I considered each and every one of them.
Because I wanted him to kiss me again. Like we were waiting for the world to end. Like it was the last thing we would ever do. I wanted him to look at my naked body with the wonder of the first time. I wanted him to watch me touch myself, to watch him bring himself to orgasm. I wanted his fingers inside me, and to feel his cock in my hand. I wanted his face between my thighs and I wanted his cock in my mouth, to taste his desire. And, god, I wanted him inside me. I wanted him inside me with a need that was painful, both physically and emotionally.
I wanted him in every position.
I wanted him soft and sweet and loving.
I wanted him fast and rough and wild.
I just... wanted him.
I wanted him so badly.
In the end, sitting at the edge of my bed on Monday after work, I decided to skip them all. I decided to make it a clean break. I needed to move on. It would be easier to do so when things had been strained for the past few sessions. It would make walking away from him hurt a little less. And by “a little less” I meant... not the soul crushing ache inside I had been dealing with non-stop for days.
I showered, towel dried my hair, skipped the makeup, and slipped into a pair of dark skinny jeans and a pale pink sweater. I sprayed on Jake's perfume. And I felt more like myself than I had for a while in all those skimpy dresses and too much makeup.
“You don't have to go,” Shay said, sitting on the couch, watching me.
“Yes, I do.”
“Do you really think you are going to get closure by doing this?”
I grabbed my keys off the table, shaking my head. “No.”
“Then why go?”
I took a breath, looking up at her. “To prove to myself that I can.”
I let myself into his office and locked the door, but Chase was nowhere in sight. I took a few steps in, glancing around, checking the time to make sure I wasn't super early. But I was right on time. And he was always waiting. I moved toward his open office door, about to call out his name, when I saw him.
He was sitting in the chair he had sat in during our introductory session, his jacket off, his white shirt looking wrinkled. He had his head resting in his hand, a scotch in his other, resting on his outstretched leg.
And he just looked so... lost.
I had never really stopped to consider the toll his job must have taken on him. Not so much the surrogacy, but the therapy. Having to hear everyone's horror stories, helping when you can, knowing that sometimes you couldn't. It must have always felt like a weight on the shoulders. And that was what he seemed like, his shoulders down- weighted.
“Chase...” I said softly.
He didn't start. He simply turned his head slowly toward me. “Is it seven already?” he asked, his eyes small and tired-looking.
“Yeah,” I said, stepping into the room, moving toward him. “Are you okay?”
He gave me a small smile that didn't reach his eyes. “That's my question.”
“Well, I'm borrowing it,” I said, sitting down across from him.
He chuckled, setting his scotch down. “Do you want a drink?”
“No, thanks. I'm good on the alcohol front for a while.”
He ran a hand across his brow, looking at me. “You look better.”
“Better?” I asked, scrunching my brows together.
“Yeah, I don't know... more like yourself.” He paused, shrugging. “You're beautiful.”
There it was.
I swallowed, looking down at my hands as the blush crept up. “Thank you.”
“I figured you wanted a talk therapy session,” he said, waving a hand out.
“Yeah, I... yeah,” I said dumbly, cursing myself. “How does this go?”
He waved a hand. “We can talk about anything you want. How you think therapy went. Any concerns you have for the future...”
“How do you think therapy went?” I asked, worrying my hands together slightly.
The air in his office felt thick. Depressing. Like he had breathed it out and it stitched itself into every fabric and surface in the room.
He sat up slowly, leaning his elbows on his knees toward me. “Ava, you did so much better than I had anticipated.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, baby,” he said, wincing slightly. “Yes,” he said a little more firmly. “I really wasn't sure we would finish the sessions in the allotted amount of time. You were so withdrawn and timid and then you just... is blossomed too cliché a word?”
No. It was just right.
But I only blossomed because of him.
He was the gracious Sun. Me, the ungrateful Earth.
“Chase, I can't thank...”
“Don't,” he said, his words heavy. “Don't thank me, Ava.”
A silence hung then, long and full of words needing to be said.
“Ava,” he said finally, making me jump. “Can you come here for a second?” he asked, holding an arm out.
I wasn't exactly sure what he was asking, but I got to my feet and stepped closer. His hand reached out and touched my arm, pulling slightly. “Closer,” he said, sitting back in his chair. With my feet touching the feet of the chair, there was no way to get closer but to move into his lap. When I looked up, questioningly, his other arm reached out for me.
And my first thought was: no.
It was what I had been convincing myself shouldn't happen. It wasn't the clean break I said I needed.
But it was everything I wanted.
So I slid onto his lap and his arms went around me, pulling me close. I rested my head on his chest, his cheek coming down on top of my hair.
And he just... held me.
I closed my eyes, listening to his heartbeat, steady, sure. His arms pulled me tighter and I carefully planted a kiss over his shirt, too soft for him to feel it.
For me, that was therapy.
His touch was a remedy. It was a cure.
