Chapter 12
Melissa
Tuesday was a fucking nightmare. I couldn’t get Brandon and the way he got personal with me in our session off my mind. It was like it effortlessly slipped from him. He wanted to know. He wanted to know how he had impacted me. He sat there as I talked about how my husband healed me from the wounds he caused, and he listened like a gentleman.
Or a doctor. Or whatever the fuck was happening.
It felt easy, talking to him like I was talking with my best friend. In some ways, it was easier to talk with him than it was with Ava. I talked about what I wanted to talk about. I told him how heartbroken I was over what he did. I told him about how it shattered me. I told him that I went to bars and cried into my drinks, and maybe that’s why I didn’t like them anymore. Maybe bars reminded me of how I was once broken, cast out and rejected by the first man I had ever truly loved.
I couldn’t concentrate on any of my work. Every time I checked my calculations, I always came up with something different. Every time someone called my name, I imagined it in his voice. I’d melted into his couch every single time he had said my name at that appointment, and I knew the moment I plugged his number into my phone that I was traveling down a bad path. I felt like a lovesick girl who was pining over the hunk in school. Except this hunk had broken my heart in one of the worst ways possible.
“Earth to Melissa. You there?”
“Sorry, Ava. What were you saying?” I asked.
“Nothing, that’s the point. I’ve got lunch, and you’re staring at your desk. You okay?”
“Yeah. I’m just thinking. I had my appointment yesterday with Brandon,” I said.
“Was it bad?” she asked as she sat my salad in front of me.
“No. Not at all. I got to tell him how much he hurt me, and how Carl came by and healed everything he had broken.”
“Wow. How did that shit feel?” she asked.
“So good,” I said. “He actually looked as if he felt bad. And he was genuinely interested. He told me he wanted me to get some vitamin D drops, start yoga, and take up a hobby. Possibly reading like I did when I was in high school.”
“I like that he isn’t doing medication first,” she said.
“Oh, he wanted to. I told him no,” I said.
“Well, good for you! And fuck him,” she said.
I speared a bit of my salad as Ava’s eyes danced around my face. I could tell she was clocking me, reading me like a book as I reached for my water. I cracked the bottle open as her eyes stayed locked onto my face, and finally, I broke and began to spill everything.
“I’m just so confused, Ava. And stressed in a completely different way. You know I actually put on some mascara for that session? Mascara, Ava! I didn’t even realize I still owned any.”
“I noticed you were a bit dressed up yesterday as well, too,” she said.
“I have no idea where any of this is coming from. I was looking forward to that session, and he kept pressing tissues into my hands and making our skin touch.”
“He’s touching you in your sessions?” she asked.
“Not intentionally and not like that. It’s just that rehashing all this stuff with those baby blue eyes looking at me. It’s …”
“Dredging up old memories?” she asked.
“In some ways, I come away from our sessions feeling crazier than I already do,” I said.
“And that’s completely understandable. Just know you can switch doctors. I’m sure he will more than understand,” she said.
“Do you think I should?” I asked.
“Honestly? I’m not sure. On the one hand, I don’t want to see you get hurt. On the other hand, I think it’s about time your body got interested in someone. I just don’t want to see you jeopardize your mental health success and get hurt by him again. He does have a track record with you.”
“I know.”
“Just be careful. Know your limits and your boundaries and don’t allow yourself to push them. When all is said and done, this is for you. Period,” she said.
“I hear you loud and clear.”
The rest of the day was just as distracting. I had nothing to turn in to my boss because I couldn’t stop thinking about Brandon’s lips, and when I went to pick Sarah up from school, I noticed that one of the teachers was built like Brandon. Tall. Muscular. His strength didn’t pull at his clothes like Brandon’s did, and suddenly my mind was showing me what it would look like to rake my fingernails down his chest. The entire ride home with Sarah in the backseat was spent squeezing my thighs together, and by the time I got her home, fed, and in bed, I was close to tears.
My clit was swollen beyond reason, I couldn’t move my legs without friction that shivered my spine, and all the while, I kept thinking about his tongue plunging in and out of my depths.
