Chapter 17 - Reunion – One Table, Four Seats
Chapter 17: Reunion – One Table, Four Seats
The table was round, worn at the edges, and far too small for the stories it was about to hold.
It sat quietly in the corner of a tucked-away hawker centre in Clementi. One of those places only locals knew—no frills, no air-conditioning, just good food and plastic chairs that threatened to collapse if you sat down too confidently.
It was Ivan who made the booking.
“Don’t ask me how I got all four of you to say yes,” he said when they arrived, checking his watch like he’d wrangled a K-pop group into a press conference. “Miracle, I think.”
It had been almost eight months since the last time ABIX was all together—truly together, not just in passing texts or rushed check-ins. And in that time, things had… shifted.
Crystal was now managing communications for a regional social enterprise. Her schedule was a patchwork of meetings, pitches, and last-minute flights. She wore a blazer now—not because she had to, but because it made her feel invincible.
Isabelle had just submitted the first draft of her honours thesis in Chemistry, hands still aching from backspacing sentences she didn’t believe in until someone told her they were good enough. She looked older somehow. Not tired—just sharpened.
Aleem arrived last, a laptop bag slung across one shoulder, dressed in that familiar semi-casual way—black tee, jeans, quiet presence. He smiled when he saw them. Not wide. But real.
No one spoke for a moment.
Then Crystal reached out and placed a single tissue packet on the table.
“The sacred seat choper. Tradition demands it.”
They laughed, and just like that, the weight lifted.
The Conversation That Wasn’t About Catching Up
Surprisingly, the night wasn’t about “So, what have you been up to?”
There were no career summaries, no curated life updates.
Instead, they talked about things that didn’t make it into social media captions.
Crystal admitted she felt like she was losing herself a little—that being strong for everyone meant she hadn’t cried in a year, and that scared her more than anything.
Ivan confessed that work, while stable, felt like wearing a perfectly tailored coat that didn’t belong to him. “It fits, but it’s not mine.”
Isabelle said she’d started seeing a therapist—not because she was broken, but because she wanted to understand the quiet inside her better. And that she still couldn’t sleep properly before lab deadlines.
Aleem, after a long silence, shared that Hana had moved to KL.
“We still talk. But less,” he said, fingers tracing the condensation on his cup. “I don’t know what it is anymore. Or what it was meant to be.”
No one rushed to comfort him.
They just stayed with him. Present. Solid.
Sometimes, the deepest kind of love is silence. The kind that says you don’t have to be okay here, just honest.
Four Bowls, One Story
They ordered too much food, as always—chicken rice, fried carrot cake, prawn mee, and four cups of teh peng that came sweating down the sides like they’d run from a fire.
Halfway through the meal, Ivan pulled out a crumpled napkin and sketched something in thick, messy strokes.
A circle.
Four small dots.
“This,” he said, holding it up. “Is us. Doesn’t matter where we go. Doesn’t matter how far. ABIX is always a round table.”
Crystal snorted. “That’s the ugliest drawing I’ve ever seen.”
“Shut up and eat your carrot cake.”
But they smiled. Because it was true.
No hierarchy. No leader. No centre.
Just four friends. Equally scattered. Equally held.
The Last Few Minutes
They stayed long after the food was gone, the cleaners hovering nearby but never quite asking them to leave.
Crystal leaned her head on Aleem’s shoulder. Isabelle sat cross-legged on her chair, eyes half-closed. Ivan had one AirPod in, playing something ambient but comforting.
There was no grand speech. No dramatic goodbye.
Just an understanding.
That even if these moments became rarer…
They were still theirs.
And they’d always find their way back.