The Silence
by TonyGW
Copyright© 2026 by TonyGW
Paul noticed the quiet. Not silence exactly. There was never real silence at these things. Just a thinning out of sound, like the room was holding its breath. The clink of glasses dulled. Laughter came in short bursts, then stopped. The carpet swallowed footsteps. He stood with a drink he hadn’t really wanted in his hand and felt that familiar conference sensation settle over him. The sense that everyone else belonged here more naturally than he did. That everyone else was hearing a very different speech than the one he was hearing. It almost felt like the Pope was addressing the faithful from the balcony at St Peters Basilica and he was the drunken tourist that had stumbled in at the back. He almost laughed at his own cleverness. The Telstra CEO had just finished his welcome, fortunately, this year they had decided to deliver the welcome over cocktails instead of cramming everyone into a theatre. That alone was a blessing, but no matter how it was delivered or how much he banged on about the future, the speech still sounded like a 40-minute advertisement for the Telco and was opening another four days of ads. Well, he thought, at least the food was good. He made the decision he was going to get drunk, free champagne for the next six hours his enabler.
He turned toward a server holding a tray of flutes, his conference ID, hung around his neck scratched lightly against his shirt when he shifted his weight.
Paul Anderson. Service Delivery Manager. ADS Systems. Brisbane.
He hated the whole Conference ID thing. Hated how it flattened him into something easily readable. Hated how it was used to track his movements, his interactions, how it would be used to build a profile over the next four days so Telstra and their Partners could better target him and ADS, anticipating our customer needs they called it. He took a sip of the Champagne. acidic, cheap.
Its free, just drink it ... stop bitching ... it’s what you need to achieve your goal of being drunk by 10.
Four days in Melbourne, hosted by Telstra, networking disguised as learning, advertising disguised as opportunity. He’d told himself to enjoy it, use the time to catch up with some of his old Sydney colleagues and possibly find something new to take back to his team.
That was the thing about Paul. He always believed the version of himself that promised improvement. Well at least this new version of himself.
The Melbourne Conference and Exhibition Centre was cavernous, and over lit, Paul drifted toward the edges, where the lighting softened and it didn’t feel like someone was about to drive a 737 in for maintenance.
He checked his phone out of habit ... well, compulsion really. No notifications. He hadn’t expected any. But it gave him something to do so he didn’t look like he needed company. Apple’s contribution to social distancing.
Five years, and still your thumb hovers over a contact that hasn’t existed for a very long time.
He turned slightly to avoid a group forming near him and almost collided with someone.
“Sorry...” they both said at the same time.
Paul looked up and froze. For a split second his body reacted before his brain could catch up. His stomach tightened. His pulse jumped. A ridiculous, irrational sense of being caught doing something wrong. The man in front of him frowned, then smiled slowly.
“Jesus,” the man said. “Paul?”
Paul stared. The face was older. More intense. There were faint lines at the corners of his eyes that hadn’t been there before, and he had one of those stupid blended haircuts all the execs seemed to have. But the voice was unmistakable.
“David?”
They stood there for a moment, both grinning now, that stunned, disbelieving grin people get when the past walks directly into them. Then David laughed and stepped forward, pulling Paul into an awkward half-hug that quickly turned into a full one, warmth and friendship flooded through Paul, something he hadn’t felt since...
“Mate,” David said into his shoulder. “It’s been forever.”
Paul hugged him back, surprised by how solid he felt, how familiar.
“Yeah,” Paul said. His voice came out rougher than he expected. “It has been, shit, a while.”
They stepped back and looked at each other properly.
David had filled out. Not fat. Just ... settled. Comfortable. He wore the same easy confidence he always had, like life had met him halfway more often than not. Paul felt a faint, unhelpful flicker of envy.
“Bloody hell,” David said. “You look good.”
Paul snorted. “Come on Mate, the rules say you can’t start lying until after the third beer.”
“No, seriously. You look, I don’t know like you’ve put on 20 kilos of muscle. Are you still doing the gym thing?”
“On and off,” Paul said. “Mostly off lately.”
David nodded like that made sense. “What are you doing now ... here?”
