It's not too complicated. Your likelihood of catching covid - or anything else for that matter - increases not with the number of times you interact with them,

It's not too complicated. Your likelihood of catching covid - or anything else for that matter - increases not with the number of times you interact with them, but with the amount of time. Any time you're wearing a mask is time wear you have a substantially reduced likelihood of exhaling infected particles, or inhaling particles exhaled by carriers. This is why open plan offices have higher disease transmission rates, even if they have the same cafeteria configuration as a non-open plan office.