Chapter 7

Dr. Aaron Laing watches his wife cross the deck to the table where he sits overlooking what feels like the entire Pacific Ocean on this cloudless spring morning. Holly strides toward him in leggings and a simple gray top, with that combination of purpose and grace that Aaron has always found so appealing. After ten years of marriage, he feels more attracted to his wife than ever. Her angular, almost androgynous features have aged well, and she’s even more striking now than she was as his resident, over a decade earlier. But he understands that part of his response is due to her absence from his life. And he’s more determined than ever to win her back.

He stands up to greet her, and they repeat their awkward dance of separation, where he leans in to kiss her, and she quickly pulls out of the hug. His lips brush over her ear instead of her cheek.

“I’ve missed this, Holl,” Aaron says once they’re both seated.

She tilts her head. “You missed brunch?”

“Well, that goes without saying.” They had their second date here, also brunch, eleven years before. Nestled two stories above Laguna Beach’s rolling shoreline, the restaurant has been popular forever with tourists and locals for its basic but consistently good food, bustling ambience, and spectacular view. “What I meant is dining with you.”

“Oh, yeah, me too,” she says distractedly. “Look, Aaron, what I really need right now is your advice.”

“Anytime. You know that.”

It comes as no surprise to him that’s why she asked him to meet. Their relationship began as a teacher-student dynamic, which, after a decade of marriage, is still at the core of their connection. Holly has always been most drawn to him when she’s vulnerable. And he has always accepted that and, when necessary, capitalized on it.

Aaron beckons a server with a wave, but when the young man with the sleeves of tattoos arrives to take Holly’s order, she declines, explaining that she doesn’t have time to stay for a meal.

Aaron swallows his disappointment. He can tell from the way his wife keeps looking at the table how troubled she is. “What’s wrong, Holl?”

“This client of mine.” She clears her throat. “She didn’t respond well to our last session.”

Aaron raises an eyebrow. “Under ketamine?”

She hesitates. “Yes.”

Aaron has to bite his tongue. While he isn’t as vehemently opposed to the use of psychedelics in therapy as some of his colleagues, he has never remotely considered them to be the panacea—the Holy Grail of psychotherapeutics—that Holly and her grandfather do. And he certainly doesn’t trust them to be free of risk. “What happened in the session?”

“My client had a serious dysphoric reaction. I had to sedate her with midazolam. She clung to me afterwards. Trembling like a leaf. She wouldn’t let go. Now her memories are all jumbled.” Holly swallows. “She’s misinterpreting that embrace, Aaron.”

“Misinterpreting? As in, she thinks it was inappropriate?”

“Yes.”

They had argued before over Holly’s clinical use of these potent drugs with patients, which Aaron has always viewed as too aggressive, verging on cavalier. Holly has never been willing to accept the obvious—that she is playing with fire. He has to restrain himself from saying, I told you so. What she needs most now is his unconditional support. And besides, he might not get another opportunity like this anytime soon. “Does your client have a history of being sexually abused?”

Holly nods. “In her childhood, yes. She exhibits classic PTSD symptoms. But her specific memories of that abuse only surfaced during our work together.”

“Which would make her particularly susceptible.” His gaze drifts off toward the ocean. “Was her abuser female?”

“No. But my client identifies as gay. And she has consistently struggled with physical intimacy issues in her relationships.”

“Makes sense.” Aaron looks back to his wife. He can’t help noticing how her fragility softens the sharpest of her features, the angle of her jawline and the ridges above her copper-brown eyes. “Obviously, you explained to your client what really did happen?”

“I tried.”

“But she wasn’t convinced?”

“No.”

“And you’re worried she’s going to do something… rash?”

“That’s one of my concerns.”

“What else?”

“We’ve been making real progress over the past three months,” Holly says. “Elaine was… emerging from that shell of childhood wounds. But she has other issues, too. Namely, addiction.”

“To?”

“Opioids.”

“And you’re worried she might relapse?”

