“If nothing else, it’s not good to keep all of that anger and resentment inside of you,” Nancy said. “I know that talking to me is something, but I can tell that you want to be close to Harper. Telling her about yourself, the most intimate things that you hardly ever share with anyone, is a good way to harbor trust.”
I nodded, thinking that over.
Nancy grinned at me. “Besides, although I’m not opposed to seeing you in here every week, I think it’s time that I let you decide if you need to be in here every week. Personally, I think we could probably start going a little longer between our sessions.”
I breathed out a sigh of relief. “I’ve been waiting for you to say that,” I said. I shook my head. “This has been helpful, but I feel like I’m doing a decent job of sorting things out on my own. And with everything with the new training center, I have a feeling I’m about to get pretty busy.”
“I think you’re doing a great job,” Nancy agreed. “I’ve seen a lot of progress in you since your return. I’d still like you to come in once or twice a month. Think of it as a little checkup, just to make sure that everything’s still okay. But for the moment, I don’t think we need to worry about PTSD. You seem to be adjusting fine.”
I heaved a sigh of relief. “I’ve been waiting to hear you say that, too,” I joked. “For a while there, you had me worried.” No matter how many of them told me they suspected I had PTSD, I’d never believed them. My issues had nothing to do with the shit that I’d seen when I was on tour. It had everything to do with my earlier life, back in West Virginia. Those nightmares were what kept me up at night.
Had I seen some gruesome things in the time that I’d spent deployed on active duty? Absolutely. But I could deal with all of that. I could deal with killing people and sacking villages and whatever else we needed to do to ensure that we survived another day. I just couldn’t deal with the phantom memory of a leather belt cutting across my shoulder blades.
Fortunately, she understood it. Nancy laughed. “I just want you to promise me that if you do need someone to talk to, you’ll remember I’m here, whenever you need me,” she said.
“I’ll remember,” I said, even though I was definitely hoping I wouldn’t need her again.
Even though things were still up in the air with Harper, even though I had so many questions about Ava and who her father was, I didn’t feel like I needed these therapy sessions like I had when I first started seeing Harper again. I felt a lot more settled.
I felt happy. I liked the direction things were headed, even if this was never the life I had planned for myself. For the first time in my life, I started to feel like maybe I had found my place in the world. And I liked that.
29
Harper
I waited until Thursday before calling Ace back. I made excuses in my head. Mom was there, and I didn’t want to call Ace while she was there, even if Ava was feeling better and I wasn’t exactly dumping all of my responsibilities on her. And if Ava was contagious, I might still come down with something, and I didn’t want to pass that on to Ace.
Things were busy with work that week. I could tell my editor was trying slyly to get me back to full-time work without actually labeling it as that, but the stories were interesting, so I didn’t exactly want to fight it.
Even if it was wearing me out, trying to juggle all of my responsibilities.
But Thursday, I knew that I was just making excuses and that I had let things go for long enough. I had promised Ace that I would call him once Ava was feeling better, and I had to do that. Not only that, but I had to tell him about her.
I swallowed hard. I still couldn’t seem to be as optimistic about the outcome as Mom was. I knew part of it was that she just wanted the best for Ava and for me. If she believed in a good outcome, then it would come true.
It was also that, even though she had never met Ace, she assumed he was a good, responsible guy. After all, why else would I want to be with him? She assumed that once I told him about Ava, he would step up to the plate and be the best father there could be. After all, that’s what my dad had done when he’d found out about me.
I didn’t want to burst her bubble, but I didn’t really believe that’s what was going to happen. It wasn’t going to be all sunshine and rainbows between us.
There were two options that I could see. The first was that he would deny it, tell me that Ava couldn’t possibly be his, and say that he never wanted to see me again. The second option was that he was going to be angry I’d never told him about Ava, that he’d missed out on so many of her firsts, and then he was going to fight me for custody.
I couldn’t see a good outcome either way.
The worst part was thinking about how all of this would affect Ava. I’d tried to move slowly with Ace so that she wouldn’t get too attached to him right away. But she was already asking about “Mr. Ace” and the doggy in the vest, and I didn’t know what to say.
In option one, she would never see Ace again, and when she grew up and found out about him, she would probably be upset that he hadn’t wanted to be part of her life because I wouldn’t be able to lie about that forever. In option two, we might have to go to court and fight over her, and she was too young to understand what all of that meant.
I wanted to do what was best for Ava. For the longest time, I had thought that that meant lying to Ace about her, not letting him know the truth. But now, I was starting to think that maybe I’d been wrong about that. Only now, it was too late to do things the right way. Ace and I were too deep into this already.
My stomach was in knots while I waited for Ace to answer his phone.
“Hey!” he said brightly when he finally picked up. “How are you? How’s Ava doing?”
“Good,” I said. I cleared my throat. “We’re both good. Sorry, I know it’s been a while.”
“That’s okay,” Ace said. “I’m just glad to hear that you’re doing okay. I was starting to wonder if I was going to have to come check up on both of you.”
“It’s just been busy with work. And Mom finally left this morning,” I told him.