My hand stops a few inches from the door handle. Hesitation… that’s a new one. Typically I’d have thrown the door open, punctual as ever, breezed past the receptionist with a wave and plonked straight into Dr. Fitzgerald’s elongated armchair. Depending on my mood, I might even strike a pose and say, “Paint me like one of your feathered girls,” which wouldn’t elicit any more than a smirk and a click of his pen. He didn’t seem to care for my sense of humor, which wasn’t surprising, but the dynamic always made it feel like there was an impenetrable barrier between us. I guess that’s just a patient-psychiatrist relationship.

So why the hesitation? The cream-colored walls and fluorescent lighting of the office hallway meld into their typical slightly nauseating ambiance soup, so the less time I spend out here, the better. Yet, I can’t quite get my fingers around that stupid lever. Am I having a stroke? I sniff the air to see if I catch a scent of burnt toast, but all I smell is disinfectant and what I assume to be a bowl of lavender corn flakes. No feeding that shit to RAYmba; he would reek of middle-aged desperation for months.

I guess I’ve just got a lot on my mind. I take a deep breath and open the door. The decor and aesthetic inside the psychiatrist’s office are a far cry from the morose hallway that connects it to the other offices in the building. Instead of the sickening ochre tone, the walls are adorned with a peaceful deep blue color scheme, accented by what appears to be oak trim. The cheap ceiling lighting is replaced with the warm glow of several ornate lamps on end tables, tied together by a singular fixture with four calming orbs of light haloed by a gently oscillating fan. You can definitely see where some of those psychiatry bucks have gone, though if anywhere should be decorated in a way that puts your mind at ease, it’d be a place like this.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Mous!” The chipper diplodocus cranes her abnormally long neck around to smile at me. Despite her… size, Susan’s voice is surprisingly dainty. I return the receptionist’s smile and make my way through the welcome room toward the second door on the left. No need for directions or waiting around. I’ve been to this rodeo enough times to know which door belongs to Dr. Fitzgerald and to know that he’s just as punctual as I am. Which means…

“Ah, good afternoon, Anon. A few minutes late, I see?” The doctor raises his stubby arm and glances from his wristwatch to me with a raised eyebrow. I know he’s not being a condescending asshole on purpose, but I’ll be damned if I’ll let this slide without at least a little shit-talk.

“Oh, come on, Doc. I’ve gotta have a little time banked up, right? We end sessions early all the time! Just last session, we were done with seven minutes to go.” I plop down on the chaise longue.

His eyebrow raises again as a smirk tugs at the side of his impressive jawline. “I suppose I can let it slide this time. I must say, though, this is a first for you. How are things today?” He takes a seat in his 'Official Chair of Officiality’ and crosses his legs, his usual notepad in one claw and impressive-looking pen in the other.

My piss-taking isn’t done yet. “Wow. Where to begin? I just can’t sleep peacefully anymore. I wake up screaming three, four times a night. I keep hearing the bullets whizzing past me. I’ve taken to wearing adult diapers to bed to avoid the clean-up when I shit myself in pure, unadulterated terror! You gotta help, Doc! … Got any stronger meds that’ll make the hurt go away?!”

Though Dr. Fitzgerald’s eyebrow remains at its heightened position, his smirk turns into a notable frown. I may have pushed the joke a bit too far. I have to remember… despite this guy being of a smaller build than our family friend Moe, his tyrannosaurus jaws could still cleanly take my head off in one swift motion. I highly doubt the situation would ever come to that. All the same, the primal part of my brain’s survival drive beckons me to flee this room. Thankfully, he merely sighs and opens his mouth without intent to dismember me but rather to speak.

“Come now, Anon. We’ve been over this before. I understand you don’t like these post-service therapy appointments. You feel that it’s a…” the psychiatrist glances at the notepad he holds in his off-hand… or rather, off-claw? “... ‘waste of time and taxpayer money,’ if my notes are correct. That being said, you understand why you were assigned these sessions as part of your discharge.”

My eyes gloss over as I turn my head away from Dr. Fitzgerald. Of course, I understand why; we’ve been over it a dozen times. I saw practically no real combat. After Basic, they shipped me to some station a relatively safe distance from any dangerous areas. I sat in a building monitoring radio chatter and putting together the odd press release for fourteen hours a day. It was boring work, but I guess they decided my big caveman brain was of more use than my spongey caveman muscle.

Four days away from being sent home and completing my service contract, some pissed-off terrorist shoots an RPG almost straight into the air from too far out for our posted watch to notice in time. The fucking thing comes straight down in the middle of the path between the mess hall and the radio station. If I had left for lunch fifteen seconds earlier, it’d be my guts plastered all over the place. Instead, only Private Weston had the privilege of giving his life in service to his country by being obliterated by a freak rocket fired by some fucking hero martyr who was promised some number of virgins in the afterlife. No clue if that piece of shit terrorist got his virgins or not. Maybe someone can ask his bullet-riddled body that’s lying face-down in that God-forsaken dirt somewhere.

