Chapter 31
Nadya
I HAD THERAPY IN SIX minutes. It had better be like Nick had promised.
The computer was already open, propped on a stack of Ljuba’s books to get the angle right.
My heart thumped like it thought I was being hunted.
Pretty sure therapy was supposed to make me feel better, but I was already feeling like shit.
I didn’t want to talk about my feelings to some stranger on the other side of the screen.
Instead of counting minutes, I tried to distract myself by reading the titles of the books I had plucked from Ljuba’s shelves.
Bred by the Horde was at the very top. It didn’t take much imagination to figure out what that one was about.
Lust and Lycanthropy was pretty obvious, too.
Seduced by the Shadow made me close my eyes and imagine having a shadow seduce me.
You’d think an artist would have vivid imagination, but this time it failed me.
It kind of made sense that she’d fantasize about non-human love interests, considering how much a human had traumatized her. Dan was a welcome addition in Ljuba’s life, and I knew exactly why Ljuba had picked him. The guy looked at least fifty percent a tank.
How much longer did I have to sit here and wonder about my little sister’s kinks?
Two minutes to go.
Should I sit or stand during the session?
People usually sat, right? I didn’t want to get too comfortable, though.
I stood up, leaned on the counter in a way I hoped looked casual, then I stuck my hands in the front pocket of my hoodie, only to remember it was torn, then crossed my arms, then just gave up.
The urge to bail was massive, but I knew that if I didn’t do this now, I’d never do it.
Finally, I sat back down and tried to look sane.
The meeting room went from “waiting for host” to a jump-cut of a perfectly lit office. The woman on the other end wore glasses, a blazer and had exactly the kind of neat, expensive hair that told you everything you needed to know about her priorities.
“Good morning, Nadya,” she said, voice calm and friendly. “Can you hear me okay?”
“Yep. Loud and clear. Like you’re sitting in my kitchen, which is honestly a little creepy,” I said, trying for lightness.
The therapist chuckled. “We’ll stick to virtual for now. First sessions are usually about getting to know each other. No pressure to share more than you’re ready for.”
“Great,” I said, leaning back in my chair. “Because I was just planning to sit here and look mysterious. Very tortured-artist vibe.”
The therapist smiled and nodded, and I could practically see her analyzing even my humor. “I’d like to know what made you decide to give this a try today?”
My instinct was to joke. To say my FBI almost-boyfriend keeps looking at me like I’m broken glass and it’s getting old. But I was here for a reason. Not to mention, this session wasn’t cheap.
“I’m looking for better coping mechanisms. I paint, which helps a lot, but not enough.
So, I’ve been drinking, which isn’t the healthiest choice, but I don’t know how else to deal with everything.
I just want to function. That’s all. If you can tell me how to do that without.
.. you know.” I waved a hand, then dropped it.
Was I babbling? Damn it. “Just the coping mechanisms, please, so I can reduce my alcohol consumption. We don’t need to talk about my feelings. ”
She smiled again, but it was smaller this time. “We can do that,” she said. “But I will need to get a sense of your current habits. When you say ‘reduce,’ what does that look like for you?”
I braced for the judgment. “Mostly, I drink at night. After work, or when I’m painting. Sometimes I have a couple of shots, but mostly it’s just to help me sleep.”
She typed something into her computer. “How much do you drink in a day on average?”
I twisted the drawstring on my hoodie into a tight spiral. “Maybe three or four drinks?” I lied. “Sometimes more on weekends.”
She typed again, then looked up. “Have you ever gone a day without drinking in the last month?”
I considered lying, but what was the point? “No.”
She nodded. “Have you ever experienced withdrawal symptoms if you try to stop?”
I fidgeted, suddenly aware of every nerve ending in my hands. “It’s just the trauma creeping in. I get antsy and can’t sleep. And my mind keeps racing and going to dark places.”
“That’s a very common experience,” she said soothingly.
