Till death do us part
chapter 32
(c) 2024 by ihatemilk
_The room was bright, with basic furniture; a green sofa, an oval coffee table of an ordinary shade of wood, a gray rug. Ordinary. Then again, most interiors seemed ordinary compared to their home.
The sofa was quite large; big enough to sit comfortably apart. Being in one room with him was draining enough, she couldn't stand physical proximity on top of that.
But when he decided to seat himself in the very middle, she glanced around for other options.
The only other piece of furniture meant for sitting was a green armchair, likely meant for the therapist. Well, too bad.
"Really?" He raised his brows.
She didn't dignify it with an answer; didn't look at him either. Though, it took focus, with the armchair facing the sofa directly. Well, she didn't have much to focus on at the moment, anyway. Apart from trying to silence the part of her that wanted to scream and kill.
The potted palm tree between the sofa and the window, that she could look at. Basked in the sun, the long, thin leaves seemed to glow green, as if artificially lit, making the plant look almost fake in its perfection. She looked away, annoyed. It was bad timing for the first session. With how irritable she was today, she had a feeling this was going to get quite unpretty very soon.
"Thank you for your patience – and my apologies…" spoke a stranger entering the room, a blonde woman in a white suit. "Force majeure – we only just now got a notice that Dr Lee's flight has been cancelled due to weather conditions and she won't be able to conduct today's session—"
"That's fine by me," she said, breathing in with relief.
"…and so, your today's session will be with me," the white-suited woman fake-smiled, revealing two rows of white teeth. "After today, you're free to continue either with me or Dr Lee, it will be up to you."
Oh, fucking hell.
The woman waltzed towards them, fake-smile frozen on the fake-tanned face; looked at Ares first, a sultry spark in her eyes, then at her, the spark gone, replaced with wariness and distance. "But I guess I won't be needed today as I see that the therapist's chair is already filled in." The fake smile widened, making her want to knock those fake teeth out.
"Hilarious," she said, raising her mouth corners in a fake smile of her own. Getting no reply, enjoying the sudden awkwardness that filled the room as she settled herself deeper into the armchair, she added, "Oh, I didn't realize there would be a shortage of chairs – I would've brought my own."
With a silent sneer, ignoring Ares' loud exhale and pulsing jaw muscles, she watched the woman squirm inwardly. What was it about her that was so annoying? Maybe it was the familiarity of the bleached hair, long and straight. Come to think of it, the fake smile did have a bit of a Callisto's psycho-vibe to it, too.
"Excuse me for a moment," the woman flashed more teeth at them, revealing how clenched they were.
She came back with a short guy carrying a blue armchair.
And the drag started.
"So, let us start from the beginning, shall we? And that is, I would like to hear what brings you—"
"We're having a child together and we'd like to discuss coparenting arrangements without killing each other," she cut in, mindful not to look at his face, knowing what she'd see there. She didn't have to look, the charge in the air was almost palpable.
"You don't seem to agree with your wife," the woman turned to Ares. "What is it that—"
"We're not married," she stated matter-of-factly.
"Your partner, then – sorry," the woman said, not even looking at her, eyes glued to Ares, "So, what is it that you yourself would like to achieve by coming here?" she asked him.
"To hear you say that cheating isn't a good enough reason to end a relationship," she couldn't help herself saying. And, she didn't look at him at first, but after an awkward silence on his part, she made a mistake and raised her eyes his way, catching a glimpse of the flutter of his lashes, his mouth twitching.
Maybe she should've bitten her tongue. He was making an effort here, after all.
She did appreciate it.
It was just that, recently when she looked at him, flashes of him and Julia flooded her mind and the urge to skin him alive took the better of her, sometimes. Most of the time. More and more often.
The silence was getting unbearably awkward, until the woman spoke, addressing her. "You reacted very strongly when I assumed you were married. Why do you think is that?"
This time, she did make an effort and bit her tongue. "You were wrong in your assumption, I only corrected you."
"And what are you feeling right now?"
"Trust me, you don't wanna know."
"I'm sure she's not exaggerating," Ares chimed in sarcastically.
"We are here because we want to know. Your partner wants to know. You yourself want to know, whether you realize it or not – you do want to know where you stand on your feelings."
"He knows where I stand on my feelings, he's just too pig-headed to accept it."
"I'd like to ask you to address your partner personally. Repeat what you said, to him this time."
She inhaled and shut her eyes briefly. Strangely, it was like the words got stuck in her mouth.
After a longer moment of silence, the woman turned to Ares. "Why do you think she's not exaggerating?"
He huffed softly. "She hates my guts right now."
"Why do you think so?"
""Cause I did something I shouldn't have."
"How does that make you feel?"
"I wish I hadn't done that."
"Why did you?"
