When All Hell Breaks Loose

Week Two: Reaching Out For Support - Ryusei

When Ryusei got his next week's assignment, he couldn't believe his luck. Saichi was wary, and she was trying to explain it in some type of way, but all he heard was that he was to spend an entire week hanging out with his friends. Which, luckily for him, was what he spent most of his free time doing anyways.

"Listen to me, Ryusei," Saichi said.

And he was listening. But he was also picturing the way he was planning on calling Bachira the second he got out of this office. Guess what, Meguru? We're having a guys night! And it's not even suspicious, because Saichi told me to!

"I'm serious, Ryusei," she said. At that, he put the daydream on the backburner and tuned back in. "I want you to do this properly."

"Hang out with my friends..." he started, tried to make sense of it, and then failed. "Properly?"

"Yes," she said, pointing a stern finger at him in a way that told him she meant business. "Properly. I don't want you gallivanting all around town like you have been this week."

He deserved that. He could admit that. He had, in fact. Then, he tuned back in all the way because he thought that maybe he could benefit from the explanation.

"So, here's what I want you to do." He was listening, and he was ready to obey. "I want you to see your friends this week, and when you do, I want you to pretend that you are indeed going ahead with the divorce."

"What?" Ryusei had listened, but he didn't understand. "You want me to lie to my friends?"

"You don't have to," she said. "You can tell them a fib, enjoy the visit, tell them the truth at the end and tell them I told you to do that, if you prefer. Or you don't have to do any of that. The important part of this exercise is that the divorce is real in your own mind while you're reaching out for support."

"Does Sae have to do this?" he asked. It was instinct. He knew it as soon as the words left his mouth, but he couldn't bring himself to regret it or feel ashamed of it.

"See his friends?" Saichi asked. "Or pretend the divorce is real?"

"Either," Ryusei answered. "Both."

Saichi let out a deep sigh. Then, much to his surprise, she answered.

"Yes, he has to see his friends," Saichi said, and Ryusei almost found that humorous, until her tone took a turn for the knife-sharp. "No, he does not have to pretend the divorce is going ahead."

"Then why do I have to do it?"

Her voice stayed like that while she answered. "Because, unlike you, he has already accepted that as a genuine possibility."

It stung where it intended to. But she wasn't done.

"I've been seeing the both of you a while, and I'd like to think I know the two of you pretty well. You're not without your problems, both individually and as a couple, and the same goes for your strengths." She delivered these most forceful blows all while she had her frail hands clasped and rested on her itchy looking skirt. "Sae can be cold and calculating, but out of the two of you, he is very much the realist. You're open and optimistic, but there is a point where that becomes a fault."

All of this, they'd heard before.

"And I know that you think that if you move out for six weeks and show up to every session and do the homework, everything will go back to the way it was when your marriage was good," she said. And of course, this dumbfounded him. Because wasn't that the case? Or else, what were they spending all of this money and putting in all this time for? Was that not the guarantee? "But that's not necessarily the case. You may stay together, and your relationship might get to a new place which is as good or even better than it was. But the opposite is also true. You may see that despite the break and despite the work, the two of you just aren't compatible, and you may want something different."