“Alcohol is a depressant, meaning it slows your brain down. Over time, your brain adapts by speeding up. When you stop drinking, your brain is still working faster than it should because it’s waiting for you to drink, so you get insomnia, tremors, anxiety, sometimes even heart palpitations. ”
It sounded clinical when she said it, but fuck.
Was she saying what I thought she was saying?
I remembered last night when I tried not to drink.
Insomnia, tremors, racing thoughts. Then I had a drink, and it all went away, like always.
Because that had been my pattern for a while now.
The only difference was that before I didn’t bother even trying to cut down.
“Isn’t there a pill for that?” I asked.
She smiled for real this time, just for a second. “There are medications that can help, but we should also talk about behavioral strategies. Are there times you find it harder to avoid drinking? Any triggers?”
I wanted to laugh. “Every time I breathe?”
She made a note. “You mentioned painting helps you manage your urges?”
I nodded. “If I get in the zone, I can lose track of everything else, but sometimes the only way to get started is with a drink.”
“Would you say painting is your primary coping mechanism, besides alcohol?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
She leaned back a little. “That’s actually very positive. The fact that you have another outlet makes it easier to build new habits. What we’re dealing with here is a two-part problem: the physiological dependence, and the psychological triggers.”
She launched into an explanation about how the body rewires itself, how cravings peak and then subside, how every time you resist, you’re literally teaching your brain to stop expecting a reward. It made sense, but it also made me tired just listening.
“So what do I do?” I asked, cutting her off. “If I want to cut back, I mean. What’s the magic bullet?”
She gave me a half-smile. “There are two ways. Gradual reduction or cold turkey. With gradual, you taper down slowly, so your brain readjust over time. With cold turkey, it’s three days of hell and then it starts to get better.”
I shivered. “Three days?”
“The first seventy-two hours are the hardest. That’s when the withdrawal symptoms peak. After that, you might get headaches, if your addiction was really bad, but it’s mostly about resisting the urge.”
I couldn’t imagine three days without a drink. “Anything else?”
“Yes,” she said, as if she’d been waiting for the question. “Exercise helps. If you can go for a run, or even just do some squats or pushups at home, it burns off a lot of that excess energy. It also gives you a different kind of endorphin rush to chase.”
She went on for a while, suggesting apps, meditation, even hypnotherapy, if I wanted to get fancy. I took notes, but most of them were just doodles of spirals and faces.
By the end of the session, I felt raw, as if someone had sanded off my skin, and now every breeze hurt.
She closed with, “Would you like to schedule a follow-up?”
I said yes, because a part of me was scared that nothing she suggested would work. I mean, I was used to my mind being a mess, but a physical addiction? That was real, not just something in my head.
Well, it actually was in my head, because that’s where my brain was, but whatever. It was physical, and I couldn’t pretend it wasn’t there. Not anymore.
Oh, hell, Vera had been right. She kept telling me I needed to stop, that I was going down a dangerous path, but I ignored her. How would I admit to her that she had been right all along?
After I ended the call, I closed the laptop and pressed my forehead to the table. What a mess. How had I gotten myself into this?
Fine, I knew how I got here. I was trying not to feel, but how could I get myself out?
I sat there for a long time, listening to the hum of the fridge and the faint buzz of the city beyond the windows. I picked at the strip of dried paint from my jeans, but of course it wouldn’t come off. It never did.
Three days of hell. I had gone through hell before and survived, so maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Just three days. Three very short days, in the grand scheme of things.
Running sounded okay, except I hated running.
I tried to picture myself on the treadmill at the gym but immediately remembered that I didn’t even have a gym membership.
And there was no way I was going outside, not with what had happened last week.
The idea of jogging alone on the streets made my skin crawl.
Maybe I could run laps in my apartment, like a lunatic hamster. Or do burpees until I puked. Maybe I’d paint until I collapsed. Maybe I’d just white-knuckle it and see how long I would last before my brain short-circuited.
The one thing I didn’t want to do was call my sisters. Vera would just lecture me, and Ljuba would cry, and I couldn’t handle either of those things right now. So I paced the apartment, picking dried paint off every surface.
