News of the affair spread through our shared social and professional circles considerably faster than I’d anticipated, Selene’s own position at my company creating an unavoidable professional dimension to what I’d initially hoped might remain a private, personal matter.
I underestimated, entirely, exactly how small our particular professional world actually was, colleagues from other departments apparently already discussing the situation in hushed tones within days, long before I’d even fully processed the divorce proceedings myself. A junior colleague I barely knew approached me awkwardly in the break room roughly a week after returning from Verlaine, clearly having heard some version of events, offering an uncomfortable, sympathetic nod before quickly excusing herself. I understood, in that particular moment, exactly how thoroughly my private devastation had already become public knowledge throughout an entire professional community I’d spent years building genuine standing within.
Human resources launched a formal review once the relationship’s details became known, examining whether our affair violated the company’s policies regarding relationships between supervisors and junior staff, given my own director position relative to Selene’s more junior role.
I sat through three separate interviews during that review process, HR representatives asking careful, methodical questions about the exact nature and timeline of our relationship, questions I answered honestly given how thoroughly the evidence already existing made any further deception pointless. I remember the particular humiliation of that process, explaining details of my own affair to strangers in a formal conference room, understanding each answer was being carefully documented for a file that would likely follow me throughout the remainder of my career.