A long time later, his hands drifted up and into my hair, stroking through it gently, tirelessly, as the clock ticked the better part of an hour away.
“Chase...”
“Yeah, baby?”
What could I say? What was left?
I sighed, shaking my head slightly. “You made me so much better.”
“No, babe. You made yourself better. I just helped you along.”
“Geez, learn to take a compliment, would you?” I asked and was rewarded with a small chuckle.
“You're amazing, Ava. Don't ever let anyone try to convince you otherwise. Promise me that.”
That was a tall order.
“I'll try.”
“Not good enough,” he said, kissing my hair. “Try again.”
I snorted, smiling a little. Bossy Chase. “Okay. I'll really try.”
“You're impossible,” he said and I could imagine the eye roll I was getting. “In the future, when you are with someone and...”
“The moment,” I cut in, surprising myself.
“I'm sorry?” Chase asked, his hands stilling.
I tilted my head up slightly to look at his face. “Someone once told me to be in the moment,” I explained. “I think that was pretty good advice,” I said, resting my head back against my safe place. I wanted to suck up every last bit of the feeling it gave me, to keep stored away, to bring out when I was lonely and sad and anxious.
I had a feeling there were a lot of those days ahead.
“Okay,” he said, and we stayed there, in that silent moment.
Until I drifted off.
Then woke up with a jolt out of a bad dream.
“Hey,” Chase's voice said, gruff, like he had been sleeping too. “You alright?”
“Dream,” I said, pushing myself up. I checked the clock then quickly got to my feet. I needed to go. The session was over. It was done. It was over. And I needed to leave. Before I kinda... lost it. Which was what I felt on the verge
of doing.
“Where are you going?”
“It's almost one,” I said, searching for my keys and wallet.
“So what?” he asked, sitting forward.
“I just... it's time to go,” I said, turning.
He looked away from me, reaching for his scotch and finishing it in one gulp. “I'll walk you to your car.”
“No,” I said, too quickly. “No, I'm fine. Stay here. Relax. You look... tired.” Which wasn't quite right. It wasn't tired, but I needed to stop looking at him.
“Ava...”
“Thank you, Chase,” I said, walking stiffly toward the door and closing it behind me.
I leaned against it for a long moment, looking for the strength to move forward, not go back. I turned, putting my hand against the wood as if I could feel him through it, taking a deep breath... then walking out of his office.
After the Session
Ten Minutes
I managed to keep it together until I got home, opening the door, and falling into Shay's waiting arms. Crying. No... sobbing. Big, ugly, snot-filled hysterics. And she just stood there and let it run through me. Then walked me to my bed, opening the blankets, and letting me bury inside.
“I'm right here,” she said, crawling into the foot of the bed and lying there, “if you need anything, okay?”
Seven Hours
“Seriously, go back to bed,” Jake said, looking at my face with a mix of sympathy and disgust. I knew it was bad. I was tear-stained and blotchy. My eyes felt like planets.
“I'm going to work,” I said, grabbing an ice pack out of the freezer, wrapping it in a paper towel, and pressing it against my eyes.
“Ava, I'll tell them you're sick,” Shay reasoned.
“I've been out twice already. And I need the distraction.”
“Still sick with that fake love shit, huh?” Jake asked in typical unfeeling male fashion.
I half-snorted, half-laughed. “I'm not sure it just goes away right away.”
“Unless it ain't no transference,” Shay supplied.
“What else could it be?” Jake asked.
“She's fucking in love with him, you idiot,” Shay said, tapping her heel on the floor.
“It's fak...”
“It ain't fake. The only person who believes that is you.”
“And Dr. Bowler,” I said, pulling the ice off my eyes.
“Dr. Bowler doesn't know shit then. Because this is love. Straight up, can't eat without them, can't sleep without them love. And it isn't going away. Especially if you keep acting like it ain't what it is.”
I shook my head, putting the ice pack away. “We are going to be late,” I insisted, making my way to the door.
“You're not even going to think about it?”
“No,” I said, finally. She just didn't understand.
It was transference.
And it was going to pass.
Three Days
“Come on, look at all this food,” Jake said, in the tone like he was trying to trick a dog into eating a piece of lunch meat with a pill wrapped in it.
“I'm not hungry,” I grumbled, burying deeper into my robe, turning the volume on the TV up.
“You've said that for like every meal for days.”
“And it's been true for every meal for days,” I said, the thought of food making my mouth dry up and my stomach turn.
It wasn't getting better.
I was trying to ignore Shay's constant nagging at me to stop being in denial. To admit that I had real, genuine, normal, woman-for-man feelings for Chase.
When that failed, she insisted I set up an appointment for Dr. Bowler because she 'wasn't going to sit around and watch me be a little bitch' about my feelings forever.
So I called.
And I had an appointment for the next afternoon on my lunch break. An appointment I was looking forward to because I needed the reassurance. Especially after three days and absolutely no lessening of the dark pit inside.
