I mean sometimes trauma just brings people closer. Why is that not real?
"It's okay, take the time you need."
Kim plays with the hair tie that's just barely loose enough where she can feel it's presence but not tight enough to make the accessory a nuisance.
For months she had been carrying around this hair tie, a reminder of who she's to go home to, who she goes home for and who she does what she does for.
"Without my job, I wouldn't have met my family." Kim starts, staring at her opposite hand's fingers twist at the band. "I wouldn't have met my team; I wouldn't have met Adam and I wouldn't have met Makayla. This job has given me my family but this job…"
She stops talking and she can feel the silence, feels the words in her throat but she's unable to speak to them. The woman across from Kim doesn't move a muscle, doesn't breathe any different, doesn't go to make a sound.
Patience.
"This job has given me my family, but this job has taken a part of my family." Kim's voice is soft, but her glance is desperate to find Ruth's eyes. "I can't bring back the family I've lost, I can't bring back the victims we've lost, and I can't control if tomorrow I don't come home from a case."
This is growth.
"That terrorizes me and recently it paralyzes me."
"The idea of not coming home?"
"The idea of completely losing my family, understanding that I have no control over my job's outcome paralyzes me at times…. but I crave it." Kim pushes her palms against her knees, forcing her to sit up a little straighter. "I used to seek that high, so much that I would over involve myself in cases to feel it."
"And now?"
"Don't get me wrong, I love the feeling still but now I find that in strategizing, negotiating, the putting together of the pieces…the high of the catch is a feeling I can't get enough of."
"Last session we talked about you thinking on this for today, to dig where the shift in that may have come from. Were you able to reflect on that?"
"Yes." Kim was quick to reply, startling her own self a bit. This sessions prep had been taxing but she was geared up mentally, well as much as she could be.
Kim had sat on the task from Ruth for two nights, weighing over her thoughts and options. The usual Wednesday musical performance from Makayla was only background noise, as her thoughts were the only sound roaring that not even with Makayla's high notes to her latest Disney obsession could ease the thinking.
A pattern that seemed to continue throughout the remainder of the week at work, so much so that Kim hadn't even realized that she had subconsciously volunteered to stay back to work the case from the computer until she noticed the trash bin full of empty coffee cups brought back with Adam for her.
"I don't feel like I had to prove myself anymore. I feel like I've justified that I deserve my position in intelligence. I've been shot, I've been beaten, I've been broken, damaged, fractured, mangled, shattered and yet I still find the value in what I do. But I cannot do this job at the expense of my body and life. I can be this great cop without trying to prove that I am indestructible, because I am not... I was not."
Kim lightly pulls at the tie to her wrist, barely feeling the snap.
"I lost a part of my family along the way, but I have chance to build this family. What this family looks like down the road is undetermined, but it looks a hell of a lot more promising than it was a year or so ago."
The band of her wrist feels a little tighter suddenly.
"The thought of him...of us losing that potential terrified me."
"Adam?"
"Yes."
"The incident to which constrained your relationship?"
"I wasn't there to support him when he shot the man who was involved in his father's case. I asked him what he did because I feared I was losing him, physically and mentally. Adam was the strength, all this time he was the foundation. But once he needed me, I couldn't do the same for him, I questioned him."
The band was tighter, but it oddly was comforting to have that feeling, Kim continued.
"I questioned him because everything was catching up to him mentally, but I was already there, and he was following in. He had been our foundation for so long that the potential of losing our infrastructure terrified me. It wasn't because I didn't believe him or thought Adam had made a poor decision. It was because I was terrified of losing this... losing him. Selfishly I didn't want Adam to be in a deep place because he's the anchor... he's, my partner. "
"Do you believe Adam knows this?"
"No." Kim stares directly at Ruth, "Yes, maybe I don't know. I can't be sure."
"I think that I put Adam at an arms distance when we lost the baby. Well, no I put Adam at a distance but kept him within a certain distance. He was so strong when everything happened and he had every excuse not to be if he chose to, we both went through it, and it was our baby we lost not just mine. But he never showed it. I've been self-absorbed in my own dealing of the loss that I didn't take Adam's own grieving into consideration, recent history included. I wasn't there for him as he was for me, that's not a good partner."
"And that's why you say no? Because you believe you were too tied into your own healing that you didn't recognize that he wasn't doing that for himself?"