The lock rattled, almost making me jump out of my skin, and the door swung open.
Nick stepped inside with a bag of cat food and two foldable pet bowls in his hands. He took in the scene—the laptop, the mess, me standing there in socks and a hoodie—and raised an eyebrow.
“Rough day?” he asked.
“I’m an alcoholic,” I blurted, just to get it over with. “Wait, is that cat food? Why do you have cat food?”
“I got it for Meatball so he’d stop stealing,” Nick explained.
I grinned. “The cat that stole your meatballs? You named him Meatball? You really named the cat after the thing he stole from you?”
Nick shrugged. “Seemed only fair, but you’re deflecting. What was that about you being an alcoholic?”
I didn’t want to talk about it. But I forced myself to.
“Therapist said it’s not just drinking. It’s an actual addiction.
She literally called it ‘physiological dependence,’ and explained why just thinking about skipping a day makes my brain try to claw its way out the window.
” I flexed my hands, all the buzzing anxiety making it hard to hold still.
“There’s a three-day withdrawal horror show waiting for me if I try to quit cold turkey and I have no gym membership, and my primary exercise is painting, which doesn’t even count. ”
Nick set down the bag, crossed over, and leaned in the doorway. “You talked about it?”
“Kind of. No way I’m oversharing with someone who wears expensive glasses and drinks tea out of a cup shaped like a lotus, but I did explain enough for her to understand the problem.
” I flopped onto a chair. “I have to come up with another coping mechanism. Something that burns off the energy so I don’t, you know, chase the high with vodka. ”
He nodded. “You want to go running with me in the mornings? I need the exercise, anyway, and I’m supposed to be keeping you safe.”
I rolled my eyes. “Sure, and die of shame after two blocks.”
He grinned. “I’ll go easy on you.”
I shook my head. “You’re pushy, you know that?”
He shrugged. “Works on you.”
For a while, we just stood in the entryway, me in socks and ratty pajamas, Nick in his jeans and a T-shirt that clung to his shoulders in the most delicious way.
“You know, we used to compete at the Bureau to see who could function with the highest blood alcohol content,” Nick said.
I snorted. “That sounds like a health hazard.”
“It’s only a hazard if you lose,” he deadpanned.
I laughed, feeling just a touch lighter. It was just that... I was an alcoholic. What did that say about me aside from me being even more of a mess? I hadn’t thought I was good enough for Nick even before this, and now...
Nick stepped closer, putting both hands on my hips. “I think it’s pretty badass to admit you have a problem and try to fix it.”
I squirmed, wishing I could disappear into my hoodie. “Would’ve been more badass if I didn’t have this problem. I don’t even have an excuse of having no control over it. I did this to myself.”
Nick shook his head and pulled me closer to him.
“You made a mistake while trying to deal with a whole lot of trauma. No one can blame you for that. So if you want to go cold turkey, I’ll be here to watch you shake and curse and throw things at me.
Or if you want to taper off, I’ll keep score. Either way, you’re not doing it alone.”
He said it so matter-of-factly that I almost didn’t hear the promise underneath. He would be there for me no matter what.
“Thanks,” I said, which felt inadequate.
“So what’s the plan, boss?”
I hesitated. “The therapist said three days of hell, then it gets better.”
“Then let’s start now,” he said, as if we were planning a road trip and not a total neurological overhaul.
“I don’t want to run. I’m not that energetic yet.
” But I could already feel the jitters coming on.
Before, I would’ve attributed to my fear of starting this super hard thing, but it wasn’t that.
I hadn’t had a drink since last night, and even that had been less than what I would’ve normally had.
My brain was already asking for booze. “Okay, I might be a little wired, but not bad enough to run.”
Nicks thumb brushed my hip bone. Up and down. Up and down. “Well, there are other things we can do to burn off extra energy,” he said suggestively.
He had a point. That would be a much more pleasant way to deal with my withdrawal symptoms.