Therapy Session
Kyle
Dr. Shah’s face blurs for a second before the connection sharpens. Same calm office. Same plant in the corner. Same stillness that makes my skin feel too tight. Everything on her end is steady. Everything on mine feels like flame under the ribs.
“Kyle,” she says, voice low, “I’m here. Let’s start with a breath.”
My feet won’t stop moving. I don’t even remember standing, but I’m pacing like the floor is on fire. Something halfway between a laugh and a groan drags out of me. “Breathing isn’t going to touch whatever this is.”
“It will help,” she says, not arguing, not matching the panic. “Sit if you can.”
“I can’t.” The words scrape out. “If I sit still, I’m going to crawl out of my own skin.”
“Then keep moving,” she says simply. “But stay where I can see you. Tell me what’s happened since we last met.”
The last session feels like a different lifetime. She’d told me to notice what my body did around Alycia, the way tension eased without permission. And how the pretend line between us wasn’t as solid as I kept insisting.
“That line is gone. “I torched it.”
Her eyes don’t leave me. “How?”
“I posted the video.” The confession hits the air raw. “The one we talked about. I looked straight into the camera and told the world I love her.”
A small nod. Not surprised. Not judgmental. “You told the truth.”
“It was supposed to help.” My hand cuts through the air.
“Cooper said to lay low, stay inside, let PR do damage control. But the headlines about her were getting worse. People calling her unstable. Saying she slept her way into her job.” My jaw tightens until I feel the ache in my molars.
“I wasn’t going to sit here and watch them skin her alive. So, I warned Cooper and hit post.”
“What’s happening now?”
“I don’t know. That’s the problem. He said help was coming. Then nothing. The internet is a dumpster fire, and she’s in that building alone with all of it, and I’m stuck here, pacing like a caged animal.”
“And Alycia?”
Her name hits like a stick to the ribs.
“This morning, she said she’d handle it the right way,” I get out. “I don’t know if she’s seen the video. I don’t know if she’s in a conference room or hiding in a bathroom stall trying to breathe. I just know she’s there, and I’m not allowed to go anywhere near her.”
“What’s your body doing right now?”
“My chest feels like someone set a skate blade on it and is leaning down.” I press a hand to my sternum. “My hands won’t stop shaking. My legs want to run. Break something. My jaw’s locked so tight I keep waiting for a tooth to crack.”
She nods slowly. “Anything else?”
“My stomach feels like swallowing guilt-shaped rocks.”
“And where does the guilt sit?”
“Behind my ribs,” I answer without hesitation. “Wedge-tight. Scraping every time I breathe.”
“What story is that guilt telling you?”
“That I did exactly what she was afraid I’d do,” I say, pressure building behind my eyes.
“That she trusted me with the most fragile part of her, and I turned it into content. I got to say ‘I love you’ out loud and call it brave, and she’s the one taking hits for it.
That if I’d just stayed quiet, she wouldn’t be bleeding for my choices.
” My voice frays. “That I’m the problem. Again.”
“Kyle,” she murmurs, “look at me.”
I force my gaze back. The room feels too bright, too loud in the silence between her breaths. I latch on to her eyes like an anchor.
She waits until my breathing loosens half an inch. “You said you ‘blew everything up.’ Tell me what else is true.”
Something breaks open in my chest.
“What’s true is that they were already lighting the match,” I say. “They were already lining her up to take the fall. I just stepped in front of the fire first.”
“What else?” she prompts.
“She walked into that building this morning with her shoulders squared like she was ready to take everyone’s heat before they even asked. I couldn’t watch that happen again.”
“Stay with that. What did it feel like in your body when you decided to post?”
“Like falling through ice,” I breathe. “Shock everywhere. No air. My brain screaming to do something. Fix it. Pull her out of the line of fire.”
“What did you do with that feeling?”
“I did the only thing I knew how to do.” My fingers clamp around the back of the chair until they ache. “I grabbed the loudest microphone I have and pointed it at myself.”
“And now?”
