love letters | shourtney

xx.

"Courtney?" Dr. T calls from her office door. I hop up and almost run into her office, gladly dropping down on her couch. "Well, hello to you too." She laughs as I pull out the notebook, readying myself. "So," she starts as she sits in her armchair, "how were we this week?" 

"Bad. Good. Fantastic. Really depends." I stare blankly at the floor, I have no idea how to start talking about all this.

"Alright. How about we start by talking about the notebook. How did that go?" I drop my gaze to the book on my lap. I need to be careful as not to let her see the letter, I forgot to take it out before I left this morning and it's a little too personal for someone else's eyes. 

"It... It really helped. At first, it was kinda weird, seeing all my thoughts on paper, but it started getting easier. It was relaxing to write about everything." I thumb the corner of it. "I wrote about everything, though, not just my feelings for Shayne... sorry." I bite my lip. 

"No, no, don't apologise. It's good that you wrote about everything. If you used it for just sorting out a specific emotion, it could start to become detrimental to your other emotions." She smiles reassuringly. "Do you mind if I read over any entries?" I think carefully. I should probably just let her read the whole thing.

I hand it to her, letting the letter fall discretely into my hand. Thankfully, she doesn't see it. I hide it behind my back, slipping it into my bag as she looks at the notebook. "There's nothing in specific that I'd like you to read, really the whole thing is all messy and jumbled." I trail off but she just smiles again.

"It's alright. I'll just take a moment to read the first few pages." I zone out while she flips through the pages. It becomes clear after about 5 minutes that she's reading more than just the initial pages. "Well, it's clear that you seem to have figured out your feelings. And that they are real. You've written about it, but I'd like to hear directly from you how you feel about knowing all this." I take a deep breath.

"Knowing that it's real... is scary. Now that I know, it means I have something to lose, but it also means I know where I stand. So, I think it's more on the positive side. I'm happier knowing that it's real. Everything has been a little easier to handle since I figured it all out. Not just my feelings for him." 

"That's really good. I also must commend you for sorting through things with your sister. That must have been a weight off your shoulders." I feel my cheeks redden. I almost forgot about everything with Kari. We hung out on Tuesday night, and it was so easy to fall into our old rhythm that it slipped my mind that we hadn't been talking.

"Thank you." I whisper, trying to get my cheeks to cool down. "It was really awkward between us at first, but it didn't take long for us to figure stuff out, which I'm really happy about. It helped everything else fall into line."

"Other than this plan of getting closer to him, you've written about writing a letter to him." I freeze. "I think that's a really good idea, especially for you. Did you end up doing it?" My fingers clasp around my bag. The letter is right here.

"Ah, no. I got so busy that it basically slipped my mind." I almost choke on the lie, a guilty feeling rising in my chest.

"Well, I think that should be a goal for you over the next few days. I understand that you don't want to tell him, so think of it as a form of telling him and vocalising your feelings without actually saying anything." The guilt continues to rise, and I think she notices a change in my body language. "Are you alright?" 

"Yeah, sorry, just uh... cramps." The first thing I think of slips from my mind. It's a good enough excuse, and it settles the guilty feeling in my chest, but I know it's still there.