“Flying the flag ... Service delivery,” Paul said. Holding up the Conference ID “Mid-size IT firm back in Brisbane. You?”
David’s grin widened. “Head of IT. Opal Mining. Working out of HQ in Sydney.”
Paul blinked. “Mate. That’s huge.”
David shrugged but couldn’t quite hide the pride. “It’s busy. Pays stupid money. Soul-destroying in a very specific way. I’ll be looking at CIO in two years ... If I suck the right board members dick and I don’t fuck it all up before then.”
Paul laughed. It came easier than he expected. “Some things don’t change.”
They moved toward a quieter corner, instinctively avoiding the crowd. It felt strange how natural it was, falling into step beside him, like they’d just resumed a conversation paused mid-sentence years ago.
“How long’s it been really?” David asked.
Paul did the math automatically. He always did. “Five years. Since ... everything.”
David’s expression shifted. Subtle, but Paul caught it. A tightening around the mouth. A carefulness.
“Yeah,” David said. “You kinda disappeared, I only heard you were in Brisbane two years ago. I was hoping I’d run into you at some point. I just ... didn’t want to push, I know you were dealing with ... a lot.”
Paul nodded. He appreciated that more than he could say. He’d needed space then. He’d needed walls. He needed people to just stay the fuck away. And David, more than anyone, had understood that.
“How’ve you been?” David asked.
Paul hesitated. Fine was the answer people expected. Good was the one he usually gave. Both felt dishonest.
“Alright, actually ... a little on the lower side of alright” he said finally. “But a shit load better than I was.”
David studied him for a moment, then nodded. “Well, I guess that counts as progress.”
They talked for hours.
About uni. About the stupid share house they’d lived in, the big Māori housemate that paid his share of the rent in weed, the time Paul nearly got arrested for getting David away from a bouncer. David reminded him of a whole life he’d forgotten. Paul laughed harder than he had in months.
They skirted around the breakup at first, like a bruise everyone knew not to press. Eventually, inevitably, they got closer.
“You never told me what really happened,” David said quietly, after a lull. “Not the details. I mean. You don’t have to. Everyone knows the story that got told and then proved to be bullshit. I always wondered just what really went down.”
Paul swirled the wine in his glass. He didn’t look up.
“Some things,” he said, “don’t get better when you say them out loud.”
David accepted that. That was another reason Paul had missed him.
“I saw that dickhead, Tim, middle of last year ... he had applied for a job at Opal ... I quietly fixed that. Did you know they all got charged? ... Providing false statements ... actually, I think that was after you’d done a runner...”
Before Paul could respond a woman approached their little pocket of space, smiling apologetically.
“Sorry to interrupt,” she said, touching David lightly on the arm. “They’re calling you for the CIO roundtable.”
David groaned. “Of course they are.”
Paul looked up at her and felt the floor shift beneath him.
Small. Blonde. tanned, straight hair tucked behind one ear. The curve of her mouth when she smiled. The way her jade green eyes narrowed slightly, like she was always assessing something just out of view. She wasn’t identical. Not exactly. But she was close enough that his chest tightened and that was too close.
“This is Emily,” David said. “She’s with us in Brisbane. Absolute lifesaver. Emily, this is Paul. Old friend.”
Emily turned fully toward him.
“Nice to meet you,” she said.
Her voice was different. Softer. Lower than Kathy’s had been. Paul clung to that detail like a lifeline.
“Yeah,” he said, forcing a smile. “You too.”
They shook hands. Her grip was firm. Confident. Paul noticed the faint warmth of her palm linger just a fraction longer than necessary, those eyes, locked on his.
He told himself it meant nothing.
“You guys should talk,” David said turning to Emily. “Pauls in Brisbane too.”
Emily’s eyes flicked back to Paul. Curious now. Open.
“Definitely,” she said. “If you’re up for it, but I’m drinking beer not that carbonated cats piss they’re calling Champagne”
Paul felt a sudden urge to retreat. To say he was busy. To step back into the safety of distance. But something else stirred beneath the reflex. A quiet pull ... Attraction, unwelcome but undeniable.
“Fair enough,” he said. “But I have to say it’s been working very well.”
