She Knew Which Day

The thing that won't leave me is the smile. July had a version of Se-ra who met my eyes over the coffee counter and looked like someone on my side. Today she looked up from my chair and smiled like she'd already won the thing I didn't know we were competing for.

She outshone me in front of GM Oh. I sat through the whole VIP check-in like a piece of furniture while she delivered her rehearsed lines and he nodded in the way he only nods when he's mentally promoting someone. I know that nod. I've watched other people get it. I have never once been on the receiving end.

And then — my chair. My login. A folio correction with my name on the metadata. She didn't even move when I came back from break. She finished signing.

The dark drop in the corner. Not ink. I keep turning that over. I photographed it and I left the page in the folder as if I hadn't seen it, because the safest version of me is the one who saw nothing.

The note in my bag is worse. If you want this opened. She knows what's in that envelope. She's known. She's been waiting for me to need her to know. Tuesday. The anteroom. Alone. She chose the wording of someone who has already decided I'm coming.

I walked home listening for someone behind me. There was no one. I counted nine streetlamps and then stopped counting because the number started to feel like a superstition I was inventing on the spot.

I drew the anteroom layout from memory on the floor of my flat, badge on the table like a paperweight on my own chest. I know where the secondary exit is. I know where the camera blind spot might be. I should not know that.

I told Min-ji I'd be late tomorrow. I did not tell her why.