Not only that, her mother was a patient in that hospital. Her breathing quickened. She couldn’t bear to be in the same building with a woman who wanted nothing to do with her.
“Amber, you need the solidarity of a support group.”
Something she would never receive from her family. She gripped her knuckles. Crack. Crack. Crack. Crack. Strangers would be worse. They wouldn't know her, yet they'd weigh her worth as she lost her shit.
“Amber.” His soothing timbre steadied her pulse. “Tell me what you're thinking.”
“They'll see how undesirable I am.”
A sigh whispered over the line. “You are a lovely woman, but you will never hear that until you believe it yourself.”
“He didn't think so.” She winced, hating herself for mentioning him.
“Yet he didn’t want to give you up.”
She'd once viewed marriage as a sacred covenant, arrogant in her belief that only three A's justified divorce. Adultery. Addiction. Abuse. He had committed none of them—never acted on his desire for her sister while they were married, never hit her, never so much as got drunk—yet she'd divorced him. She'd given up, taken the easy way out. “I failed him.”
“Eliminating the toxicity in your life is not a failure. It's curative and courageous and never, ever easy.”
She blinked against the achy burn in her eyes. Brent hadn't always been toxic. Sixteen years ago, he looked at her like she was so much more than a sparkling accessory on his arm. She deeply missed the man she'd fallen in love with. “Leaving him was the hardest thing I've ever done.”
“That's right. So the Outbound meeting would be a piece of cake in comparison.”
She straightened the envelope on the table, leaving a four-inch, right-angle gap from the table's corner. “I won't be calling you anymore.”
“These sessions are necessary in your recovery.”
“I know what I need to do to get better.” Face her fears. Remember to belly breathe. Ask for help.
“What have you eaten today?”
The purged pancake floating in the toilet. Had she remembered to flush it? Gripping the phone, she ran to the bathroom and relaxed when she saw the clean bowl. “I can't afford to pay you.”
“I see.” Wariness breathed through his voice, but he didn't offer to counsel her for free.
She wasn't worth his charity. Not that she would've accepted it anyway.
His movements rustled through the phone. “The self-help group is free. That's your next goal. I'll forward links to online support groups and see if I can find a therapist who might be more affordable.”
She'd already looked, but maybe he'd have better luck. “Thank you.” Jesus, she was going to miss him. “I'll look for your bill in the mail.” And hopefully, she'd have the funds to cover it.
“Be patient with yourself, Amber. Sometimes you have to step back to open the door.”
Three days later, she glared at the front door, her legs paralyzed with fear. Clutching the cell phone to her ear, she said into the receiver, “I call bullshit.”
“Amber, ring my boss if you don't believe me.” Zach sniffled through the speaker, his voice leaden with congestion. “He sent me home. I feel like I'm going to die.”
“You can't die from a cold.” But a heart attack was fatal. She could feel one coiling around her chest, squeezing the life from her body. “What about my mail?” She covered the phone to muffle her panicked gasps.
“Why can't you get it?” He sneezed, followed by a nasty, wet inhale. “Are you on house arrest or something?”
Unbelievable. They’d had this arrangement for six months. He was just now asking why? She released a thready breath. “I just can’t. Will you ask someone else at the store to bring my mail to the door? Or maybe you know someone who wouldn’t mind swinging by?”
“No. No one lives near you, and I can’t just ask people to do that.” He coughed. “Listen, I need to go.”
The palpitations in her heart wobbled her legs. “I need my mail today.” She needed it two days ago. The leather dye she'd ordered sat twenty-six steps from the door. She couldn't finish the knife sheaths without it. If she didn't mail out the completed sales by tomorrow, the water would be shut off.
He hacked through the phone. “I'm sorry, Amber.”
Guilt formed a hard, jagged lump in her stomach. “Please don't apologize. This isn't your fault.” She rubbed her forehead with cold, shaking fingers. Her stomach gurgled with dread. “Get some rest. Hope you feel better.”
“Yeah, okay. See you Tuesday.”
The phone disconnected, and she slumped to the floor, sucking harshly for air. She hugged her stomach against an onslaught of queasiness and glared at the front door. It stood between her and her paycheck. The damned thing wasn't a terminal disease. It wasn't swinging a chainsaw. It was just a door. A bolted, four-sided shield against certain suffering.
Sometimes you have to step back to open the door.