A Social Encounter (The Encounter #3)

Chapter 1 Aftermath

They looked like statues, frozen in time.

Greg standing by the PA desk outside his office, little baby Elizabeth in the stroller to his left, and Janet Thompson sitting in the chair.

Both were staring down the hallway toward the elevator that Carry had just disappeared into.

Neither one could move or say anything. The silence was nearly deafening, as Greg’s mouth finally fell open wide.

The sound was small—but in the stillness, it echoed.

The ring box had slipped from Greg’s hand as finally his hand released the death grip he’d used to make sure he didn’t drop it while running down the hall.

It had been hidden there within what had appeared like a fist. With the box striking the floor, a sharp crack echoed followed by the clattering sound as it went skidding across the polished surface.

It continued forward a few feet then began spinning, once…

twice…then coming to rest near the base of Janet’s desk.

Neither of them moved at first. The empty hallway now looming in front of them.

The echo of Carry’s heels had already faded; swallowed by distance, steel doors and the indifferent rhythm of elevators moving up and down without a care in the world.

‘Gone,’ was the thought repeating in Greg’s mind.

His hand remained suspended in the air where it had been, fingers slightly curled as if the weight of the box were still there.

His chest rose, but the breath didn’t fully come.

Something had locked inside him—tight, unyielding.

Janet was the first to shift. Slowly, she looked from the hallway…

down to the box as it stopped spinning and settled to the floor.

She just stared at it for a good ten seconds, then looked back up at Greg.

The pieces were assembling behind her eyes faster than she wanted them to.

Her lips quivered in place as she searched for the words.

“Greg…” she said quietly. No response. Still frozen like stone.

He blinked. “Greg?” she called again, starting to find her voice.

He took a slight step forward—but not toward the door or the elevator.

Toward the box. The movement felt like breaking a nut from a rusted bolt, signaling that his body was finally catching up to a moment his mind still refused to accept.

When he reached it, he just stared at it, sitting there on the floor like something abandoned, too late.

He couldn’t pick it up, at least not right away.

His jaw tightened. Then finally, he bent down and picked it up, turning it over once in his hand.

He still didn’t open the box. “I didn’t even get to say it,” he muttered.

Janet exhaled slowly, steadying herself. “You still can. Don’t just stand there. RUN! Chase after her already!” In her mind one thought repeated, ‘What are you waiting for?’

Greg let out a hollow laugh under his breath, shaking his head. “Did you not just see what happened?”

“I saw a misunderstanding,” Janet replied carefully. “A bad one.”

He slowly lifted his eyes off the box and looked up at Janet. She saw it then—really powerful—there was something raw in his eyes now. Not anger or panic. Loss. “She just accepted it,” he said nearly dumbfounded. “Right in front of me.”

Janet didn’t answer immediately. Her gaze drifted briefly toward the hallway again, as if expecting Carry to reappear and undo it all.

A moment passed, but she didn’t return. “Greg, you don’t have to accept it this way.

You need to go after her,” Janet said finally, more firmly now. “You can’t just stand here.”

Greg’s grip tightened around the box. For a moment, it looked like he might move—like instinct might take over and send him running down that hall.

But it didn’t. The color was gone from his face, as he reconciled himself to it.

“She’s gone,” he said, quieter this time.

Not arguing or resisting; simply accepting. “Just like Erica,” he muttered.

Janet studied him, and something unsettled took root in her chest. This wasn’t hesitation.

This was doubt. And that…that was new. ‘What is wrong with him,’ nearly screamed in Janet’s head.

Behind them, Elizabeth shifted softly in the stroller, letting out a small, sleepy sound that seemed impossibly out of place in the weight of the moment.

Life continuing unabated. Janet reached down instinctively, resting a hand on the side of the stroller seat beside Elizabeth, grounding herself.

When she looked back up, Greg had turned slightly—his gaze no longer on the hallway but somewhere farther away.

“Greg…” she started again, softer now. “What are you thinking?”

He didn’t answer right away. His eyes were glazed over now. His voice didn’t sound as he tried to open his mouth, no words coming out. When it finally did, it came almost as a confession. “…I think I just lost her.”

The words hung there. And for the first time—Neither of them tried to argue otherwise. Janet took in a deep breath as she stood up and looked Greg directly in the eyes. “Greg, you know that she is not at all like Erica. Why are you just letting her go like this.”

“I waited too long,” the words stumbling out of his mouth.

“So many times I talked about asking her, but something always got in the way. Why did I hesitate?” He finally found the chair beside the desk and sat down, putting his head in his hands.

“How did I miss the signals?” He looked down at Elizabeth who was just smiling up at him.

‘This is what I wanted, what I thought I’d found with Carry? Did I push her away?’

The elevator doors closed with a soft chunk.

For a moment, she just stood there—frozen—staring at her reflection in the polished steel walls at the back.

The sound resounded in her head, having sealed her off from the hallway…

from Greg… from everything she had just detonated behind her.

She turned around slowly, the conflict exploding in her mind.

Carry didn’t remember pressing the button.

Her chest heaved like there wasn’t enough air in the entire building.

‘What did I just do…?’ nearly screamed in her mind.

The question hit—but it didn’t stay as something louder answered it.

‘You chose. Tessa told you to act. You decided your own fate, not letting it decide for you.’ Her hand tightened around her clutch, fingers trembling so hard she had to bring her other hand up just to steady it.

She pulled her phone back out as the elevator began to descend.

The screen was still lit. Email Sent. There it was.

Final and irreversible. A clean, digital line drawn straight through her old life.

Her reflection blurred as tears flooded her eyes—but she blinked them back hard, jaw tightening.

“No,” she whispered under her breath. “No… don’t do that.

Not now.” She steadied herself, taking a deep breath, trying to focus.

The elevator jolted slightly during its descent.

That movement broke something loose inside her.

Images hit—fast, disjointed, merciless. Greg in the hallway, out of breath, saying her name like she mattered.

Then—Veronica. Greg’s words echoed in her mind “She’s still pissed…

making it public… staking a claim…” Carry squeezed her eyes shut.

This was the moment; That one line that sliced everything open.

‘Not me. Not us. Him… and Veronica.’ Her stomach twisted violently.

“I was never part of that,” she said to herself, her voice cracking now despite her effort to hold it together.

“I was just… in the way.” The elevator numbers ticked down.

Each floor felt like another layer peeling off—another illusion stripped away.

She let out a shaky breath and leaned back against the wall, the cool metal grounding her just enough to keep from collapsing.

‘It was always Janet’s desk.’ The image that surfaced next was like a nightmare replaying.

Janet—back at her desk, settling in like she’d never left.

And then she remembered how little Elizabeth was right there in her stroller.

Like she belonged there in a familiar environment.

Carry’s lips parted slightly. “That was never mine,” she whispered.

And somehow… that hurt more than Greg. Because it wasn’t just losing him.

It was losing the life she thought she was building.

The future she thought she was earning. The place she thought she had.

Her grip on the phone tightened again. The image of the email now floated in front of her eyes as if it was happening all over again.

Veronique Offer Of Employment. The subject line burned into her memory.

Cassie’s voice echoed faintly behind it.

“Different pace… different expectations… we’d actually get to see each other again…

” A different life. One where she wasn’t— the second choice or collateral damage.

No longer a pawn in something bigger? Her eyes opened again, locking onto her reflection.

Red from the tears she was trying to suppress.

But something else now, too. Both harder and resolved.

The elevator slowed as it approached the lobby.