Chapter 5: Professional Betrayal
The cold plastic of the waiting room chair leached through Joan’s thin slacks. She stared at a framed certificate on the opposite wall, the looping script blurring. Dr. Eleanor Vance, Ph.D., Clinical Psychology. The letters swam. Every Tuesday, 2 PM. Routine. Like dusting the shelves at the library. Except here, the dust was inside her, thick and choking. The muffled sound of a door opening down the hall made her flinch. A woman emerged, eyes red-rimmed but composed, clutching a tissue. Dr. Vance stood in her doorway, serene in a crisp linen shirt. "Joan? Come on in." Her smile was warm, practiced.
The office smelled faintly of lavender disinfectant and old paper. Fluorescent lights hummed overhead, bleaching color from the worn Persian rug. Joan settled onto the familiar, slightly lumpy couch, its brown leather cool against her palms. She folded her hands in her lap, pressing down to still the tremor. Dr. Vance took her seat in the leather chair opposite, crossing her legs, a yellow legal pad balanced on her knee. A sleek silver pen rested between her fingers.
"How has the week been, Joan?" Dr. Vance’s voice was gentle, inviting. Her gaze, however, was sharp, assessing.
Joan’s throat tightened. The scent of Sean’s sweat, Bethany’s cloying perfume, the image of the third place setting… it rushed back. "He… he brought her home." The words scraped out. "For dinner. While I was cooking. Her." She couldn’t say the name. The purple hair flashed in her mind. "They went upstairs. While I sat… downstairs." Her knuckles whitened where she gripped the edge of the couch cushion. She stared at the floor, at a faint scuff mark near Dr. Vance’s sensible pumps. "The sounds…" She swallowed, the memory of the thudding headboard, the screams, tightening like a vise around her ribs. "He calls her… names. Filthy names. Loud. So loud." Her voice cracked on the last word.
Dr. Vance leaned forward slightly, her pen poised. "That must have been incredibly difficult to witness, Joan. Violating the sanctuary of your own home." She made a brief note. "And your agreement… the boundaries you attempted to set about protection?"
"He refused." Joan lifted her head, meeting the therapist’s eyes, seeking validation, shock, something. "Condoms. He said… he needed connection. Said it would be… clinical. Cold. Without feeling." A bitter laugh escaped her, harsh in the quiet room. "Connection. With her." The image of Sean kissing Bethany in the hallway, slow and deep, flashed behind her eyes. "He said I was cruel. For asking. That it wasn’t who he was. That I wanted him happy." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "I said… fine." The admission tasted like ash. She looked away again, shame heating her cheeks. The cold, clear despair from the dark dining room seeped back in.
Dr. Vance’s pen scratched rapidly across the pad. Her brow furrowed, not in concern, but in concentration. A clinical analysis. Joan caught the phrase: ...fixation on sexual specifics... Then, lower down, the words seemed to leap off the page: Hysterical fixation. The pen paused. Dr. Vance tapped it thoughtfully against the paper, twice. Her expression was unreadable, detached. Joan remembered Sean mentioning Dr. Vance admired his 'commitment to mental health'. A chill, unrelated to the office AC, prickled Joan's skin.
"Joan," Dr. Vance began, her tone softening into that therapeutic cadence, smooth as the leather chair. "It’s understandable you feel overwhelmed. Betrayed. The introduction of another partner into the dynamic, especially so… viscerally… is destabilizing." She paused, letting the clinical words hang. "Your focus on the graphic details of their intimacy… the names, the sounds… this intense preoccupation. It suggests a possible hysterical fixation." She said it gently, as if diagnosing a common cold. "It’s a coping mechanism, perhaps. A way to maintain a connection, however painful, to the emotional core of the betrayal. But it’s trapping you in the hurt."
Joan flinched. Fixation. Like she was the sick one. Obsessed. Not him, parading his conquest in her kitchen. Not him, demanding raw intimacy with a stranger while denying her basic safety.
