Caught in-between #Wattys2016

Third Option

Two hours. I had talked for two hours. I watched Nina carefully, trying to decipher what she made of my situation. To her credit, Nina had been respectful as I laid bare my most shameful secrets. Her two defaults statements during the past two hours had been, "what happened next" and "please go on," but now, she really seemed to be taking the time to wrap her head around my words.

"Whenever you're ready Nina" I said impatiently.

"Sorry, sorry" Nina responded hastily.

"Well?"

Nina opened her mouth and shut it immediately. Her brow furrowed and an uncertain smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. For the first time in our history, Nina appeared to be lost for words.

"Oh God" I groaned, covering my face with my hands. "I'm a terrible person, I know already. You don't have to say it."

"Aww honey no" Nina said kindly as she prised my hands away from my face. "I'm sorry Cassandra. I guess I'm in shock. I mean, HOLY SHIT... this is just so far removed from how you usually are, but that doesn't make you a bad person Cass."

"How do you work that one out?" I asked.

"Come on Cass" Nina chided. "You have been through the worst possible ordeal, and I don't know... I just think that it broke you. Literally smashed you to pieces. Trauma is a terrible thing and it leads people to make choices that they wouldn't usually make, and I guess seek comfort in the most unlikely of places... I think that's what might have happened here."

"So basically you think I'm a mess."

Nina burst out laughing. "Yeah, I do actually, but that's okay hunny. You're human. A shitty thing happened to you, and in response, you kind of lost your mind and did a shitty thing in turn, but now you've got to figure out what you're going to do."

"Right, Adam or Joe?"

Nina scrunched up her nose, as if she'd smelled something really bad.

"What?" I asked a little defensively.

"Well, I just think there's a third choice."

"What third choice?"

"Well" Nina began. "Of course there's the choice of Adam or Joe, but you could also choose Cassandra. You could choose yourself sweetie."

 I rolled my eyes. As much as I loved Nina, her suggestion was just typical of her carefree idealistic way of thinking.

"Wait Cass, just hear me out" Nina protested.

"Nina, I love you but I really don't need to hear some hair brained idea of how I need to be on my own, and find myself." I said dismissively.