The final round went well. Afterwards, the recruiter called to ask how it had gone, then asked whether he was comfortable with a particular salary.
He said he would like $10,000 more. It was still inside the posted range — in fact, close to the middle of it. He had not asked for anything unusual, and he had not hidden the number until the last minute; the question had simply arrived, and he had answered it.
Then the doubt set in. He worried he had blown it. A week passed. The recruiter came back to say that more interviews were being held, but that he was still under consideration.
He was left with the arithmetic of it: a strong final round, a number inside the band, and a process that had somehow become longer after he said it out loud. The role was still open. So was the question of whether the salary discussion had been a test with a correct answer.