"Trust me, I've been asking myself that ever since..."
"Did you reach any conclusions?" the woman asked, with a poorly disguised, satisfied expression etching on her face.
"I was drunk and kinda lost my temper."
She let out a snort. "Does happen to him a lot."
"What does?" the woman asked, never taking her eyes off him.
"Losing his temper."
"You're the one to talk," he lifted his eyebrows.
Well, he did have a point. With what the pregnancy was doing to her hormones, to say she was irritable might've been a bit of an understatement. "I'm pregnant, what's your excuse?"
Ignoring her, the blonde turned to Ares. "How would you describe your partner's reaction?"
He exhaled audibly. "She's angry…"
"Why do you think is that?"
"Like I said, because I—"
"I mean, where do you think this anger stems from?"
"From the fact that every time I look at you, I see you fucking her – is that helpful?" she offered.
"I didn't fuck her."
"Oh, I must have misunderstood, then."
"I went there, got shitfaced, and she went down on me, happy? And it wouldn't have fucking happened if I'd been sober and—"
"You were sober when you got there," she pointed out, to which no response came.
So, they hadn't fucked, so what, it didn't change the fact that – the very fact that he went to see Julia in the first place was a deal-breaker.
He groaned with exasperation, his fingers combing through his hair, the awkward, tense silence settling in. It didn't seem to affect their therapist at all, though – the blonde was staring at him, mesmerized, and she was either unaware of it or stopped trying to hide it altogether – the look in her eyes that said if he unzipped his pants right now, she would drop to her knees in a heartbeat.
"If you could say honestly, what pushed towards that step you took, openly, without fear of being judged or blamed, what would you say?" the blonde inquired. "People are unfaithful for different reasons, whether it's a dissatisfaction with their sexual life with their partner, or—"
"We don't have a problem here, we fuck all the time," she chimed in casually, shooting the blonde a challenging glare, enjoying how the fake-tanned cheeks turned rosy. Of course, Ares was having a blast, but she didn't pay him any attention; the words weren't for his benefit.
"She's subtle like that – it's what I love about her," he said throatily, in a way that would've put color in the blonde's cheeks if she hadn't been blushing already. He wasn't looking at the blonde, though; his gaze was fixed on her, and she scolded herself for how it sent a warm tingle all over her, how she couldn't break her gaze even when the blonde interrupted.
"Sometimes, we have hidden desires that we're scared to share with our partner—"
"I've never been more sexually satisfied in my life – she completes me on every level," he said huskily, his gaze intensifying. What a son of a bitch, was he really trying to seduce her now, in the therapist office? And how the hell was it possible for it to affect her?
"Why did you do it, then?" the words left her mouth before she could stop herself.
He looked down, inhaling. "At your brother's tomb… when you told me I had no right to be there, that I had his blood on my hands… I just lost it – I mean, with everything else going on, for fuck's sake, I'm—"
"How did those words make you feel?" the woman cut in.
"It's like, no matter how hard I try, I'm never enough," he said, a hint of quiet, sad resignation to his voice.
Her lashes fluttered, her vision going blurry.
The aircon went silent, and the room was suddenly so quiet she could hear the steps and voices in the hall even with the door closed. The high-frequency, chirpy one, belonging to the woman at the reception desk, and a new one, lower, soft but confident and steady, dominating the higher one even despite being quieter. She couldn't quite pinpoint it, but there was a weird familiarity to it, making her fight the irrational urge to get up and go see who the voice belonged to.
"It must be Dr Lee," the woman said, baring the white row of upper teeth.
"Oh, I thought her flight was cancelled," she noticed with irony, and watched the blonde try to cover up her uneasiness by lifting the perfectly drawn lines of eyebrows dismissively. "You really did want to have this session with us, didn't you?"
"Dr Lee was running late, so it was my—"
"Look, I get it that you'd like to fuck my husband, but the least you could do is be professional enough to at least try to be more subtle about it," she couldn't help herself, reveling in how the blonde's cheeks went full crimson. "It's a little hard to focus on therapy if it's written all over your face – just saying," she added with an innocent smile. "Now, if you'll excuse me for a second," she said, grabbing the armrests to lift herself up off the armchair. "I can do it myself," she muttered under her nose when he rushed to her side to help her up, and scolded herself inwardly for loving that he did that, how tight he wrapped his arms around her; and hated herself for how she let herself melt into the embrace, how much she enjoyed the grin he was trying to suppress.
"Everything alright?" the blonde's annoying voice broke the moment, which she both hated and welcomed.
"You okay?" he asked in a soft whisper, ignoring the blonde.
"Never better." She forced herself to push him away and made her way towards the door, and opened it.
And froze, her heartbeat wild when her eyes fell on the face of the person leaning over the reception desk.