Lethal Desire (Fatal Pursuit Sequel)

nine

A few weeks pass and I'm sitting on a quilt in a cozy, little park near my apartment with my psychiatrist, having our first outing.

"How do you feel now that you know you're not pregnant?" Dr. Kavon asks in her soft, non-judgmental tone.

"Honestly-" I pluck up a blade of grass, "I feel so relieved."

She flattens her lips into a straight line, "Why's that?"

"I'm not ready, I mean, I wasn't ready. You know that."

She looks at me, "No, I don't know that. I know that motherhood gave you a lot of anxiety, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you weren't ready. Perhaps you were simply afraid of the new responsibility and pressure."

Yeah, no shit, doc. I only told you that a million times.

She jots something down, "Other than the feeling of obligation, did any part of you want to keep the baby? Like, if you had a choice to make the baby magically disappear, or reverse time, would you have done it?"

I open my mouth because I think I know the answer but after a few seconds I realize that I'm really not sure. Saying 'yes' sounds cruel but at the same time, saying 'no' seems dishonest. There were some things that I sort of was looking forward to.

"You don't have to answer that if you don't want to. Let's move on because it seems like something else is bothering you about the situation. Would you like to talk about it?"

She's a mind-reader for real.

"I've lied to my really good friends about it. I was going to tell them, I really was. But, I was scared that they wouldn't want me to be in TAC anymore and it's helped me so much, I couldn't let that happen. Then Abena said she would help out with the campaign and... I backed out. Now, we're closer than ever and the more I get to know them, the harder it is to 'fess up."

She just looks at me. She doesn't seem disappointed at all. She looks at me as if she's waiting for me to get to the juicy part of a story. She doesn't ask why I did it, she doesn't tell me to do the right thing. She simply says, "That's neither here nor there."

I'm stunned, "Shouldn't I tell them the truth?"

"I'm not here to be the little angel on your shoulder. I'm not you. I simply supply you with the tools to heal so you can move about your life proactively. So, make the choice that you feel advances your progress."

"Uh-huh. That's just a professional way of saying 'that's not my damn job'"

She smiles, "Precisely."

"Well, damn." I cradle my head in my hands, "Luckily, they haven't brought it up again but it just feels weird."

"Do you think that if you never tell them the truth, it won't affect the relationship?"

"Maybe. But, whenever I'm with them there's always this little nagging voice in the back of my head, calling me a phony. Saying that I don't deserve to have such amazing friends. I'm starting to think that it's not just the miscarriage thing either. I feel like it's just me. Even when I'm at work I feel like I shouldn't be there. Like me getting that marketing position was just a fluke."

A morsel of concern flashes in her eyes, "How long have you felt this way?"

I take a deep breath, "For a while now. It comes and goes."

"I understand. Do you think that ties into everything that happened when you were in Spain? Do you find yourself reminiscing on it often?"

"Honestly, yes. I try to keep my mind off of...David and Nathaniel." David and Nathaniel are the names she makes me use instead of Dante and Nacho because it's supposed to help trigger my panic attacks less but to be honest, I didn't see the point of it. I still think of them even I called them Danielle and Natalie.

"But sometimes," I continue, "when I have trouble falling asleep or there's the occasional lull at work, I find myself getting buried in my feelings."

She nods comprehensively, "That makes total sense. Having to basically experience all those feelings again must make you feel so overwhelmed."

"You can say that again. Sometimes, there's so much noise in my brain and I just want it all to go quiet."

"That is a lot more common than you think, y'know? Perhaps you should consider antidepressants. They've recently cleared a new one called Eternitol. It's very safe, they've been testing it since the early 2000's. It works wonders with little to no side effects."

I slap a mosquito off my arm, "Do you really think that could help?"

She smiles, "I highly recommend if you think you're ready. I can write you a prescription whenever you'd like."

I take in a shallow breath, "I'm definitely ready to move on to the next stage of my life so if you really think it'd help, I'm down."

"Alright. I'll put in an order as soon as I get back to the office. This is a beautiful park by the way, what a lovely choice."

"Oh, yeah. It really is."

I was originally going to choose the coffee shop near HAUTE but was paranoid that someone from work might come in and overhear our session. Especially since when I made the appointment I still thought that I was pregnant.