“Now, I’m stuck here refreshing my phone like it’ll give me a different outcome. I’m watching strangers dissect her life and what she means to me, and every instinct in me wants to jump into the line of fire again.”
Dr. Shah lets the silence form enough space for the burn behind my eyes to spill over. I swipe it away, irritated at myself.
“Say it out loud,” she urges. “What are you afraid of?”
“That I broke her life trying to prove I love her.” The words come out thin, shredded. “That she’ll lose everything she fought for because I couldn’t stay in my lane. That she’ll wake up and realize I’m the worst mistake she’s ever made. That she’ll choose survival over me… and she’d be right.”
“And what part of you believes that?”
“All of me.” Shame settles like lead. “She’d be safer if she never met me.”
She lets that sit before speaking. “Kyle… tell me where you are.”
“My condo,” I mutter. “Living room. Kitchen. Ring light. Coffee mugs.”
“Who is with you?”
“No one.”
“That’s important,” she says. “You’re alone in there with your thoughts. And inside those thoughts, you’re judge, jury, and executioner. You’re deciding for Alycia what she thinks, feels, and chooses. None of that is reality. That’s fear wearing a mask of realism.”
I shift, throat tight. “Someone has to be realistic.”
“Is it realistic to say you made a choice with consequences? Yes. Is it realistic to say you’ve destroyed her life before either of you knows the outcome? No. That’s you trying to control a story you don’t want to watch unfold.”
“Feels finished from here.”
“That’s fear,” she says calmly. “Not fact. Give me facts.”
“Fact: I posted the video. Fact: the internet is chaos. Fact: Cooper told me to stay put. Fact: management hasn’t said anything. Fact: Alycia went to work. Fact: I haven’t heard from her.”
“Good,” she says. “What else is true?”
“Last night she told me she loved me and meant it.” My voice wavers. “She said she’d choose me even if it cost her. I’m terrified. She probably is, too.”
“What do those facts tell you about what’s happening between the two of you?”
“That we’re in it together,” I say slowly. “That she’s not collateral. She’s choosing it, too. That we’re… a team. Even if everything around us is chaos.”
Something loosens behind my ribs. Just a fraction.
“Notice that,” she says. “Where did you feel it?”
“In the same place the guilt sits,” I answer. “But lighter.”
She nods once. “Kyle, your instinct has always been to run into the fire for the people you love. You absorb blame before anyone can hand it to you. That instinct has protected people. It’s also punished you.”
A humorless breath slips out. “I feel it.”
“You don’t trust people you love to stand beside you,” she continues gently. “You decide for them what they can handle. And then when things hurt, you blame yourself for not carrying more.”
“I’m trying to keep her safe.”
“And by doing that, you’re speaking like she’s already gone,” she says. “As if she hasn’t told you directly that she loves you. That she chooses you. That she would again.”
The memory hits warm and brutal at once. The way her voice trembled when she said last night was worth everything.
“She did choose me,” I say quietly.
“She did,” Dr. Shah agrees. “So, this is not a story of you destroying her life. It is a story of two people trying to love each other in a system designed to punish honesty.”
“It sounds nicer.”
“It sounds accurate,” she says. “And accuracy challenges your belief that you are dangerous simply for feeling.”
“You said the danger was pretending not to feel.”
“And today proved that again. What caused harm wasn’t the truth you spoke—it was the months spent denying it while both of you were quietly breaking under the weight of the lie.”
The exhaustion finally drags me into the chair. My body sinks, drained.
“I’m not dangerous because I love her,” I mutter. “I’m dangerous when I lie about it. Great. Still doesn’t tell me what to do with my hands right now.”
“That’s the next part,” she says softly. “Right now, your body wants to act. To fix. To storm the arena. To protect her. If you obey that impulse, you make everything worse.”
“I know.”
“Your job is to hold the line,” she says. “To keep from adding lightning to an already dangerous storm.”
“That feels impossible.”
“Difficult,” she corrects. “Not impossible. This is a different kind of bravery. Not action. Stillness. Feeling everything without breaking yourself to stop it.”
