I nod, not trusting myself to speak. My eyes burn with tears I refuse to let fall.
"Thank you for sharing this with me, Nate." She leans forward slightly. "I know that wasn't easy."
The gratitude in her voice catches me off guard. Like I've given her something valuable instead of dumping my tragic backstory in her lap.
"Yeah, well." I clear my throat. "Now you know why I'm such a fuck-up."
"I don't see a fuck-up." Her eyes hold mine. "I see someone who survived something terrible and did the best he could with the tools he had."
For a moment, the silence stretches between us, heavy with what I've just revealed. I feel like I've peeled back my skin and shown Elena the broken parts underneath.
"So…" I clear my throat. "Now that you know my tragic story, what's the diagnosis, Doc? Am I fixable or should we just cut our losses?"
Elena doesn't rise to the bait. "There's nothing to fix, Nate. You're not broken."
"Could've fooled me." I lean forward, elbows on my knees. "What about you?"
"What about me?" Her brow furrows slightly.
"What's your story?" I hold her gaze. "You know my deepest, darkest secret now. What's yours?"
She shifts slightly in her chair. "This session is about you, not me."
"Right." I can't keep the edge from my voice. "But we crossed those lines a while ago, didn't we? In your car. In your hotel room. On your desk."
Her cheeks flush, but her voice remains steady. "That was a mistake."
"Was it?" I press. "Because it didn't feel like a mistake to me. It felt real."
She places her pen down carefully on her notepad. "Nate?—"
"Just tell me something true, Elena." My voice drops lower. "Not as my therapist. As the woman who can't keep her hands off me when we're alone. What is this between us? Does it mean anything at all to you?"
"We can’t talk about this here." Her voice is tight.
I run a hand through my hair. "But I just told you the worst thing I've ever done. The thing that broke me. Don't I deserve some honesty in return?"
Something flickers across her face—conflict, uncertainty. "It's complicated."
"That's not an answer."
"What do you want me to say, Nate?" There's a slight tremor in her voice now. "That I've compromised my ethics and a career I’ve worked so hard for? That I can't stop thinking about you even though I know better?"
Hope flares in me. "Is that true?"
She looks away. "We can't do this."
"Why not?" I stand, restless energy propelling me to my feet. "Because of your dad? Because of your job? Or because you're scared?"
Her eyes snap back to mine. "That's not fair."
"None of this is fair." I pace the small office. "I can't get you out of my head, Elena. I walk around feeling like I'm half-awake until I see you, and then suddenly everything's in focus. That has to mean something."
"It means we're attracted to each other." Her voice is measured, controlled. "It means we have chemistry. It doesn't mean we should act on it again. We never should have acted on it in the first place."
"But we already have." I stop in front of her. "Multiple times."
"And it was a mistake. Each time." She stands too, looking up at me, crossing her arms across her chest. "We need to maintain professional boundaries."
