Back to her own city, Yeh quickly slipped back into her familiar rhythm. Meetings, emails, project milestones—everything proceeded according to plan. Her life remained tight, structured, and perfectly under control.
Yet sometimes—in the few seconds between elevator doors closing, in the quiet lulls between meetings, or late at night when she finally shut down her computer—images about Lin would surface unbidden. The way Lin's eyes curved into crescents when she laughed, the habit of tilting her head slightly while telling stories, and that unmistakable light that ignited in her gaze whenever she spoke of her dreams.
These details were not intrusive or sharp, but they returned again and again.
Yeh wasn't flustered. She understood clearly that this wasn't the kind of emotion that made her lose judgment. It was more like a lamp lit inside her heart—soft, unobtrusive, but was constant, steady and enduring.
She knew better than anyone:
Attraction does not mean getting close, nor does it means taking action. To act would mean changing the current status. It would mean pushing a currently balanced relationship into an uncertain direction.
She knew her own boundaries too well, and she understood exactly what rhythm was required to keep things from spiraling out of control. Especially since they were business partners, she would never allow emotion to override logic.
She didn't want a misinterpretation to jeopardize a viable collaboration, nor did she want to appear overly eager in something that hadn't even taken shape yet.
This wasn't restraint to show to others; it was a standard she set for herself.
She had analyzed it calmly: She wasn't afraid of rejection, nor was she afraid of a bad outcome. She simply knew that if a connection relied solely on her pushing forward, it was inherently unstable. Relationships like that were exhausting to maintain and prone to collapsing without warning. She didn't need that. What mattered more to her was whether the other person shared the same willingness to take that step. Only then did a relationship have real value.
This wasn't about surrendering control, it was choosing a more sustainable approach after experiencing enough ups and downs of life.
Sometimes, she allowed herself to think: if the collaboration ended and they returned to their separate orbits, never to cross paths again...
She could accept that.
For adults, "falling int" someone doesn't always require reciprocation. Often, it is simply acknowledging that it happened, and then letting it rest where it belongs.
She could accept a brief encounter and she could accept no future. She could even accept that one day, this memory would fade into something faint but clean. To her, that was enough. So she didn't chase, nor did she wait. She simply tucked the feeling away, leaving it to rest quietly in her heart.
If this relationship was meant to be, it would find a way. If not, there was nothing more to be done.
She just needed to keep moving on.