CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR What Love Wasnt
Therapy taught Maya that language mattered.For years she had called what happened with Jalen"passion.
"Dr. Brooks asked her to describe it without usingromantic words.
"I never knew where I stood," Maya said.
"What did that feel like?""Exciting when he came close.
Terrifying when hepulled away.""And when he came close after pulling away?
" Maya thought."Like relief."Dr. Brooks nodded.
"Sometimes relief after distress canfeel very intense.
Intensity is not always intimacy." The sentence stayed with Maya.She began examining old memories with less nostalgia.
Jalen showing up after three days of silence had once feltromantic because he brought flowers.Now Maya saw the three days too.Jalen crying after cheating had once made her believeshe mattered.Now she saw that his remorse had required her tocomfort him while she was wounded.Even the sweetest memories changed when placedbeside their full context.That did not make every good moment fake.
It made the story complete.Maya also examined Andre.She resisted the temptation to turn him into a saint nowthat she had lost him.Andre had not always understood her.
He had missedemotional cues, stayed late at work after promising dinner,and once spent three days being distant because he wasangry about money instead of admitting it.
There had beenreal problems in their relationship.But they had been solvable problems.That distinction mattered.Andre had not required Maya to betray herself in orderto remain loved.Jalen often had.One afternoon, Dr. Brooks asked, "What do you thinklove is now?
"Maya leaned back on the sofa."Not a feeling.
""Not at all?""A feeling, but not only a feeling.
""What else?"Maya considered."Behavior. Safety.
Honesty. The way somebody handlesyou when they're angry.
The way they respond when yousay no. Whether you can tell the truth without beingpunished for it.
Whether they make room for your lifeinstead of needing to be the center of it.
"Dr. Brooks smiled slightly. "That sounds different fromwhere we started.
"Maya laughed. "Where did we start?""You told me, 'I can't help what my heart wants.
'" Maya winced.Andre had hated that sentence.Now she understood why.
"I think my heart can want something that isn't goodfor me," she said.
"And then?""Then I get to decide what I do with the wanting.
" For the first time, the lesson did not sound likepunishment.It sounded like power.