PART 2
“Iappreciate your flexibility. Hopefully we will be back in the old space in no time, and this will be a temporary adventure.” Kindra, my therapist stood in the doorway of a spartan room and motioned me inside.
Her smile was the only familiar thing and the thing that allowed me to enter the mostly empty room.
I didn’t love adventures, temporary or otherwise.
My life and the things that kept me dragging myself to her office—wherever it happened to be—were more than enough adventure for me. But I nodded and went inside.
“My office is through here.”
She opened a second door onto a much warmer space filled with a few familiar books and hangings from the old place.
The scent of sage wafted through the opening and my chest relaxed a fraction of an inch.
It didn’t smell exactly like the office I’d been going to for ages, but it softened some of the strangeness of the new space.
I heard a noise behind us and froze in the doorway, fighting the urge to turn around and bolt.
I hated feeling like a rabbit. Prey to some unseen predator. I forced myself to inhale, breathing in the almost familiar scent, before turning slowly to meet whatever had made the noise.
A tall man, with shaggy blond hair tucked under his backward ball cap wrestled with the front door and the giant framed picture he carried.
I stopped having hallucinations a long time ago, but the figure seemed so out of place in any space Kindra would occupy.
I paused for a moment, only relaxing when she took a step toward the man still struggling with the door.
“Go on in, Elijah.” She waved to the open office door. “My friend sent cookies, there’s coffee made, and the kettle is there for tea. Help yourself, and I will be right with you.”
I went into the new space, taking comfort in the few familiar things.
Curiosity and not wanting to be closed in by myself kept me from shutting the door after me.
I glanced around and found the coffee maker on a narrow table.
A glass dome covered an assortment of cookies.
Kindra didn’t usually keep treats in her office.
It must be some kind of offering for the strange shift in venues.
“What is that?” Kindra’s voice came from the other room, sounding as close to frustrated as I’d ever heard her.
Her unfailing calm had been one of the things that kept me coming back to see her. It was curious to hear her riled up. I paused just inside the room. I wanted to hear the man’s response and find out why he seemed to rub my therapist the wrong way.
“John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success.” He spoke slowly, as if the answer should be obvious to everyone. “I’m going to hang it on that wall so it doesn’t feel so much like a prison waiting room in here.”
I might not have the best people skills. Spending the first half of your life questioning reality will do that to a person. But even I knew that was a terrible idea.
“What in the world makes you think an over-conflated success pyramid by some basketball coach belongs in the common space of a therapist’s office?
” She sounded almost angry, and I fought the image of her always serene countenance puffed up like one of those fighting roosters.
“Or that you have the right to decide that for everyone else?”
“Life coach. I am a life coach, not a therapist.” The man said the last word as if it left something distasteful in his mouth.
I’d been intimately acquainted with therapy—cognitive, dialectical, psychodynamic, you name it—almost my entire adult life, but I was unfamiliar with life coaching, beyond those late-night infomercials and MLM-style workshops.
I poured coffee into my favorite thick blue mug and leaned closer to the open door to hear Kindra’s response.
“And John Wooden is not just some basketball coach.” The way he mimicked Kindra’s words made me think the guy could use some life coaching of his own. The how to win friends and influence people kind. “He’s brilliant and ...”
“I know who John Wooden was. That doesn’t change my original point. I don’t have time for this now. I’ve got a client.”
I moved away from the door, as if her mentioning me could suddenly make me visible through the wall.
“Do not hang anything until we’ve had a chance to talk.”
“You’re awfully sure of yourself.”
I’d half expected him to hit her with a who made you the boss comment, but apparently, he wasn’t completely without people skills.
“Of course. It’s the second line from the top of your pyramid, isn’t it?”
I heard the swish of her skirts and the way her voice changed as she turned toward the door and shifted my attention back to my coffee.
Swallowing a sip, I lifted the glass cover off the cookies.
The aroma hit me like a long-forgotten dream.
I breathed in the sweet scent of sugar and cinnamon and pictured the red-haired woman with green eyes.
Could she be the one who’d made the cookies?
The woman who I’d tried and failed to keep out of my thoughts.
Or was I just imagining a sugary olfactory connection?
I’d seen her with Kindra that one time. It seemed like they were friends.
I wouldn’t ask. I didn’t want to risk doing anything that gave the impression I was interested in the woman I knew I had no business caring about.
Instead, I settled for putting two cookies on my napkin before replacing the cover and moving toward the unfamiliar couch.
“Wooden’s Pyramid of Success. Like I haven’t seen Ted Lasso like every other person on the planet.
” She mumbled the words under her breath before turning to face me and replacing any frustration she still felt with the smile I knew.
“You found the cookies. The snickerdoodles are my favorite, but really, they’re all delicious.
Meredith is a genius with butter and sugar. ”
“Please have a seat, and we can get started. I’m sorry to make you wait.” She motioned to the sofa and took the chair opposite.
I set my mug on the side table and balanced the cookies on my lap as if they were something precious. The cookies Meredith made.
“Tell me what’s going on with you.”
THE END