Chapter 4: The Weight of Perception

Henry heard the rumors on a Tuesday morning, three days after Tanya’s dinner.

He’d arrived at his usual time—7:15 AM—and was walking past the break room when he heard voices. Two of the junior associates, Sarah Chen and Marcus Webb, getting their morning coffee.

“I’m just saying, it’s weird,” Sarah was saying. “He never talks to anyone, and suddenly he’s driving her to work every day? For two weeks?”

“Maybe he’s just being nice.” Marcus sounded skeptical even as he said it.

“Henry Gordon doesn’t do nice. Henry Gordon does efficient. And paying for her car repairs? That’s like four grand, minimum. You don’t drop that kind of money on a coworker unless—”

Henry kept walking. He didn’t need to hear the rest. He knew what came after “unless.”

At his desk, he sat very still, staring at his computer screen without seeing it. They thought he was—what? Sleeping with Tanya? Taking advantage of her? The idea was absurd. Offensive. He’d helped her because she needed help, because for once in five years he’d felt something other than numbness, because her relentless optimism had cracked something open in him that he’d thought was permanently sealed.

But of course they’d think that. What else would they think? A forty-two-year-old doctor and a twenty-six-year-old secretary. The cliché was so obvious it was almost painful.

He thought about Tanya sitting across from him at his dining table, tears in her eyes as he told her about Allison. He thought about her hand on his, warm and steady. He thought about the hug in the doorway, brief and careful, the kind of hug you gave someone who was hurting.

There had been nothing inappropriate about any of it.

So why did he feel guilty?

The answer came to him with uncomfortable clarity: because he’d liked it. He’d liked having her in his apartment, in his space. He’d liked the way she looked at him—not with pity, but with understanding. He’d liked the sound of her voice filling the silence, the smell of her cooking in his kitchen, the warmth of her presence.

And that felt like betrayal.

Allison had been dead for five years, but Henry had kept himself in a state of suspended animation, as if moving forward would be an act of infidelity. He’d convinced himself that his isolation was a form of loyalty, that his carefully maintained routines were a memorial to their marriage.

But now, sitting at his desk with the taste of guilt bitter in his mouth, he wondered if he’d just been hiding. If his grief had calcified into something else—not love, but fear. Fear of feeling anything, fear of losing anyone else, fear of making another wrong choice.

He saw Tanya later that morning, passing through the lobby with a stack of files. She smiled at him—that same warm, genuine smile—and he nodded stiffly, then looked away. Her smile faltered. He saw it in his peripheral vision, the way her expression shifted from open to confused to carefully neutral.

He took the stairs instead of the elevator for the rest of the week.

By Friday, he’d perfected the art of avoiding her. He knew her schedule now—when she took her lunch break, when she usually went to the copy room, when she made her afternoon coffee run. He planned his movements around hers, taking different hallways, using different bathrooms, timing his arrivals and departures to minimize the chance of encounter.

It was cowardly. He knew it was cowardly. But every time he thought about facing her, about seeing that warm smile and knowing what people were saying, what they were thinking, the guilt rose up in his throat like bile.