“It’s really important for me to see you,” I reiterated.
He read the message. A minute passed, then two... Sweat began to bead in my palms as I gripped the phone, growing increasingly anxious. I barely managed to endure until the fifth minute.
“Sorry, I really can’t tonight,” he finally replied, still tactfully firm. “Are you okay? If you need, I can call you before I leave work.”
He still hadn’t offered a reason for not meeting tonight, but my intuition told me it had something to do with Gao Zi Yuan. I suddenly recalled our past meetings—unless I asked directly, Chu Ke Huan rarely brought her up. After all, she wasn’t a topic that brought either of us joy.
Rarely mentioning her didn’t mean he didn’t care for her or couldn’t tolerate her.
Chu Ke Huan had once complained that his marriage was “chosen for him,” but he had also admitted that he couldn’t just walk away from Gao Zi Yuan. He did, in fact, have a choice. And when he ranked me and her in order of priority, he made his choice.
I was the “other,” the one not chosen.
Realizing this, I stopped replying to Chu Ke Huan’s messages. If I wasn’t the one he chose, then there was no need for us to define anything between us—not even to say goodbye.
I closed the chat window, telling myself that this was the best way to end things: the messier and more rushed, the less burdensome. Like old friends who had drifted apart, exchanging a few casual lines after a long silence, only to be interrupted by other obligations. A fleeting conversation, forgotten as quickly as it started, leaving no urge to continue it later.
But brushing it off so easily was easier said than done. A suffocating tightness crept into my chest, and I found myself compulsively checking my phone again, hoping that Chu Ke Huan might send a follow-up message to ease the discomfort.
There was nothing.
I put the phone down, but almost immediately, the notification sound chimed. Heart racing, I opened it.
It was a message from the work project group chat. Frustrated and numb, I responded, addressing Marketing’s (Marketing: the sales department) request for sales highlight summaries. Just as I resolved that, another issue from RD (RD: research and development) surfaced, flowing toward me like an endless conveyor belt. And yet, all I could focus on was whether the adjacent chat with Chu Ke Huan showed any new activity.
After three years of a stable relationship, I had stayed in my comfort zone for far too long. The uncertainty of this ambiguous disappointment left me reeling, my resilience weakened. To feel this heartache, like a lovesick teenager, for something so trivial—it was embarrassing. My rational mind chastised me for being so affected.
The group chat appeared calm, as I moved from resolving Marketing’s issues to RD’s. My experience as a PM (PM: project manager) told me the next domino in this butterfly effect would likely be SWRD (SWRD: software R&D). I knew those engineers were often hesitant to bother me and were probably figuring out how to frame their questions. Not wanting to deal with more messages over the phone, I pushed aside my emotional turmoil and instructed the driver to change course.
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