Dirty Letters(16)

“Change of plans for today, Luca,” he yelled as he opened my screen door.

I tugged on Hortencia’s collar to make her back away from the door. “Come on, girl, leave the doctor alone. He only wants to play with you if you grow wings.”

Doc bent and gave Hortencia a treat from his pocket. The man carried peanut butter crunch pig treats in one pocket and dog biscuits in the other—even though he didn’t have a dog. “Get ready, Luca, dear. We’re going to the pet store today.”

I froze. “No we’re not. You said we were walking today.”

“I said that because when I tell you we’re going to do any type of exposure therapy, you stress on the days leading up to the outing. This way, you have less time to stress in advance.”

“Except now five days’ worth of stress will get jammed into a fifteen-minute car ride to the store, and my head might explode.”

Doc frowned. “I don’t think it works that way.”

“Don’t you remember the last time we went to the pet store?” We’d tried some exposure therapy a few months back, the weekend before Easter. Unbeknownst to either Doc or me, it happened to be the same day the store had an Easter Bunny dressed up to take pictures with pets. We’d entered through a side door, so we didn’t see the packed parking lot. The place was a madhouse of people and their animals. Halfway down the first aisle, I’d gotten so dizzy and nauseous that I had to sit on the ground while I hyperventilated. Unfortunately, I’d accidentally sat in a small puddle of dog urine. When I finally got enough courage to get up and leave the store, every dog thought I was a fire hydrant and wanted to sniff me—or rather sniff my wet ass.

“We’re going to a smaller store this time. And I went by this morning on my way over here and made sure there are no events being held today.”

That didn’t make me feel any better. “Why don’t we go to the store in our next session, and today we can just take a nice walk. It’s beautiful out.”

He shook his head. “I need to get a new bird feeder. A squirrel knocked down my hummingbird one.”

“You have at least twenty different feeders in your yard. The hummingbirds can eat something else for a few days.”

Doc walked over and put both his hands on my shoulders. “Trust me, Luca. Our therapy visits are not about going to the store and not having panic attacks. Having a panic attack while we’re there is perfectly expected. Exposure is about entering a feared situation and dealing with the panic when it comes. We will get through this together.”

I shut my eyes. “Fine.”

“That’s my girl.”



“So tell me what’s new with your pen-pal friend.” Doc and I had parked in the pet-store parking lot, but I needed a few minutes to calm myself enough to walk in. So we took a walk around the block. I knew he was bringing up Griff to distract me, but honestly, if thoughts of Griff couldn’t bring my mind someplace else, I wasn’t sure anything could.

“He sent me a gift.”

“Oh?”

I wasn’t about to tell Doc my Furby masturbation story, so I sidestepped the truth. “Just some toys that I’d been sort of obsessed with back when we were kids. It wasn’t like he sent me diamonds or anything.”

“I’m sure him remembering something you liked meant more to you than a piece of jewelry anyway.”

I smiled. Doc really did know me well. “We’ve been exchanging letters once a week for a while now, and things have sort of . . . gotten personal. Like we talk openly about dating and our sex lives, or my lack of a sex life might be more like it.”

“And you two still haven’t exchanged current photos or spoken on the telephone?”

“I tried. But Griff said he liked the mystery of things the way they are.”

Doc was quiet for a moment. “Do you believe he’s telling you the truth?”

That was something I’d thought about a lot lately. I got the feeling that maybe Griff wasn’t as confident as he was when we were kids. He didn’t really want to talk about his job—other than saying things hadn’t worked out as planned. And he’d been dodgy on even his physical description. It made me think that maybe Griff was embarrassed about not having done as well as he’d liked in the music industry, and maybe that had shaken his confidence overall. It probably hadn’t helped that I’d gone and bragged that my debut novel hit the New York Times bestseller list.

“I’m not sure. But I do have a theory that maybe he’s a little ashamed of his job, and his confidence has deteriorated. It’s funny because neither of those things matters. I don’t care what he looks like or if he works in a grocery store stocking shelves. Whenever I’ve done online dating in the past, I didn’t give a man a chance if he wasn’t physically attractive to me. Yet I honestly don’t care if Griffin hasn’t aged well and has a huge scar running down his face. I like the guy he is inside and his sense of humor.”

“That’s very mature. It sounds like you’re really growing feelings for this man.”

I sighed. “I think I am. But I’m not sure how to let Griffin know that I like him for who he is and that it doesn’t matter what he looks like. It’s a hard subject to discuss via letters. But I think I’m going to try and push it a little more.”