"Yes. I feel like I've let him down time and time again, destroying our brickwork. It's me, I'm the one sabotaging this. I help assemble the bricks to only knock them down, and it's just going to be a matter of time before they crumble to where they're dissolved. That will be on me."
The tie now feels as though it's cutting off her circulation, Kim looks down to yank the band off and into her palm until she realizes that's impossible.
It's not the band, it's a hand tightfisted around her wrist that's holding her hand to her thigh.
Peering over for the first time since starting the session, Kim's eyes reach Adam's.
"Please..." Kim begs softly, "Please I won't let this crumble anymore."
"Darlin'." Adam barely speaks louder than a whisper, impossibly gripping her wrist tighter, moving his fingers to enclose them together in a tighter fist together. "I haven't gone anywhere after all this time; I think I've made it pretty clear that I'm not going to either."
The grip was oddly comforting as it was hard now to tell the difference between Makayla's tie and his hand, even with it being as tight as it was. The grip was strong, reminding her that this was real. That this talk was real.
Kim clasps both of their hands together with the opposite hand. "I know there's a lot we haven't shared with each other these past few years, and that's on both of us... but I'm here and I'm trying to tell you that it won't happen again..."
Kim looks up at Ruth wide-eyed and remembers the weeks that led to this conversation and corrected herself "Well I mean it'll happen again, but I will disclose it to you rather than make you guess what I'm thinking or what I mean."
"You mean no more having to guess why Trudy's giving me stink eyes when I walk in for shift?"
Kim chuckles a bit, her head falling a bit to hide her smile. "No promises, Trudy's got an agenda of her own most of the time. You know this."
"I'll work on it too," Adam promises.
"Yeah?"
"Of course, why wouldn't I? I've got a few faults I could work on too, ya know."
"Like your inability of interior decorating?" Kim's mouth fits into a bit of a smirk, gesturing the lightheartedness of the comment.
Adam chuckles a bit himself, his shoulders relaxing just a bit for the first time since entering the room with Kim.
"This is your space." Ruth states, gesturing to the two. "This was a great start, if you're willing to come back again next week, I think you'll both be eager to see how this evolves. But I'll give you time to discuss that amongst yourselves this week, how does that sound."
Both nod and smiled lightly at Ruth.
The file out shortly after Kim confirms her appointment time for next week and walks silently down the stairs to the bottom floor of the old medical complex. Adam holds the door open for her as they walk into the Chicago summer heat, Kim turns around once she knows Adam's out on the sidewalk.
"You know..." Adam speaks, "There's a really great bar right down the street..."
Kim laughs, "You mean Molly's?"
"Fantastic place, everyone raves it." Sarcasm dripping from his tongue, but he genuinely smiles through it.
Kim shifts on her feet, pulling at her shirt a bit at the end. "I would but Makayla's going to be getting out of school in about an hour and a half, I promised I would get her today instead of Carla."
The nanny Kim hired was one of the only other people Makayla trusted to grab her from school, well besides Adam or Kim and occasionally Hailey.
"How about this then," Adam steps forward a bit flashing his car keys "We'll go have a drink and then go grab Makayla together. We could go see a movie or something, she wouldn't stop talking about that new Disney one that came out last week."
"You sure?"
"Am I sure about seeing the Disney movie? Nah. But I'm sure I want some popcorn; place off Mallards has the best popcorn."
Kim watches Adam inch a few steps forward in the direction of Molly's, completely waiting for her to walk with him. He nudges his head a bit in the direction and Kim falls in step with him.
"Thank you." She looks up at him as they walk together.
"Thank you." Adam returns, and for once she felt as though they were in tune with one another.
"I meant it, you know that right?"
"We've both always meant everything we've said to one another in one shape or form but maybe this is what we need to get to where we want to be."
Kim couldn't look at anywhere besides the sidewalk ahead of her, afraid she would trip from her racing mind if she did.
"Does that mean you would like to come back with me next week?"
They stop in front of Molly's, waiting for Adam's reply.
"Kim, that's the most I've heard from you in years after everything we've been through. I love you; you know that. I think that this has the potential to a good thing for us, both together and individually."
"I agree." Kim nods
"Then Wednesdays it is." Adam bluntly announced, opening the door to Molly's. Kim clutches onto his elbow giving him a direct smile as she slows before passes and squeezes his elbow.
"Wednesdays."