When The Stars Align

Chapter 98

Christmas, New Year...all the holidays were gone. We all came back home and to our normal live. Instead of going on tour, Metallica stayed home and began to finish the next record, some songs that were left unfinished on Load sessions. I also knew it was the way James found not to leave me alone at home and keep an eye on me. I avoided therapy...I gathered more time for me, but it didn't mean we were getting better, because we were not. We would fight a lot, there was no intimacy between us, and he still insisted on therapy, I, on the other hand found therapy somewhere else.

Joe...Joe would calm me down, would make me smile and I could be me the whole time and he wouldn't pressure me. After coming back from Aspen we became even closer. We talked about everything and anything and I'd spend as much time as I could with him and pushed away anyone who was close enough to me to talk about my real problem. I did talk about that with Joe, but it seemed to me it was easier with him, as I said, he didn't pressure me.

"Andrea, would you like to go outside for a while?" Joe asked peeking at my office's door. I raised my eyes off the paper I was correcting and found him smiling at me.

"Sure." I agreed. "Let me just finish this page and I'll join you." I said.

"I am at the usual spot waiting." He said. I saw him turn his back on me walking away. Inside I felt guilty I was getting that close to another man, other than James. I loved James and I knew that, but we were growing so apart. I corrected the rest as fast as I could and then grabbed my purse and closed my office, ready to join him. Joe was sit all alone on the bench at the main yard of the university. He looked incredibly good and my heart skipped a beat a bit, not because I was in love with him or anything, but because I knew I'd feel relaxed near him. When he felt my presence, he raised his head from the book he was reading and smiled. His smiled crushed me, because it was just amazing.

"There you are." He said. I sat by his side and sighed.

"I am exhausted." I said. "These classes have been killing me."

"I know...so much work. And how are you?" He asked.

"I am ok, I guess." I smiled.

"Really? Andrea...don't lie to me. I saw you getting a bit sad here today." He commented. Yes, James and I had another fight in the morning. He was getting impossible with all the jealousy that was corroding him and all the despair trying to get me better and back to him. I guess James had two battles that time, to get my head straight and in good direction and bring me back to him, because I pulled away too much.

"We had another fight. He really doesn't understand me, right now. He doesn't..." I shook my head. "That hurts me, you know." Joe grabbed my hand in his and caressed it, I let him.

"He'll come to his senses Andrea." Joe told me.

"I don't know who needs to come to our senses, if me or him. We have two children, we fought so much to be together. He just doesn't understand me now..."

"How about we go for a coffee near the beach?" He offered.

"I have to wait for Tyler." I said.

"We'll be here on time. I promise." He said getting up, still holding my hand. It felt so scaring right and I let him take me by the hand. I went to the beach with Joe for a coffee.

"So your ex-wife wants Erica's custody?" I asked him sipping in my cup of coffee. That's what I loved so much in my moments with Joe, I get relaxed in short time, and there I was free of problems, of obsessions...that was all inside my house, in my infected relationship, around my friends.

"She does. I already have a lawyer, she won't win the cause, because she was a drug addict and didn't care about Erica at all." He explained.

"I know she won't, still the bother of all this. I am glad she's still too little to understand what is going on right now." Joe bent over me and grabbed my hand again.