David was already backing away, phone in hand. “I’ll find you two later, after I finish pretending that I know what I’m talking about.” He looked directly at Paul “Don’t disappear again, alright?”
Paul watched him go, then turned back to Emily.
For a moment neither of them spoke.
“So,” Emily said, tilting her head slightly. “How are you finding the conference?”
Paul exhaled. “Underwhelming.”
She laughed. Not politely. Genuinely.
“Exactly,” she said. “I keep thinking I should be learning more than I am. I mean that’s what the company expects, although David did say we’d all end up drinking enough to forget anything we’d have learned.”
Paul laughed “Well that does sound like David ... What do you do?” Paul asked.
“Applications delivery,” she said. “Mostly legacy systems. Lots of translating executive panic into developer language. Just taken over as the Team lead. David said I should come to this” she waved her hand indicating the room “so I can get use to dealing with bullshit”.
Paul smiled. “I feel that in my soul.”
They talked. Easily. About work, about Brisbane, about how Melbourne coffee was overrated. Paul relaxed despite himself. He kept noticing the similarities and then immediately correcting for them. Kathy had worn her hair longer. Emily’s nose was slightly different. Kathy had always spoken faster when she was nervous. Emily seemed to slow down instead.
Still, the resemblance sat there, unspoken, like a third presence between them.
When the night wound down and people began drifting out, Emily checked her watch.
“I should head back,” she said. “Early start.”
“Yeah,” Paul said. “Same.”
There was a pause. A moment where something hovered, unclaimed.
“Maybe we grab a coffee tomorrow?” Emily said. Casual. Careful.
Paul felt his mind spin then click into overdrive.
One part of him listed reasons not to. Too soon. Too similar. Too risky. Another part, quieter but more persistent, reminded him that five years was a long time to stay frozen, too long to keep punishing himself.
“I’d like that,” he said.
She smiled again. This time there was something warmer in it. “Me too.”
They exchanged numbers. When she walked away, Paul stood there, staring at his phone. His mind replaying their conversation. He realized that their conversation was the longest he’d had with someone that wasn’t a co-worker in a long time.
Back in his hotel room, the city lights and rain smeared against the window, it was Melbourne after all. He lay on the bed, fully dressed, staring at the ceiling.
He told himself he was just tired. But in the dark, his mind kept returning to the same unsettling question.
In all the time they had talked ... was he seeing Emily. Or was he seeing what he’d lost.
Paul woke before his alarm, the grey light of Melbourne morning pressing softly through the hotel curtains. For a few seconds he didn’t know where he was. That thin, floating moment before memory clicks into place, before awareness becomes solid.
Then it did ... Melbourne. Conference. Emily.
The sound of her laugh. The way she’d said “Me too” like it mattered. The way her hand had felt when they shook, warm and steady.
His chest tightened, not with panic exactly, but with something close to it. Anticipation mixed with dread. He lay still, staring at the ceiling, cataloguing the feeling like it was a system fault he needed to diagnose before it escalated.
This is just a coffee; nothing is happening yet. Don’t get ahead of yourself.
He’d learned the hard way how quickly getting ahead of yourself could turn into ashes. How quickly it can all fall apart. How quickly swimming can become drowning.
They met in the lobby café an hour later. Emily was already there, seated near the window, fingers wrapped around a mug like she was borrowing warmth from it. She’d changed from the business formal power suit of the night before. Now, a casual dress, hair loose, minimal makeup. She looked younger somehow. More real. Less ... Kathy.
Paul hesitated before approaching. A ridiculous urge to turn around tugged at him. To delay. To postpone the moment where expectation could turn into disappointment. The self-doubt almost a taste in his mouth.
Fucking man up!! It’s a cup of coffee. Even if she hates me, it’s over in 20minutes.
She looked up and smiled when she saw him.
There it was again. That narrowing of her eyes, like she was focusing, looking into him rather than at him.
“Morning,” she said.
“Morning,” he replied, sitting down across from her.
There was a brief, awkward pause as the server came over. Orders placed. Space created. Paul noticed Emily’s knee bouncing slightly under the table her ring finger tapping at the side of her mug.
She’s nervous.
