Moving On

Stronger

 They went into an office and a pretty, brunette woman sat at her desk on the phone, she smiled warmly as Dean sat and the receptionist left shutting the door behind her. A couple minutes later she hung up and stood smiling as she walked over to him and shook his hand as she spoke.

 "Mr. Ambrose, I'm so sorry about that." She apologized, as she sat in a chair across from him.

 "It's cool, please call me Dean." Dean said smiling nervously.

 "Okay, and you can call me Maria."

 "Okay." Dean said smiling still nervous, as he bounced his leg up and down again.

 "Nervous?"

 "A little." Dean admitted rubbing the back of his neck.

 "There's no need to be Dean. Why don't we talk about whatever you'd like, for our first session?"

 "I...I don't know." Dean answered.

 "What do you do for a living?" She asked.

 "I'm a wrestler with the WWE." He answered.

 "Oh, that sounds exciting! Let's talk about that?" Maria suggested.

 "I guess so." Dean agreed.

 For the first hour of his appointment, no matter what Maria said or did she couldn't get Dean to open up about anything. He was quiet, withdrawn, cold and would only give one word answers, he just wasn't into it, believing it was pointless. Finally he had had enough and decided to leave, he had tried and it didn't work, he would always be screwed up, everyone would just have to accept it...he had!

 "I'm done! Look, I'm sure you're good at what you do and I'm sure you've helped lots of people, but I don't need your kind of help!" Dean said getting up, he then went to the door, he reached for the doorknob when she spoke.

 "So, you like being a victim Dean?"

 "What?" He asked his hand still on the doorknob, his back to her.

 "You heard me Dean."

 "I'm not a victim!" He replied angrily as he opened the door.

 "Prove it!"

 "This...this is just a trick to get me to stay!" Dean replied as he turned smiling, he crossed his arms.

 "I'm not a magician Dean." She began smiling. "I don't do tricks."

 "I don't know what you want from me dammit!" Dean said angrily.

 "It's not what I want, it's what you want Dean." Maria said gently.

 "I just want my guilt and pain to stop." Dean said quietly looking at the floor.

 "Let me help you Dean, I can do that if you'll let me?"

 "Yeah." Dean agreed sighing as he shut the door and sat back down.

 Once Dean sat back down, the wall he had put up came crashing down and he began telling her everything, letting his tears fall, as he held nothing back. He had been terrified to relive the painful memories, but she was his anchor in his emotional storm, listening never judging as he said whatever came into his head, his emotions all over the place. By the time his appointment was over he felt a little lighter, but he knew it would take more than one visit to be completely free of King's memory. He agreed to come back twice a week, she also gave him her cell number in case he needed help between appointments. He also agreed to quit drinking and do weekly sobriety tests with the results being sent to Hunter and Stephanie along with progress notes from Maria. He left her office and drove home, walking into his house he felt the urge to call Seth and Roman to tell them what happened, but decided to wait until he was truly better not wanting to get their hopes up, only to disappoint them again if he failed. He knew what he was in for, but the thought of a future with Seth and Roman was enough to make him strong enough to fight!