Therapy Session
Kyle
The clock on the wall ticks too loudly. I know it isn’t that loud, but it burrows into my skull anyway, each second a little jab.
The office is warm in that overly inviting way I can’t stand, softer than I like, with framed prints of ocean waves and a plant in the corner that somehow looks healthier than I feel.
The couch I am sitting on is too comfortable. It keeps trying to swallow me whole.
It is ridiculous that the last place I felt steady today was an elevator with her in it. Everything afterward felt too soft, too slow, like my body had not yet caught up.
Dr. Shah is sitting across from me, waiting. She’s good at that. Not staring or pushing, just sitting in her chair with a notepad on her lap and the kind of calm that makes me want to crawl out of my skin.
“You’re very interested in that clock today,” she says eventually.
I drag my gaze down from the wall and force a shrug. “Just making sure time still moves in here.”
“Does it feel like it doesn’t?”
“Didn’t slow down earlier,” I mutter, the words slipping out before I can stop them. “Not when she…” Heat crawls up my neck, and I bite the rest back. “Never mind.”
Dr. Shah tilts her head a fraction. “When she…?”
“Nothing. Forget it.” I scrub a palm over my jaw, like I can wipe the slip away.
“You have used that line before.”
“It was a good line,” I say, relieved she lets me back away but doesn’t pretend she didn't notice.
“It was a deflection,” she replies calmly. “How are you, Kyle?”
“Fine.” My knee starts bouncing. “Better than fine. Living the dream. I am in the NHL. My brothers are all in one place. Momma is happy. Coach, also known as my big brother, is only a little pissed at me. Ten out of ten, really.”
“And you came here anyway.”
“I had an appointment. I’m very responsible now. Cooper would be proud.”
She doesn’t bite at the joke. She never takes the bait first.
“Last time you were here, you described feeling like you were ‘skating around with your head underwater,’” she says. “Is that still true?”
I shift, the cushion sighing under my weight, like it’s annoyed with me, too. “Things are different now. New team. New start.”
“And the underwater feeling?”
I stare at a spot on the carpet until the pattern smears. “Depends on the day.”
“Tell me about today.”
The elevator flashes in my mind. Alycia’s eyes meeting mine when the doors slid shut. Her saying she needed a fake boyfriend, and my mouth agreeing before my brain could catch up, because some part of me has been waiting months to be pulled back into her orbit.
“It was a big day. Cooper gave me the official Timberwolves welcome and the ‘act like a professional’ speech.”
“And how did that feel?”
“Like being fifteen again,” I admit, hearing the edge in my own voice and hating it. “Like I’m back on the old rink at home, waiting to hear if I did enough to make the cut.”
“Did you?”
“Back then? Yeah. Now? Who knows. Cooper looks at me like I’m a problem he’s trying to solve. Says it’s expectations, but it feels a lot like doubt. And when people expect you to screw up, it’s hard not to feel like you’re halfway there.”
She nods and writes something down, not interrupting my thoughts.
“You mentioned something similar in our first session. That it’s hard to tell the difference between someone wanting you to succeed and someone waiting for you to fail.”
“You must have a great memory.”
“I wrote it down,” she says, tone dry.
A corner of my mouth twitches. “Right. There’s that.”
“Has anything shifted since then?”
Beau’s tired smile flashes through my head. The slight tremor in his hand. Cole calling me a walking headline like it’s a joke and not a warning. Cooper's eyes softening for half a second before the coach mask slammed back into place.
“Beau is doing better. Alise has him on a schedule with actual meals and sleep. Cole is still Cole. Cooper is still trying to run the universe.” I shrug. “So, no. Same movie, just a new arena.”
“And you?”
I pick at a loose thread on my jeans before I unravel the whole damn thing. “I’m trying not to be the guy everyone has to clean up after.”
“That’s their story. What’s yours?”
I look up, and for a second, I’m just tired. Tired of my own voice in my head calling me a screwup before anyone else can.
“I’m not a screwup,” I say quietly, “no matter how much people look at me like I am one.”
“That sounds more honest.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
Silence settles between us, giving me room to hear my own heartbeat trying to climb into my throat.
“You texted me three times this week to confirm this appointment,” she says at last.
Heat creeps up my neck again. “I like a firm schedule.”
“And you almost canceled last night.”
“You saw that.”
“You said you were ‘fine now’ and probably didn’t need to come in. What changed?”
A girl in an elevator with a laugh I’ve never forgotten.
“I ran into someone.” I shift hard enough that the couch squeaks.
“A teammate?”
“No.”
“Staff?”
“No. Nothing like that.”
Her pen pauses. “Then who?”
I drag a hand over my jaw, fingers pressing into the ache there. “A girl. We met at a party six months ago.”
Her brows lift slightly, but she lets the silence do the asking.
“I only met her for maybe five minutes, and then she was gone. I told myself I’d forget her, and it was stupid to feel anything, but I didn’t.
