought the laptop to the pantry.
Showed *Haziq*.
He looked at the screen. Said nothing for a moment.
"Same," he said finally. Short.
We looked at each other.
---
"Is there a way to trace Farhana?" *Haziq* asked again, this time in a tone different from before — not an ordinary question, but the question of someone who had decided they wanted an answer.
"I have her full name from the file." I looked at my food container. "Nur Farhana binti Azman."
"I can try." *Haziq* took his phone. "I can ask Ridhwan again too. Properly this time, not just asking if he's okay or not."
I looked at him.
"Why do you want to help?"
*Haziq* looked at me — in a way that wasn't on the list of answers I was prepared for. Direct. Without qualification.
"Because a pattern like this shouldn't exist." Short. Ordinary. In the way of someone saying something because it was right, not because it sounded good. "And because you're the one who noticed."
I said nothing.
*Haziq* put his phone away. Picked up his spoon again.
"We start with Ridhwan first. He's easier for me to approach."
---
In the afternoon, Zayriel came back from the external meeting with a file in his hand and the way he always was — unhurried, not looking tired even though external meetings were always more tiring than office ones.
He placed the file on my desk without saying anything.
Walked to his room.
Door closed halfway.
I opened the file — ordinary documents, meeting notes that needed to be retyped in a certain format. I started working.
Ten minutes later the door of Zayriel's room opened.
"*Haziq*."
*Haziq* looked up from his desk.
"The server project next month — I want you to lead it." Zayriel stood at the doorway of his room. "There are several sections that need to be worked on at night. Are you okay with that?"
*Haziq* nodded. "Okay, *En.* Zayriel."
"Briefing on Wednesday." Zayriel turned back in.
Door closed halfway again.
I looked at my screen.
Server project. Night work. Wednesday briefing.
All made sense. All had a reasonable reason. All were ordinary things in an ordinary office.
But there was something in the timing — in the way it came out exactly after noon, exactly after *Haziq* and I had sat in the pantry, exactly after we had said Ridhwan's and Farhana's names and the empty exit interview in the same breath —
that sat in my head with a weight that didn't ask permission.
I rationalised.
Coincidence. A project already planned. Timing I was giving too much meaning to because my head was looking for meaning in everything.
I typed the meeting notes.
But my hands on the keyboard were slower than usual.
---
Before leaving, *Haziq* passed my desk.
"I already texted Ridhwan earlier." Quietly, not for other ears. "He replied. Said he's okay to meet."
I looked at him.
"When?"
"Not confirmed yet. But he wants to meet." *Haziq* nodded once — the way of someone doing something because it was right and not needing more than that to continue. "I'll let you know when there's a date."
He stepped toward the lift.
I sat with that thing — with Ridhwan who would meet, with Farhana whose full name was in a file, with an exit interview that was empty in two different files from two different people who had left the same place.
With a server project and night work and a Wednesday briefing that made sense and had reasonable explanations.
I took my bag.
Stood.
And in the moment I stood, in an ordinary movement that required no thought — the bracelet at my wrist moved.
Not cold.
Not heavy.
Something different from everything I had ever felt from the bracelet before — like a vibration too subtle to be called a vibration, like something living inside it had just realised there was something that needed to be warned about.
I stood still.
Looked at the bracelet in the white ordinary light of the office.
And in that moment — in one unplanned second — I felt something that had no precise name. Not cold. Not heavy. But something deeper than both. Like the bracelet was no longer simply sitting at my wrist.
Like I was the one sitting within the bracelet.
Like all this time I had thought I was the one wearing it — but it was actually something else making the decision about who was wearing whom.
A moment.
Then gone.
I exhaled slowly.
Left the office.
---
In the lift, the mirror in front of me.
My ordinary reflection — the same clothes, the same bag, a face tired in the way of someone whose face was tired but whose mind was still running.
The lift descended.
And in the moment between the third floor and the second — in a moment less than three seconds — my reflection in the lift mirror lagged.
Half a second. Not more.
But enough for me to see — my reflection was still standing upright when my body had already begun to move forward. As though it existed in a slightly different time. As though it had only just followed after something invisible gave it the signal to follow.
Then normal.
The lift reached the bottom. The door opened.
I stepped out into an afternoon that was already turning dark.
And in my mind — in the part that had learned to store things without processing but couldn't do that with this —
Zayriel wasn't afraid of *Haziq*.
He wasn't trying to stop *Haziq*.
He was using *Haziq*.
And I didn't yet know what for.
But the bracelet at my wrist —
that had just felt like it was the one wearing me, not me wearing it —
perhaps knew.
— END OF CHAPTER 8 —