“Whatever I find in the fridge that looks good, unless you have a request.”
“No requests.”
She nods, smacks a loud kiss to my cheek with a grin, and slips out of bed. I watch her pull on her clothes and then she leaves the room. I’d think that being alone for a little while would be a blessing and would feel good, but I miss her presence the moment she’s out of view. It’s easier to pretend depression doesn’t exist when she’s around and I’m putting on a show for her.
She depends on the Trace who is strong, stable, and there for her. That’s the Trace I want to be. Not this version who is struggling so much. I need to find a balance because I know I can’t hide it forever. It’s not good for me, for Brittany, or for our relationship. All the reminder I need is to remember what happened with my failed marriage. Faith cheating was simply the last straw; not the cause. We had problems prior to that, which were leading us down the path to divorce.
Brittany walks back into the room with my phone buzzing in her hand. “Someone is calling you.” She tosses it to me before leaving to continue cooking, I assume.
A quick glance at the number, and I don’t recognize it. It’s tempting not to answer it. I do though.
“Hello?”
“Trace? It’s Faith.”
“Oh.” Why is she calling me? It’s odd that she is, since I was just thinking about her.
“I know it’s a surprise, but I wouldn’t call if it wasn’t important.”
“What is it then?” The sooner we can hang up, the better.
“I’m moving, and where I’m going, I can’t take Lily.” Lily was our golden retriever. “I figured I’d see if you wanted her before I try to make other arrangements. If you wanted her, I could drop her off whenever, or you could come get her.”
“I live near Charlotte now,” I interrupt.
“Oh. Well, I could still make a trip to give her to you. I just want to make sure she has a good home, and I know you hated to leave her with me.”
Do I want Lily? Do I want to have to see Faith to get her? “Why can’t you take her with you?” I ask.
Faith is silent long enough that I know she’s hesitating.
“I didn’t think that would be a hard question.”
“It’s not; just an awkward one. I’m moving in with my boyfriend and his daughter is allergic. So, what do you say? Do you need to think about it?”
“You have no one else who could take her?”
“No.”
It’s like the music from Jeopardy is playing while I think about it. “Fine. Yeah, I wouldn’t mind having her.” She is a great dog.
“Fantastic. When can I bring her to you? The sooner the better for me.”
“If you wanted to do it tomorrow, that would work.”
I give her my address, and find out if there’s anything I’ll need to buy before she comes, but Faith is bringing everything. Once we hang up, I get out of bed and get dressed. I smile when I walk into the kitchen.
“I thought you were cooking.” She’s leaning against the counter by the oven, folding up an empty pizza box.
Brittany smirks. “Last I checked, you have to cook pizza to eat it. So, I am cooking.”
“And here I thought I was getting a decent meal.” She only shrugs. I walk over to stand next to her. “So, how do you feel about dogs?”
Her eyebrows pull together in confusion. “They’re fun. My parents already had one when I was born, but he died when I was ten. Why?”
“My phone call?” She nods. “It was my ex-wife. She wants to give me our golden retriever because she can’t care for her anymore. She’s bringing her tomorrow.”
“What’s her name?” she asks.
“Lily; I didn’t name her.”
Brittany laughs. “Well, are you excited?”
“Yeah. She was a good dog. I missed her more than Faith, but I haven’t thought about her in a while.” She laughs again, shaking her head. “What?”
“It’s kinda sad that you missed the dog more than your ex-wife.”
It is sad. That’s just where we ended up, I guess. I’m bombarded with memories of Faith asking what was wrong, and me not answering, trying harder to hide it because I didn’t want to tell her of my struggles. Our marriage fell apart because of that, and what am I doing right now? Trying to repeat history with Brittany.
Just as I open my mouth to spill the truth, the timer dings and Brittany turns away to pull the pizza out of the oven. I need to say something. Give her something in exchange for holding out on her. She gets the pizza cutter from a drawer and begins to slice.
