"Oh, yeah?" Dr. Baker asked.
"Yes!" she said excitedly.
While he was intrigued by her innate ability to work through her deep-seated personal issues with no outside interference, Dr. Baker desperately wanted to steer this impromptu session with Brock and his ex-wife back on track. He would pencil her in for a solo session if working on her problems was what she truly wanted. However, he suspected she was blissfully unaware of the diversion tactic she'd been using for the past twenty minutes to avoid getting to the heart of why she had abruptly shown up here in the first place.
"Now, about your current relationship with Brock," he urged.
She set her hands down on the back of the couch cushions. "Oh, wait a minute. I'm not through talkin' about my Daddy yet!" she said.
He exhaled and let his hand fall onto the arm of the chair.
Brock shook his head in equal irritation. "You see why we got divorced? She never wanted to talk about our relationship," he said.
Reba scoffed. "That was you, you mo-ron."
"Well, I want to talk about it now," he said.
"We don't have a relationship now!" she exclaimed as she rounded the sofa to face them both head-on.
Dr. Baker sighed. "And yet, here you are." He leaned forward, "Why are you here?"
She narrowed her eyes. "Well, if I yelled at you over the phone, you could hang up."
"So, you're here because of our relationship?" he sat back and pointed between her and himself.
"Well, You gotta admit it needs work," she agreed.
He smirked, twisting the eraser of his pencil against his temple. In the twenty minutes he had come to know her, he had already come to admire her witty sense of humour and backhanded retorts.
"Y'know," she put her hands on her hips, her tone suddenly becoming serious. "If you spent less time jokin' around and more time on gettin' people back together, I wouldn't have to come home and find my husband fixin' my sink!" she jabbed an accusatory finger pointing in Brock's direction.
Dr. Baker pointed his pencil at Brock, "You mean your ex-husband."
She looked down, only now realizing her slip. "Okay. Ha, ha, ha, point for you." Her voice had gone thin as she tried to deflect. "You're the therapist; you know what I meant!"
"Still, for someone who's moved "so far" past on. That's a strange slip." Dr. Baker said, throwing her previous statement back at her. Her anger had returned, and he now realized that it was in the heat of the moment she disclosed the real root of her problems.
Uncomfortable, she shifted her weight to one foot. "Not so strange when he's practically livin' at my house."
Brock scoffed, "Yeah, to be with the kids."
Dr. Baker had no intention of stopping them this time. Letting her get this off her chest was the only way they were going to make any headway here.
She turned her icy glare on her ex-husband. "They're not the only ones livin' there!" she spat.
"Well, I didn't know it was such a big deal," he said.
Her jaw dropped, and she grasped at the air between them. "How could you not know?" she choked out. She was desperate to put something between him and the growing sense of hysteria rising in her chest, so she retreated behind the sofa again. "Do you think I like settin' an extra place at the dinner table or droppin' everything because you need a fourth for Pictionary?" she cried. "Or when I have to sit there and watch your victory dance because your team won because I got stuck with Jake!"
Brock shrunk back into the sofa cushions and brought his hands up. "Gee, sorry. I thought we were gettin' along pretty well."
"We were," she said.
"Then what's the problem?"
"That's the problem!" she cried.
In the silence that followed, she realized what she'd just revealed, and her jaw locked. Dr. Baker was about to shrink the ever-living hell out of her unintentional admission of feelings.
After a moment, Dr. Baker gently urged her to continue. "Go on," he said softly.
Reba released her aching jaw. She glanced at Dr. Baker, who nodded his encouragement before she turned back to Brock. "I don't want to get along that well, not after you told me you made a mistake after you left me."
"You told me that door was closed," Brock said cautiously.
She lost her composure once again. "Well, there shouldn't even be a door! There should be a brick wall with a big ol' fence around it. Whatever it takes to keep you out of my livin' room, so I don't have to think about how it was when we were together, and it was so good."
"Oh," Brock finally breathed his understanding.
Though she tried to keep her voice steady, it shook, and she knew Brock would pick up on that before the next words left her lips, but she didn't care. If her one moment of weakness got them to the bottom of this, she could get over it in time. "But, there is a door," she continued, "And it'll never be truly closed until you and Barbara Jean get back together."
