Chapter 15 The Empty Space #3
"I was going to say congratulations."
"You were going to make a joke."
"That too."
Khun Dew laughed.
Across the office, Ling and Orm walked together.
They weren't hiding.
They weren't performing.
They weren't even trying to look like a couple.
They simply were.
Orm stopped at her desk.
Ling looked at her.
"You have work."
"So do you."
"Then why are you standing here?"
Orm smiled.
"Because I wanted to."
Ling smiled back.
"Stay."
Orm sat down.
Just like before.
Except this time, there was no campaign.
No contract.
No reason.
And that made all the difference.
?
The day passed differently.
Ling still had meetings.
Orm still had work.
They still disagreed.
At eleven, Orm criticised one of Ling's decisions.
At eleven fifteen, Ling told Orm she was being difficult.
At eleven twenty, Orm told her she was impossible.
At eleven thirty, they were laughing.
Bow watched from across the room.
P'Cherry shook her head.
Fluke whispered,
"I missed this."
P'Cherry replied,
"You were here."
"Not the point."
At lunchtime, Orm appeared in Ling's office.
"You haven't eaten."
Ling looked up.
"I know."
"Then come."
"I'm busy."
"So?"
Ling smiled.
"So?"
Orm crossed her arms.
"Don't make me use the executive director's own tactics against her."
Ling raised an eyebrow.
"What tactics?"
"Stubbornness."
"That's not a tactic."
"It works."
Ling stood.
"Fine."
Orm smiled triumphantly.
They walked out together.
The ordinary returned.
But now it was different.
Now neither of them needed an excuse.
?
That evening, Ling stood at the window of her office.
Orm was sitting in the chair opposite her.
She was scrolling through her phone.
Every few seconds she laughed at something.
Ling watched her.
Orm looked up.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"You keep looking at me."
"I know."
"Why?"
Ling smiled.
"Because you're here."
Orm stared at her.
Then she smiled.
"I am."
Ling nodded.
She looked around the office.
The same walls.
The same desk.
The same chair.
The same city.
But something had changed.
The empty space was gone.
Not because the office had changed.
Not because the campaign had returned.
Not because the contract had been renewed.
Because Orm was there.
And Ling finally understood that home had never been the apartment she returned to every night.
It had never been Veyra.
It had never been the office.
It had never been Bangkok.
Home was the person whose absence made every familiar place feel unfamiliar.
The person whose laughter could change the atmosphere of a room.
The person who could irritate her and comfort her in the same breath.
The person who stole her coffee and somehow made her want to buy another cup.
The person who sent ridiculous messages at midnight.
The person who challenged her when everyone else stayed quiet.
The person who had entered her life as a professional obligation and somehow become the one person she couldn't imagine living without.
Ling looked at Orm.
"Orm."
"Hm?"
"I love you."
Orm smiled.
"I know."
Ling laughed.
"That's all?"
"What do you want me to say?"
"Something romantic."
Orm pretended to think.
Then she stood.
She walked toward Ling.
She stopped in front of her.
"I love you too."
Ling smiled.
"Better."
"Demanding."
"Always."
Orm took her hand.
Their fingers intertwined.
Outside the windows, Bangkok glittered beneath the evening sky.
Inside, Veyra was quiet.
The campaign was over.
The photographs had been archived.
The contracts had been signed.
The clients had moved on to their next project.
The world had already begun forgetting the story they had once sold to it.
But Ling no longer cared.
Because the most important thing the campaign had given her was never the success.
Never the numbers.
Never the photographs.
Never the praise.
It had given her Orm.
And losing her had taught Ling something she could never have learned while pretending.
Sometimes you don't realise someone has become home until you are forced to live without them.
Sometimes the empty space they leave behind tells you more about what they meant than all the moments you shared while they were there.
And sometimes love doesn't arrive like lightning.
Sometimes it sneaks into your life disguised as irritation.
As an argument.
As a stolen coffee.
As a late-night message.
As someone sitting in the chair across from your desk because they simply don't want to leave yet.
You don't notice it happening.
Not at first.
Then one day, the person is gone.
And suddenly every room feels too large.
Every silence feels too loud.
Every ordinary morning feels incomplete.
That was how Ling finally understood.
She hadn't lost her fake girlfriend.
She had lost the person who had become home.
And when she finally found the courage to admit it, she discovered something even more frightening.
Home wasn't a place she could return to.
Home was someone she had to choose.
Again.
And again.
And again.
So Ling chose.
She chose Orm.
Not because Aurelia needed them.
Not because Veyra benefited from them.
Not because a client wanted photographs of them standing together.
Not because a contract told them to hold hands.
She chose her because when Orm wasn't beside her, the world still functioned-but it no longer felt like hers.
And Orm chose her too.
Not because pretending had become comfortable.
Not because the campaign had made them a perfect pair.
But because somewhere between the arguments and the laughter, the jealousy and the fear, the stolen coffee and the midnight messages, they had stopped acting like two people in love.
They had simply become two people who were.
And this time, there was no script.
No rules.
No cameras.
No pretending.
Only them.
And for the first time, that was enough.