Chapter 37
IF IT’S brOKEN, THROW IT OUT
The blonde woman was back in my office. She had on a pair of jeans and a dark sweater.
Her hair was pulled into a low, sleek ponytail, and she had no makeup on.
Her cracks were starting to show. She had told her husband about the guy.
When she told him, he laughed at her and said she lasted longer than he thought.
“And how did that make you feel?”
Her laugh was hollow and empty. “Like shit. Stupid. Worthless.”
“And why do you feel those things?”
She blinked at me. “Why do I feel those things? I fucked a twenty-nine-year-old. I threw my marriage away for a pretty face and a nice ass.”
“Why the twenty-nine-year-old? What did he give you?” Same reason I was with Carter: because it felt good.
“Why a twenty-nine-year-old? Have you ever had sex with a twenty-nine-year-old?”
“So this was just about the act of having sex. Nothing more?” I made a couple notes, ignoring my own reason for having sex with Carter.
“Yes. Just sex.” She looked down at the tissue crumpled in her hands. “No that’s not true. I wanted to feel desired. Be more than an accessory to someone’s life. Their obligation. And for several times that night, I felt seen.”
She was one of us. The ones who believed in love. “So it wasn’t really just sex. Was it?”
The woman looked up, her blue eyes bright with tears. “No.”
The alarm announced we were done. And this time, she hadn’t been ready. The sound brought her back to reality, and the mask slipped back on.
“So am I cured?” she asked, standing.
“No. I would like to see you again. But I think you’re getting closer.”
She smiled. “I’m seeing him again tonight. The twenty-nine-year-old. He’s like a drug. I know he’s just using me, but it’s fun.”
“Sounds like we have lots to talk about in two weeks.” I said goodbye and walked to my desk.
The message light was blinking on my phone.
It was Callie; she had called three times checking to see if I was okay.
Tonight, Carter and I needed to talk about San Francisco.
He was leaving in a couple days. I had moved a few things around so I could join him on the last few days of his trip.
“Did you look at that file?” Holly asked, walking into my office.
“I did. You didn’t tell me she thinks her husband is gay. But your assessment is correct. They should get couples counseling. Until he comes out, I’m not sure there is anything I can help her with. Plus, my schedule is pretty booked.”
“Alright, I’ll recommend Larson. You okay?” Holly cocked her head. “Satan finally suck your soul out?”
“What the hell did he do to you?” I held up my hand. “On second thought, I don’t want to know. And I’m fine, just a lot going on. My mother’s husband had heart surgery.” She said Harold was fine and in the nursing home. I should probably call her back.
“Okay, but you know that it’s okay if you need to talk to someone. Right? If anyone needs therapy, it’s us.”
Holly knew nothing of Tristan and me. She didn’t know the years of shit we had piled around us.
That kept us apart. “I have a client. She is, um… well…” I paused, trying to think of a way to condense almost seventeen years of Tristan and me into a sentence.
“She has a history with a broken boy, one she is struggling to let go of. And to make matters worse she has another boy, one who isn’t broken. ”
“Broken people can be very hard to love. I’m not saying they can’t be. But it’s difficult.” Holly thought for a moment. “This other boy the one who’s not broken. Does she love him?”
“I think so. It’s complicated because that boy is breaking the rules.
He told her he couldn’t love her.” Carter had.
One night when we drank too much wine in Italy.
He told me he wished he could love me. But something broke in him a long time ago.
He had tried. He was engaged once, but it fell apart.
He said his mother was the same way. She didn’t love his father.
It should have been a red flag. But it made things easier because I loved someone else.
“And the broken boy. Does he love her, this client?” Holly’s normally hard eyes had gone soft. The sharp clip of her voice was gone.
“I… She doesn’t know.” I thought about the video and his life in Miami. I knew the answer. I just didn’t want to admit it. “Their paths have gone in different directions.”
Holly nodded a couple times. “Sometimes we hold on to things because of the way they make us feel. We go back home, hoping to recapture the freedom of our childhood. But our childhood never looks the same when we’re adults.
Love is the same way. Think of it as a vase.
When it breaks, we try to fix it because we have memories with it.
But when we glue it back together, it’s not the same.
It can’t hold water. So we add more glue.
But in the end, it’s broken, and flowers need water. Your client needs to buy a new vase.”
Her words fell like ash on my skin. “And what if that new vase doesn’t fit in her space?”
A soft smile touched her lips. “I think it does. I think it’s the broken one that is cluttering up the space. Love is tricky; it can make us see things that were never there. It can make us believe that we deserve broken.”
I looked out the window. Letting go of Tristan would be the hardest thing I had ever done. The memories of him were so entangled in mine that I was afraid that when I separated them, there would be nothing left of me. “So what should I tell my client?”
Holly stood and watched the rain streak down the narrow window. “That flowers need water to bloom. And a boy who says I love you today is better than one who said it yesterday.”
I closed my eyes for a moment before turning to Holly. “You’re right. I’ll tell her that.”
“Good luck. Tell her to wear gloves so she doesn’t cut her hands.” Holly winked, walking out of my office.
I didn’t know whose pieces were sharper. Mine or Tristan’s.