The Corner Between

The Corner Between

J never spoke much, which suited everyone just fine.

At work, he was the guy who nodded at meetings, typed fast, and brought his own coffee in a thermos that had once been blue but was now chipped silver at the edges. In the breakroom, he’d sit at the same corner table, farthest from the microwave. People said hi, he said hi back. And that was it.

No one really knew J.

That was how he liked it.

Until the Tuesday that Ashley sat down across from him, completely uninvited, with a sandwich in one hand and the wrong kind of smile.

“Hey,” she said. “You always sit here?”

He looked up, startled, mid-chew.

“Yeah.”

She took a bite, chewed noisily, and didn’t go away. “Quiet table,” she said with a grin.

“Yeah.”

He hoped that would be the end of it. But she kept showing up. Tuesday turned into Wednesday, then Thursday. She brought different sandwiches, sometimes leftovers. She always talked. About her dog, her neighbors, the paper towel shortage at her grocery store.

J listened. He didn’t really have a choice. But slowly — without meaning to — he started responding. A little at a time. A “that sucks” here. A “what kind of dog?” there.

It was like finding out your old, broken radio still picked up one station.

Ashley wasn’t like anyone he’d known. Loud in the way people usually found annoying, but it didn’t feel that way with her. She didn’t ask the usual questions — where he went to school, whether he had siblings, what he did on weekends. She didn’t treat him like a problem to fix. Just… like someone she liked being around.

And that started to scare him.

Because if someone liked being around you, it meant they’d notice when you pulled away.

J had spent most of his life learning how to blend in. He didn’t make waves. Didn’t share too much. There had been enough early years of being the weird one — the boy who cried at loud noises, flinched at eye contact, and didn’t know when a joke was a joke — to learn that silence was safer than being yourself.

He learned the rhythms of people. When to nod. When to laugh. What not to say.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want friends. He just didn’t trust that he could have them without lying.

Until Ashley started showing up, breaking patterns he didn’t even realize were habits. She talked to him like he was normal. Like he wasn’t just tolerated — like he was wanted.

And one Thursday, after they’d both finished eating and were sitting in that quiet corner like always, she said something that made the floor tilt.

“You know I like talking to you, right?”

He blinked. “What?”

“I mean, you’re not a big talker, obviously. But you listen. You don’t fake-laugh or try to outdo people. It’s kind of nice.”

He stared at her. Words caught somewhere in his chest.

“I don’t know,” she said, wiping her hands on a napkin. “You’re just easy to be around. Even if you are a bit of a mystery man.”

That last part — mystery man — was said with a smile. A teasing thing. But it made his stomach twist.

Because he wasn’t a mystery. He was just hiding. Always hiding.

That night, he didn’t sleep.

He kept replaying it- her words, her face, the lightness in her voice.

And the weight in his chest.

He wanted to believe her. Wanted to think maybe someone could like him as-is. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that she didn’t really know what she was saying.

She didn’t know the whole story. The labels. The years of feeling off. The diagnosis he kept to himself, not because he was ashamed — but because people never saw him the same way after.

Autism was a word that changed the rules. Even when people said they were cool with it, they weren’t. Not really. They tried too hard, or got uncomfortable, or backed away. Like it was a glitch they couldn’t code around.

J had spent years building a version of himself that was passable. He wasn’t about to let that unravel just because someone finally paid attention.

So he did the only thing he knew how to do.

He pulled back.

The next day, he took lunch at his desk. Said he had emails. Ashley passed by and gave him a little wave. He waved back, forced a smile.

The day after, he took his break fifteen minutes earlier. By the time she came in, he was gone.

On Monday, he called in sick.

It was easier. Safer. He didn’t want to explain himself, and he didn’t want to risk her seeing too much.

But when he came back on Tuesday, Ashley wasn’t in the breakroom. Or at her desk. Or anywhere.

That day turned into a week. No one said anything. People came and went. Laughed. Typed. Ate.

And J sat in his quiet corner, alone again.

But now it didn’t feel peaceful.

It felt hollow.

On Friday afternoon, he found her.

She was sitting on the back steps behind the building, earbuds in, sandwich in her lap.

He hesitated for a long second, then stepped outside.

Ashley looked up, surprised.

“Oh — hey.”

“Hey.”

He stood there awkwardly. She didn’t say anything more, so he sat down next to her. Not too close.

She didn’t take her earbuds out. One song finished, another began. He waited.

Finally, she hit pause.

“You been dodging me?” she asked, not angry. Just curious.

He looked at his hands. “Yeah.”

“Why?”

He took a breath. “Because I thought maybe you liked the idea of me. But not me.”

She frowned. “That’s a pretty big difference.”

“I know.”

Silence stretched between them. Not tense, just waiting.

“I’m autistic,” he said quietly. “I don’t tell people. Because they treat me different when I do.”

Ashley nodded slowly. “Okay.”

He blinked. “That’s it?”

“Well, I mean… thanks for telling me. But yeah. Okay.”

“You’re not weirded out?”

“No,” she said. “But I am kinda mad at you.”

That surprised him. “Why?”

“Because you decided what I could and couldn’t handle. You decided how I’d react, without even giving me a chance.”

He didn’t know what to say to that.

“I liked sitting with you, J,” she said, softer now. “I looked forward to it. And then you ghosted me, because… what? You assumed I wouldn’t accept you?”

He nodded slowly.

“Well,” she said, shrugging, “joke’s on you. I already do.”

He looked over at her. Really looked. And for the first time, he let his shoulders drop a little.

Let himself be seen.

“I’ve spent a long time being half-visible,” he said. “I didn’t realize how lonely it made me. Until you sat down.”

Ashley smiled. Not the usual teasing one. A different kind.

“I’m not going anywhere,” she said. “But next time, maybe don’t vanish. Just say what’s on your mind. I can handle it.”

He nodded. Then, after a second, pulled something out of his pocket — a folded scrap of paper.

She took it. Opened it. Laughed.

It was a cartoon he’d drawn. Stick figures. Her and him at the breakroom table. Speech bubbles-

HER- “This seat taken?” HIM- “It is now.”

She grinned. “You’re secretly funny.”

“Not that secret.”

“Good,” she said. “Let’s keep it that way.”

They sat there a little longer, quiet again.

But this time, the quiet wasn’t about hiding.

It was just comfortable.