That afternoon, I got home earlier than usual—my shift had been cut short because Ms. Wening said business was slow. As soon as I entered the lobby, I headed straight for the elevator, pressing the button with a weird sense of enthusiasm after spending days going up and down the fire stairs.
Ding.
The doors opened, but just as I was about to step inside, the noisy commotion from the first-floor hallway caught my attention.
“Oh, kid, check it again. Why is the fan completely dead like this?”
I turned around. At the end of the hallway, the door to one of the units stood wide open, and an old man—with completely white hair, wearing a sarong and undershirt—stood beside someone crouched down and busy taking apart an old standing fan.
The person crouching was the guy from the stairs that time—the plain dark T-shirt, the camera slung over his shoulder, exactly as I remembered.
I stopped for a moment, curious, then decided to approach slowly instead of getting straight on the elevator.
“Try turning it on again, sir,” he said, his voice as flat as usual, though his hands deftly fixed the cable connected to the plug.
Click.
The fan turned slowly, then picked up speed, blowing air that made the old man break into a wide smile.
“Whoa, it’s working! You’re a clever kid.” The old man patted his shoulder several times, looking delighted. “Good thing you were here. Otherwise, this fan would’ve stayed dead until Judgment Day. Kids these days don’t understand stuff like this anymore.”
“It was just a loose cable, sir. Easy.” He stood and put the small screwdriver back into his crossbody bag.
“Still, it’s rare for someone your age to go out of their way to help an old man like me.” The old man shook his head in admiration. “Young people these days are all busy with their own phones. You’re different.”
I stood a little way off, pretending to check my phone even though I was paying close attention to their conversation.
“I just happened to be passing by, sir,” he replied, brief as usual.
“Oh, please. What do you mean, happened to be passing by? That’s just who you are. Always has been.” The old man chuckled, then softened his voice. “Just like back then, when Mr. Broto’s kid—the owner of this building—was still around. You were always like this too, helping the old folks here without being asked.”
I sharpened my attention without realizing it.
Mr. Broto’s kid?
His expression changed slightly—only slightly, but enough for me to catch it from several yards away. His jaw tightened faintly, and his eyes dropped for a moment toward his crossbody bag.
“I’ll get going, sir,” he said, quickly cutting off the topic. “If the fan dies again, just call me.”
“Yes, yes, thanks, kid. Stay healthy.”
He nodded once, then turned—and that was the first time we looked directly at each other since the elevator incident a few days ago.
“Uh—hi,” I greeted him, a little awkwardly now that he’d caught me watching.
“Girl from Resident 18,” he said, as flat as usual, though I caught something different in his voice—like he was in a hurry to shut down the previous topic.
“I heard what he said,” I replied, unable to hold myself back. “You really do like helping people around here, huh?”
“Not really.”
“That old man said you’ve always been like that.” I tilted my head, curious. “Who’s Mr. Broto’s kid?”
For a moment, he was silent. His eyes looked at me, but for some reason, it felt like he was staring at something far behind me instead of actually looking at me.
“No one,” he finally answered softly. “Someone from a long time ago.”
His tone was different this time. It wasn’t his usual flatness—there was something heavier beneath it, even if only for a split second before he put his usual blank expression back on.
“I’ll get going,” he said, then walked away toward his own unit without waiting for my reply.
I stood still in the hallway, watching his back retreat for what felt like the hundredth time since we first met.
Alone in the elevator, I leaned my head against the glass wall and thought about everything I’d just seen.
That usually unchanging blank expression had cracked for a second earlier—only a second, but enough to make me realize there was something behind all that kindness he supposedly “had always had.”
Mr. Broto’s kid.
Who was he? Why did that name make his expression change so quickly?
I sighed and stared at my own reflection in the elevator’s glass wall. Everyone I’d met—Ms. Sri, the old man from earlier—always said the same thing: he was kind, he was polite, he always helped people without being asked. But every time I faced him myself, all I got were short answers and a face that was impossible to read.
Those two disconnected sides of him only made me more curious instead of helping me understand him.
Ding.
The elevator stopped at the eighteenth floor. I stepped out, still thinking about the jaw that had tightened and the eyes that had dropped for that brief moment.
Who was that man, really?