The office was quieter than usual, like the world itself was holding its breath, waiting for something inevitable to happen.
She sat at her desk, fingers trembling over her keyboard, but she couldn't focus on the work in front of her. She kept stealing glances at the clock, counting down the hours, knowing that soon, he would walk out the door for the last time.
It was his final day.
The thought had been a constant whisper in the back of her mind, but now, as it grew more real with every passing minute, it felt like a weight pressing down on her chest. A silence hung between them, thick and suffocating — a silence that had been building ever since he first entered her world.
She had hoped, foolishly perhaps, that things might feel different on his last day. That they might share one last moment, one final conversation that could close this chapter. But no. Instead, it was just the same — just the distance, the empty spaces where words should have been, but never were.
Still, there had been a moment. Small. Silly. So easily overlooked.
He had kept teasing one of their mutual friends about a free coffee — lighthearted, persistent, like a running joke between shifts. "So, where's my coffee?" he would grin, playful and expectant. And though it wasn't said to her, she had heard it. Again and again.
So, one day — quietly, without announcement — she bought him a coffee. Just the way he liked it.
She left it with their friend to hand over, never saying a word. She didn't need to. That single gesture was enough. It was her secret — a small, quiet offering in a story that had never really been shared. A way of saying, I heard you. I saw you. I cared.
And he never knew.
As the minutes ticked by, she realized that she was going to miss him more than she ever allowed herself to admit. Not just because he was leaving the office. But because he was leaving her heart in a place she didn't know how to leave behind.
He had already said his goodbyes, in his quiet way. No grand gestures. No dramatic speeches. He didn't need to. The absence of words was enough.
She couldn't bring herself to say anything. Couldn't bring herself to face him one last time, knowing that the ache she had carried would never go away.
As the end of the day approached, she saw him — standing by the door, his bag on his back, ready to walk out and never return. His eyes briefly flickered over the room but never reached her.
And just like that, he was gone.
She didn't even know if he had noticed her looking at him. If he had seen the silent goodbye in her eyes. But it didn't matter anymore. He was leaving, and no amount of wishing or longing could change that.
She stayed at her desk long after he was gone, the quiet humming of the office surrounding her. She didn't feel the need to rush home. There was no one waiting for her. No need to pretend that everything was normal.
This was her goodbye, in the silence of the empty office.
A goodbye to the person who had never truly been hers, but who had still managed to capture her heart in a way she never expected. A goodbye to the unspoken, to the what-ifs, to the small moments she had cherished in the quietest corners of her mind.
As the last few minutes of his final day slipped away, she realized something. He would never know how much he had meant to her. He would never know the way she had loved him from afar, in a way that could never be returned.
And maybe that was okay. Maybe that was how it was always meant to be.
But she would carry him with her, in her heart. Not as a regret, but as a bittersweet memory of someone who had once filled a space in her life that no one else ever could.
The office was empty now, save for the quiet hum of the fluorescent lights and the distant sound of the elevators. She stood up slowly, her heart still heavy with the weight of the goodbye she had never truly said.
She left the office that night, not looking back.
But somewhere in the quiet of her heart, she knew she would always remember him — and maybe, just maybe, he'd remember the coffee too, even if he never knew it was from her.