"Hi," Malik said. "Coffee still means coffee."
"Good." She ordered something with oat milk and sat. For a moment they both looked at the table as if it might provide a script.
Then Tessa said, "June called. She cried in a productive way. She owns the mismatch. I told her I don't need her to manage the sequel."
"Rafi owns it too," Malik said. "I made him sit in the uncomfortable chair in our office. We have one chair that wobbles. I save it for moral conversations."
Tessa's mouth twitched. "Do you always use furniture as ethics?"
"I use what I have," Malik said. "Yesterday I used a seating chart metaphor on myself and it was ugly. Today I'm trying plain speech."
They talked about the site visit—how the venue's ceiling height lied on paper, how a curator wanted drama and a facilities manager wanted fire-code compliance, how Tessa had spent an hour mediating between beauty and sprinklers. Malik talked about a partnership pitch that had almost collapsed because two organizations used the word equity to mean different budgets. He did not turn every story into a parable about their night. He let some stories just be work.
Halfway through her cup, Tessa said, "I keep replaying the moment you said wait. Your face did this—" She made a small open-handed gesture. "Like someone pulled a fire alarm in a room you thought was a lounge."
"It was," Malik said. "I hate that I made you feel briefly absurd for believing what you'd been told."
"You didn't make me absurd," Tessa said. "The setup did. You made me… abruptly alone inside a shared joke." She tapped the cup. "I'm telling you that because if we ever try a date on purpose, I need you to notice when the joke stops being shared."
"I can do that," Malik said. "I am also someone who gets excited and fills silence with charm. Charm is not listening. I'm working on the difference."
She nodded. "I'm someone who decides fast and then defends the decision like architecture. I decided it was a date before I met you. That was my contribution to the mess."
"Incomplete apologies," Malik said softly. "Both directions."
"Incomplete," she agreed. "And still useful."
They did not schedule a second coffee before standing. Outside, the wind had sharpened. Malik walked her toward the corner where their routes split—hers toward the train, his toward the bus that would take him back toward the warehouse office and a late grant narrative.
"There's a members' evening next Wednesday at Meridian," Tessa said, surprising herself as much as him. "Not a gala. Smaller. I have a pass because I consulted on a lighting redo last spring. I could bring someone. Or I could go alone. I'm not offering a redo of the emerald dress night."
Malik felt the held-open door in his chest.
"I would like to see Broken Refrigerator again," he said. "With clearer eyes. If that someone is me, I will arrive knowing the frame: two people returning to a sculpture and deciding, in realtime, what the evening is. No friends translating for us."
Tessa's gaze steadied. "Realtime. No translators."
"Realtime," Malik echoed.