Love Therapy (Stanton Falls #2) (3 page)

Donna was surprised and
confused.  She took the folder from him, opening the contract from the
company to the offices there.  She covered her mouth.
 
The numbers were shocking.

“M-me?  On top of
my pay.  Oh my goodness. Is this right?”

“Of course.
 Standard industry rates.  We actually gave them a small hometown
discount.”

“I don’t really know
what to say.”

“All you’ve got to say
is that you will do it.   It’s a great opportunity for you, and the
other doctors and I already have a full patient listing and aren’t even
accepting new patients.  You showed up right on time to allow us to keep
meeting the needs we are getting in this small town.  Is there some reason
you
wouldn’t
want to take this position?”

“It’s not that I don’t
want to sir but I’m just worried that they might be expecting a little more
than I have to offer currently.  I don’t even have my doctorate yet.
 I figured that it would take a few years before I ever even got an
opportunity like this.  I’m just a counselor, not a full psychologist like
you.”

“Donna, that’s not a
cause for concern.  First of all, I’m sure you know that not all companies
actually want to pay the fee for a doctor.  That fee you see there would
be almost doubled if they had to get me to do it.   A counselor is
actually what they want.  Secondly, you are supremely talented, as I said
before.  What you lack in years of experience, you gain in intuition and
basic know how.  And in a year or two, you will have all that experience
that you are so concerned about being lacking in.  Besides, clinical
experience is overrated for people like you.  You have a natural talent
for understanding people.”

“Well when you put it
like that, how can I possibly say no?”

“Which is exactly why I
said it like that.  So, I am assuming that I can go ahead and let them
know that I’ve got the perfect person for the job?”

Donna was thrilled at
the prospect and could hardly contain how pleased she was.  It was going
to be the start of something really great for her.  

“I would like to gladly
accept, and thank you so much doctor.  You won’t be disappointed in your
decision.”

“Oh I’m sure of that.
 Unless, of course, they try to hire you away from me full time.
 Then I might regret it a little bit.”

“No worries there.
 I love my patients and couldn’t see not working with some of the people I
help here already.”

“Great.  Then all
that is left for me to do is to go ahead and let them know when to expect you.
 I anticipated your acceptance and spoke with Cindy already to have her
start clearing your appointments on Mondays and Fridays which happen to be your
lighter days here.  You may have noticed that schedule is a little light
this week.”

Donna nodded yes,
surprised that he had already assumed she would say yes.  Then again, what
valid reason could she really have found to say no?  

“They have been waiting
on someone for about two months now so they want you as soon as possible.
 I would like to let them know that you can start next Monday.  Is
that going to be feasible for you?”

It was a quick change
but she was excited.  

“Most certainly sir.
 I look forward to getting started as soon as possible.”

“Alright then I’ll have
Cindy get everything else finalized with them.  Congratulations Donna, you
deserve this and you are going to do great.”

Donna looked at his
clock on the desk before standing up from her chair.  They had been
talking so long that she had another appointment in five minutes and she was a
stickler for being on time for everything.”

“Thank you again sir.
 I’m sorry to jump up like this but I have a session in a few minutes and
I need to look over the file from my last session.  Do you mind if I run
now?”

“Of course not.
 I’ll talk with you more about this later in the week.  Have a great
rest of your day.”

“You too sir.”

As she walked back to her office, she was astounded
at just how perfect everything in her life was going.  She didn’t know how
life could get any better than it already was for her.

“You know me Christa.
 I’m not going to let it get to my head.”

Donna walked around her
kitchen talking to her best friend through her Bluetooth headset.  She was
fixing herself a peanut butter and banana sandwich.  One of the great
things about being single without kids is that she didn’t have to put on airs
for anyone.  If she didn’t feel like cooking a big meal or ordering out,
she didn’t have to.  No one was going to scoff at her dinner that night,
and no matter how much it sounded like a kid’s meal--she loved it.
 Whenever she popped a grilled PB and banana out in public, friends would
laugh at her but she didn’t care.  She loved them, and if it was good
enough for the king of rock and roll, it was good enough for her.  

“Why not Donna?
 You are the most boring person I know.”

“Gee, thanks bestie.”

“No, I’m so serious.
 You don’t drink.  You don’t smoke.  You don’t go on dates or
anything.  In all the time I have known you, I’ve only seen you have one
semiserious boyfriend and that’s being generous.  Now you have this nice,
well-paying job with a promotion coming of all things.  Still you won’t
even buy yourself a new car.  Driving that same green beetle from years
ago and living in that tiny apartment.”  

