“Remember, you don’t have to justify your emotions to anyone. What you feel is valid.”
“I loved Dahlia, but there was an element of caretaking,” Eric said slowly, repeating what it had taken them several sessions to parse out. “I loved Trina in a romantic sense. I fell in love with her.” The words felt heavy. Uncomfortable.
“You don’t sound as sure about that as you did the last time we discussed it.”
“I wasn’t lying.”
“I didn’t think you were.” There was a short pause. “But…”
Eric turned. Dr. Mata was smiling gently at him. The perfect calm, waiting expression.
“But I could have loved her more.”
Dr. Mata leaned back in his overly ornamental chair. “And why do you say that?”
Eric leaned back, the cold stone ridge of the deep window ledge digging into the back of his thighs. “Because I’m in love with someone, and what I feel for her is more than I ever felt for Trina.”
For the first time, Dr. Mata looked shocked. “I’m sorry, you’re what?”
Eric laughed. “I’m in love. And it’s…” He had to pause and find a way to put the roiling, wild mass of his feelings into words. “If the spectrum of romantic love were beverages?—”
“Beverages?” Dr. Mata smiled with genuine amusement.
“Beverages.” Eric held up one hand. “What I felt for Dahlia was a cup of coffee. A good cup of coffee. Comfortable. Warm.” He held up his other hand, palms facing one another. “What I felt for Trina was whiskey. Smooth and a little exciting. And after a while, you really feel the heat of it in your gut.”
“And the person you’re currently in love with, where are they on the spectrum?”
Eric took two steps to the right, far past the end of the imaginary spectrum. “Over here. Loving her is like drinking Ayahuasca.”
Dr. Mata blinked. “The psychoactive traditional medicine from South America that contains the serotonergic hallucinogen DMT?”
“Yeah.” Eric dropped back into his chair. “That’s Nikolett.”
CHAPTER FOUR
“Why do you love him?”
Nikolett groaned. “Don’t ask me that.”
“Just answer the question.”
Rather than answer, Nikolett stuck the end of her straw into her mouth and took a long sip, the dry white wine crisp and cool.
It was heathen behavior to drink wine through a straw, but she was past caring.
Nikolett was lying on the low couch, her bad leg propped up on the low, wide back to keep it elevated. After a day spent mostly sitting, having it up like this was blissful. However the position made it hard to eat or drink. Nyx had called down for an insulated tumbler and a long straw. Nikolett’s lid-capped tumbler of wine—which had been refilled several times, as new bottles kept magically appearing in Nyx’s hand—was sitting on a stack of books near her head, the end of the bendy straw never far from her lips.
Nyx was lounging in a chair across from her, a wineglass dangling from one hand, a bowl of cashews propped on her tits.
“Give me one,” Nikolett demanded, holding out her hand for a nut.
“Answer the question first.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Why?”
“Because if I talk about him, I might scream. Or cry. Or both.”