I panted, catching myself against my wall as images flashed through my mind. Images of him pinning me to my bedroom wall and fucking me senseless. Images of me on my knees sucking his cock as he came down my throat. Images of my body riding his hips as he pounded up into me like the virile man he was instead of the immature little boy he had been.
And then I passed by a picture of Carl.
It was the one picture I couldn’t take down. A picture that was taken of us while we kissed at the end of our wedding. His long, lanky limbs were wrapped around me, pulling me close as he bent me backward. There was a smile on his cheeks. My foot was raised off the ground and my hands thrown around his neck as I clung to him for dear life.
Here I was, pining over the asshole he helped me to heal from while his very aura still hung heavily in this house. Along these walls. In this picture.
In his daughter’s eyes.
I backed up from the picture as my back hit the wall, and I slid down to my ass. I felt like I was cheating on him, betraying him in some way. Tears poured down my cheeks as my mind battled between my clit pulsing for Brandon and my heart longing for Carl. My jaw quivered as I closed my eyes, trying to block out my thoughts and stop my mind from racing so badly.
Why the fuck did Brandon take me off my fucking medication?
I crawled to the kitchen and pulled myself up to the counter. I grabbed a wine glass with my trembling hands as my breathing came in short spurts. I poured myself a glass of wine and chugged it before I quickly poured myself another one. When my hands were still shaking after the second one, I thought back to what Brandon had told me. I could call him at any time, and he’d be there to talk with me.
I poured myself a third glass of wine and made my way to the kitchen table. My knees were weak, and my breathing was still shaky. I pulled my phone from my robe and scrolled until I saw his number, and for a split second, I hesitated. My chest hurt from heaving and my eyes burned from crying, and before I could stop myself I pressed the call button and held the ringing phone up to my ear.
“Dr. Brandon Black speaking,” he said as he answered.
“Brandon,” I said breathlessly.
“Melissa? Is that you? Are you all right?”
“I don’t think so,” I said as I took another gulp of wine.
“Take deep breaths for me. Just try, okay?”
I tried to breathe deep, but the breaths were choppy. My chest was heaving, and my stomach was turning, and all the while, Brandon was coaching me on when I should inhale and when I should release. I closed my eyes and allowed his voice to drench my body, covering me in its raspy low tones as my hands slowly stopped shaking. Soon, my breathing was even, and my mind was settled a bit, and I no longer felt like I was choking on my own panicked state.
“Can you hear me?” he asked.
“Yes. I can,” I said.
“You sound better. How’s your breathing?” he asked.
“It’s all right, I think. Still hurts, but it’s even.”
“That’s good. That’s good. Chances are, you had a mild panic attack. Are you sitting down?”
“I am now, yes,” I said.
“Good. Now, talk to me about what you were thinking about before it happened.”
Should I be honest with him? Should I answer that question in full? I didn’t want to risk losing him yet. Not when I’d just got him back. That pang of guilt still stung my body, but I was able to drown it out as I chugged my third glass of wine.
So, I decided to give him the bare minimum answer in the hopes that he would leave it be.
“I was thinking about Carl and about how Ava tells me it’s time to move on and find someone who makes me happy. I felt his awful pang of guilt curl my stomach as I looked at a wedding photo of ours I just can’t take down yet,” I said.
“I can see how that would start a mild attack. When did you have this conversation with Ava?” he asked.
“This afternoon, at lunch. She said it was time my body started craving someone or some crap like that.”
He chuckled into the phone, and I could feel my body relaxing at the sound of his voice. We talked into the small hours of the morning, not hanging up the phone until close to three o’clock. We talked about Ava, and he mentioned a little bit about a colleague of his. Dr. Michael Smith. I recognized the name from the nameplates on the doors adjacent to him, and for once, I got him to open up a bit about his life and about how he and his doctor friend go get drinks from time to time and how he and his mother are still close.
Of course, most of the conversation was geared toward me. He wanted to make sure I was going to be okay when we hung up the phone, and I smiled at the compassion that seemed to be emanating from his voice.
I told him I was all right now that I’d talked to him, and I could feel the smile radiating through the phone against my ear. I enjoyed talking to him more than I should have, and as I laid my head down on my pillow, I found myself hoping he’d make use of my number now that he had it.
After all, even a world-renowned psychiatrist needed someone to go to.