Holly exhales. “She walked out of our session. I’m not convinced she’s coming back.”

“That’s her decision, Holl. Sounds to me like you reached her in a way no one else has.”

“But what good did it do her?”

“I bet her response—her misremembering of what happened with you two—is at least in part attributable to transference,” Aaron says, using the psychological term to describe when a client misinterprets a therapeutic connection and empathy for a romantic attachment to their therapist.

She squints. “Are you wondering if I have feelings of countertransference for Elaine?”

“Do you?”

“No,” she says without a trace of defensiveness.

“Then, no. I’m not. You’re experienced enough to recognize if you did.”

“What would you do if this happened with one of your clients?”

Aaron is tempted to tell her that it wouldn’t have happened with his patients. That he would never have toyed with psychedelics in the first place. But instead, he says, “I suspect that with a little time and reflection, she’ll want to come back to your care. But in the meantime, there’s only one thing you can do.”

“Which is?”

“Protect yourself.”

Holly’s face falls. “You think she might launch a complaint?”

“Or go public in some other way.”

“Jesus…”

“Hopefully not, but you have to do everything you can to prevent that.”

“And how do I do that?”

He reaches across the table and places his hand over hers, relieved that she doesn’t pull away. “Talk to her, Holly. Make her see the light.”

“And if she doesn’t?”

“She’ll come around,” he says, though he’s more focused on the feeling of her warm knuckles in his hand.

They sit quietly for a while, as the briny scent of calamari wafts to them from a nearby table. Finally, Holly smiles and says, “Thank you.” She pats the back of his wrist with her other hand and then gently slips free of his grip.

He hides his frustration behind a smile. “Don’t you miss this?”

“Of course, I do,” she says. “And I appreciate how you’re always there for me.”

“Not enough to come home though?”

“That’s different.”

“Why?”

“Please, Aaron. Not now. It’s not the time.”

“Graham’s doing better,” he says. “He really is. Especially since we started him on the new combination of mood stabilizers.”

“We? You mean you prescribed medication for your own son?”

“Someone had to.”

She sighs. “This isn’t about Graham.”

But Aaron believes otherwise.

His sons, Nate and Graham, were twelve when Aaron and Holly married. She tried to bond with both of her new stepsons, but the fraternal twins responded entirely differently. One welcomed her, the other resented her. Holly and Nate have always been close. But everything comes easy to Nate: sports, academics, and relationships. A first-year med student on scholarship at Columbia, Nate is on track to follow his father’s career path. Graham, on the other hand, takes more after his mother, an expert in self-sabotage who finds conflict where it doesn’t exist. When Graham was eighteen, another psychiatrist diagnosed him with a borderline personality disorder. But Aaron disagreed with his colleague, believing Graham was too functional in his life and his relationships to fit the criteria. While Aaron appreciates that Graham is still adrift, to his mind it’s because his son is a deeply sensitive soul who needs a lot more support than his twin brother.

But even Aaron can’t ignore the damage Graham’s volatility has inflicted on his marriage. And Holly sometimes mistakes Aaron’s protectiveness over his flawed, vulnerable son for siding with him against her. Especially since that online trolling incident.

“You’re right,” Aaron says. “It’s not the time to discuss this. I’m only here to offer my advice. To help you however I can. But…”

“But what?”

“These days, it seems impossible for us to find time to talk.”

Holly stares at him with a look of affection, maybe even love, but that doesn’t diminish the growing distance he senses between them. “The last few months have been out of control,” she says. “I’ve barely had a minute to myself.”

“Not easy being a celebrity, is it?”

“Hardly,” she snorts. “But ever since Simon Lowry—an actual celebrity—publicized my involvement in his treatment, my practice has gone wild. It’s too much. I’m pulled in a hundred directions. I never asked for that, Aaron.”

“And I never asked you to leave,” he blurts, regretting the words as soon as they pass his lips.

Holly brushes her hand over his arm again. “Thank you, Aaron, for your support and your wisdom,” she says as she rises to her feet.