“I didn’t just not talk to Faith about my depression; she didn’t know about it at all,” I blurt out.
Brittany’s hand stops over the middle of the pizza. Her shoulders droop, and it takes a moment for her to look at me. “What?” she asks softly.
“She didn’t know; I never told her.”
“But you were married to her.”
“I know.” I nod.
“I don’t understand, Trace. Your dad doesn’t know, and neither does your ex-wife. Why? Who does know?” She sets the pizza cutter down and faces me, folding her arms over her chest.
“My doctors and you.” I sigh as I prepare myself to continue talking. “When Faith met me, it was a good time for me, so I avoided telling her. Once things got bad, like they always do, I didn’t want to tell her because I knew it would be a complete surprise and I didn’t think she’d be able to handle it. Be able to handle me like that. I did my best to hide it from her or avoid talking about what was going on with me.”
“Why can you tell me, but not them? I get not wanting to tell every single person you meet, but these are people you’re close to, or were close to. If you couldn’t be honest with them, how can you be honest with me? Are you being honest with me?” Her eyes search mine, trying to find the answer, and I hate that I transformed her from a good mood to one where she’s now concerned about what I’ve been doing.
I reach out to grab her hand and pull her against me. In a low voice, I tell her, “I’m a work in progress, Britt. We both are; you’re just farther along than I am.”
She squeezes her arms around my waist. “I don’t want to be left in the dark, Trace.”
“Okay.” Not a promise, but not a refusal either.
“Well, we should eat, and make sure you get some rest.” Brittany pulls away from me to finish cutting the pizza.
I need to do better. Brittany doesn’t deserve anything less.
“Are you sure about this?” Brittany asks as she squeezes her wrist.
“Yeah. Don’t you want to meet Lily?”
“Yeah, but I don’t want to meet your ex-wife. Won’t it be awkward?”
I laugh. “It’ll be better than what it was like to meet my dad, I’m sure.”
My laughter makes her frown, or maybe it’s the memory of meeting my dad. I grab the hand clutching her wrist and interlock our fingers.
“Aren’t you nervous?” she asks before I can say something to relax her.
“It’s just Faith.” Why would I be nervous? It’s not like I still have feelings for her. I’ve moved on; she’s moved on. There’s no reason to be anxious about seeing her.
“It’s just Faith,” Brittany mocks in a deepish voice with the roll of her eyes.
“Why are you nervous, Britt?” I ask seriously in a gentle tone, searching her expression for an answer.
“It’s the whole ex-wife, new girlfriend scenario. It’s awkward.”
“It’ll be fine. She’ll stay long enough to drop off Lily, bring in her things, and say goodbye to her. It’ll be fine,” I repeat. Finally, she nods and seems to relax a little. I kiss her forehead before leaving for the restroom. When I come back, I want to wince at the bad timing. Faith has arrived and poor Brittany had to answer the door.
At least, she seems relaxed as she pets Lily, and there’s a man with Faith. Looks like she brought her boyfriend. That has to make Brittany feel better.
“Thanks so much, Trace,” Faith says.
“No problem.”
“This is Peter, my boyfriend,” she introduces.
He holds his hand out and I shake it. “Nice to meet you.”
“You too. Thanks for being able to take Lily.”
“Of course.”
There’s an awkward silence, and I’m surprised when Brittany is the one to break it. “So, Trace said you were bringing Lily’s things?”
“Yeah, it’s all in the car. We wanted to bring Lily in first,” Faith answers.
We all walk outside; Lily explores the yard. I help Peter with Lily’s things. He does the talking I expected Faith to do.
“Faith just took her to her annual checkup last week; she’s in good health and won’t need to go again until next year. She put the vet’s contact information in one of these bags, so you can get her records transferred to wherever you take her. That’s pretty much all you need to know, I think, considering you’ve taken care of her before.”
“Right.”
