She glanced down at her notepad for a quick second. “Something easy; your daddy issues?”
Daddy issues?
I’m the last person to have daddy issues.
“Oookay.” I dragged out between amused laughter. “This is going to be a quick session because I don’t have daddy issues.”
Andrea pushed a few loose locs out of her face before grinning from ear to ear. “My apologies. I will rephrase that because no woman should be labeled because of her attachment needs.” Attachment needs. Was she serious right now?
“When a child is born they need a dependable parent in their lives to feel secure. By not having a parent in their lives it’s quite normal for that child to grow up having insecure relationships and behaviors. Sometimes leading to attachment that can be classified unhealthy.”
I had no rebuttal this time. I’ve always said that the way I loved Amell was unhealthy. “Well, I can agree with you, Andrea. My heart has been Amell’s since I was sixteen years old. Never thought I’d classify my love to result from daddy issues but if you say so.” I shrugged my shoulders, not sure what she expected me to say.
“What would you like to talk about today?” She placed her chin on the palm of hand as she leaned forward.
“We can talk about anything but my mother and the miscarriage. Those two are off limits.” Those were the hardest things for me to talk about because I had yet to properly grieve. I barely shed tears for my mother and thinking of how I miscarried, I refused to go back down that dark road.
“You haven’t mourned them.” She wrote notes down on her pad. “Today I’ll let you off the hook but before the month is out we will come back to them.” “Fine,” I sighed in annoyance.
“What’s bothering you? I sense that you’re annoyed and agitated. Have I or someone here done something to make you feel uncomfortable?” “I’m annoyed because I no longer want to be here.”
Hearing her giggle made me smile a little. “Oh, I know you don’t want to be here. See, I listen. I listen to everything and while you and I had several conversations prior to you coming here, I read between the lines. I have a gift of discernment. When you explained how you formed your plan to get Amell out of prison I paid close attention to the words in the sound of your voice. The pain. The anguish. The embarrassment. Part of you wants to indeed come here to fight for your marriage but the other half wanted to cause him shame. Make him hurt.” Whew.
I shifted on the couch and averted my attention around her office. “Hehe…he took away my peace. He shattered my dreams. He made me stop believing in fairytales.”
“And you wanted him to suffer. Amell and I have talked a few hours every day for the last month. Trust me, I know he’s a strong alpha male that does not like being told what to do, what to think, nor does he like people questioning his mental stability.”
“Amell took from me so I took from him.”
“And what exactly did he take?” Her persistence was becoming annoying.
“I said it already. It’s been almost three years since that dreadful day. Do you know what it feels like to walk again after having your legs broken? No, right? Me either, but that’s about as close as I can explain the level of grief this man caused me. I don’t blame him for my parent’s death. Never even crossed my mind. What I blame him for is not including me. Amell never, ever considers my feelings and what I want. Do you know that our first date was at Walmart?” I laughed, wiping my eyes.
“We were barely there for two hours but I had so much fun because we were out in the open. People could see us. People could witness our love. Granted when we do spend time together, he’s presents. Like physically there in tuned with me, but it has always felt like we were missing something. It’s like he did the bare minimum and I allowed it.” I allowed it because I loved him.
“I can’t imagine what it’s like loving such an enigma of a man. My husband is all I know and to me he’s super complex. If you let him tell it, I’m the complex one because of my hindrances, but we compromise. Do you feel that Amell compromised when it came to loving you?” Gosh. Her and these deep ass questions.
I sighed, rubbing my eyes. “Yes and no. No one knew about us for years and even when I did confide in some he controlled who it was so I wouldn’t tell the wrong person. Noelani is only my best friend because of Amell. He wanted eyes on me, so he gave me a friend that I’d connect with. To be honest I can’t even say if her and I are truly friends or if she tolerates me because of him.” Another puzzle I had to figure out how to piece together.
I loved Noelani. Loved my godson Cashton. After knowing that she came into my life because of Amell I started to question everything. Part of me knew that she and I had a genuine bond but it was hard to not think otherwise when everything hit the fan.
Andrea stood and smoothed out her white capri pants. She began walking and talking. “Your parents are gone. Your relationship with your best friend is in the ruins. Your husband wanted a divorce and you lost your child. Everyone you had or have in your life is connected to him and once that ended, you were left alone. Him wanting a divorce showed how much emptiness drifted in your life. That hurt you. Reminded you of the control your father had over your life for so long, even into your adulthood. You began to blame him for the life you lived.
You started blaming him for being the reason you fell in love with a man like him. Started to resent your mother, again, for allowing her curse of letting a man be her world get passed onto the next generation…you. Outside of your father, the guards, raising Amell’s brothers, your mother had no one. Just like you.” She paused, glanced over at me and smiled. “Have you heard of the five stages of grief? You’re in the fourth stage depression.”
Beau had said the same thing last year. He said that I was going through the five stages of grief. Denial came first and I lived there for almost a year after Amell got sentenced. There was no way in the world that he came to me in the middle of the night nine years ago to ask for my hand in marriage and now he wanted a divorce. Living through that denial, my life felt so surreal. Then anger happened and that’s when I started figuring out his master plan that sucked, by the way. I sat in my thoughts, wrote down things that mattered. Formed my plan and executed it without so much as shedding one tear.
Stage three had been there since my denial and it came in the form of Beauregard Humphrey. I told myself that I could be friends with this man. That I could be around him and not fall in love. He gave me recollection that I hadn’t lost my damn mind. That I still had the capability to love if I played it safe. Instead of drinking myself to sleep like I did in the beginning, attaching myself to him became my aid of substance.
Then, as time went one after I cracked Amell’s codes for release, I waited. Waited for him to come for me. My father had been murdered and he was still allowing himself to wallow behind those prison bars all because he got into his own head. I concluded then that I had to do something to save him from himself.
Now here I was depressed but smiling like life was great.
“My vision board spoke different than the life I live. Everything is different except my professional achievements. At least I kept that within my grasps. My goal was to be married at twenty-six and have my first child no later than thirty.” I shook my head with tears streaming down my face. “I waited and waited for him to propose to me. No other man could even get me to entertain them on a serious level because I was so smitten. Amell only asked me to marry him because he was afraid.” My body began to tremble, my heart felt so damn heavy.