Four Days
“Ava, how have...” she trailed off, stepping aside and waiting for me to join her in her office. “What happened?”
My head jerked slightly. “I, um... I ended therapy, remember?”
“When?”
“Monday.”
“Why didn't you call me sooner?”
“I was just... dealing with all these... residual feelings and I wasn't really feeling up to talking yet.”
“How did your last few sessions go?”
Horribly.
Then great.
Then over.
“Not great. Things were cold. Some... distance I guess. On both our parts. I was trying to, you know, keep myself together. I knew it was ending and I was struggling with that.”
“May I ask, and you do not need to answer, what you did on your last visit?”
I nodded, looking down at my hands. “I guess it started with a little talk therapy, but it felt weird. Kind of forced and awkward. And then he...”
“He did what?”
“He asked me to come over and sit on his lap. So I did. And we just... sat there like that for... I don't know... hours.”
“Ava,” she said, in a tone I knew not to trust. Something was coming. Something I probably didn't want to hear. “I'm not... entirely convinced this is a case of transference.”
“What?” I asked, my eyes shooting up to her face.
No.
That wasn't possible.
It had to be.
She held up a hand. “Transference is usually a pretty cut-and-dry thing for doctors to recognize. Because it is so one-sided. One person is bared to the other and one is completely closed off. With sexual surrogacy, that isn't exactly the case. You are both vulnerable. You are both exposed in a very literal, but also figurative, way. Maybe what you feel is genuine, Ava. Maybe you have feelings for Chase Hudson.”
I closed my eyes, exhaling hard.
I think a part of me knew.
I think that was why I had been clinging to the idea of transference so hard. As an excuse. As an explanation. So I didn't have to take responsibility.
“Ava...”
“I know,” I said, my voice quiet. “I think I've always known.”
“What are you thinking?”
I rolled my eyes. “That there is nothing as pathetic as unrequited love,” I said, smiling a little.
Of course I would fall in love with my therapist. It was completely inappropriate and needy and co-dependent.
How like me.
“Ava, maybe you should talk to Dr. Hudson about...”
“No,” I said, firmly. “No,” I added again. “That chapter is over. I'm not dragging him back into my mess. This is my problem. I need to learn to fix it myself. I can't keep leaning on him. It isn't right.”
“Did you ever stop to consider...”
“Consider what?”
“That maybe the feelings...”
“No,” I said, loudly enough for Dr. Bowler to start. “Sorry,” I said, shaking my head. I just... I couldn't let that false hope into my bruised little heart. It wouldn't help. It had been days. Chase could have called. He could have shown up. But he didn't. Because I was just a client. That was all. One of many. Nothing special.
“Okay,” she shrugged. “I know right now, this seems impossible and like I am just feeding you platitudes,” she said, smiling a little, “but this will fade. I know it doesn't seem like it. And that this is such a unique situation because Chase gave you things that no man has ever been able to before. That feels like a insurmountable thing to get through. But now that you know you are capable of having those kinds of connections with men, you can eventually have that again.”
No. Not really.
Nothing would ever be like that.
But something could come in second place.
Something could be almost the same.
And I would just have to learn to feel like tha
t was enough.
“Why don't we consider going back to twice weekly, or at the very least, weekly appointments for a while? Just until you are feeling better?”
“Sure,” I said, giving her a very small, very false smile. But it was the best I could muster. “That is probably a good idea.”
If nothing else, it would appease Jake and Shay.
Seven Days
I would like to say something upbeat about moving on. About how it aches and eases as everything heals. How it sounds quietly sad, yet hopeful... like hymns sung by a solemn choir. But it sounds more like worlds falling apart. It feels like walls being built stronger around your heart.
It is all grit and determination. It was the small voice that screams through the urge to curl up in bed all day and cry and tells you to get up, get dressed, eat, go to work, get shit done. To not let it swallow you up. To not let it become all there is to you.
So, after a few days, I listened to it. I went through the motions. I did what needed to get done. I had dinners with Jake or Shay or both of them.
Then I would get into bed, setting the alarm on my phone, and let it all out for twenty minutes. Twenty. Not a second more. Then I got up and wiped all the evidence of it away.
I tried.
And that was all that could be expected of me.
“Hmm,” I said, sitting at my computer, looking at my bank account online.
“What?” Shay asked, leaning over her leg to paint her toenails.
“My money is still here.”
“What money?”
“My three thousand dollars for... my therapy.”
Shay looked up, her brows drawn together. “That's weird. Call the office. See if they messed up or something.”
I nodded, taking a deep breath and picking up the phone, hoping I would catch the receptionist before she left for the day. Because if it was Chase...
“Dr. Hudson's office,” the voice said, sounding a little frazzled.
“Hi, this is Ava Davis. I have a question regarding a payment I made last week.”
The Sex Surrogate Page 22
