It happened on a Tuesday. I was in the kitchen making risotto. Maya was sitting at the island, sipping a glass of wine I'd poured for her, staring at her phone with a soft, private smile that I hadn't seen directed at me in months.
"How was work?" I asked, stirring the rice.
"Intense," she said, not looking up. "Gavin had a panic attack in the break room for round two."
"Is he okay?" I asked, trying to feign sympathy.
"He is now," she said. She finally put the phone down and looked at me, her expression challenging, like she was daring me to react. "I stayed with him. We went into the quiet room in the back office. I turned the lights off, and we just laid on the couch and cuddled for like an hour until his breathing regulated."
I stopped stirring. The wooden spoon hovered over the pan. The kitchen suddenly felt very quiet.
"I'm sorry," I said, my voice steady, though my heart rate had just spiked through the roof. "Did you say you cuddled him? On a couch? In the dark?"
She rolled her eyes, taking a sip of wine. "Oh my god, here we go. Yes, Mark. We cuddled. It's called co-regulation. It's a somatic technique to help lower someone's cortisol levels. It was completely platonic."
I turned the burner off. I turned around to face her. "Maya, you are a 30-year-old woman in a committed relationship. You spent an hour lying in the dark in the arms of another man at your workplace. You don't see an issue with that?"
"No, I don't," she shot back, her voice rising. "Because I'm an adult who understands that touch is a basic human need. Gavin was in distress. I provided comfort. It wasn't sexual. He didn't try anything, and neither did I. We just held each other."
"And if I did that?" I asked quietly. "If I told you I spent my afternoon spooning the new intern because she was stressed out, you'd be okay with that?"