The realization surprised him. He’d assumed she’d be more at ease. She was ... someone her company clearly valued, someone who had earned David’s casual respect. Someone clearly competent, socially fluent. Attractive. But there it was, plain as day.
That helped.
“So,” Emily said, blowing gently across the surface of her coffee. “Did you sleep?”
Paul huffed a quiet laugh. “Not much.”
“Conference excitement?”
“Something like that.”
She smiled but didn’t push. He noticed and appreciated the restraint.
They talked about the sessions they planned to attend, complaining mildly about needing a glossary for all this year’s new buzzwords, rolling their eyes at leadership panels that said ... nothing of substance. It was easy. Comfortable. And yet, under it all, there was a level of awareness Paul couldn’t switch off. Body armour he wasn’t prepared to shed.
She noticed.
The way he deflected personal questions without fully shutting them down. The way his posture stiffened when conversation drifted toward relationships. The way he chose his words carefully, like someone who expected conversations to become evidence.
Emily understood ... she had her own tells.
She listened intensely. Didn’t interrupt. Asked follow-up questions that suggested she remembered details most people would forget. But whenever Paul asked something that edged toward her personal life, she answered smoothly and briefly, then redirected.
“No boyfriend”, she said lightly... “Busy with work ... Haven’t really thought about it.”
The words were casual. The timing was practiced.
Paul recognized that, it was a page from his own play book.
By the end of the first day, they were walking between sessions together discussing them. Sitting beside each other during panels, sharing quiet comments that made them both smile. He caught himself leaning toward her when she spoke, lowering his voice unconsciously, noticing she didn’t pull away.
At one point, she brushed her fingers against his wrist as she passed him a program. The contact was brief. Almost accidental. Electric.
His entire body reacted.
Jesus, for fucks sake ... Get a grip.
Emily felt it too. She felt the jolt of awareness, the way her skin tingled after she pulled her hand back. She told herself it was ridiculous. She barely knew him. He was clearly guarded, clearly carrying something heavy. That should have been enough to slow her down. A red flag.
Instead, it made her curious ... sparked her interest.
She watched him. The way his jaw tightened when speakers talked about trust. The way his mouth curved slightly when he was amused but trying not to show it. She sensed something unresolved in him, something he lived around rather than through.
It felt familiar in an uncomfortable way.
On the second night, they found themselves at a quieter bar a few blocks from the conference centre. Not officially together. Not really. Just ... there.
Emily picked at the label on her beer bottle.
“You don’t talk much about your past,” she said, not accusing. Just observant.
Paul stared into his drink. The amber liquid caught the low light, steady and unmoving.
“Neither do you,” he said.
She smiled faintly. “Fair.”
Another pause. A longer one.
“I was engaged,” Paul said suddenly.
The words surprised him as much as they did her. He hadn’t planned to say it. It had just ... slipped out, like a truth tired of being held back.
Emily’s eyes softened. “Was.”
“Yeah.”
She waited. Gave him space. That was becoming a pattern.
“It ended badly,” he continued. “Publicly. Messy. I wasn’t ... I didn’t handle it well.”
He felt his throat tighten. The old familiar ache stirred, but it didn’t spike like it used to. No sudden nausea. No instant need to escape. Just sadness. Dull and distant.
“I’m sorry,” Emily said quietly.
Paul nodded. He appreciated that she didn’t ask why. Didn’t push for the story like it was entertainment.
Emily felt something twist in her chest. Sympathy, yes. But also, recognition. The echo of her own unresolved ending ... carefully boxed and never opened.
She took a sip of her beer, grounding herself.
“We all carry stuff,” she said. “Some of us just hide it better.”
Paul looked at her then. Really looked.
“And you?” he asked gently. “What do you hide?”
Emily’s smile didn’t reach her eyes.
“Another time” she said.
Paul nodded ... he accepted that ... understood.
By the third day, the attraction was no longer subtle. It sat between them like a live wire. Their conversations drifted closer. Silences stretched but didn’t feel empty. They brushed shoulders, touched hands. When Emily laughed, Paul felt it somewhere low and deep, a reminder that his body hadn’t forgotten how to want.
Emily lay awake that night in her hotel room, staring at the ceiling, replaying moments with him.
