Where Are We Now? (Marina)

Cinquanta.

Carina

"So was the talk with Maya as scary as you made it in your head?" Dr. Wyatt asked, as she jotted down what I had come to know as her preliminary list of points she wanted to touch on during our sessions. I wondered if she always got to every one.

"I've come to learn that my wife is full of surprises and almost always for the better. So no, it felt very... like a pressure release of sorts," I described and Dr. Wyatt pursed her lips in that way that made me wonder what sort of question she would throw at me next.

"Now, in reflection, what is it that scared you more? Her reaction or her response?" My hands cradled my bump that officially felt bigger than my body could handle, gently lifting it to relieve some pressure off my pelvis. "Carina?" Right, she had asked me a question.

"Her response. Maya tends to hyper fixate on parts of the conversation and... I guess I expected her to focus on the part where that makes it seem as though I'm not happy about being pregnant. Which she said she was worried about, because I'm unenthused." I looked down at my belly, I am bellini. Mamma vi vuole.

"And what exactly surprised you?" She crossed her leg over which meant that this was the part she was more interested in hearing, the rest seemingly unsurprising to her. Sometimes I wondered if she knew how much I analyzed her body language so I could gauge where the conversation was headed. Like how now she was tapping her fingers to every beat of the metronome I saw ticking away on her book case, waiting for my answer.

My eyes stayed on it, like they did every time I had to talk about something difficult. Maybe that's why she had it there."That I said every dark thing I was scared to say and admit outloud and Maya... she just listened. She took in every word, bit her tongue and then she comforted me. She even offered some things that we've been trying over the last week."

"Like?" She crossed of something on her page and moved down to start a new note.

"The only person as close to paranoid as me is Maya. So talking through the thoughts, devising plans or rationalizing why they are irrational helps. Also she wants me to try talking to them even if I'm not inclined to." Wyatt lifted her eyebrows as she wrote down what I said. "It's interesting because I know they are memorizing the sounds of my voice, forming the connections that I am the one constant in their lives, and here I am talking through surgical plans and if I think food needs more or less salt."

"Is that what you talk to them about?" I nodded and she hummed in curiosity, then kept writing things down which for some reason began to annoy me. I set my hands over my bump as I waited for what was next, "Is it helping?"

I frowned, annoyed at the very anticipated questions. This felt more like a conversation I could have with my girls rather than the therapist that's been in the depths of my mind almost as long as I've known Maya. "Sure," I placated. She nodded and I rolled my eyes, running my hands over the movement I felt inside of me. "How are you Dr. Wyatt, because these are very predictable questions and we've been through this enough for you to be going so easy."

Dr. Wyatt snickered. I didn't even know that Dr. Katherine Wyatt knew how to snicker, she so rarely even smiled unless I crossed her in the hall. "Is it making you angry that you can guess what I am going to ask or that you came in here expecting me to grill you?"

Now that was not something I was expecting, "You've never been easy on me, so why are you starting now?"

"Because I'm posing myself a question and it seems to be leading me somewhere." I sat back and waited for her to explain, except she didn't. "Tell me about one of these fears and how you rationalized it." My chest felt a little me tight at trying to recall all of the conversations I've had with Maya in the last week.