With her sandwich
prepared, Donna placed it and a glass of milk she had poured herself on the
table and sat down.  A glance around her apartment and she disagreed with
Christa.  The apartment was not tiny at all.  It was decent in size,
not too small but certainly not something that screamed ‘I’ve got more money
than I know what to do with’.  That was due in part to not having anyone
to share it with but it had also been affected by the fact that prior to Monday’s
conversation, even if she did want something bigger she really couldn’t afford
to go overboard.   Now that she was going to be getting such a nice
addition in income she pondered upgrading her unit.  Maybe she would get
one of those corner ones they had with the attached garage and no one above or
beneath you.  Now
that
was luxury living but her apartment complex
didn’t have any like that and she was just a few months into her lease and
wasn’t about to pay the thousands that it would cost her to get out of the
lease early.  She’d just stay where she was for the time being.

The truth was that she
didn’t really want to move anywhere else anyway.  She loved where she
lived.  Her apartment fit her well enough, though she might upgrade
somethings.  Her mind flirted happily with the idea of purchasing a nice
queen size bed with one of those nice memory foam mattresses and the heating
and cooling features.  Her mother had showed her the one she recently
purchased the last time she went by to see her and it was the most comfortable
thing she had ever sat on.  

“I have been thinking
about picking up a few things here or there.”

“Good.  At least
you are living it up some, even though I would gladly take you going on a date
than I would buying a mansion, but we can’t have them all, right?
  Anyway, I gotta go Donna.  God forbid this husband of mine
have to fix a meal for himself for a change.  He’d die of starvation.”

“Alright Christa.
 Talk to you later.”

Donna hung up the phone
and placed it on the table--swapping it for her sandwich, which she took a
giant bite of.  Christa had been Donna’s best friend since high school and
knew her better than anyone except maybe her mother.  She was one of those
people Donna was really thankful for in her life.  She was always honest
with her about her faults and flaws and always had her best interest in mind
but if she didn’t let up on the find-a-boyfriend-to-complete-you thinking.
Donna didn’t know how much more of it she could take.  It’s not like Donna
had good example of love to fall back on.  

Before becoming a
counselor, she only saw a few real marriages up close and they all had issues
ranging from a horrible husband like her father to the few marriages that
seemed like they were truly happy.  It seemed like a crap shoot to her
with a one in a hundred chance of resulting in real happiness anyway.
 Fairy tales and TV show families simply didn’t exist in real life.
 Unless a person was like her mother who put love above everything based
on her values.  Those same values that resulted in she and her mother
crying for fear.  Her father had never hit them once but his verbal abuse
was just as bad.   If being constantly afraid and unsure was what she
had to look forward to in a relationship, she didn’t want any part of that.
 

Donna ran her fingers
over the top of her glass of milk as she was accustomed to doing when she was
in one of her deep conversations with herself.  She knew that she might
fall in love someday because it was human nature to desire companionship and even
though the past had hurt her, she was sensible.  She knew that her father
was an extreme case so she always kept the door open in case fate decided she
was supposed to have that.
 
But she was
never going to
find
it.  If she was going to fall in love, it was
going to have to blind side her, pin her down, and make her say “I do”.  

Christa was right
though, and Donna knew it.  She deserved to enjoy some of the fruits of
her hard work.  She finished off her food and made her way to the computer
to research all new furniture for her apartment.

***

Nick rubbed his temples
with his thumb and forefinger.  He needed to take a few minutes break so
he walked to the lounge to get a cup of coffee.  The rest of the staff had
been gone at least an hour or two but there he was, still working late into the
evening.  That’s how it had been over the past few months.  When he’d
actually started the business he had done it not as an endeavor to fail or
succeed, but more as just something to take up his time without him having to
go work for his father.  Not that he had any problem with his father or
the traditional family business and he was even pretty sure that he would end
up running it one day, but for now he didn’t want to be known as Nick Dellinger
Jr.  He wanted to have a separate identity.  His company,
specializing in marketing and financial services did just that for him as it
was the complete opposite of his father’s manual labor factory jobs.  