I shake off my thousand-yard stare. I’ve got the physical scars to remind me how close I came to death that day and the mental scars of watching Private Weston cease existing. Both have healed well enough. I turn back to Dr. Fitzgerald. “Yeah, Doc. And I feel like we’ve exhausted that topic by now. A lot of soldiers go through a lot worse shit. That said, these chats have helped clean the viscera off my mind long after I cleaned it off my BDUs. … Sorry for the morbid humor.”

Dr. Fitzgerald waves a claw dismissively. “Don’t worry about it. Humor can be a healthy coping mechanism. I would, however, spare the grisly details around people who aren’t your psychiatrist. So, if you’re feeling well enough to move past the incident that landed you here, is there anything else you’d like to discuss? You seem like you have something on your mind.”

Can’t get anything past Sherlock Hornes here. I click my tongue against the roof of my mouth as I formulate the words. “Well… yeah, I do. But it’s not about me. Rather, it’s about my wife, Lucy…”

The psychiatrist cocks his eyebrow again, proving himself to be a real contender in an eyebrow-raise-off against Dwayne “The Stone” Johnstone. He references his notepad again. “Wife? My notes say that she was your fiance. I hadn’t realized the big day had arrived–and so soon! I would have gotten you a gift had I known.” He grins more widely than his usual mouth-corner smirk.

I wave the gesture off. "Don't sweat it, Doc. Admittedly, it was a pretty rapid-fire engagement. We stayed in touch throughout my deployment and were able to keep our relationship afloat, albeit at long distance. Because of that, marriage upon my return felt natural. Hell, most of our correspondence over the last year of my service involved planning a future together. It was a no-brainer that I’d pop the question as soon as I got home, and there was no real reason to drag our feet up to the ceremony.”

The grin remains on his face. “Well, congratulations to both of you. How was the reception? Did you get a good turnout of friends and family?”

I purse my lips and inhale through my nose a bit more sharply than I intended to. I think he picks up on it because his grin quickly fades. Give this man a fucking Deerstalker and gourd Calabash; there’s mysteries need solvin’. “That’s just it. Both the ceremony and reception were very lovely… with barely anyone in attendance. That is to say- barely anyone was invited. Her parents were there, as were mine. Her brother Naser made it, though he grumbled about having to miss a couple days of med school to make the trip. A few family friends, too, like her dad’s friend ‘Uncle’ Moe. That said… as far as weddings go, it was a barren dance floor.”

Dr. Fitzgerald shifts in his seat. “Small receptions aren’t necessarily bad, but it sounds like you think yours didn’t live up to expectations?”

“It’s not exactly that. Honestly, I’d have been fine with a certificate from a courthouse, but her parents insisted on having a proper walk down the aisle in their church, followed by a reception with way too much food for the meager turnout. It’s… complicated.”

“Complicated is what I’m here for, Anon. Please, go ahead.”

I bring a hand to the side of my head. I’m unsure if I should be airing Lucy’s dirty laundry to my psychiatrist, but I’ve already uncorked this bottle. “Me not having many folks to invite is somewhat understandable, what with not being in the damn country and all. I only met one other guy on my deployment from even remotely near Volcaldera Bluffs, and he was a douchebag so I wasn’t about to invite him. But Lucy… she’s been here her whole life and had nobody to invite–save her family.”

Dr. Fitzgerald glances at his notepad once more. “You mentioned before that you and Lucy met in high school during your Senior year. Did she have trouble making friends then, too?”

“Well, yes… but also, no. She wasn’t exactly a social butterfly and definitely had a sharp edge to her which limited her approachability… but she had friends. Unfortunately, near the end of our final semester, shit went wrong in a catastrophic way. I won’t bore you with the gory details; pretty much nobody made the right maneuvers leading up to or on our prom night… not even me. That incident cost her, and by proxy me, all of our friends.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. And based on what you said, Lucy didn’t make any new friends while you were away?”

I let out another sigh. “As far as I know, no. She’s mentioned a coworker or two from her church’s daycare. Never invited anyone over for dinner, though.”

The tyrannosaurus uncrosses his legs and crosses them again in the other direction. It’s an impressive feat for how fuck-huge his stompers are, but he pulls it off with relative grace. It also clues me in that we’re getting close to time–it seems his leg starts to get uncomfortable around the same point each session. Guess he’s not the only detective here. He speaks up again after his posture adjustment. “Do you think she wants to make friends?”

“I mean, I think so? She doesn’t bring it up, yet I can’t help but notice a sad look in her eyes when we’re out and about and she sees social circles of more than just husband and wife enjoying themselves. I know she’s happy with me… I just don’t think it’s healthy for me to be her only friend, is it?”

“Not generally, no. It’s very healthy and, in fact, important for partners to be friends with one another, but rarely is it enough for someone to have no other friends besides their partner.”

