“He met someone else.”
“I know she’s been talking about me behind my back. I don’t clean enough. I don’t cook enough. I’m never enough. She’s just like my mom.”
“He comes home late. There isn’t any other explanation.”
Simone heard these surface-level thoughts from the two tight-lipped people sitting across her. People seemed so unwilling to talk about their problems, to pretend they didn’t come in due to issues because vocalizing that there are issues scares people.
Simone loosely held a pen in one hand, her left leg crossed over her right, and a legal pad rested on her lap. She stared flatly at her clients, Benjamin and Sarah Margrove.
Soft music, only audible because her clients weren’t speaking, played from a speaker in the middle of the room. A spritz of eucalyptus mint shot into the air every fifteen minutes from the fashionable and functional air deodorizer. Simone inhaled deeply, adjusted her glasses, and tapped her pen on the page three times. A fresh spritz shot into the air filling the room with the fragrance.
“Let me try to rephrase for clarity. What made you finally decide to come in today? Things of this nature are rarely sudden. Opening up can be hard. Benjamin, can I call you Ben? Please start.” And the way you demanded to see me on short notice made it seem like life or death. Yet neither of you is thinking of killing the other.
“Oh.” Simone’s two clients thought simultaneously.
“Ben’s fine. My mother recommended we seek help and… She insisted.”
“And she insisted?” Simone finished Ben’s trailing thought.
“Of course she did; she insists on everything.” Sarah Margrove’s inner voice was deep, much more bassy than her speaking voice.
“Maybe she really is that good?” Benjamin Margrove’s inner voice sounded timid, unconfident.
Ben’s mouth opened a hair, and he stared at Simone, words forming at the tip of his tongue.
“I’m told I have a gift for reading people,” Simone said with a smile.
“Creepy,” Sarah thought.
Not as creepy as your inner voice. Simone kept her polite smile up as a new silence filled the room. The first silence was hostile, distrustful. This new one was made of uncertainty and trepidation.
“Would you say your mother is overbearing?” Simone asked, leaning more to the side to appear more comfortable.
“Yes!” Sarah’s thoughts were a scream so loud that Simone had to fight not to flinch. Surface-level thoughts could be like that at times. Passionate, loud.
“No. Overcaring maybe,” Ben chuckled. The laugh didn’t reach his eyes and was over as soon as he realized his joke hadn’t landed.
Sarah folded her arms across her chest and tapped her foot at the opposite measure to Simone’s pen.
“You disagree, Sarah?” Simone asked.
“Of course not,” Ben replied, looking at his wife. “Right?”
“You don’t speak for me! Maybe that’s what your little girlfriend is into, but—”
“Ben. Please let her speak for herself. I’m sure she wanted to say something when I asked you about your mother, but she demonstrated control and let you have a voice. Could you try to do the same?”
“Of course, I’m sorry. Babe, go ahead.” “Shit. Another thing for her to hold against me later.” Benjamin’s thoughts sounded as mournful as he looked. He slumped a bit, hand resting on his cheek. Simone didn’t need telepathy to know the man cared about his wife.
“She’s a lot. I mean, she can be a lot to handle,” Sarah said.
Ben’s cheeks flush a shade, and his thoughts became too discordant and jumbled to hear accurately.
“Can you explain what you mean by that?” Simone asked. She wrote down Ben and Sarah’s names and jotted shorthand notes below them. Ben has control issues. Of himself and others. Sarah has more insecurities than she would openly say. More than Ben, though he projects it more.
“She thinks I’m not good enough for her son. And does her best to remind me of it all the time!”
“I mean, she has so much love. She obviously cares about Ben and me and wants the best. But things have to be her way or no way.”
Ben stewed in Sarah’s words.
“I can say that, but that’s rich coming from you!” Ben’s lips drew tight.
Simone nodded. This was what she waited to hear from both of them. Not a perfect agreement, but close enough to start a dialogue between them.
“Do you agree, Ben?” Simone asked, knowing that he did.
Ben’s lips loosened, then he frowned and pressed his hands together in his lap.
“Of course, he doesn’t. Sharon can do no wrong.” More of Sarah’s insecurities screamed from her thoughts.
“Well…” Ben mumbled.
“Speak your mind. Get it off your chest, whatever it is,” Simone said softly.
“My mother can be a lot, but her actions and words come from a place of love,” Ben said.
“You two are saying the same thing, but you sound as if you’re arguing a point against Sarah.”
“Of course he is.” Sarah thought while her foot continued tapping.
“No!” Ben thought while his head shook a fraction. “You’re the same way, Sarah. Nothing ever feels good enough for you.”
Simone looked up and scribbled next to Ben’s name in her shorthand. Will vocalize to make a point.
“What should be good enough for me? Waiting at home while you fool around with other women?”
“That’s not true,” Sarah said, her mouth contorting into a frown.
