“Oh, I’d be plenty generous. Trust me.”
My heart fluttered a little at the sight of Drew’s wicked grin. I shook my head. “Is this what my life’s come to? I’m a couples counselor, and I’m getting my own relationship advice from a divorce lawyer.”
“You’re an idealist. I’m a realist.”
I straightened my shoulders. “And what exactly is your relationship status, if you’re such an expert?”
“I have lots of relationships.”
“You mean sexual relationships?”
“Yes. I like sex. In fact, I fucking love sex. It’s the other shit I don’t like.”
“You mean the relationship part?”
“I mean the part where two people get together and start to rely on each other, share a life even, and then one of them fucks the other one over.”
“Not every relationship turns out that way.”
“In every relationship, one person ends up screwing the other at some point. Unless you keep it to just screwing. Then there are no false expectations.”
“I think your divorce and line of work have tainted your outlook.”
He shrugged. “Tainted works for me.”
Sarah and Ben Aster were a prime example of the reason I loved couples counseling. I’d started seeing Sarah after their son was born and realized quickly that their relationship problems were much more than the added stress of having a new baby. The couple had only been together for four months when Sarah became pregnant, which led to a quickie wedding and having the normal honeymoon-marriage period cut short by the arrival of a baby.
After such a whirlwind, the couple had finally begun settling into their lives, only to discover that their hopes and dreams were very different. Ben wanted a houseful of children, a home in the suburbs with a big backyard, and Sarah to stay at home. His wife, on the other hand, wanted to stay in their tiny apartment on the Upper East Side, go back to work, and hire a nanny.
The funny thing is, they both insisted they’d told the other how they saw their future—and I believe they did. The problem lay in their communication. So even though over the last few months they’d found a way to compromise on their living arrangements by looking for a house in Brooklyn with a small yard and short commute to Manhattan, they still needed to work on communication. Which led me to this week’s exercise.
I’d asked both Sarah and Ben to bring a list of five things they wanted to accomplish over the next year. Today we’d spent most of our hour going through Sarah’s list. She would read Ben one of her planned accomplishments, and he would have to explain back to her what that plan meant. It was amazing how a couple that had been married for eighteen months could still misinterpret things.
“I want to take a trip down to South Carolina to see my best friend, Beth,” Sarah said.
I looked to Ben. “Okay. Tell me what Sarah just said.”
“Well, she wants to go to South Carolina to visit her single friend, Beth.”
“Yes. Well, Sarah hadn’t mentioned that Beth was single, but it sounds like you heard something important to you. Why is the fact that Beth is single significant?”
“She wants to get away. I get that, and she deserves a break. But she wants to go down and spend time with Beth to recapture what she had before we were together—the single, carefree life. Then she’ll come back and resent us.”
Sarah then told him the things she missed about not having her best friend near her anymore and how she would like to spend her time while visiting. It was clear that what she wanted and what he’d interpreted her trip to mean were very different. But after fifteen minutes of talking it out, she’d put his mind at ease. Communication and trust were getting better each week with these two, and at the end of our session, I suggested that we begin every-other-week sessions rather than weekly.
“You know what I just realized?” Sarah said as Ben helped her put on her coat.
“What’s that?”
“After our video conference sessions end, there’s always a cute little quote on your home page that I read—something that reminds me to do something nice for Ben. We’re not going to have those anymore.”
I smiled. “Actually, we are. The quotes are still updated on my website, but I’ll also be writing them on my door. It was open when you came in, so you probably didn’t notice it. But you should read today’s on your way out.”
Sarah stopped Ben, and together they read the whiteboard after they opened the door. Sarah looked back at me with an odd expression, while Ben smiled from ear to ear.
After they were gone, I grabbed my reading glasses and went to the door, wondering if perhaps I’d spelled something wrong.
I hadn’t, but apparently Drew thought it would be funny to adjust my quote. While I’d written:
Blowing out someone else’s candle doesn’t make you shine brighter.
Today I will make my spouse shine by ___________________.
The board on my door now read: