Why the casualness is the tell
A genuine apology for disappearing would usually name what happened — 'I'm sorry I went quiet, that wasn't fair.' Zombieing skips that entirely, acting as if the silence never happened, because naming it would require taking responsibility for it.
What it's actually testing
A low-effort reappearance is often a way of checking if the door is still open without risking anything if it isn't — if you respond, they've regained an option at no cost; if you don't, they've lost nothing they were ever invested in.
Why it can feel so disarming
Relief at being thought of again can override the memory of how it ended, especially if the silence left questions unanswered — the resurfacing can feel like it's finally providing the closure you wanted, even when it isn't designed to.
What actually changed, versus what didn't
The thing that made them disappear the first time — avoidance, low investment, a better option elsewhere — almost never gets addressed just because they resurfaced, which means the same ending is still the most likely one, just delayed.
A reappearance isn't automatically a red flag to ignore completely, but it's reasonable to expect an actual account of the silence before extending the same access that was withdrawn without one.
Recognizing the pattern in general helps. Deciding what an actual apology — not just a reappearance — would need to include is the harder, more useful thing to look at. Define that apology, in OLENRI