Ninuo texted first thing.
"Free this afternoon? My shout."
I almost said no. There was a basket of washing waiting, and I still hadn't replied to Dad about Sunday lunch.
Then I looked at the basket again and decided it could wait.
"Yes," I typed back. "Same place?"
"Same place."
She was already at the window table when I arrived, laptop bag still over one shoulder, like she'd come straight from the airport.
In a way, she had.
"You look well," I said. And I meant it. Even straight off a flight, she had that same clear, rested look she always seemed to carry — like tiredness simply didn't stick to her the way it stuck to me.
"Melbourne weather. Four seasons in one afternoon, as usual."
The coffees came before we'd even properly sat down. She always orders on her way to the table, out of habit.
For a while we didn't talk about anything important.
A flight delay.
A conference room that was freezing.
A hotel breakfast she'd photographed just for the size of the croissant.
Then she reached into her bag.
"I brought you something. Small. Don't make a thing of it."
A little sealed sachet, printed with a name I recognised from the shelves at work.
"I'd bet you're still using whatever you had before," she said. "Try this instead. It'll feel different."
I laughed. "How would you know that?"
"Because you always are," she said. "Some things about you never change."
I turned the sachet over in my hand while she talked about the event — new faces, an old colleague she hadn't seen in years, someone's toddler running laps around the trade stand.
Then she asked about home.
I told her about Mum, that things were mostly steady. About Dad, still cooking like it was his full-time job. About my daughter, still buried in maths papers, counting down weeks instead of months now.
Ninuo listened properly. She always does.
"And the shop?" she asked.
"Busy. Good busy."
"You seem different lately," she said. "Steadier."
I hadn't thought of it that way. I said something about just getting used to the roster, the customers, the routine.
She shook her head slightly, like that wasn't quite what she meant, but let it go.
She, on the other hand, always looked the same. Steady. Well. That faint glow she seemed to carry no matter how many time zones she'd crossed that week.
I still hadn't worked out how she did it.
We sat a while longer, not saying much. That was the nice part.
Somewhere between the last of the coffee and the bill arriving, I realised this was the first time in weeks I hadn't been half-thinking about the next thing — the next parcel, the next appointment, the next question I couldn't answer.
Just a table by the window, and someone who remembered the small things.
Outside, she hugged me quickly before heading to her car.
"Same time next month?" I said.
"Don't leave it that long," she said.
I laughed. "No promises."
I drove home with the sachet sitting in the cup holder the whole way, and the washing still waiting exactly where I'd left it.
Some things can always wait a little longer.