The way he listened when she spoke. The way he looked at her like she was something to be considered, not consumed. It scared her more than indifference ever could.
She thought of her ex without meaning to. The last conversation. The casual cruelty of “I didn’t plan this; it’s just the way it is.” The feeling of emptiness ... betrayal ... burned into her memory like a brand.
She swallowed and rolled onto her side.
Don’t do this. Don’t build something on silence, let him open up, then open up to him.
But she couldn’t tell Paul. Not yet. She couldn’t. The obsession lived quietly, privately. A wound she refused to examine too closely. Sometimes pain shared isn’t pain divided, it’s just more pain. Ignorance, she’d learned, if not bliss ... could be survival.
On the final morning, David cornered Paul near the espresso machine.
“So,” he said, smirking. “You and Emily.”
Paul sighed. “Is it that obvious?”
“To anyone with eyes,” David said. “You have really slipped under her armour ... She doesn’t do this, you know, like ever.”
“Do what?”
“Get close,” David said. “She’s popular. Everyone likes her. She’s friendly ... But she keeps people at arm’s length. Always has.”
Paul frowned. “You think she had a bad breakup.”
David shrugged. “Really, I don’t know, we aren’t that close, it’s just she stands out in my little crowd. But it wouldn’t shock me. I mean ... You two seem ... similar. You’ve both got that wounded puppy thing happening”
Paul hesitated, then said, “She looks like Kathy.”
David blinked. “Huh.”
“Not exactly,” Paul added quickly. “Just enough to mess with my head.”
David studied him for a moment. “Well, I guess you’ve got a type ... Do you realize you said her name just now?”
Paul went still.
“Yeah,” David continued. “You didn’t flinch. That’s new.”
Paul considered that. Let it sit. “No stomach cramps,” he admitted quietly.
David smiled. “Maybe Emily’s the reason. Maybe ... Just maybe ... this is what you need, what you both need”
Paul didn’t answer. But the thought followed him all day.
That night, they walked along Southbank together, the Yarra dark and slow beside them. City lights reflected in the water, fractured and restless. Music drifted from somewhere. Laughter. Movement. Life going on around them, restaurants buzzing, a constant ever-changing crowd at the Casino entrances.
They stopped beneath a large fig tree wrapped in fairy lights. The glow softened everything. Made the moment feel suspended.
Emily leaned against the railing, looking out over the river.
“I’m glad we met ... I’m glad I met you” she said.
Paul felt the weight of the words. The implication. “Me too,” he said.
She turned toward him then. Close enough that he could see the faint freckles across her nose. Her eyes narrowed, he felt her gaze. Watched as she drew a breath.
“Paul,” she said, hesitant. “I don’t usually do this. I don’t jump into things.”
“Neither do I,” he said.
They stood there, just looking at each other, just a moment.
The kiss was slow at first. Testing. Like they were asking permission with their lips. Paul felt heat bloom through his chest, his hands settling at her waist without urgency, just certainty.
Emily sighed softly into him, fingers curling into his jacket. The kiss deepened, hunger threading through restraint. It was heated but controlled. Two people very aware of what they were risking ... what they were starting.
When they finally pulled apart, foreheads touching, they were both smiling.
“We’ll see each other in Brisbane,” Emily said. Not a question.
Paul nodded. “Next weekend.”
She smiled, nodding.
Hope flickering bright and dangerous. Hope could be devastating, hope fuelled Secrets. Secrets created silence.
Neither of them mentioned what they were thinking, what they weren’t saying.
They walked back hand in hand, the city humming around them, both wondering in their own quiet way how long silence could last.
Paul lay on his back, staring at the ceiling of the hotel room, hands folded loosely over his chest like he was trying to keep himself contained.
The room was dark except for the thin line of city light sneaking through the gap in the curtains. Outside, the traffic was dying. A siren wailed and faded. Melbourne settling down.
The moment under the fig with Emily kept replaying in his mind.
Not just the kiss. The way she’d leaned in first. The way she’d hesitated for half a breath, like she was asking herself if she was allowed to want something again. The way she’d sighed when he touched her waist, like relief had slipped out of her before she could stop it.
