Page 73 of The Fall Before Flight

I’m his ex-patient.

“Leo?”

He looks up sharply, eagerly. “Yes?”

I open my mouth, then close it and look away. On the other side of the pool, I spot Kinsey and Nix. They’re standing close, smiling and kissing and holding each other. Oblivious to my crisis of conscience, insulated by their love. For some reason, the sight of them calms me. Brain takes advantage, delivering a knock-out punch to Vagina.

When I turn back to Leo, he speaks before I can. “You don’t have to answer. I understand. And fuck, I’m proud of you. My only excuse is I haven’t been thinking clearly since I saw you yesterday. I’m sorry.”

I manage a wobbly smile. “Don’t be sorry. For anything. You brought me back to life.”

He studies me another moment, then nods and stands. “If it’s any consolation, you did the same for me.”

Watching him walk away lands in the top five worst moments of my life.

32

GREY MATTER

Making hard choices in alignment with my highest, healthiest self sounds great in theory. In reality, it sucks. Leo Chastain asked me to be his booty call and I turned him down. Why the hell did I do that? Because of some inner-princess telling me I deserve more? The boring ritual of dinner and a movie before sex? Push and pull and ignoring calls and the usual, stupid games men and women play?

More importantly, what if it’s not about me deserving something at all? What if my choice didn’t stem from self-respect or some new, misguided sense of dignity but stemmed instead from patriarchal conditioning that tells me I can’t trust my impulses? That I’m not allowed to follow my body’s desires and have mind-blowing, no-strings-attached sex with my ex-doctor?

“Is that all it would be? Sex?” asks Dr. Wilson, one eyebrow arched.

Winded from my tirade, I sink back into the plush couch in her office. “I don’t know how to answer that. I’m not in love with him—I get there was some Stockholmey-ness happening for a while, and that I don’t really know him beyond what he shared in our sessions.”

“But?”

I look out the window at the closest palm tree. “It’s complicated. I have a lot of respect for him. I trust him, feel… safe, I guess, because he’s seen the worst of me already.”

Dr. Wilson makes a noise of consideration. “Finding acceptance is a powerful motivator in the search for relationships. Unfortunately, he implied that he doesn’t want a relationship, likely because of the professional ramifications. Is that something you can live with, or would it make you feel like he was ashamed of you?”

I don’t bother answering.

She doesn’t know Leo’s name or exactly when he treated me, but she’s a smart cookie and has rightly gleaned his personality. She’s also a nonjudgmental cookie, which is one of the main reasons I’ve stuck around.

“Have you ever had the hots for a patient, Doc?”

Like I knew she would, she deflects the question. “Therapy can create a strong, pseudo-intimacy between two people. When those people also have physical chemistry, that closeness can be mistaken for something else.”

“Love?” I ask rhetorically.

She nods. “Obviously I don’t know this man’s inner thoughts and can only speak from my experience. But perhaps his conflict is not too dissimilar from yours. A battle between what he wants and what he thinks is expected of him. Consider his parting words on Halloween.”

You did the same for me.

I shake my head. “He couldn’t have meant I brought him back to life. Right? Maybe he misheard what I said.”

The damn eyebrow goes up. “Why do you say that?”

“Because I have self-worth issues,” I mutter robotically.

Dr. Wilson smiles softly. “I think it’s time to disavow you of the notion that life is simply a series of good or bad choices, Amelia. It’s much more than that.”

“I know,” I parrot.

“Do you?” She waits for me to look at her before continuing. “What if instead of focusing so much on what you should and shouldn’t do or what is or isn’t healthy, you try focusing on what makes you happy?”

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