A gentle kiss to the forehead woke me up the next morning and I was both excited and mortified to wake up and see Zack lying in my bed. He was all smiles, obviously remembering the good time we had last night.
"Shit…" I swore under my breath. "What Rach," He finally registered that I wasn't as happy as he was.
"This just complicates everything and oh my God you had to see me naked and I am SO not ready for a relationship and just…oh my God what time is it?"
He smirked at my rambling and kissed me reassuringly before telling me it was okay, and that he was just glad to have had that experience with me. Zack was always more of a free spirit, so at least I could put this relationship shit on the back burner. Then, finally, Zack told me the time. It was 11am, and I was supposed to be meeting with Alex in thirty minutes. I let out a strong line of swears, and jumped up to get ready. Zack helped by ordering me coffee and staying out of my way. Finally, about 10 minutes late already, I was ready to leave. I had on a black pant suit with a purple blouse, and my still wet hair was hanging loose around me. I slipped on a pair of heels, grabbed my bag, a coffee and a kiss from Zack, and hurried to my rental car. Soon I was arriving at the office that was letting me rent out a room for mine and Alex's sessions. He was already there, laying across the couch.
"Sorry, I know I'm late," I started, before he put up a hand to stop me.
"I can't complain about my therapist being late because she was getting laid, that sounds like something that I would do. Though a 'hey, I'm fucking Zack' text would have been nice."
"How do you know…?"
"Oh, please, Prince. You forget just how well I know you."
He sat up then, and I gasped at how bad he looked. His eyes where bloodshot and he had horrible bags under then. His clothes hung off of him like he had lost weight. I instantly felt bad for sleeping with Zack. Damn, I hated this man.
"Let's just get started shall we," I asked softly, gesturing for him to sit back down.
He defiantly crossed his arms and scowled, and I knew then I was in for an ear full.
"We will start after you tell me who the fuck you think you are. Seriously Rachel, you shouldn't be fucking with Zack like this, we both know you and him will never work out. You have other people on your mind."
I could feel the anger boiling up inside of me, and tried to just let him talk out his emotions. It was my job to let him talk.
"…I mean come on, you're really gonna sleep with a guy you haven't seen in five years because he is nice to you? How desperate can you get?"
He just kept going, spitting the words out like they were poisonous. I sunk into my chair and he followed my lead and sat on the couch. This was already tiring and way too hard.
"Okay, I think I'm done." He smirked.
Knowing he was at the end of his rant, I wiped a few tears from my eyes and launched into the session without skipping a beat. This fact seemed to shock Alex, but he did finally start to talk to me. We talked about Lisa, and this Tay girl, and how things went down. We talked about his brother who he had lost way to soon. We talked about tour and how it affected him, and I felt like I finally was getting somewhere. Alex had a hard life, despite how other people saw him. He struggled with anxiety to an extreme, and the depression of life events was taking its toll on his already overstretched mind. He mentioned Lisa's engagement, and I admitted that I had seen her recently. That's when the conversation took a turn I never wanted it to take, we had to talk about that day.