Rockz

As soon as I got back to my apartment I had three missed calls from Sean and one voicemail:

“Look, I’m sorry. I was just mad. Call me back; I’m sorry about how I reacted.”

I was still wiping tears from my eyes and might have yelled back at my phone after listening to his voicemail when I realized I had a call waiting.

“Hello?”

“Hey Faith!”

“Hi Anna.” I said trying to hide the fact that I was crying.

“My baby shower is coming up and I wanted to know if I should send you and Sean separate invitations.”

“Oh, uh, aren’t baby showers generally ‘no boys allowed’ type of events?”

“Yeah, but I figured if I invited some guys, Theo won’t feel so left out or bored. He’ll at least be able to watch football with Sean in the basement or something.”

“I think if you just send me the invitation for both of us, it’ll be fine.” I said trying to get off the phone as quickly as possible without Anna thinking something was wrong.

“Okay…well I’ll call you later.” Anna’s voice sounded like she knew something was up but, thankfully, she didn’t press it and let me go.

I collapsed onto my bed and continued to cry until Murphy reminded me that he was hungry and needed food immediately. I dragged myself to the kitchen and fed him before realizing I was starving. Rather than cook myself something I wanted greasy comfort food. I kept looking at my phone and decided to call Zoey.

“What’re you up to?” I asked.

“Nothing, I just got back from seeing a movie with Wesley.”

“Oh.”

“Why? What’s up.”

“Are you hungry?”

“I could eat.”

“I need to talk to someone. And shove comfort food into my mouth.”

“Okay, well, there’s this diner near my apartment.”

“Perfect.”

“I’ll come pick you up. You want to have a sleep over?”

“Yes.”

I packed an overnight bag, said goodbye to Murphy, and piled into Zoey’s car. We arrived at the diner in about 15 minutes and I ordered a pot roast platter with mashed potatoes, gravy, and dinner rolls, a side of French fries, a grilled cheese, and a piece of chocolate pie for dessert. Zoey ordered a French dip and a piece of red velvet cake. She tried to hide her shock at how much food I ordered but was still caught off guard.

“What happened?” She asked once our waitress left.

“I don’t even know anymore. Sean and I do nothing but fight and I don’t know how we got here. I feel like we do nothing but try at this relationship. Maybe we’re just not compatible?”

“What do you mean, you guys were doing really well before.”

“He’s having a hard time dealing with what happened to me that night with Kevin. I think he’s blaming me for it, Zoey. I really opened up to him tonight and he blew me off. We promised to be more communicative but he’s still SO pissed at me for the Gerry and Kevin stuff. I don’t know what to do. I really screwed things up.”

“What do you mean he blew you off?”

“I told him that I wanted to-”

Just then our food came and I waited for the waitress to leave.

“I told him that I wanted to have sex with him and he refused. He told me he didn’t want me to have another panic attack and I-”

“Wait, what?” Zoey said nearly dropping her sandwich.

I realized I hadn’t really told Zoey anything about what happened with Kevin that night or with the lawyers not to mention the whole conversation with Sean that eventually lead to us trying to have sex and my panic attack. I updated her on all of it and by the end I was crying like a baby without regard to anyone else. I’m pretty sure I saw our waitress start waking over to our table, look at me, and then decide to leave about three different times. It was the first time I actually told anyone but the police what Kevin had done to me that night.

“Oh, Faith…”

“B-but I told him that I f-felt like he was punishing me for what Kevin d-did and he just asked if we could w-w-watch the movie, that’s when I left.”

I started shoving inordinate amounts of food into my mouth while Zoey waved the waitress over.

“We’re going to need a platter of cheese fries and two strawberry milkshakes.”

The waitress looked at me before nodding and headed towards the kitchen. I looked at Zoey with thankful eyes and we ate in a comfortable, knowing silence until the waitress came back with our extra food. She cleared away the plates I had basically licked clean and refilled our drinks before we resumed our conversation.

“I just don’t know what to do Zoey. I don’t think Sean loves me anymore and I’m starting to wonder if I love him. I’m so sick of feeling like the bad guy in this relationship!”

“Do you want to be with him, Faith, is this relationship worth how you’re feeling.”

“You know, my dad basically asked me as much.”

“Well? Is it?”

“I honestly don’t know. I’m so frustrated and confused. I feel like if we could just get past all of this we would be great together, but I don’t know if Sean can get past what Kevin did to me.”

“Have you considered couples counseling?” Zoey asked as she dipped her sandwich.

“No. I thought seeing Dr. Sheehan would have been enough, but it’s obviously not.”

“Well, you’ve only had your one session with her, maybe if Sean sees your commitment to healing he’ll also be more open to healing.”

I let that sit for awhile and continued to shove food into my mouth like a starving animal.

“You don’t like him very much, do you, Zoey?” I asked taking a giant bite of dinner roll.

“It’s not that I don’t like him, I don’t like what he’s doing to you. He’s letting the insecurity he feels about your relationship to make you feel bad about everything. I don’t like that he’s doing that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s pretty obvious that Sean is an insecure guy and I think he’s probably wondering if maybe you enjoyed what happened with Kevin. Sean is easily threatened and he overreacts when he’s insecure, I think his current behavior is caused by his insecurity and since he can’t punish Kevin like he wanted to, he’s punishing you for not punishing Kevin the way Sean wanted you to.”

“You should be a psychologist.” I said starting on my pie and milkshake.

“I do what I can. I’d never charge you, if I was, just so you know.”

I giggled at Zoey’s joke.

“Are you going to call him?”

“Not tonight. I think I’ll just go over there and skip the phone call. I’m not really looking forward to it, though. We fight so much that this is a regular occurrence so I know how uncomfortable it’s going to be but I don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t need to say anything. He’s the one that needs to apologize. Having sex is going to be part of your healing process, Faith, and if Sean isn’t willing to support you or your needs while you move from being a victim to a survivor then I think you might need to think about going on a break. I mean, you’ve supported him throughout your relationship constantly, the least he could do is support you when you need him the most.”

“You’re right. You’re always right. Zoey: my rock.”

We finished dinner and then went to Zoey’s place where we watched horrible reality television and eventually went to bed at an obscene hour. She dropped me off at work this morning and I feel like I’m a little clearer about how I feel about Sean and our relationship and I’m planning on going to talk to Sean tonight after he gets done with work.