” My chest tightens that too-fast squeeze I always pretend is nothing.
“I tried. I went out with other girls and pretended I wasn’t measuring everyone against a stranger I barely knew. ”
“And now she is back.”
“Yeah. I got in the elevator, and she was just there. Like the universe decided to throw a live wire into my chest.”
“You’re certain it was her?” Dr. Shah clarifies.
“Oh, yeah. She called me trouble and told me to bring pie to dinner with her mom.”
Her brows rise another fraction. “Dinner with her mother?”
“It’s a fake date thing. She needs a boyfriend to get her mom off her back. I said I’d help.”
“And that’s not a big deal?”
The couch complains when I shift again. “She needs someone to play the part, and I can do that. We have plans to talk about rules, keep things clean and simple.”
“What rule did you want to make first?”
“No feelings,” I say, too fast.
She tilts her head. “How soon did you decide that rule?”
“Before she finished explaining,” I admit, bitter amusement leaking through. “Because if I don’t fence this in somehow, I’m screwed.”
“What happens if you break that rule?”
“Then I’m the idiot who caught feelings for a girl who might not want me back. Or worse, I fall, and she does, too, and it still blows up. And then I’m the reason her life gets messy.”
“And?” she prompts gently.
“And if I let it be real, I can’t laugh it off when it starts to hurt.”
Her expression softens. “Charm as armor.”
“Armor works. People like you and never ask what’s going on. They don’t see you drowning.”
“Did you feel like you were drowning on your last team?”
“It felt like the second I stopped performing, everyone started looking at me like I was a problem.”
“And how did that end?”
“Being benched with a mandatory referral.” The words taste metallic in my mouth, but I continue.
“I started going to therapy in college after an altercation with a teammate landed me in anger management. It was supposed to be punishment, something to check off a list until the heat died down. But it stuck. Not the anger but the relief. Talking to someone who didn’t see the name Hendrix before they saw me.
I kept going long after anyone stopped paying attention.
No one knows I’m still coming, or at least I don’t think they do.
Somehow, them not knowing makes it easier to breathe here than anywhere else. ”
She hums under her breath and flips back a page. “When you think of Alycia now, what do you feel?”
I should dodge. Throw a joke. But the truth is already at the back of my teeth.
“Like I’m standing in the slot, waiting for a shot I know is coming,” I say, my voice pulled tight. “I can’t see it yet, but I can feel it.”
“Fear?”
“And anticipation.” The word hangs there between us. “And something else I haven’t felt in a long time.”
“What else?”
“She sees me.” My knee bounces harder, like it’s trying to run away from what I just admitted. “And I don’t know what to do with that.”
Dr. Shah is quiet for a beat. “Here’s what I’m hearing: You’ve spent a long time being compared to your brothers.
You learned to stay ‘on’ so that no one asks if you’re okay.
When the world gets too loud, you look for something that quiets it.
Her laugh did that once. Now she’s back, and being around her feels like fate and a threat at the same time. ”
My breath leaves in a slow exhale. “Exactly.”
“And what are you hoping will happen?”
“I keep saying it is fake, but part of me wants it to be real.”
“And what scares you most?”
“That I’ll lose her the way I never really had her. Then she’ll look at me and only see whatever version of me the world has decided I am.”
She nods once, then sets her notepad aside, like she wants my full attention. “Here’s what I would like you to do this week. Pay attention to what happens in your body when you are around her. Notice what tightens. What softens. When you reach for a joke. When you go quiet. Just observe.”
“That’s it?”
“For now. But if you want to write it down, do. You don’t have to show me.”
“Homework,” I mutter.
“You didn’t graduate from being human. You’re just learning how to be one without losing yourself in the process.”
The clock ticks again. This time, it doesn’t dig quite as deep.
She glances at it, then back at me. “We’ll stop here today.”
I push up from the couch, rolling my shoulders until they crack. “Pay attention to my body, don’t create a scandal, and try not to fall for the girl I’m fake dating.”
“I didn’t say that last one,” she replies.
“No.” I give her my crooked grin, the one that hides more than it shows. “But I heard it.”
“What you heard was your own fear trying to keep you safe. Ask yourself if it’s also keeping you small.”
My hands find my pockets like they are hiding places. “I’ll let you know.”
“I hope you do.”
I step out into the hallway. Cool air hits the back of my neck, inching under my collar. My hand finds the wall without thinking, needing something solid before the truth knocks me flat.
I always expect to feel lighter after a session, but instead I feel wrecked.
I finally said the thing I’ve been trying not to let touch daylight since the second I saw her again.
I don’t want this to stay fake, and the thought hits sharp enough to steal my breath.
I scrub a hand over my face, trying to slip back into the version of me I was an hour ago, but I’m not that guy anymore.
Because now the truth is loud and impossible to outrun.
The worst part is, if she said one word, I’d let everything else fall.
And deep down, I already know I’m not walking away from this untouched.