Healing, we learned, was not a smooth ascent. It was a jagged path through a minefield, and we were still learning where the bombs were buried.
A month into therapy, we managed an actual date night. A movie. A comedy. It felt like a dare, a test of our new, fragile normal. We sat in the dark theater, a shared bucket of popcorn between us like a peace offering. For the first hour, it worked. We laughed at the same dumb jokes. Our shoulders brushed in the dark, and it didn't feel like a violation. Then came the love scene.
It wasn't even particularly graphic. Just a slow, passionate kiss between the lead characters against a rain-streaked window, the camera close on their faces, full of tender hunger. A standard Hollywood moment.
I felt Leo go rigid beside me. A complete, total freeze. My
