I stared at the message longer than necessary before typing back:
Depends.
His reply came almost instantly.
On what?
On whether this involves rooftops again, I sent.
No rooftop this time. But I think you'll like it.
The next day, I told my assistant I had a "personal appointment" in the afternoon. I didn't offer details, and she didn't ask.
When I arrived, he was waiting by the corner café again. This time, there was no coffee, no slow walk through rain. Instead, he led me toward a narrow side street I'd never bothered to notice before.
It opened into a hidden courtyard, framed by ivy-covered walls. At the center stood a single, massive tree whose branches spread out like dark green lace against the sky. Beneath it, a bench.
"I used to come here when I needed to think," he said. "Thought you might like it."
I sat, feeling the weight of the week slide from my shoulders in slow increments. The sound of the city was muted here, as if the tree swallowed noise.
We talked about nothing and everything. I learned he hated mornings, loved thunderstorms, and once tried to live in another country but couldn't stay away from this city. I offered pieces of myself in return, careful ones, like pebbles dropped into deep water where no one could see how far they sank.
At one point, our hands rested on the bench between us, close enough that the space felt deliberate. I almost moved mine away. Almost.
Instead, I let it stay.
When I left that afternoon, the thought struck me like a quiet truth: I wasn't just curious anymore.
The city moved in shades of gray that morning. The kind of overcast sky that blurred the line between dawn and mid-morning, as if time itself had decided to sleep in.
I liked mornings like this, cold, quiet, predictable. Normally.
Today, the calm felt like a thin layer of ice over restless water.
I arrived at my office early, as usual. The building's lobby smelled faintly of fresh paint and coffee, the kind of scent that reminded you everything was in constant upkeep. I exchanged nods with the security guard, my heels clicking in precise rhythm on the marble floor.
The moment I sat at my desk, I opened the quarterly reports and buried myself in numbers. Numbers didn't lie. They didn't smile unexpectedly in the middle of the rain. They didn't send messages that hovered unanswered in your phone, tempting you to look, to respond, to risk.
Half an hour in, I realized I'd read the same column of figures three times. My pen tapped against the desk without rhythm. The numbers blurred together, and without permission, my mind replayed Thursday night's walk through the park. The way the rain had softened everything, even the edges of my own thoughts. The way I'd caught myself smiling for no reason at all.
I set the pen down with more force than necessary. Enough.
I'd built my life on discipline, on clear boundaries, on not letting people or feelings trespass. That was how I'd survived, how I'd earned respect in a business world that often expected women to smile politely and step aside. I had never stepped aside.
Yet here I was, tripping over my own thoughts like a rookie.
My assistant, Julia, knocked and entered without waiting for an answer, as she always did. She was holding a stack of folders and an amused expression.
"You're distracted," she said, placing the folders on my desk.
I arched my brow. "I'm working."
"You're pretending to work. Big difference. I've worked with you long enough to know the signs." She tilted her head, studying me like I was a puzzle she was close to solving. "You've got that… faraway look. Like you're listening to someone talking, but they're not actually here."
I flipped open the first folder just to avoid her gaze. "Maybe I'm just tired."
Julia leaned one hip against the desk. "Tired, distracted, checking your phone a lot lately"
"I am not checking my phone a lot," I said, sharper than intended.
She smirked. "Whatever you say, boss."
When she left, I let out a slow breath. Julia was good at reading people, but she wasn't going to read me. Not completely.
Still, her words stuck. I was checking my phone more often. Not to reply, just to… see. As if something could change if I stared long enough.
That afternoon, during a meeting with the board, my thoughts drifted again. The conversation around the table was about expansion strategies, but all I could think about was how strange it felt to want something I couldn't measure, couldn't plan for. I prided myself on knowing the next step in every move I made.
This, whatever it was, wasn't in my playbook.
After the meeting, I stayed behind in the conference room. The polished wood table reflected my expression: calm, collected, unreadable. On the surface, anyway. Beneath that, I felt like I was leaning over the edge of something I didn't dare name.
My phone buzzed in my jacket pocket. I didn't have to check to know who it was.
For a full minute, I didn't move. I told myself I wouldn't read it. That I had work to do, deadlines to meet, investors to call. But then I took the phone out anyway.
"Hope you're having a good day. No agenda. Just thought I'd say that."
I stared at the message longer than necessary. Simple. No pressure. And yet it hit like a stone dropped into still water. Ripples.
My first instinct was to put the phone away and pretend it never arrived. My second was to type something back, something equally casual.
Instead, I set the phone face down and walked to the window. The city stretched out below rows of glass and steel, each window reflecting pieces of the sky. I thought about how easy it was to get lost in a place like this. To disappear into schedules and transactions until you forgot there was a world outside of them.
Maybe that was why he unnerved me. He didn't belong to my routine. He didn't fit neatly into the compartments I'd built. He was… color, in a life I had trained to stay monochrome.
I pressed my forehead briefly against the cool glass. "Don't do this," I whispered to myself.
By the time I left the office, the sky had darkened into the early evening. My driver was waiting, but I waved him off and decided to walk. I told myself it was for the fresh air, but the truth was, I needed space to think without the hum of an engine or the glow of a dashboard screen.
The streets were wet from a light drizzle, the air carrying that faint, metallic scent before a heavier rain. My heels clicked against the pavement, steady and sure. And yet, inside, nothing felt steady.
Every few steps, I felt the weight of my phone in my coat pocket. A tether. A temptation.
At one point, I stopped under a streetlamp, pulled it out, and unlocked it. My fingers hovered over the keyboard. I could type something simple, You too. Or even Thanks. Nothing more.
But I didn't.
Not because I didn't want to. Because I did. Too much.
I slipped the phone back into my pocket and kept walking, my pace quickening as if I could outrun the pull.
When I reached my apartment, I didn't turn on the main lights. I left the city glow filter in through the tall windows, filling the room with silver shadows. I poured myself a glass of wine, sat on the couch, and stared at nothing for a while.
My life had been built on saying no to distractions, to detours, to anything that might weaken my focus. But I could feel the yes forming in my chest, stubborn and quiet and undeniable.
I sipped the wine, told myself I'd let the feeling fade, and tried not to notice how warm the thought of him made me feel.
For the first time in a long time, I wondered if keeping the door locked was really the smartest choice.
And that was the most dangerous thought of all.