Her expression softens further.
“That’s important,” she says. “Your body responded when you weren’t under scrutiny. When you felt safe.”
I snort. “My penis needs a very specific emotional environment.”
She smiles. “Your body needs what you need.”
I roll that around in my head. “So you’re saying this isn’t a fluke.”
“I’m saying it’s information,” she replies. “And quite encouraging information.”
I glance up. “Encouraging how?”
“Well,” she says carefully, “it suggests that something in your life has shifted. Less pressure. More ease. You’re not bracing yourself in the same way.”
I think about Christa. The way she doesn’t watch me like she’s waiting for something to go wrong. The way shelaughs at me instead of through me. The way being near her feels like exhaling.
“That someone you were thinking about,” Pee-Pee continues, “how do you feel when you’re with them?”
I open my mouth. Close it again.Goldfish mode activated.
“Calm,” I say eventually. “Grounded. Like I don’t have to beon.”
She nods, pleased. “That’s not nothing, Geoff.”
“No,” I admit. “It’s… new.”
“And do you think,” she asks gently, “that perhaps your body is responding to the fact that you’re starting to feel emotionally settled?”
I rub a hand over my face. “You make it sound very sensible.”
“It is,” she says. “Arousal isn’t just physical. It’s relational. Contextual. When your nervous system feels safe, your body follows.”
I sit quietly for a moment.
“And if,” she adds, “this person happens to be someone you care about more than you’ve admitted so far, that would make sense too.”
I huff out a laugh, low and nervous. “We’re just friends.”
She raises an eyebrow. Not accusing. Curious.
“Are you?”
I don’t answer straight away.
The room is quiet in that deliberate way therapy rooms are, like even the furniture knows better than to interrupt. Pee-Pee doesn’t rush me. She doesn’t fill the silence. She just waits, hands folded loosely in her lap, expression open.
I rub my thumb along the seam of the chair.
“It’s Christa,” I say.
The words come out calm. No fanfare. No flinch. Like they’ve been waiting their turn.
Pee-Pee’s mouth curves into a small, knowing grin.
“Thank you for saying that,” she says. Notwell done. Notfinally. Just… thank you.
I huff out a breath I didn’t realise I was holding. “There it is.”
