Should you double text after a one-word reply?

Look first at what you asked. If your message was a yes or no question, a one-word answer is just a correct answer and says almost nothing about her interest. Asking whether she's free this week or whether she likes a certain band are both easy to answer in a word, so "yeah" may be all she had time for. If your message was open and inviting, like something about her trip or a story you told, and she still went one word, that's more informative. It usually means she's distracted, not that she's uninterested. Her profile and past messages help too. If she wrote long, thoughtful replies earlier and has suddenly gone terse, it's worth taking seriously. If she's always been brief, one word is just her style. Pay attention to whether she's still engaging with the thread at all, or whether she's left a door open by saying something like "yeah, it was fun." That kind of line gives you something to pick up on, which is different from a dead end.

A follow-up only works if it gives her something specific to react to without much effort. Start from something she actually said or something you know about her, and make the new message a small step forward rather than a repeat of the first one. If she mentioned the gym, you could ask about one concrete thing like how long she's been going, or share a small related detail about your own week. Keep the message short and make it obvious she can reply without having to think. What it shouldn't do is ask her to explain the one-word answer, comment on her tone, or reassure you that you're not being too much. Those messages put her in the position of managing your feelings, which is a bad way to restart a conversation. If the new message reads like a thing you'd be fine receiving from someone you barely know, you've got the right energy.

Timing matters more than the wording. If it's been a few hours, she may simply not have looked at her phone, so don't read silence as a verdict yet. A reasonable window is somewhere between a day and two days, depending on how fast the conversation was moving before. Send one follow-up, at a normal time of day and not late at night, and then stop. If that message gets no reply at all, or gets another one-word answer, the conversation has told you what it can. Don't send a third text to check in. Don't switch to a different app or ask a mutual friend. Move on, let the match fade naturally, and if she comes back later with a real message, respond warmly. A one-word reply followed by silence is a common outcome and usually just means it wasn't going to become a conversation.