Between Boyfriends

"Oh, hey, yeah, I only saw your message just now. I was fast asleep, I'm afraid."

"Not to worry. We called the hotel and they opened the room for us."

He hadn't raised Renee's absence as an issue so chances are whatever she'd said had been accepted, so I simply said "Oooh, croissants!"

Wang followed me to the breads. "By the way, as Cherry's now flying back, she can go on the shuttle bus to the airport with you."

"Great," I said.

Normally I'd be delighted. I could probably cope on my own, but it was amazing how many people around the airport didn't speak good English, especially in a provincial city. The check-in staff would be fine, but bus drivers and security staff could be annoying. An extra pair of eyes to confirm I was at the right terminal could be useful. I'd half wondered if I could get Renee to play minder again and get an extra half-an-hour of semi-privacy with her. No point now, even if she came we'd have to focus everything around her office-mate's loss.

"When is the bus?" I asked.

"We'd better get the eight-thirty one. Cherry's flight is earlier than yours and they're only every hour."

I did the maths. If I missed the first one through some excuse, then it was tight but probably still safe, but Cherry would probably insist on waiting with me. However long you stayed, you were always a guest in the country and she'd feel the pressure to play host. I couldn't really add to her stress. I just had to hope Renee put in an appearance in the next twenty-five minutes for the round of emotional farewells.

She didn't.

The flight home was fine. I tried to follow my usual habit of using the in-flight entertainment system to burn through the first half-an-hour of various popular movies that I hadn't quite been interested in enough to watch at the cinema, but my heart wasn't really in it. I picked up some duty-free for my relatives during my stop-over in Schiphol and then was met my parents at Heathrow.

As I was driven out of the car park, I checked my phone. I had a lot of goodbye messages, but only one from Renee.Everything's fine. Have a safe journey

I checked the time of the message and adjusted for time zones. However long she'd slept in, she hadn't had to send this in a rush. She'd had time to consider her answer and this was it.

I typed back:Just landed. Want to talk?

It was the middle of the night there, so it maybe wasn't surprising she didn't answer until I was home and sleeping off the jet lag myself.It's okay. Get some sleep.

Over the next few days and weeks I made various gentle attempts to contact her, each one rebuffed. I never went as far as to say we needed to talk, or that we had to talk. I just tried to keep the door open.

About five weeks later, I was replying to messages on WeChat and I saw she'd posted a photo of her and a boy on her Moments page. They were making a big heart symbol with their hands in front of Cinderella's Castle at Shanghai Disneyland. I hadn't paid that much attention at the time, but it was probably the same guy from the photo in the restaurant. She'd already received a lot of comments about what a great couple they made. I added my own 'heart like' to the fifty or so she'd already collected.

It didn't seem like there was going to be another opportunity to work abroad and I wasn't sure I wanted to in any case. As I settled back into working life in England, I started to check Chinese social media less and less. It had been an adventure but also exhausting. When I did, Renee was inevitably posting her and her new boyfriend doing something cute.

That kind of got tiring so I went a whole two months without looking. When it came to Christmas and I was going through the usual social media blitz, I ended up clicking on it again. She'd spent the whole of November barely posting anything except a few kitten pictures, then there she was again in December holding hands in the snow in her village in the north with a boy. They were wrapped up so tightly in winter coats and bobblehats that it took me a moment to realize that it was a completely different guy.

There might have been an indication of what had happened to the previous guy in Chinese, but that was beyond my ken. I doubted it. WeChat Moments was a happy place for happy thoughts and any drama would have gone on in private messages. That photograph was part of a set of six or so. There was another couple in them. A sister or brother with an attendant partner in tow, perhaps. It was hard to tell. As with most Chinese photographs, whatever fun they'd been having had been paused while they took a series of immaculately posed snaps.

I spent a week looking at those photographs.

Not for hours and not all the time, just, occasionally, I'd pull out my phone and go back to it and just stare at them for a while.

At first, I thought it was just regret or ennui or whatever. Then I woke up on New's Years Day morning and realized what my subconscious had been trying to tell me.

I knew the guy.

He'd been at the bar -- the one my colleges had introduced me to. We'd never spoken, but I'd seen him - several times. He'd been popular. He'd always had a boy hanging off his arm or else a crowd round him on the dance floor. I looked again at the picture of what I'd assumed was the sibling couple. The other guy...no...him I couldn't place, however hard I tried.

I couldn't help shake the feeling that those two guys would make a cute couple, though.

And so I found myself looking intently at the 'sister.' There wasn't a lot to say. She was cute, for sure. Renee's type? I had no idea. But why not? I liked the idea. It was a logical leap of faith that made me feel good.

I sent aHappy New Year message and got a dancing snowflake wishing me a happy New Year in return.

I then spent a long time with my hands just above the touch screen trying to think of what to say next.

I wanted to congratulate. I wanted to confirm. Hell, I just wanted to probe. We exchanged a few messages, pleasantries, and details about how the new product line was going. I tried to think of a way I could mention her private life. Then find a way I could tell herI know.

I typed a few different variations, tried a few different attack vectors, but never hit send. I knew full-well how she'd shut each one down.

I know. So what? That fact that loud mouthed Laura five thousand miles away knows didn't help her any. I tried to convince myself that I could be a shoulder to cry on. And then, what? Dispense culturally-irrelevant advice that would drive her love life into complete disaster if she was ever foolish enough to take any of it? It's not like I was able to be hugely discreet with my own secrets when I was over there. I could tell her,I know but I'm not going to say anything, but why even bother to go that first. If I'm not going to say anything, just don't say any fucking thing.

In the end, I just sentTake care, and she repliedWill do.

As far as I'm aware, she did.