A/N: This session is longer than the others, and a bit heavy. It will be broken into three parts. So bear with me and enjoy the ride! :)

Week Three

Adam opened his notepad to a clean page as he relaxed into his seat and focused on the two individuals he had grown fond of the past few weeks.

They entered his office just five minutes ago, appearing very much married. Not that they walked in arm-in-arm or were staring at each other with goggly eyes. But there was an air of amicability he picked up on. A striking contrast to the strangers they resembled when they began to argue and fought like boxers, trying to calculate the best moment to throw an uppercut so the other backed down in defeat.

Despite their history in this room, both seemed to be in good spirits as Peter and Alicia cheerily addressed him before settling on the sofa. He didn't pay their slight change of attitude much mind while he was concentrated on finishing a lengthy email. But now that the session was underway, their behavior struck him oddly.

His attention was immediately drawn to their positioning. It was something he had always observed, but today, he noticed it was somewhat … different. As he zoned in on Alicia's uncharacteristically relaxed demeanor and Peter's casual posture, he still couldn't place his finger on it, but something was definitely different.

Clearing his throat, he broke the contented silence filling the room. "You two seem more neutral than usual. Almost as if you are comfortable in the other's presence again."

Their eyes met briefly, seeming to consider the possibility themselves, then looked back at him.

Seated on the couch, in their customary positions, everything did seem normal. Felt normal. For a change. That terrifying distance wasn't between them anymore. Granted there was still a chunk of space separating them, Alicia was no longer burying herself into the seat as deep as she could go to escape being close to Peter, and he had begun to gradually lean against the dividing great wall they had built.

Although it was probably merely an inch moved on both their parts, it was progress.

"What do you mean?" asked Peter.

Adam crossed his leg and sifted through his thoughts as he studied their body language for a minute.

"The" — he formed an invisible giant sphere with his hands — "aura around you on the couch. It is not as stifling and confrontational as it has been since our first session. It is as if an understanding has passed between the two of you." He glanced down at his notes. "That Peter, your comforting Alicia during the tail end of our last session shifted the animosity a bit."

Alicia adjusted herself along the couch and glimpsed at Peter then stared down into her lap. She didn't want to discuss her emotional upheaval on last week again nor dig that deep as soon as the session had begun.

Peter nodded, somewhat agreeing with his observation. "Well, after we left here last week, I did stop by her apartment and we talked. Maybe that has something to do with it."

Adam's brows rose at this revelation as Alicia looked at Peter, wanting to reprimand him for sharing such details. It felt as if he had disclosed her greatest secret.

"And how was that visit?" asked Adam.

"Fine." He folded his arms and sank deeper into the cushion. "She informed me about my mother, well, being my mother."

She exhaled a breath of relief when he purposely left out the last part.

"What do you mean by that?"

Peter casually stroked his chin as he thought for a moment. "She and Alicia haven't always had the best of relationships. So when the opportunity arises, she'll take any chance to interject herself inappropriately."

Adam narrowed his eyes. "How?"

He sighed as he thought of the numerous occasions where his mother never failed to put a strain in their marriage.

"For instance, right now, she's trying to use the time when we are here to spend with our kids. It's not that she doesn't see them. She's free to spend time with them whenever she likes. But it's the little things like that which causes chaos between the three of us."

Adam nodded as he wrote down a note.

"Alicia, how would you describe your relationship with your mother-in-law?"

She carefully sought out her words. "Nonsensical."

Adam stifled a laugh, not expecting that answer.

"I just …" She shrugged. "I will never understand it. The lengths she will go to drive me crazy just to look good in Peter's eyes will never cease to amaze me."

Peter chuckled slightly. "That's not what she does."

She whipped her head around to face him. "Of course you would think that because she's not always attacking you."

"She's not attacking you, Alicia."

"Then what would you call it? Please enlighten me because I've been trying to figure it out since the day you introduced us."

Sighing, he rolled his head back and closed his eyes. "You and my mother have differences. That's as far as this conversation needs to go."

Adam observed Alicia mostly. He saw how she wanted to say more on the matter but chose to icily stare down her husband instead before averting her gaze back on him. Clearly this is a battle that she had always wanted to win, but knew she never could.

"Peter, do you take your mother's side when she and Alicia are disagreeing on a given matter?"

He looked at him as if he had grown a second head. "What? I've never taken my mother's side. If anything, I'm always caught in the middle between them, trying to make peace."

"No, I am not implying that you deliberately side with your mother. That, I don't know. I have never seen the three of you interact. But just now, you sounded as if you were defending your mother to Alicia. You two have been together long enough that if you defended your mother to Alicia on more than one occasion, that could certainly cause a serious riff amongst the three of you."

"It does," said Alicia. "It did a lot in the beginning of our marriage. She hated that Peter would always side with me on things she didn't agree with."

Peter sucked his teeth as he shook his head.