Dr. Baker stood up from his chair and moved to her side. "Reba, I hate to tell you this, but open or closed, if there's a door, it's going to be there whether Barbara Jean is in the picture or not."
She turned to face him and then looked back at Brock. "You know what, I just want to get out of here," she said, knowing it wouldn't be long until her quivering voice turned into a quivering lip and tear-filled eyes. She crossed the room in several quick strides and picked up her purse.
"One last question," Dr. Baker said, stopping her in her tracks. "Do you two still love each other?"
Reba's jaw dropped. She didn't dare chance a glance at Brock. Instead, she kept her eyes trained on Dr. Baker. She expected to need to hold her head high against his intense scrutiny of her, but what she found in his eyes were compassion and understanding. The air of discernment wafting from him earlier had softened now that more and more details had come to light. She'd bared her soul to a perfect stranger and the ex-husband who had been carelessly raking her heart through the coals. Dr. Baker's eyes held validation for how she was feeling, and she didn't know it now, but she was relieved.
In the silence, they heard the front office door open. Reba glanced over her shoulder to see Barbra Jean walking toward them. She turned away, her heart pounding, and pressed her lips together, attempting to compose herself. She knew if she couldn't, Barbra Jean would pick up on it, and all hell would break loose right here, right now, in Dr. Baker's office.
"Knock knock, Doc. Sorry, I'm so late." Barbra Jean giggled, then reached out to touch Reba's shoulder, "Oh, Reba, good you're still here! Let's gang up on Brock!"
Reba looked at Dr. Baker and pointed over her shoulder at Barbra Jean, "That's the other voice." She turned on her heel to leave the room.
"Reba," Dr. Baker quickly followed.
At this point, he realized how wrong he had been about the woman his patients had unintentionally vilified during their sessions. The last few minutes had him viewing her in an entirely new light. Understandably, she had come guns blazing to set the record straight about her involvement in Brock and Barbra Jean's separation. Still, she was anything but the vengeful ex-wife he'd been led to believe. Empathy and kindness radiated from her like a beacon. She had been putting aside her feelings for the betterment of everyone else without a second thought, for God only knew how long. That took an incredible amount of strength, a strength that he could tell she was rapidly running out of.
"Reba!" his hand absently reached for the door handle behind him.
When she finally turned, the weariness on her face took him completely off guard. The last half an hour had taken nearly everything from her, and she no longer had the strength to hide how emotionally drained she was. He knew all she wanted was to get as far away from here and him, and Brock and Barbra Jean as she could, as fast as she could, and he couldn't blame her.
"Uh, if you want, you uh, you can call me; anytime," he offered gently.
She shook her head and dismissed the idea with a slight wave of her hand. "No, I'm finished here. Just get those two back together," she said firmly before she crossed the length of the waiting room and grabbed the frosted door. "Oh, and if I owe you anything for this, just bill them."
He watched as she gently shut the door and walked quickly down the corridor without a second glance. He ran his hand over his face and sighed. "Is she going to be okay?" he asked quietly when Brock materialized at his side.
"Probably not," Brock answered truthfully.
"She's not going to call, is she?"
"No," Brock shook his head but extended his hand and passed Dr. Baker one of his own business cards, which he'd grabbed from the table in the office.
Dr. Baker flipped it over and ran his thumb over the blue ink Brock had used to write down Reba's number. He felt terrible as nothing about this session had been typical. In hindsight, he had realized far too late that the strength she possessed was something she'd been using as a coping mechanism.
"You do, don't you," Dr. Baker said after a few moments of deafening silence.
He didn't pose it as a question, but Brock knew what he was asking. He held Dr. Baker's gaze for a moment too long before looking over his shoulder at Barbra Jean, who now sat on the sofa with receipts from her purse scattered everywhere.
"Aha!" she exclaimed to herself as she held up a pre-wrapped mint.
Dr. Baker followed his line of sight and nodded before placing a hand on Brock's shoulder to usher him back into the office for the remainder of their session.