That was the part that scared him. Not the desire. He understood desire. Desire was simple. Chemical. Honest. It was the hope tangled up inside it.
Five years, and he’d built a life around not letting hope get leverage.
He rolled onto his side, curling slightly, phone face-down on the bedside table. He didn’t need to check it. He knew there would be no messages. He and Emily had agreed. Brisbane. Next weekend. Simple. Clean.
So why did his chest feel tight like something was already threatening to crack it open?
Because this is how it starts. Because you’ve felt this before. Because you thought you were safe then too.
His thoughts slid, uninvited, backward.
He was twenty-two when he proposed to Kathy.
The ring wasn’t extravagant. He’d spent weeks agonizing over it anyway. White gold. Simple setting. Nothing flashy. He wanted it to feel like them. Solid. Practical. A future ring, not a showpiece.
They’d been sitting on the sand at Cronulla, shoes kicked off, feet half-buried, the ocean a steady, reassuring presence. The kind of afternoon that felt like it had been designed for memory.
Kathy had laughed when he pulled the ring out. Not mockingly. Just surprised. Overwhelmed.
“Yes,” she’d said immediately, like there hadn’t been any other possible answer.
Paul remembered how his chest had nearly split open with happiness. How sure he’d been. How complete.
They’d known each other since high school. Studied together. Graduated together. They’d grown up, side by side. Shared history like a shared language.
They lived in a rental house in Cronulla with another couple, Tim and Christine. Close to the beach. Too expensive for what it was, but they made it work. Every morning, they caught the train together into the city. Paul to his IT job. Kathy to Uni for her Masters.
Life felt like it was lining up.
He’d noticed small things, in hindsight. Kathy laughing a little louder at Tim’s jokes. The three of them staying up late when Paul had early mornings. Christine and Kathy growing closer, whispering, touching, sharing everything. The distance between them slowly growing.
But love had narrowed his vision.
They were happy. The sex was incredible. Intimate. Frequent. Familiar in the best way. Paul’s mind filed everything under ... we’re solid ... and stopped looking for contradictions.
Confirmational bias, he would later learn. The mind protecting the story it wants to believe.
The day it shattered started like any other.
Paul was at work when a coworker leaned over the divider of his cubicle, grinning.
“Mate,” the guy said. “You enjoy the Cronulla festival?”
Paul smiled absently. “Didn’t end up going. Work ... we had that outage at Parker Brothers; Mike and I were there all night.”
“Shame,” the coworker said, scrolling through his phone. “It was wild.”
He flicked through photos, stopping now and then to comment. Paul only half paid attention until the coworker turned the phone toward him.
“Hey, check this out, she looks like your Misses”, he said nodding toward the photo of Kathy and him on his desk.
Paul leaned in.
There was Kathy, unmistakably Kathy, between Tim and Christine. All three of them laughing, bodies pressed close. The next photo loaded.
Kathy and Tim, mouths locked together, intensity unmistakable. Christine just behind them, watching.
Paul felt heat drain from his face.
“Yeah, hot, right” the coworker said casually. “Those three put on a real show. Thought they were going to fuck right there in front of us.”
“The three of them?” Paul asked. His voice didn’t sound like his own.
“Yeah. Blondie was all over both of them,” the coworker said, chuckling. “Didn’t know who they were. Probably just randoms. Everyone was off their head, weed smoke so thick you couldn’t help but get a buzz.”
Paul stared at the image. At Kathy’s body language. The ease. The familiarity.
The coworker laughed again. “Only got the shots ‘cause I was trying to get a photo of the blonde’s arse. Mate. You should have seen it ... Absolute work of art.”
Yes, Paul thought numbly. It was.
He excused himself, pale and shaking, got the photos sent to his phone, told his manager he felt sick. Which, in a way, was true. He called Kathy. Voicemail.
His mind raced, grasping for explanations that didn’t lead to the end of everything, looking for excuses that didn’t destroy.
It was just the music. Drugs. A stupid moment.
He decided he could forgive that. He just needed her to say it; he just needed to know.
The house was quiet when he arrived. Unusually quiet since his car and Tim’s car were both there.
He came in through the back, habit more than intention, and stopped dead.
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