CHAPTER NINE — The Distance That Didn’t Announce Itself
627 Words
Some endings don’t arrive loudly.
They begin as silence… that grows where conversation used to be.
——
It started small.
So small neither of them named it.
A missed message.
A delayed reply.
A meeting that didn’t happen.
At first, it felt normal.
Life happening.
Schedules shifting.
Pressure building.
But then it became a pattern.
Keira noticed she stopped checking her phone as often.
Not because she didn’t care.
But because she already knew what she wouldn’t see.
Ziven’s name didn’t appear like it used to.
Not less.
Just… slower.
And somehow, slower felt worse.
The café still existed.
Their place still existed.
But time inside it felt different now.
Keira sat alone more often before he arrived.
And even when he did come—
something felt slightly out of reach.
“You’re early,” Ziven said one evening.
Keira looked up.
“I wasn’t doing anything else.”
A pause.
Not awkward.
Just different.
“You used to wait for me,” he said quietly.
That landed softly.
But deeply.
Keira’s fingers tightened slightly around her cup.
“I still do,” she said.
Then added, softer—
“I just don’t know when you’re coming anymore.”
Silence followed.
Longer than it should have.
Ziven looked down briefly.
Like he understood more than he said.
“I’ve been busy,” he replied.
Keira nodded.
But this time, she didn’t respond the way she used to.
She didn’t ask what kind of busy.
She didn’t try to pull him closer.
Something in her had started learning not to reach too far.
At home, pressure grew louder.
“You need clarity,” her mother said one evening.
“Your life is not something you can pause like this.”
Keira didn’t argue.
She didn’t have the energy to.
Because her mind wasn’t fully in that room anymore.
Part of it was somewhere else.
Sitting across from someone who was slowly becoming harder to read.
Ziven’s world was tightening too.
Meetings.
Emails.
Transfer discussions.
Deadlines that didn’t care about timing.
“You’ll need to make a decision soon,” his supervisor said.
He nodded.
But his thoughts weren’t in the room.
They were elsewhere.
In silence.
In pauses.
In a girl who used to look at him like he was present.
And now… wasn’t always there.
They met again.
But it didn’t feel like meeting anymore.
It felt like alignment of two people who were no longer fully in sync.
“You’ve been distant,” Keira said softly.
Ziven looked at her.
“I haven’t changed.”
A pause.
“That’s the problem,” she replied quietly.
Silence.
That line stayed between them longer than anything else that night.
Because neither of them denied it.
Not really.
“I don’t know how to do this anymore,” Keira admitted after a while.
Ziven’s expression shifted slightly.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
“Do what?” he asked.
“This,” she said softly.
Then corrected herself.
“Us… whatever this is.”
The word hung there.
Us.
Still unnamed.
Still fragile.
Ziven leaned back slightly.
And for the first time—
he didn’t have a quick answer.
“I don’t think we ever learned how to hold it properly,” he said quietly.
Keira looked down.
Because that was the truth she didn’t want to hear.
A notification broke the moment again.
Ziven checked his phone.
His expression tightened slightly.
Another decision.
Another pressure point.
Another reminder that his life was moving somewhere else.
“I have to go,” he said softly.
Keira nodded.
But neither of them stood immediately.
Because now—
leaving wasn’t just leaving a café.
It was leaving something unspoken behind.
And neither of them knew how many more times they could do that.
- Writer
