Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 68033 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68033 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
She tightened her trembling fingers around the pen, blinking away the last of her tears and signing the papers. Half of her heart moaned because this was it, but the other half—those chambers she couldn’t hide from any longer—whispered one name.
Walsh.
The thought of being with him made her ache and burn, twisted her heart around itself. Though the divorce wouldn’t be official for another few months, she knew it was only a matter of time before he came to her. Would he even wait? She hoped so. She hoped not.
Kerris was still wrestling with the same riot of emotions when she entered her therapist Dr. Stein’s office later that afternoon. Dr. Liza Stein was a gravedigger, exhuming the cadavers of past hurts, starting with Amalie and working her way backward. She had been unable to fully explore what Amalie had meant to Kerris without touching on Cam. And, of course, Dr. Stein had picked up the thread of that pain, Cam’s departure, and followed it to her foster parents, and Mama Jess, and, finally, her mother.
It was hard for Kerris to accept that she had abandonment issues, but it seemed that was the case. Would she even have married Cam at all if she’d had someone like Dr. Stein in her life earlier? Immediately after the rape, or when she was a teenager? Well-meaning counselors and teachers had recommended it before, but she’d never done the interior work this process demanded, and she’d probably regret it for the rest of her life.
You shouldn’t cry over spilled milk, but there were so many innocent bystanders who had been splashed by her sloppy attempts to feel whole, to feel wanted and secure and like someone worth sticking around for. Namely, Cam and Walsh. Casualties of her insecurity and, dare she admit it, selfishness. She didn’t just cry over the milk she had spilled. She mourned it, and wondered how she could ever make amends.
Dr. Stein didn’t believe in a lot of preliminaries and pleasantries. She dove right in, and it wasn’t long before she had Kerris confessing her guilt about the divorce, which was moving ahead with speedy inevitability.
“Kerris, do you want to stay married to Cam?”
“No, I definitely don’t.” Kerris shifted on the couch, glancing at the petite therapist with her stylish auburn bob and cat-eye glasses. “But he deserved someone else. He deserved better. I married him knowing I didn’t love him the way I should.”
“And did he know that? Did he walk into this with his eyes open?”
“Well, he knew I didn’t love him that way.” Kerris hesitated, not wanting to broach a subject she had managed to avoid. “He may have even suspected how I felt about Walsh.”
“Walsh?” Dr. Stein pounced. “And who is that? Where does he figure into all this?”
Kerris laid out her history with Walsh and Cam, piece by piece, detail by detail. She searched Dr. Stein’s face for condemnation, for censure, but saw only professional impassivity, and the occasional gleam of sympathy.
“Kerris, what holds your heart back from Walsh?”
Nothing. Absolutely nothing held her heart back from Walsh. What she felt for him was tidal. It had crashed past her sense of right, had swept over her vows. He had capsized her heart.
“Um…I’m not sure I understand the question.”
“Do you love Walsh Bennett?”
Kerris closed her eyes. She couldn’t say that aloud, not today, especially with the divorce papers just now beginning their three-month journey through the legal system.
“Well, I…I care deeply about him,” Kerris edited, hoping Dr. Stein would, just this once, leave this one stone unturned.
No such hope.
“Kerris, this works only if you’re honest with me and with yourself. You know that.”
Dr. Stein laid her glasses aside, her eyes sharper without the lenses.
“You’ve already admitted you married Cam knowing you had feelings for his best friend. And you’ve done what adults do when they realize they’ve made mistakes. You’ve owned that. Healthy people can own their mistakes and, over time, move on. You’ve taken huge steps toward that, and I applaud you. Can you own this emotion? Do you love Walsh?”
Kerris looked down at the brightly patterned sundress she wore, tracing the paisley swirls with her finger, wishing she could disappear into the design, be consumed by the color and pattern.
“Kerris, I asked you a question.”
Kerris shook her head, setting the silver bells in her earrings jingling.
“No, you don’t love him, or no, you won’t answer?” Dr. Stein leaned forward, those unrelenting eyes never leaving Kerris’s face.
“I…I don’t want to talk about this. Not today,” Kerris said. “To say it while I’m still married to Cam, it just feels wrong.”
“Kerris, don’t judge your feelings. Don’t avoid them. Own them. If you feel something, you have to voice it. Have you made any progress on the other thing we discussed last week?”
Kerris froze, unsure which poison she’d choose. Talking about Cam and Walsh or talking about…