I get the feeling that he would have continued to speak had I not chosen this moment to butt in. Too late now. I bumble over my words, trying to get the sentiment out of my brain. “Right… and, like, I love her and all–don’t get me wrong, I love her with all my heart. But… fuck, man. I feel like she’s codependent or something. I love her, and I always want to be there for her, but… if something happened to me, she’d have nobody. Her parents won’t be around forever, and her brother’s off at med school. Once he’s done there, who knows where he’ll be settling down? She could end up entirely alone.”

My tear ducts start to twitch. What the fuck is this? I don’t cry. Men don’t cry. I didn’t even cry when talking about Private Weston getting turned inside out. Dr. Fitzgerald seems to understand my frustration and wordlessly hands me a box of tissues. No wellsprings break loose, only a slight moistness of my eyes and a dribble out of my nose. I grab a tissue, give a quick blow, and discard the evidence of my bitch boy behavior.

I take a deep breath to recompose. “I promised myself a long time ago that I wouldn’t try to be a savior to anyone. I’m not a superhero, nor am I Raptor Jesus. I’m a support class. I give everything I have to help those closest to me, but I can’t solve their problems for them. I can only do my best to help them solve their problems themselves. That being said… when it comes to Lucy, I don’t know what to do. I can only nudge and prod so much. I’ve brought up reconnecting with some old friends a few times, but there’s always an excuse or a barrier that prevents anything from getting into motion. I know she wants things to be different… I just don’t know if SHE knows that she wants things to be different. You know?”

Responding to my merciless butchering of the English language, Dr. Fitzgerald uncrosses his legs. It’s the universal sign that we’re on the home stretch for time. “Your situation is not an easy one, nor is it one for which I can offer a perfect remedy. You are right that you cannot solve the problems of others, but I’m a firm believer that there is always more that you can do to work toward a good outcome. Don’t give up simply because you’ve bumped into a few hurdles, but also, don’t assume that you unquestioningly know what’s best for Lucy. She is her own person, and unfortunately, she’s not in the room with us so we can’t ask her opinion on this. I would be happy to offer my services-”

I cut him off. “I… highly doubt that’s gonna happen. She’s already not terribly happy that I have to attend these sessions and leave her on her lonesome every Wednesday afternoon, and I’m pretty sure the suggestion of therapy for her would crack open a whole new bucket of pissed-off worms.”

He sighs. “All the same. My door is always open to her should she wish to attend a session with you. I don’t technically do couples therapy, but perhaps I could still be of some help. Barring that, I strongly suggest you talk to her about this. Clearly, the issue is weighing on your mind, and it might be weighing on hers as well. Having a serious discussion about your concerns is the first step.”

I take a moment to compose my thoughts as Dr. Fitzgerald scribbles some more notes in his notepad. I’m honestly amazed that his stubby arms can reach one another to perform this feat. Before I can speak up again, he decisively clicks his pen. “I’m afraid that’s all the time we have for today’s session. No minutes to bank today; we’re right against the clock.”

I chuckle, pleased that he’s finally reciprocated one of my corny jokes. “Damn! How am I gonna save up enough time for a trip to Dipley World?!”

He smiles, and I swear I hear him exhale a little more than usual from his nostrils. Was that a near-laugh I detected? “Ah, before I forget… A refill for your prescription.” He hastily lumbers over to his desk, retrieving a small pad of official-looking pieces of paper. He scribbles a few runes onto it, an ancient language only decipherable by pharmacists and witchdoctors. “How have the meds been treating you? Did you say something about them not being strong enough earlier?”

I shrug. “That was a joke; they’re just fine.” I don’t reveal to him that I haven’t been taking the pills since about two days after my first prescription was filled. The only effect they had was to make me feel sleepy and stupid. I’m not a fan of the medicated life, but I’m not about to tell the good doctor something that might prevent Uncle Sam from dishing out a few more dollars on my behalf. Who knows? Maybe I’ll have a hell of a migraine someday and pop a couple of loopy pills to get a bit of rest. I might even consider selling them to some high schoolers. I doubt they’re as potent as carfentanyl, but they could do some work. Reed did say he could use a business partner all those years ago…

The swift tear of paper from pad brings me back to reality and wipes the dopey, nostalgic look off of my face. I hoist myself up from the pseudo-couch as Dr. Fitzgerald extends his stubby arm to its maximum length, prescription in hand. I still have to reach a bit further than natural to avoid getting too close to his tremendous head. As I retrieve the form, he bids farewell. “As always, it’s a pleasure to speak to you, Anon. We only have two ordered sessions remaining. However-”

“Yeah, yeah, you’d love to keep seeing me after the taxpayer money dries up so you can start fleecing my pockets. I’m onto you, you con artist.” I begin to head towards the door. Before I reach it, I turn back. “... Thanks for listening, Doc. I’m a bit embarrassed that today was harder than talking about all that gruesomeness from overseas.”

He smiles again, even more warmly than normal. “You obviously love your wife very much, and your concern for her is apparent. I know you’ll be able to work things out for the better–for the both of you. See you in a couple weeks, Anon.”

I return the smile. “You got it, Doc.”