Images of Alycia flood in—her in my doorway that morning, eyes shining, whispering that last night was worth everything. That she’d still choose me.
“I want to try,” I say hoarsely. “For her.”
“Good.” A hint of warmth touches her face. “Then small steps. No big decisions today. No surprise interviews. No showing up at the arena. No dramatic self-sacrificing texts.”
A breath leaves me, almost a laugh. “You really do know me.”
“I do.” She lifts a finger. “Step one: every time you feel the urge to fix, pause. Name what your body is doing. Out loud or on paper.”
I grimace. “So… journaling.”
“Giving your fear somewhere to go that doesn’t involve setting more fires,” she corrects.
“You told me once that at home, you joke one step ahead, so no one sees the parts you don’t want to face.
You’re doing that here—trying to outrun fear with action.
I’m asking you to let it walk beside you instead. ”
“Horrible idea,” I mutter.
“Uncomfortable,” she agrees. “And necessary.”
“And Alycia?” I ask quietly. “What if she decides she’s done?”
Her face softens. “Then you will hurt. Your chest will ache, your thoughts will spiral, your stomach will knot. None of that pain will mean you deserved it or caused it. It will mean she made the choice she needed. And you will survive it.”
My gaze drops. “I don’t know how to let someone choose themselves and still believe they’re choosing me, too.”
“That’s because the last time you wanted something you couldn’t keep, you were a boy being told to stay in line,” she says gently.
“You’re not that boy now. You’re a man in a mutual relationship with a woman who loves you.
Her choosing her dignity is not a rejection.
It’s proof of the kind of love you share. ”
My eyes sting. I swallow hard. “Last night, she said if the world tears her apart, if PR makes her a villain… she’d still choose me.” The words wobble. “It shut the noise off inside me. Just for a second.”
“Anchor to that,” she says. “The storm outside is loud. That truth isn’t going anywhere.”
“Feels like trying to remember the score in the middle of a bench-clearing brawl,” I mutter.
“Then keep checking the scoreboard.”
I let out a breath, shaky and long. “What’s my homework?”
“Three things,” she says. “Pause and name sensations. Write a letter to Alycia you won’t send today—everything you’re feeling. And third: decide what kind of man you want to be when this settles. Not for PR. For her. For yourself.”
“That’s… big.”
“It is. You don’t have to finish. Only start.”
I nod slowly. Becoming. Not ruined. The idea feels foreign.
“What are you taking from today?” she asks.
I look around my too-quiet apartment. The ring light. The half-empty mugs. The faint echo of Alycia’s voice saying last night was worth everything.
“That I didn’t blow things up because I love her,” I say. “I blew things up because lying was killing us. That it’ll hurt no matter what, but at least this way we’re real. And my job now is to sit with the hurt instead of turning it into more destruction.”
The tightness in my chest shifts—less like rocks, more like bruised muscle.
“And,” I add quietly, “that I’m not sixteen anymore. I don’t have to earn what I want by tearing myself apart.”
A small smile touches her mouth. “That is enough for today.”
My throat tightens again. “What if I fall apart later?”
“You will,” she says. “And when you do, you’ll notice it. You’ll write. You’ll breathe. You’ll remember you’ve survived every feeling you’ve ever had. And if you need another session, we’ll schedule one.”
The panic flares, then settles into something low and steady. Manageable.
“Okay,” I breathe.
“Kyle,” she adds gently, “give today a chance to unfold without trying to direct every scene.”
A huff slips out. “Control freak.”
“Loving man learning a different way,” she says. “Talk soon.”
The call clicks off. My reflection stares back—red eyes, tight jaw, shoulders up like shields. Someone who’s been in a storm and is still standing.
I drop my head into my hands and inhale the way she taught me. Four in. Hold. Six out.
My chest still aches. My hands still tremble. The world is still spinning fast and loud.
But the truth is out. And for once, I’m not running from it.
I’m staying.
For her.
For me.
And when the knock finally comes—whoever it is, whatever it brings—I want to be the man who can open the door without flinching from his own heart.