There’s her bed, a bag of food, a bag full of toys, and a bag with things like shampoo and heartworm prevention meds, it looks like. We walk back into the house, Lily following behind us without having to be called. We set her things in the living room. Brittany sits down on the couch, and Lily jumps up to lie with her head in her lap. Brittany has a goofy grin in her face. Having Lily might be better than I thought it would be.
“We should head back,” Peter says.
“Yeah,” Faith agrees. She walks over to Lily and pets her head, saying her goodbye. Then, she turns to me. She surprises me when she hugs me. “Thank you, Trace.”
I loosely hug her back. “You’re welcome.”
Faith steps away, and I walk them to the door. They say goodbye, and then they’re gone. I return to the living room to sit next to Brittany, reaching over to pet Lily’s head.
“I’m in love.”
“With me or Lily?” I grin and Brittany rolls her eyes.
“Lily, obviously. She’s so sweet. How am I supposed to leave your house when the cutest dog I’ve ever seen is here?”
“You’ll just have to visit more often.”
“As if I’m not already here a lot.”
“Have you heard me complain?”
She smiles, one of those bubbly, happy, my-boyfriend-just-said-something-great kind of smiles. “No.”
I take her hand and tug to pull her to straddle my lap. My body crashed last night after pizza, so I got some decent sleep. I’ve been feeling good today. Leaning forward, I kiss her softly. Lily wedges her head between our stomachs.
“Lily,” I chastise. “You’ve already overstayed your welcome.”
She barks, which causes Brittany to giggle. Lily scoots closer and rests her head on my shoulder.
“Aw, she missed you.”
I reach up to rub her neck. “Are you staying again tonight?” She’s debating it; her gaze switches between Lily and me. She was originally going to head back to the dorms. “Don’t you want to spend more time with Lily?” I say as a way to bribe her.
“Okay, fine. I’ll stay.”
Good. I need to make up for hiding how I was feeling yesterday.
***
“How often do you and Dustin have sex?”
Rebecca rolls onto her side. “Oh, come on. Don’t tell me you and Trace aren’t having enough sex? Brittany, I know you have anxiety and all, but you are seriously worrying too much over every aspect of your relationship with Trace. You’re both alike, so if y’all aren’t having a lot of sex, it’s probably because you’re both too wrapped up in your own problems.”
“That’s not why I was asking.”
“Oh. Sorry.” She smiles weakly.
“I think we’re having too much sex.”
Rebecca groans and sits up on her bed. “I take my apology back. How is there such a thing as too much sex? You are worrying too much, Brittany.”
“Will you just answer my question?” I’m starting to get annoyed and regret asking her.
“A few times a week. If we have the whole night, then more than once that night usually. How often are y’all having sex?”
“That’s how often it was for us, but now, it’s like multiple times a day every time I see him. He’ll stop us mid-conversation to have sex. It’s great sex, but I don’t know. I’m wondering if maybe Trace is using sex to both pretend to be normal and as an escape. I still feel like he’s not being as honest and open with me as I am with him. That can’t be good for us.”
“Give him more time,” she says. “He obviously cares for you because he’s put his job on the line, taken you on a trip, is a damn good boyfriend, and he decided to go to Las Vegas with us. Cut him some slack, enjoy the sex, and give him time to open up.”
I nod. Maybe I am too hard on him. I might be expecting too much too soon. After all, Trace hid his depression from his father and his ex-wife. Habits are hard to break. He needs more time to work on it himself. I highly doubt me saying something will help. It’ll probably just make it worse. I’ll stay quiet and trust in Trace.
I smile to myself. That should be my new motto. Trust in Trace. I want to text him, but I need to focus on my homework. It’s been hard, but I’ve been slowly learning how to stop obsessing over it. My grades have been better, too. We have midterms next week, and I feel pretty prepared. Students from all of my classes have formed study groups, so that’s on the calendar.