Adam watched him closely, looking for signals that would show he was on the verge of exploding and challenge him to enlist a method of therapy he wasn't so experienced.

"Like what, Alicia?"

She began to twirl her wedding band. "During our first year of marriage, I was also pregnant with Zach. She didn't respect the fact that I wanted to work up until the time I was due, and even after I gave birth, didn't approve that I chose to return to work. She thought I should be a stay-at-home mother and cater to my husband, like her."

"Which, you did end up doing," said Peter.

She wasn't sure if his comment was just a matter of fact or if it was a low blow in some way. Whichever way he meant it, she took it as an insult. Her face scrunched in disbelief as her head cocked to the side.

"Are trying to say something, Peter? Because I don't recall you complaining about how I took care of our house and our children while you ran around doing whatever it was that pleased you."

"I'm not complaining, Alicia. And I didn't look down upon how you took care of home while I worked."

She stared hard at his profile, her voice leveled and steely when she spoke. "But your mother did."

Unfolding his hands, he closed his eyes and massaged his eyelids as he ignored the anger stirring inside of him. He wasn't going to lose his temper today.

"Let's explore the deep issues you have with my mother for another time, alright?"

"Why? So you can avoid it then, too?"

She knew she should have let it go, and where the pent up frustrations came from, she didn't know. But his flippant stance on the matter irked her. Just as it first did many years ago, and every moment in between.

Adam rolled the platinum ballpoint pen between his fingers as he continued to monitor their interaction.

It was interesting to see them confront the other this way; a stark polarity of Peter usually being the aggressor and Alicia carefully hitting him back when she felt necessary. But now, on an issue that clearly bothered her greatly and has for years, she didn't hesitate to dig into him like he had often did her, seemingly intent on striking him where she knew he couldn't win. Where she knew eventually, he would take her side. No matter what his mother did or said.

"Alicia, let's retract for a moment. You said that Peter's mother looked down upon your decision to not be a stay-at-home mother, which you eventually did end up becoming. Did your relationship ever blossom from that?"

She leaned up from her slouched position and eyed Peter for a fleeting second.

"No. It only got worse because she always tried to come over and dictate our marriage and how we ran our household."

His eyes were fixed on Peter who seemed like he was traveling down that familiar route of rage, getting ready to explode any second. His continuous, exaggerated sighs and squinted eyes centering on Alicia whenever her responses didn't praise his mother, led him to wonder just how long he had allowed the boundaries between the first woman whom had ever shown him love and the woman he was using his love to fight for, to be crossed.

"I see. But now that you are working again, I take it that you two have gotten worse, or have you found a happy medium?"

She tucked her hair behind her ears and re-crossed her legs. "It's a mutual acceptance."

Adam's brows furrowed as he tried to make sense of her answer. "I-I do not understand. Can you explain?"

"She means that they tolerate each other. And when needed, I will remind my mother that she is my wife, and the decisions we make, is between us. That's it."

His strong voice boasted throughout the room as he stared at her, giving a clear warning that they were truly done with this talk about his mother.

But she wasn't backing down. "He asked me, Peter."

If he wanted to go there, she was ready.

"Well, that's what you were going to say, right? Because basically, that's the relationship."

Her brows rose in mock surprise. "Is it? Because I think it's more than just us tolerating each other when not around you." She looked back to Adam. "To answer your question, Jackie and I have a relationship where, we basically agree to disagree. But it's when she questions my ability and overrules me as a mother that I can't tolerate her, and Peter doesn't understand that."

Peter laughed in disbelief. "When did she question your ability as a mother?"

His sarcasm struck a raw chord inside of her. He always brushed off her concerns when it came to the elder Florrick, unless the subject matter was dire or concerned the kids. To say it was annoying and drove her batty would be an understatement.

"When she took the kids to visit you in prison, to name one! I specifically told her not to. And what did she do? Took them anyway because she wanted to make your birthday special." She rolled her eyes. "It's always been about you. It's always about what makes you happy."

Adam patiently waited for either to venture further on the topic, but seeing how Alicia stared her husband down for a second time and he looked away, he realized he probably needed to prod where he shouldn't to get to the bottom of this.

"Alicia, does your mother-in-law still question your abilities as a working mother? Or, as a mother in general?"

She shook her head. "No. But I know she still doesn't necessarily approve."

He nodded. "Can you tell me a time when she did question your ability?"

As her mind recollected his request, her eyes dropped to her lap as she took a deep seated breath, the memory sending her body into a state of poignant paralysis. "It was a few years ago." Her mouth grew dry as involuntary tears flooded her eyes. She ensured to keep her gaze down. "It was … it was when I …"

Adam sat up straighter in his chair as he watched her closely, his mouth practically salivating. What she was about to say, he knew without a shadow of a doubt that this was the issue he had been wanting so badly to know on last week so that he could help this couple overcome the great wall they had built in their marriage.

Peter watched her with a held breath, anticipating the moment when he would have to reach out and pull her into his arms.

