I address it with him later.
Not immediately after the meeting, when the air is still charged and people hover in doorways pretending to scroll through their phones while actually listening for tone. Not in the hallway where conversations echo and nothing stays contained. Not in the kitchen, where interruptions are inevitable and privacy is a myth. I wait until the building settles back into its afternoon rhythm, when the urgency has bled out of the walls and everyone has retreated to their own corners again, absorbed in tasks that feel safely individual.
Timing matters.
It always has. The same words spoken at the wrong moment become something else entirely. A challenge. A defense. A performance. I’m not interested in any of that.
I knock once on his door, not because I need permission