Tomorrow, I meet with a new therapist. Dr. Gunner suggested I start seeing someone off campus, and Mrs. Rumley was able to recommend someone in the area. I called to make the appointment soon after Dr. Gunner made his suggestion, but tomorrow was their first available appointment. I’m nervous. Trace had me call his old office to have my records transferred, so they should know my background by the time I arrive.
My phone vibrates with a text.
Trace: Come over? I have Lily, fried pickles, pizza, and a fridge full of Sun Drop.
Me: What about my boyfriend?
Trace: He’s here too, but he had a bad day.
Shame on me. I’m a little excited because he’s told me he had a bad day. Usually, I know only because I find him in the recliner. Lily loves the recliner, so her big body is usually lying across his lap. He hasn’t been in it but a time or two this week. I think having Lily has helped. He’s always talking to her, petting her, and letting her sprawl all over him.
Me: Be over shortly.
I stop where I am on my homework and start packing a change of clothes. Rebecca eyes me, knowing where I’m going without me having to say it.
“Are you still going to move in with me once we graduate?”
Whirling around to look at her, I say, “Of course. Why wouldn’t I?”
“You’re at his house a lot.” She shrugs.
“Yeah, but I don’t want to live with him yet. I want to live with you some more.” I smile. “Don’t worry, Bec. I’m all yours for a while longer.”
“Whatever,” she laughs.
“Want to grab lunch after my appointment tomorrow?” I ask as I finish stuffing my things in my bag.
“Absolutely! Just text me when you leave and we’ll meet up somewhere.”
“Will do. See ya later.” I wiggle my fingers in a wave before walking out of the dorm. My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I pull it out. “Hey, Mom,” I answer, getting into my car.
“Hey. How’s it going? I’m not interrupting you or anything, am I?”
“No, I’m just leaving campus and things are good. My grades are better, and my anxiety hasn’t been as bad lately, so I think the meds are working.”
“That’s great to hear! Are you nervous about tomorrow?” she asks, and I pull onto the road.
“Yeah, but I think it’ll be okay. Trace keeps telling
me it’ll be fine, and I keep reminding myself that what anxiety I do have is completely normal.”
There’s a long silence, which is odd.
“Mom? Are you there?”
“Yeah, Brittany, I’m just confused.”
“About what?” What is there to be confused about?
“This Trace is the same Trace who was your therapist, right? I didn’t know you still talked to him. Why are you getting a new therapist there if you could just continue talking with Trace? I know you really liked him.”
Oh, god. Dear lord, no. “Mom,” I begin. “Trace isn’t my therapist and he doesn’t work at that office anymore.”
“Then how are you talking to him now? I assumed you were having phone appointments like you sometimes do with Dr. Gunner.”
Shit, shit, shit! “I…” God, how am I supposed to tell her? Stupid, stupid, stupid! I’ve been so careful to avoid saying his name, and I’ve let it slip.
Mom has caught on that something is going on. “Brittany, what are you hiding?” I don’t answer fast enough and Mom figures it out. She gasps. “He’s your boyfriend, isn’t he? Brittany, what are you thinking? What is he thinking? You can’t date him! Isn’t he married?”
The only good thing is she didn’t ask if he took advantage of me.
“Get in here,” she hollers to my father. “Brittany is dating her married therapist!”
God, this is so bad. I pull into Trace’s, and I hate that I’m about to bring this on him on top of his bad day. First, I need to explain things to my mom. “Mom, he’s not my therapist. Can you take a breath and let me explain first?”
“Explain,” my dad demands. Great. Now, I’m on speaker.
“First, Trace is divorced and has been for a few years. After I left for college, he’d check in with me, or I’d email him if I was having issues. I eventually gave him my number because I didn’t want to email anymore and texting was more convenient. By that time, he was in the middle of his divorce. We just started talking more and more often as time went by, he called me sometimes, and that was it. Then, he got a job opportunity here. He took it, moved, and I ran into him. That’s when we started dating.”
Driving Me Mad Page 14