2:14 a.m. The moment the phone’s clock ticked over, Minji asked carefully,
“Should we have just one more beer?”
Her voice was as quiet as the sound of ice melting in a glass. I was still lying on the floor of her living room. The television had been off for ages; only a single lamp remained lit. In that light her face was half shadow, half silver.
For two hours we had traded any words that came to mind—office gossip, the ex’s wedding notice, a cat video from that afternoon. Then the words ran out. The silence was so perfect neither of us dared break it. Minji sipped her beer slowly, and I studied a hairline crack in the ceiling. Such a tiny fissure—why notice it now?
“There’s… beer left,” I said and opened the fridge. Cool air curled out. Two bottles, three cans. I pulled two cans from the shelf, fingers trembling so badly I clicked the tab twice without success. She laughed softly and handed me an opener. While I worked it, we avoided each other’s eyes.
― You’re okay, right? ― With what?
She closed her eyes, then opened them. Two seconds—maybe three. Yet in that sliver of time we exchanged a hundred replies: This isn’t right. This is fine. We’re only friends. That’s exactly the problem.
“It’s nothing. Really.” I lifted the can to my lips; the cold liquid slid to the back of my throat. She gave a small shrug and leaned back against the sofa. The lamplight stretched the shadow of her brow until it brushed my knee. I curled my toes so even the shadow would go untouched.
After a moment she spoke. “Does your wrist still hurt?”
“Hm? Oh—almost healed.”
“Then you can hold a cup again.”
She brushed my left hand. The contact was light, but it stopped my breath. A brief spark that traveled from the back of my hand along my forearm and settled somewhere behind my ribs. I set the can down and rubbed the spot as though to erase it.
“Minji.”
“Yeah?”
“Could we… just sleep here?”
I regretted it the instant the words were airborne. She tilted her head, then smiled—a smile reserved for friends, effortless and safe.
“Sure. I’m fine with it. Are you?”
I couldn’t answer. I no longer knew what fine meant. We spread separate blankets—she on the sofa, I on the floor. One meter between us, but that single meter had transformed us into strangers.
When the light went out, the room turned pitch black. With my eyes closed her breathing grew vivid: slow, steady, too near. I lifted my arm, lowered it, lifted it again. My fingertips inched through the darkness—ten centimeters at a time, cautious. But I never reached her.
Why? Perhaps because we both knew that at 9 a.m. we would walk into the same office, sit in the same team meeting, call each other colleague and smile on cue. Or perhaps it was the simpler fear that the hand I extended might cost me her altogether. Or maybe—maybe that night we were simply protecting the legitimacy of whatever we were.
4:07 a.m. Minji’s breathing had deepened. I was still awake, staring again at the ceiling. This time the crack looked less like a fracture and more like a hairline seam through which a faint light leaked. I watched that glimmer and quietly closed one hand into a fist. There was nothing inside it—yet I could not bring myself to let go.