"When you what, Alicia?" Adam asked softly.

Lifting her head, she blinked rapidly as she licked her lips and swallowed the lump in her throat.

"When I miscarried our second baby," she whispered so low Adam thought he was going to have to ask her to repeat it.

Neither men said a word as they watched her emotionally unravel, struggling to inhale deep breaths and not dissolve into tears. When she held her head high and focused on Adam again, did he continue.

"And how did she question your role as a mother from that event? Was it a physical question about your ability to bear children?"

She shook her head, trying to suppress the tornado of hurt rising inside as she swiped a tear that trickled down her cheek.

"Then what?"

Her lower lip quivered as the flashback played through her mind of that time when she was eight weeks pregnant and curled into a ball on their limestone bathroom floor, bargaining everything near and dear in exchange for her baby's life.

"No. No. No. No!"

The cramps came suddenly, keeling her over in the computer chair she sat. She rose from the chair, a careful arm wrapped around her stomach. No more than two steps and a pain shot across her belly, paralyzing her mid-step.

"Oh God ..."

The pressure in her lower back and pelvis brought her to her knees as she grasped the back of the cushioned seat for support, trying to breathe through the excruciating cramps. She thought of calling Peter and her doctor, but the cordless phone was on the opposite side of the room, too far from reach.

She was in their home office, momentarily crippled. In minutes, she would be a mess. Zach and Grace were due home within the hour from school. They couldn't see her like this.

At a break in pain, she began to crawl down the hallway towards their bedroom, her destination the bathroom. The first time was worse. A lot worse. Which is why she thought, although the pain was strong, it was not in the same ballpark as the first.

Her child might be worth saving.

She reached the bathroom as a thundered wave hit her harder than the last, sinking her glimmered hope faster than the current destruction in her uterus.

Shaky hands touch the heated limestone flooring as a familiar warmth gushed between her legs — her worst fear confirmed.

She curled into a ball beside the toilet, clenched her stomach, and covered her face as she screamed aloud for someone, anyone to spare her baby. To not take another so soon.

Another gush seeped from her body, heavier than the first. The fear of looking between her legs, to visually see the evidence of her child's life ending before it began in the seat of her pants, numbed her.

She pleaded aloud again as sobs wracked her limbs and strangled her breath.

Why me? Why again?

"Alicia?"

She snapped to attention at her therapist, who was now sitting forward in his chair, his arms resting on his knees, seeming as if the first second that she lost her strong will and broke down, would he fly to the couch and comfort her.

"What are you thinking?"

Her red-laced eyes glanced to Peter. It was seeing the pained expression in his own eyes that led her to turn her head away and bury her face into her hands.

"When I miscarried," she sobbed.

Moving across the space on the couch, Peter began to pull her into his arms, but she swung out her hands, pushing him away.

"No, Peter. Don't!"

Adam observed how she coiled back into her usual buried position on the couch and covered her eyes as she tried to gain control of her grief. Her suffering right now, made him feel as if it was something that had just happened, the intensity of her agony making him doubly consider probing this issue further.

"Alicia, can we … talk about when you had your miscarriages? Perhaps it will … help you heal. Help you both heal."

Lowering her hand from her face, she accepted the tissue Adam offered as she quickly wiped her eyes and looked to her husband. She saw the own sadness in his eyes, the brokenness the same as it had been on the day when they realized she lost their first baby.

It was at his sadness did an unspeakable feeling of commiseration course through her just as it did then.

Opening her mouth to speak, no words came out as the tears only flowed harder. It had been nearly three years now and even she didn't understand why it still hurt so much. Perhaps it was due to the fact that she did not allow herself to properly grieve after the last one and months after did their lives turn upside down from Peter's allegations, allowing her no time to mourn.

All she could do was survive and compartmentalize those feelings, which she carried in a reserved space of her soul, hoping one day to unleash them and find a pith of restoration.

Peter watched her visibly tremble from despair, wanting badly to take her pain away, badly wishing he could somehow bring back the two miracles they were robbed. He felt powerless as he was only able to be here for her now, hoping that she didn't push him away as she did those years ago.

"Do you need me to step out? Would you like to talk with Dr. Lewis about this alone?" he softly asked.

Dropping her head, she shook it fervently. "No. You've been wanting to hear this since 2008."

Her eyes slowly closed for a second as she remembered those two misfortunes vividly. Unlike other occasions when she shut down the thought as soon as it entered her mind, she instead put on a brave face and permitted herself to relive those desolating moments.

Steeling her back against the couch, she stared straight into Adam's eyes as she imagined herself in court as a strong and courageous woman on the witness stand, instead of being a vulnerable and broken wife on this couch. She would not break down or waver. She would finally unchain her vow of silence and tell the details of when a part of her died, and never recovered.

For perhaps from this small testimony, they could both find some solace and open the door they had been struggling to reach, that contained the solution in helping them restore their shattered marriage.