AN: So I've been getting projects done. Some floral wreaths and some painting projects. I did a super cute grey bunny reading a book that looks like my husband. I cannot explain how this rabbit looks like my husband but we all immediately agreed it did. Haven't been sewing much because I'm avoiding doing mending stuff for work. My house is a LITTLE more organized than it was previously as I keep tackling small ignored projects. Oh and our jerk DM clearly doesn't hate my boss or me because we have BOTH yelled at him for his crap and neither of us so much as got written up. The same cannot be said for others.

Chapter 4 – A week later

"We're going to do an exercise together." Kelly announced.

"Oh goodie." Jack muttered under his breath.

"Sir." Sam hissed.

Jack raised an eyebrow at her, almost daring her to have a romantic quarrel in front of strangers. Sam huffed and piped down. Coward, Jack thought but wasn't sure if that annoyance was directed at her or himself.

"I realize all of you are in different spaces in your relationships so your results will vary. Everyone, please sit on the floor facing your partner." Kelly told them.

Sam rolled her eyes but sat down on the floor. Jack did so gingerly, wary of his knees.

"Now that everyone is seated I want you to reach out and take your partner's hands and just hold them. You should be looking at each other but I understand if that's difficult right now." She said soothingly.

Jack's mouth canted into a lopsided frown but he looked at Sam who was pretending she wasn't avoiding his gaze by looking around the room to see what the other couples were doing.

The Klines, of course, were staring daggers at each other. The Britemans looked resigned while the Jamisons and Winslows stared at each other adoringly. Notably the Andersons looked at each other in seeming confusion. Sam looked at Jack out of the corner of her eye and saw his troubled expression. She returned it with one of curiosity then worry for him. His eyes narrowed in frustration then softened in resignation. Sam looked at him sadly. She didn't know what to do, or what to tell him to make this right again between them. She just wanted to get through this part and move on.

Jack sighed. She was never happy to just be in the moment. That was their real problem really in his estimation. Not that it really mattered now anyway.

"The eyes are the window to the soul." Kelly told them. "That's why liars avoid eye contact. They know you can see them for who they are if you really get a good look."

Judy notably gave her husband a mean smile.

"Love is a funny thing. Often when we are young, it's warm and bright and overwhelms us. As we age, as our relationships mature, it can seem like what we feel is no longer love because we don't have that heart pounding excitement around each other… but do you feel that way a little if you have been apart for a while? Or when the other does something unexpectedly thoughtful? Comfort is also love. Feeling safe with that person is love too." She told them.

A sharp sob came from the corner where Carol and Bill had sat and Carol stumbled to her feet and ran out of the room.

"Carol?" Bill asked in a small, frightened voice.

"It's all right, Bill. I'll go talk to her." Kelly reassured the average looking man and left the room to seek out the sobbing Carol.

Judy and Craig pointedly dropped each other's hands with disgust. The younger couples continued the exercise. Mike and Marie looked at each other with matching perplexed expressions about the events, but continued to hold hands as they turned to the others.

Jack and Sam gave each other sympathetic looks before Jack gently squeezed Sam's hands and let them go. "Well, that was interesting." Jack observed.

"I wonder why she got so upset?" Mike asked out loud.

"She's afraid of what he might see." Sam said quietly without meeting Jack's eyes. He looked at her sharply but she avoided his gaze after that.

"I say we stock that thing with wine." Judy muttered of the fridge.

"That's the only thing I've agreed with you about in thirty years." Craig said.

"Oh, shut up, you ass." Judy told her ex-husband.

A few moments later, Kelly came back with Carol. "Let's split off into gendered groups again. Gentlemen, my husband Brian is here tonight and will meet you in the other room. Ladies, we'll remain here and discuss the exercise." She said as she patted Carol's arm reassuringly.

"Right. Let's go." Jack said and herded the group of men out after wincing as he stood, sighing that His knees were no longer cut out for sitting on the floor. Even casually dressed, Jack had the air of authority that prompted the other men to follow without argument. Even Craig.

After they were gone, Kelly motioned the women to move to the small sitting area with couches and chairs together. "I feel I can have a more informal grouping with you then I can with the men. Not because of their personalities but because men are conditioned to treat this kind of thing as a punishment. Eventually I'll work with them to be comfortable talking. Yesterday with them was a 'getting to know each other' exercise and I suspect you did that on your own?"

Most of the women chuckled in agreement.

"Good." She said to them with a smile. "With that out of the way, let's talk about what's bothering us about our spouses. It can be major or minor. It can also be something about ourselves that we can't get past."

Everyone covertly looked at Carol who lowered her eyes in shame.

"Let's start with you, Sam." Kelly said unexpectedly.

"Er, what?"

"What bothers you about Jack?"

Sam looked wide eyed at the woman. "Um… well… nothing really." Sam hedged.

"Hm, if nothing is bothering you, why are you seeking an annulment from him?"