"Perhaps," Dr. Vance continued, her pen making another swift notation – reinforce non-obsessive coping – "the path forward involves shifting focus. Away from the mechanics of Sean's… connections… and towards cultivating your own sense of self-worth outside this dynamic. The open arrangement theoretically offers you freedom too, Joan. Have you considered… exploring connections yourself?" The suggestion hung in the air, bland, reasonable. To Joan, it felt like being pushed off a cliff. Explore? With whom? While Sean’s laughter and Bethany’s perfume still choked her?
Dr. Vance uncrossed and recrossed her legs, the movement fluid. "Your medication," she shifted seamlessly, tapping the pad where Joan knew her prescription details were noted. "The low dose of Sertraline. Given this heightened… reactivity… the intrusive thoughts, the hyper-focus… I think we need to address your neurochemical stability more robustly. To help you detach from the distressing stimuli and engage with your own life more constructively." She opened a drawer in her desk, pulling out a prescription pad. The scratching of the pen was loud. "A moderate increase. To take the edge off the anxiety, help you find some mental space." She tore off the slip, holding it out. It was a demand disguised as care.
Joan stared at the small rectangle of paper. Help. Detach. Constructively. Hysterical fixation. The words swirled. Sean’s triumphant smile in the dark dining room. Bethany’s purple hair against Sean’s bare chest. The feel of cold chicken in her mouth, dry and tasteless. The vial in her bathroom cabinet, half-full of tiny white pills that did nothing but make her feel numb and tired.
Slowly, mechanically, Joan reached out and took the prescription. Her fingers brushed Dr. Vance’s. The therapist’s skin was warm, smooth. Unblemished. Joan pulled her hand back as if burned.
"Good," Dr. Vance said, her smile returning, warm and professional. "Consistency is key. Let’s see how you feel next week. Focus on you, Joan. Your interests. Your peace." She stood, signaling the end of the session. "Try to observe Sean’s choices without absorbing them. He’s on his journey. This is about reclaiming yours."
Joan walked out into the sterile hallway, the prescription slip crumpling in her damp palm. Reclaiming. The word echoed hollowly. In the elevator, the fluorescent lights flickered. She caught her reflection in the polished metal doors – pale, shadowed eyes, hair limp. The face of hysteria. Obsessed.
Outside, the afternoon sun was bright, jarring. She fumbled in her purse for her keys, her hands trembling violently now. The prescription fluttered to the sidewalk. She bent to pick it up, her vision blurring. As she straightened, a sleek, dark blue sedan glided past her in the parking lot. Dr. Vance was behind the wheel, lifting a phone to her ear. Joan saw her laugh, a bright, unrestrained sound Joan had never heard in the office. Her head tilted back, exposing the smooth line of her throat. She said something into the phone, smiling, then lowered it, turning the wheel towards the exit. Joan stood frozen, watching the car disappear.
In the silence of her own car, the crumpled prescription felt heavy. Not like paper. Like a sentence. She pulled the small plastic vial from her purse – the old prescription. Sertraline 50mg. The new slip demanded 100mg. Neurochemical stability. Her thumb rubbed over the raised lettering on the vial. To take the edge off. To detach.
She unscrewed the cap, the plastic clicking loudly in the stillness. The pharmacist's voice echoed in her memory: May cause drowsiness. Avoid alcohol. Sean’s voice, laughing: Cum dumpster. Dr. Vance’s calm diagnosis: Hysterical fixation. Bethany's shriek: Breed me! The white pills inside looked innocuous. Tiny. Powerless. Like her.
Joan tipped two of the old 50mg tablets into her palm. The new dosage. Doubled. She stared at them. To help you detach. Her hands shook so badly the pills rattled against her skin. She didn’t reach for her water bottle. She closed her eyes, tilted her head back, and dry-swallowed them both. The chalky bitterness coated her tongue, sticking in her dry throat. She gagged, coughing harshly, her eyes watering. When she opened them, the parking lot was empty. The sun glinted off empty cars. The silence pressed in, thick and absolute. The plastic vial, clutched in her white-knuckled hand, felt cold. Colder than the wedding band still circling her finger beneath it.