It was one of the worst days. The project I had poured my heart into for three months was canceled with a single email. My boss yelled at me in front of the whole office. A client called to complain.
That evening, I was the last one in the office. The fluorescent lights cast a cold, soulless glow. I sat in the silence and felt utterly hollow. A terrifying emptiness, as if I were about to dissolve into the air.
I don’t know what I was thinking when I opened OVFRIENDS and posted a short status: “Feeling empty. Just want to disappear for a few days.”
A few people dropped sympathetic emojis. A few commented, “stay strong” or “it’ll be okay.” I scrolled past them all, indifferent. The empty platitudes only made me feel more pathetic.
Then a private message popped up.
It was from Yumi, a Japanese friend I had added just last week. We met because we both loved film photography and had only spoken a few times about photo tints and rare film types.
Her message had no emojis, no advice, no analysis.
It just had two words: “Stay, please.”
Nothing else.
Two simple English words, typed by a Japanese person to a Vietnamese person, carried a strange weight. It didn’t tell me to be strong. It didn’t comfort me that things would get better. It was just a message, as if she were right there, placing a hand on my shoulder and saying, “Don’t go.”
A plea. It acknowledged my right to disappear, but asked me not to.
I sat still for a long time, staring at those two words on the screen. And then, I took a deep breath, shut down my computer, and went home. I stayed.
Later, I went to Japan to study abroad. We met in real life, went shooting photos together, and eventually started dating.
Looking back now, I still believe that sometimes, the thing that keeps a person from the edge isn’t a grand speech or a bright light. Sometimes, it’s just a tiny, quiet whisper: “Stay, please.”