At first, he thought it would
be easy, and when it wasn’t, he sort of slacked off--just playing a figurehead
role.  That was until one of the people he employed had a real major life
event and the company had almost no resources set up to help them.  That
was when he realized that his company wasn’t just about an identity separate
from his father’s.  It was the rent or mortgage, grocery money, and
college education for dozens of people in the city.  He actually had a
responsibility to those people that had accepted the opportunity to work for
him.  It was more of an honor than he had imagined and he had to make sure
he honored their commitment to his company back.

He made his way back to
the office and looked around at what he and his people were building together.
 He remembered Aaron approaching him in his office when he was working
late one night almost two years ago.  That was right about when he really
started devoting more of himself to the company.  

“Yo, Nick.  Time to
check out man.”

“No can do Aaron.
 I got a lot of work to do.”

“You see, that’s
starting to really freak me out.  Since when do you stay late for work?”

“C’mon Aaron, I have
things to do.”

“I’m totally serious.
 I may sound like I’m joking with you all the time but I’m your friend and
of course I worry about you.  You cut your hair to a respectable length,
come in to work on time every day and leave after everyone else on a regular
basis now.  Not that there is anything wrong with any of that, but it’s
just so sudden that I wouldn’t be a friend if I didn’t at least ask.”

Nick was tickled at the
thought of Aaron getting all concerned about him until he noticed that his face
was completely serious.

“Wow.  You really
are serious.  Was I that bad of a slacker that me putting some serious
time into the business worries you.”

“Umm, yeah a bit at
least.  And not just me.  Your mother called me the other day to ask
if everything was ok with you.  I told her as far as I know.  She
thought maybe some woman had broken your heart so you were retreating into work.”

“Well her I understand.
 She’s always worried about me.  But you man, get real.”

“Hey, no one can say I
didn’t ask.   I mean, it’s a total three sixty.  It’s like you
are going through a reverse mid-life crisis, if there is such a thing.  Instead
of buying a motorcycle and staying up all night drinking, you are really
getting your act together.  I shudder to think what’s going to happen here
when you really start applying yourself.”

“Well, I figure it’s my
company but the people that work here have families too.  I want to do my
part for them.”

“I understand man but
make sure you don’t burn yourself out.  You gotta find a happy medium.
 Go on a date or something.”

“I’ll have time for that
once I get things in order like I really want them around here but thanks for
looking out.  I knew there was a reason I hired you on here.”

“Oh, for moral support?
 Here I was thinking it was based on my title of IT Director.”

“That too.”

“Regardless, I’m calling
it a night so I’ll see you bright and early again in the morning I’m sure.”

“Later.”

Nick had never noticed
before then how much he had changed but it was definitely for the best.
 Today was different though.  He wasn’t there late because he had a
ton of work to get done.  He was there because he wasn’t able to get his
regular workload done and that was for one reason.  

Donna.  

Her smiling image popped
up front and center in his mind.  It had been a few days since he had
crossed paths with her last and she was on his mind.  He was so caught up
in her that he found himself going by the diner some mornings around the same
time, hoping that she might show up and he would have a chance to talk to her
again.  He knew it was kind of
stalkerish
and
definitely sad but she was in his thoughts so it was tough to let her go.
 The worst part was that Aaron could tell what he was doing and told him
to just let it go because there was no reason to think she was into him like he
was with her.  She didn’t even know him.  

Easy for you to say.

That’s how Nick felt.
 Aaron and Emily were celebrating multiple years of marriage and she was
pregnant with child.  Meanwhile he hadn’t even scratched the surface of a
good relationship.  He had dated, but nothing with substance.  What
they had was substance and that was what he wanted.  He walked up to his
office window and looked out the window at his city.  Before he realized
it, he had already begun thinking how great it would be to raise a family
there.  Moreover, Donna was the one that he saw himself raising that
family with.  He realized how foolish of a thought that was and quickly
scolded himself.

A family.  The only
woman that I am remotely interested in, I don’t even know her last name.
 Check back into reality now why don’t you Nick.  

He turned from the
window and sat down, beginning to scan his remaining work for the night.
 A minute later, he had shut his computer down and was getting ready to
leave the office.  No matter how hard he tried, he kept hearing her sing
song voice in his head.

           
‘Now how
y’all
boys doing?’

He knew he wasn’t going to get another minute of work
done.  He might as well head on out and get a start on his nonexistent
weekend.  No matter what, he knew something was going to have to change.
 He was going to just have to let his hopes for ‘them’ go.  He’d do
that starting next week.