Nara’s fingers trembled as she ran them over the texture of the sketchbook paper in front of her. The paper was somewhat thick, carrying a faint scent somewhere between old wood and a thin coffee spill. Every pencil stroke on it—the bold lines blending with delicate shading—seemed to be silent proof that while Nara had spent seven years believing she’d been forgotten, Arka had never truly left.
“Ka…” Nara’s voice was nearly drowned out by the roar of rain outside. “Did you… draw all of this?” Arka nodded slowly. He reached for his Americano, which was giving off only a thin thread of steam now, and took a slow sip before looking back at Nara. “I’m not good at putting words together like you are, Ra. You know that, right? Back then, every time I wanted to talk to you at school, my tongue would always freeze up. So… all I could do was draw.” Nara turned another page. There was a picture of herself sitting at a bus stop in the middle of a downpour—exactly like the scene this afternoon. She remembered that day. The last day of high school’s national exams. Nara had waited for him at the bus stop for quite a while, hoping Arka, who stood a few yards away, would talk to her or offer her his umbrella. But until her bus arrived, Arka had only stood there silently, staring at the road. And the next day, Arka disappeared. His phone number was disconnected, his house was empty, and his friends only knew that Arka had moved out of town with his father.
“Why only now?” Nara asked. The emotion she’d been holding back finally trembled across the wooden table between them. The warmth of nostalgia had now mingled with bitterness kept buried for years. “Seven years, Arka. Why did you suddenly disappear when we graduated, then suddenly show up again and hand me this book as if no time had been lost?” Arka let out a long breath. His gaze dimmed, hinting at deep regret.
“I know I was wrong,” Arka said quietly. “That day… my family’s move happened very suddenly because of problems with my father’s business. I had to go with them to Bandung within a matter of hours. But honestly, that wasn’t the only reason I didn’t tell you. I was a coward, Ra.”
Nara furrowed her brow, waiting for the man to continue. “Back then, I felt like I had nothing to offer you,” Arka continued, his honest tone cutting deep. “You were smart, you had big dreams of becoming a writer, and you always seemed to shine. And me? I was just a quiet guy who could only doodle in the back of the classroom. I promised myself… I wouldn’t come back to see Nara until I’d managed to become someone worthy of standing beside her.” Silence crept between them. Behind the counter, the barista could be heard making coffee, while a quiet acoustic song played in the background of the café.
Nara stared at Arka in disbelief. The man sitting across from her now looked much more mature. His shoulders were straighter, his jawline sharper, and an architect’s calm confidence radiated from him. Yet beneath it all, Nara could still see the same Arka—the shy boy who hid his feelings behind sheets of sketches.
“You’re an idiot,” Nara whispered, even as the corners of her lips lifted into a faint smile she couldn’t hold back. “I never needed you to become ‘someone’ first, Ka. I just needed you to say hi.” Arka smiled—a faint, rare smile that had always made Nara’s heart flutter. “I know. And I regret that it took me this long to realize it.”
Arka then pulled a black pen from his jacket pocket. He took hold of the edge of the latest sketch, which depicted Nara that afternoon, and wrote a ten-digit number in the bottom-right corner of the page.
“This is my new number,” Arka said as he gently pushed the sketchbook toward Nara so she could keep it. “The book is yours now. Every line in it was made for you from the beginning.”
The rain outside began to ease, leaving behind a fine drizzle and the soothing scent of wet earth. “Nara…” Arka called softly as Nara prepared to put the sketchbook into her laptop bag. “Yes?” “Your novel draft… is it going to take you much longer to finish this afternoon?” Nara glanced at her laptop, then looked back at Arka. “It seems like my story idea just completely changed because of someone. Why?” “In that case,” Arka said, standing and picking up his jacket and umbrella before looking at Nara with a warm light in his eyes, “can I keep you company over coffee until the café closes? We have seven years to make up for.”