37. Thompson, Motif-Index of Folk-Literature, Type X905.4, The liar: “I have no time to lie today”; lies nevertheless.
38. Thompson, Motif-Index of Folk-Literature, Type C411.1, Taboo: Asking for reason of an unusual action.
You tell her she has to go to therapy or else you’re going to leave her. Sullen, she agrees.
She does go, for a while. The first morning, you make her coffee and breakfast, so that she’s ready to head out into the world. You feel like a mother on her child’s first day of school. You sit there in your underwear and robe, contemplating the winter morning from the plate-glass window in her kitchen.
She returns in a cheery mood, holding a second coffee; her nose and the tops of her ears blushing with winter.
“What did the therapist say?” you ask. “I know I shouldn’t be asking, I just think—”
“We’re still getting to know each other,” she says. “It’s too early to say.”
Things get better for a little bit. They really do. She is attentive, kind, patient. She brings you treats—little foods, dips and things, your favorite—and leaves them for you to find when you wake up. A few weeks later, she tells you over the phone that she’s not going to continue therapy. “It’s too much time,” she says. “I’m really fucking busy.”
“It’s one hour a week,” you say, gutted.
“Besides, he says I’m totally fine,” she says. “He says I don’t need therapy.”37
“You threw things at me,” you say. “You chased me. You destroyed everything around me. You have no memory of any of it. Doesn’t that alarm you?”38
She is silent. Then she says, “I’ve got lots of things to do. You don’t understand how hard I work.”
You remember your promise, to leave her if she doesn’t get help. But you don’t push the issue. You will never talk about it ever again.