One Moment Please (Wait With Me #3)(87)
“You’re a therapist, Lynsey…or soon to be,” Kate retorts, sitting back in her chair and crossing her arms over her chest. “Surely, you can see the power of working through past traumas.”
“He won’t work through them!”
“Not now that you’ve left,” she bellows.
“What was I supposed to do?”
“You should have stayed and fought for what you want. Fought for the family you were building.” Her face softens, and she shifts her chair so she’s right in front of me, then places her hands on my legs. “I love you, Lynsey, but you’ve always been too passive with guys. You assume they’re only with you until someone hotter or more outgoing comes along. You put yourself down and moan about your pie butt…but amazingly, you weren’t like that with Josh. You were confident. It was like you finally felt comfortable in your own skin.”
I open my mouth to argue, but the words get stuck in my throat. Closing my eyes, I take a deep breath and hold it in my chest until I regain control of my emotions. “I felt comfortable with him because there was no pressure.”
“Exactly,” Kate says, her blue eyes flashing with passion. “You knew he wasn’t going to fall in love with you, so you relaxed and became your true self with a man, which was beautiful to watch. But when you realized he couldn’t love the baby, the one person who you love more than anything in this world, all of the sudden, you grew a fucking backbone.”
“What are you saying, Kate?”
“You need to fight for yourself the way you fight for this baby!” She smiles and touches my belly tenderly. “You need to grow some monstrous, mama bear, hairy lady balls and tell Josh your feelings and force him to confront his own.”
“Why do my mama bear lady balls have to be hairy?”
“Because you’re shifting into big bear dick energy.”
“How did we go from hairy lady balls to a bear dick energy?”
“I don’t know, just go with it,” she says with a somber look. “I think you need to swing those balls around and make a big stink. Show Dr. Dick that your testicles are worth stroking, I mean loving.”
“The analogies are getting out of hand here, but I understand the sentiment.” I nod as I absorb everything. “I just hope my hairy balls are enough to win him over in the end.”
Kate smiles and continues rubbing my belly. “If I had a nickel for every time I wrote that in a book…”
“Dr. Richardson, I said you’re needed in exam room three,” Nurse Sheila shouts at me for the third time.
“I said one moment please.” My fists clench as my entire body threatens to implode from my pent-up rage.
Anger and rage have been my default for the past week, which is not well received around here because I didn’t exactly have a sunny disposition before. But I’m just doing the best I can to work and compartmentalize my fucked-up mess of a life.
Honestly, I probably shouldn’t even be working, but the ER is the only thing keeping me sane right now. I need something to keep my mind busy, or I’ll wind up at Dean’s house, beating him to a bloody pulp and begging Lynsey to come home.
Which is wrong.
Because I can’t give her what she wants.
She was right to leave. She deserves better than me. A lot fucking better. She deserves the world. And I can’t stand in the way of that for her.
Rising from the desk, I stuff the chart I was working on into its prospective slot and make my way to exam room three. At least now Nurse Sheila can get the fuck off my back. I search for the chart that’s supposed to be in the door holder, but there’s nothing inside. I frown and check around for Sheila, who’s conveniently MIA.
Grumbling under my breath, I open the door to see if the chart was left in the exam room with the patient. My heart lurches at the familiar face that greets me.
“Jesus, you look like shit.” Mark narrows his gray eyes at me as he stands on the other side of the room. “You look the way we did when we were studying for MCATs, like a walking zombie. Are you sick?”
I expel the breath I’m holding high in my chest and steel myself to step inside and close the door behind me. “I’m not sick. I’ve just had a rough week.”
He tilts his head and nods. “I’ve heard something to that effect.”
I frown. “Who did you talk to?”
“Kayla,” he replies with a shrug. “She couldn’t believe she found you and that you actually showed up to help her patient.”
I bite the inside of my cheek and look away. “The problem was obvious.”
“Humble as ever,” Mark replies with a dry laugh. “We were both surprised to learn you were still practicing.”
I adjust my stethoscope around my neck, suddenly self-conscious. “Do you have a problem with that?”
Mark’s eyes flare. “Josh…what the fuck, man?”
I brace myself for the hits that will surely come. Either verbal or physical. Last time I was alone with this man, he beat his fist into my face over and fucking over again, and I laid there and let him. In fact, I egged him on. I remember begging him to punch harder and stop holding back. I told him to make me pay for everything I did to his son. To Julian.
He fractured my cheek and his knuckle in the process.