“Ben, let’s keep from telling Sarah how she feels and only focus on how you feel. Does that seem fair?” Simone asked.
Ben nodded slowly.
“How do you feel, Sarah? In general?” Simone asked. She breathed in deep as the third spritz of eucalyptus mint traveled up and into the air. Their session was almost over, and too much of it had been spent in silence.
No surface thoughts, no facial twitches or shift of the shoulder. For the briefest moment, Sarah was unreadable.
Simone stared into Sarah’s eyes.
“I think…” she whispered, “I think he’s having an affair.” Sarah’s eyes, bright brown, were made all the brighter by the tears that welled in them. Emotionally distressed. The mind was silent when the mouth spoke for it in earnest.
“What the fuck?” Ben thought. A range of expressions transformed his face, and his cheeks grew red as he shook his head.
“Sarah, I would never.”
“Liar,” Sarah’s lips tightened. “Then explain—”
“Demands aren’t a good way to communicate. Ben, I think what she means is… if there is no other person can you explain the erratic behavior she feels you’ve demonstrated?” Simone held her breath.
“Did I mention that?” Sarah thought. She narrowed her eyes and tilted her head, curly hair falling off her shoulder. Her tears were still there, but confusion had taken the place of concern in her eyes.
“Erratic?” Ben asked. His leg was jumping as much as his head was shaking. “Have I been erratic, Sarah?”
“Yes.” Sarah whispered. She turned and looked at her husband. “You’re never….” She stopped and pursed her lips, eyes darting to Simone. “I feel like you’re never home anymore. When we are around each other, you barely speak. It’s like you’re checked out.”
Simone glanced at her wrist. The session only had a few minutes left, but this had been what she wanted and what they needed; to speak their minds.
“There’s no one else. I promise. Work has been a lot, and I feel like when I am home, no matter what I say or do, it won’t be good enough.”
“Ben, Sarah, I think this is a great example of communication and the communication needed if there will be tangible long-term results. In my experience, both partners tend to find fault with themselves and project it onto the other’s actions.”
Ben and Sarah nodded, and Ben held his hand out to Sarah from across the chair. She looked at it, wiped her eyes, and grabbed it.
“I just want you to be happy.” They both thought simultaneously.
Simone smiled. “Communication is key. Talk about your frustrations— your ups and downs. That is how I think you can make yourselves and each other happiest in the long run.”
The mist sprayed a final time, and a timer beeped from Simone’s wrist. “If you want to schedule another session, please do so with my receptionist. Thank you both for trusting me to mediate these issues and, hopefully, guide you to a positive outcome.
“I feel like this was a step in the right direction,” Ben said as he squeezed Sarah’s hand.
“Slow steps are still steps. Let’s all agree to try and talk more from the beginning, okay?” Simone smiled and set the notebook on the table next to her chair.
“Is she psychic?” Sarah’s surface thoughts bubbled up, and she seemed to force a smile.
Simone ignored the thought and walked to the door opening it for them. The hall led down to a waiting room and the cheesiest motivational posters Simone could find hung on the walls.
The couple would be back. Even if they discussed how creepily accurate Simone was, she hadn’t given away anything that might prove to them she could read minds. Simone walked back to her desk and drank from her bottle, popping two pain relievers for her headache. Reading minds had its perks, but damn if it didn’t take a lot out of her. It was like reading a sign through mesh fabric or watching a movie upside down.
Simone sighed and looked at her calendar. One last couple for the day, another new one. Tanya and Jacob Finch. Married five years with two kids, a dog, and a cat. Problems abound. The intercom buzzed as she pressed the button. “I’m ready for the next ones, Jeff. Send them back.”
Jeff replied with a buzz, “On their way.”
Simone got comfortable, as comfortable as she could get with the pen and notepad in hand.
Jacob and Tanya Finch walked in, dour expressions matching sour thoughts. “Waste of time. Why get help when all I want to do is leave? She’s pretty. Should tell her the truth. I want to murder him.”
The thoughts were a jumble, as they always were before Simone could sort the actual surface thoughts. But that last one had stood out to her. Murder him.
Simone smiled, jotted a note in shorthand next to their names, and waited for them to get comfortable. As comfortable as they could sitting beside a person that neither one wanted to be with anymore. There were some couples worth the trouble of saving, but there was a reason Simone had become a counselor and not a priest. All she hoped to do was convince them to separate before murder did occur, or at least take that thought off the table.
“So, tell me why you’re here,” Simone said, tapping her pen three times as she waited for the two to open up, scanning their thoughts the entire time, hearing what they refused to tell each other. Simone frowned. The couple might think it was due to their silence, but her pen was going dry, and Tanya would just not stop thinking of killing Jacob. Partly due to past grievances, partly because of how he kept staring at Simone.
Simone thought the last session was terrible, but this one might honestly be the worst she’s had in a long time. Eucalyptus mint sprayed into the air, and Simone inhaled, waiting for one of them to speak.