"Oh… oh that." Sam assumed Jack hadn't told the therapist why they were there so she launched into her reasons. "You see, we work together and, um, well we go on a lot of covert missions to very remote locations and, um, well, at one pla-place, a village elder in this small, um, country objected to an unattached woman making decisions for the village so Jack and I lied about being married to save time." She said as if this sounded completely reasonable. "Anyway, the elder wasn't exactly convinced so he held a wedding for us. Daniel, our… um… civilian liaison suggested we just roll with it because it wasn't like we signed any paperwork or intended to follow up on it." Sam huffed a sigh. "But someone misread the file and relisted us as married and filed the forms with the Air Force so here we are, trying to get it annulled so I can marry my fiancé."

The other women looked at her like she'd grown another head.

"Wait… let me see if I have this right. You accidentally got married to your coworker?" Judy asked.

"Well, I mean we did it to make the villagers happy not because we planned to get married." Sam hedged.

"How does your fiancé feel about this?" Lorie asked Sam.

"He's pretty miffed." Sam admitted.

"How does Jack feel about this?" Carol asked about the obvious elephant.

Sam looked down at her hands. "I wish I knew." She admitted softly.

"You haven't asked him?" Corkie asked her in shock.

"Well, I mean he's my coworker and my commanding officer. I can't just ask him something like that. It's against regulations."

"You can't ask the man you're married to if he wants to be married to you or how he feels about it?" Lorrie asked her softly. "That sounds kind of shitty." She concluded.

Sam sighed. She didn't, after all, disagree.

"Do you love him?" Marie asked her.

"Uh… er…"

"I'll take that as a yes." Carol said dryly.

"I… I love Pete, my fiancé." Sam interjected.

"But you love Jack, too." Judy said with finality.

"It's not like that… he's one of my best friends and we work together… we can't…" Sam trailed off but no one seemed terribly convinced by her protest. A best friend she couldn't really talk to anymore.

"All right, ladies, let's move on." Kelly said to them, realizing much more prodding tonight and she'd have two women in tears and they had given Sam food for thought. "Carol, are you feeling better?"

"Yah… um, yah. Sorry guys." She finished lamely.

"What happened?" Lorie asked out of concern.

"I don't know… I just… I'm not…" She trailed off and looked miserable.

"It's okay, Carol. We're here for you." Marie said to the other woman.

"Okay… well… it's just we've been married for so long and I'm not thin like I used to be or as pretty and I'm losing my sex drive and what if… what if he looks at me and he sees the tired out hag I've become?" She said miserably.

"So what if he does?" Judy said pointedly.

"Judy!" Marie admonished her.

"Oh, I don't mean it like that. Everyone gets old. I didn't stop loving my husband because he got old or fat. I stopped loving him because he's a jerk. Do you love him any less because his hair is going grey or he's got a bit of a belly?" Judy asked.

"Well, no." Carol hedged.

"Does he say he loves you?"

"Yah but…"

"No buts. Men aren't that complicated. If they say they love you, there's only two reasons. They want something, or they actually love you." Judy shrugged. "As long as you know which is which, there's not many other options with how men think." She said matter-of-factly.

"Oh." Carol said.

Kelly smiled. "Judy is right. Most men don't bother with being dishonest about their emotions."

"Well, I mean some do. Craig had me fooled for a few years, but I was young and dumb and in love so I dismissed all those red flags like love bombing me and telling me what and how I should think to make him happier. I've been in therapy for a couple years now. It took an outsider looking at how miserable I'd gotten and suggest the problem wasn't me. I wasn't a bad person for wanting a life outside the home or not telling him personal things about my friends if they asked me to keep it to myself or spending time with people who weren't him. Do you know he managed to run off all my old friends one by one? He tricked me into thinking they were bad people too."

"Have you found any of them and reconnected?" Carol asked.

Judy nodded. "One or two. Some of them forgave me, some of them won't give me the time of day… but no one who loves you tells you who you can be friends with unless they are genuinely bad for you." She smiled a little. "But I don't think Bill does that, does he?"

"No, he's never been that way about my friends or me spending time with them,"

"See, so there you go. I know the bar for men is really low, but it sounds like Bill is a good guy. Why do you think he doesn't want you?"

"It's just… he never wants to be intimate with me anymore. I've caught him watching porn but he's not doing it all the time, not enough to not want sex. I think he doesn't find me sexually attractive anymore."

"So what?" Judy said with a shrug. "If the only thing keeping you together is sex, you may as well be Craig and I." She said pointedly.

"But…"

"Is he fucking his secretary?" Judy asked bluntly.

Carol looked at her in shock. "No!"

"So he's watching porn. So what? Ask if you can watch with him. It might get you both in the mood."

Carol blushed furiously.

"I don't think she's quite ready for that step yet." Marie suggested.

"Even so. Talk to him about it. I bet you a bottle of Silver Oak, I'm right." Judy said.

"A what?"

"Wine." Sam supplied, "from Napa valley. It's fairly good for an upper mid-priced wine."

"Who have you been partying with?" Marie asked in amusement.

"Jack enjoys a glass of the good stuff now and again." Sam hedged.

"I bet." Judy said in amusement.

Kelly coughed gently. "All right, ladies, let's move on shall we?"