Mei Wa followed the supervisor into the office. The heavy wooden door closed softly behind her.
The supervisor walked straight to his desk chair, took a silver cigarette case from a drawer, flicked out a cigarette, and placed it between his lips. Then he casually tossed the case onto the desk.
"Do you smoke?" the supervisor asked, as the metal case clinked against the desk.
Mei Wa pressed her lips together and shook her head. "No, sir."
The supervisor's gaze lingered on her face for several seconds. He picked up the kerosene lighter on the desk. With a crisp click, he flipped open the lid, then struck a flame.
Orange-red light cast flickering shadows in his sunken eye sockets. They vanished when the lighter snapped shut with another click.
"Have a seat, Team Leader Mei Wa Lake." The supervisor exhaled a plume of smoke and shifted in his chair.
Mei Wa quietly sat in the chair opposite him, her gaze settling on the slightly gleaming cigarette case on the desk. The office was filled with a faint tobacco scent, mingled with the smell of leather and wooden furniture.
"When you're in a bad mood, there's no harm in having one." The supervisor's voice drifted through the wafting smoke.
Mei Wa hesitated, then drew a cigarette from the case with her slender fingers.
Seeing this, the supervisor gently nudged the heavy lighter toward her with his index finger. It scraped faintly across the solid wood desk, the sound unusually clear in the quiet office.
Mei Wa awkwardly lit the cigarette but didn't take a drag, simply letting pale blue smoke curl upward between her fingers. It burned slowly between her long fingers as a mound of ash gradually formed.
The supervisor gazed at Mei Wa through the swirling smoke. The cigarette