I wasn’t planning on telling Dr. Hall about Ryan again.
But the second I sat down on that couch, with Charlie the cat nosing at my shoelaces like he wanted to trip me, the words shoved their way up.
“I keep thinking about calling him,” I blurted immediately.
Dr. Hall didn’t even blink at this. She just relaxed back in her armchair, her pen resting across the top of her notebook. “Ryans?”
“Yeah,” I muttered, sinking lower into the couch. “Not that it matters. I never actually do it.”
“What stops you?”
Everything. The picture. The way my chest still felt like a cracked rib cage when I thought of him. The silence between us that had stretched too long. The fact that I hadn’t heard his voice in weeks and I hated that it hurt so much.
But what came out was, “ Because despite everything y
