Guilt by Maria Lipovchenko

Emma could have a bad mood
nearly every time she feels insecure. As he could see, she felt insecure very often. It was strange, they practically did not communicate, faced in the corridor of the office and briefly greeted, for the sake of decency. Later, at the office party, they for the first time started to notice each other. All that time she thought that he was an arrogant irresponsible guy working in a nearby department. He believed that she was just a girl from the neighboring department, did not even know her name (“Ella? Ola?”, “That gray mouse”, “In a black jacket”, “Secretary upstairs”), and always faced her in the elevator, where she embarrassedly lowered her head and turned away. "Well, she is weird!" Kay thought. To their general surprise, their guesses about each other were false. At that party they had a long conversation about everything, he was convinced that her name was Emma and nothing else, and she realized that he was not very arrogant. From that moment, every morning he went into her office a floor above and wished her a good day, feeling ridiculous when he came and did not see her in the workplace. She was pleased to be noticed. Sometimes she deliberately left the office to observe his reaction from the outside when he went to her office and only saw her friend there. “So, what did he say? Embarrassed?” Emma asked enthusiastically. “You bet!” Emma’s friend could not resist.
Months of beautiful flirtation passed, and they became a couple, which was a fairly obvious scenario. She was addicted to him. He got promoted, became too proud and in many things radical. He stopped paying attention to Emma. She, in turn, did not make scandals, did not scream, did not condemn. Knowing perfectly his daily routine, adapts to his interests and desires, expecting that her efforts will be able to return former feelings. Emma once wanted to be able to read other people's thoughts, now she wanted it the most.
One evening he did not return home. “Honey, don’t wait today, urgent assignment from Mr. Joseph, you know, I have to”, he wrote in a message without calling. “Fine. Take care!” her message glowed unread. That night he was not busy with work. Standing by the window and smoking a cigarette, he suddenly felt something unpleasant. Something that he did not feel before, or tried to avoid in every way. Lower lip twitched slightly, he looked at his watch. “Stop smoking, come here better”, gentle voice called him. He flinched and pulled his shirt collar. The voice continued to sound soft and melodious, but he did not hear it. “What should I do now?” he repeated in his head. “Are you okay?” and hands hugged him from behind. “What should I do now?!” he cried out breaking out of the hands of a ‘urgent night assignment’ girl. Kay slowly sat on a chair, clasping his head with both hands. The shirt on his back couldn't hide the sweat.
His phone was treacherously silent. She didn't call.