Doctor Charlotte Preston sat in her dark grey wingback chair and quietly tapped her pen against her folio papers as her client rattled on about his latest setbacks, as he saw them. She had been trying to concentrate all day with little success, Jackson was coming in for his appointment right after lunch and she could barely contain herself. Charlie flushed a deep scarlet when thoughts of Jackson entered her mind, which nowadays was all too frequently and her case load was starting to suffer. Right now she was trying and failing to discreetly keep her fidgeting to a minimum so that she didn't disturb her patient's thought flow.
Laid out on the white leather sofa to her left was one of her more daunting cases. Gabriel had been a Green Beret before suffering a complete mental breakdown out in the field when his entire battalion was gunned down. He had only lived because he had sustained a severe head wound and fallen underneath his dying brothers. However, despite the horrific situation that encompassed Gabriel's PTSD and more specifically his survivor's guilt, he was actually fully recovered in her professional opinion. But he was still uncomfortable and resistant to letting go of his time with her, constantly worried that he would have some unforeseen setback that would cause him to unravel and once again become the empty shell he had been when he had first met Dr. Preston.
Charlie looked at her watch for the hundredth time and then calmly interrupted Gabriel's monologue.
"Why don't we leave it there this week Gabriel? I would like you to continue using the led meditation tapes which we created together when you are feeling overwhelmed and keep a log for me of any flashback episodes."
"Ummm. Yes. That sounds good Doc." Gabriel answered as he sat up from his reclining position on the couch. "Same time next week?"
"Of course." Charlotte answered back, smiling at her patient's anxious face. "I'll be here with bells on."
Gabriel laughed at Charlie's joke and she ushered him out of her office. Glancing around the waiting room as she waved goodbye, Charlie noticed that Jackson had not yet arrived and she quickly masked her crestfallen look at his absence.
"I am going to run across the hallway to discuss some patients with Dr. Zimmerman, Lindsay." She said turning to face her receptionist. "I'll be right back."
Fifteen long minutes later Charlie walked back into her waiting room. Dr. Zimmerman had been particularly chatty with her today and she had no doubt in her mind that it was because he had been admiring the way her new outfit highlighted her buxom figure. She had spent way too much money on the form fitting steel grey skirt and jacket set and the crisp white silk blouse, and even more on the white lace lingerie which was hidden beneath. But she had rationalized the purchase to herself because impressing and enticing her patient Jackson Hawthorne had been Charlie's obsession for months now.
Meeting Jackson had happened as it did with all of her clients. The Veteran's Affairs office had sent him to her after he had made his way through several other doctors and had been unsuccessfully treated. He had come into her office disheveled and an obvious sufferer of PTSD, who was poorly masking his symptoms with alcoholism. Jackson had been a Marine, joining up when he had just turned eighteen. His file had indicated that he'd been in the field almost immediately from the day he had graduated and that his first few missions had been uneventful and routine. Whatever had happened to him after those first few years, the years and missions which were still secret enough that her file only held pages upon pages of blacked out type, were the ones that had caused him to become unhinged. But even on that first day she had seen something in his eyes. The real man that he was, the one he had been, buried under all his skeletons and grief.
Their first few sessions had progressed about as well as all his previous therapy had. They hadn't achieved anything. However, after Charlotte had created a led meditation recording for him and asked him to try it out, suddenly she was met by an altered person at their next meeting. According to Jackson he had completely given up drinking and he was even willing to admit that he was an alcoholic. Charlotte had encouraged his progress but had kept an extra vigilant eye on his mannerisms to ensure that he wasn't just trying to bluff his way through his therapy. But in truth, since that day she hadn't seen anything to suggest that he wasn't completely serious about therapy and about keeping away from destructive habits that only buried his problems. Every session she was met by a confident man who opened himself up to her completely, without reservation and she listened to him with rapt attention as he slowly unearthed all of his dirty laundry and insecurities.
At first, Charlie hadn't noticed that she was spending more and more time thinking about Jackson when they were not together in a therapy session. She didn't put two and two together when the night before he was scheduled to see her, she would spend extra time primping herself by waxing everything, by plucking and painting her nails. Then at the end of one of Jackson's meetings with her, as she walked him out, he had stopped, turned to her and squeezed her into a long hug. She had been startled initially by the contact with him, but as he whispered his thanks into her ear, she had begun to melt into his embrace and when she finally realized that he had stopped talking, she had awkwardly broken away from him and flushed a deep crimson with embarrassment as he proceeded out of her office and waved goodbye.
That night she had tossed and turned in her bed, not able to sleep. Having exhausted every other avenue, Charlotte had pulled out her vibrator and begun pleasuring herself. Thoughts of Jackson's hands and lips on her skin built up her lust and before long she was dripping and writhing on her bed. Then she pictured herself naked in front of him, his steely gaze drilling into her, the same look she kept just catching glimpses of in person, the one that she finally realized was driving her to distraction. It was imagining that look which broke her and as her orgasm shook her body, his face was all she could see and his name sighed from her lips.
Her utter infatuation with Jackson Hawthorne had only gotten worse since that night six months ago and despite her guilt, knowing that she was compromising her ethical standards, Charlie had continued to treat him. He had made so much progress that he really didn't need to see her anymore, and as each of his sessions ended, she grew ever more fearful that he would soon realize it and that she would never see him again. That was why she had spent a whole month's pay on her outfit for today. She wanted him to want her, she wanted to see the desire in his eyes. She needed it.
As Charlotte's quick steps crossed the waiting room, she still did not see Jackson waiting for her and decided that she could spend a few minutes in the washroom of her office fixing her hair. She was moving so fast that she barely heard her receptionist trying to speak to her as she turned the handle and opened the door to her office. Charlie crashed directly into Jackson, who was standing just inside and began to fall as she bounced off his solidly built form. Her eyes closed as her body recoiled from the impact and braced itself to hit the floor. But the floor never came and when she opened her eyes it was Jackson's smiling face that she saw, he was holding her two feet from the ground, having caught her as she had fallen backwards.
"Good afternoon Doctor Preston." He said, grinning at her.
Charlotte instinctively smiled widely back at him and then as he slowly pulled her back up to her feet and they were standing far too close for comfort, she whispered.
"Thank you, Jackson."
She had placed far too much emphasis on his name and immediately regretted it. Until she saw that his gaze had turned from playful to icy steel and still smiling he nodded to her and turned to take his seat on the couch. She shakily turned away from him and closed the door but not before giving Lindsey a dirty look. Her receptionist looked back at Charlie and mouthed the words "sorry", but Charlie was embarrassed and off kilter now, so she could only grimace at the attempted apology from her employee.
When she turned back to Jackson, she had been expecting to see him reclining in his usual manner across the couch but instead she was greeted again by his hardened gaze. She stared at him for a moment transfixed and then took her seat, crossed her legs and cleared her throat.
"How was your week?" She tried to begin as she always did, in an attempt to regain her equilibrium.
"No."
"Pardon me?" Charlotte said, misunderstanding his meaning. "I asked how your week has been since you were last here." She repeated her question to him politely.
"I understood the question Charlotte." He answered her back, his tone now matching the steely gaze in his eyes.
Charlie was genuinely perplexed now. Jackson had never spoken her first name before although she knew he was aware of it. He had always chosen to address her as Doctor Preston and she had never had him answer her before with such an authoritative and clipped tone. As she opened her mouth to ask him what exactly he meant, he cut her off.
"You can't be my doctor anymore." He said and Charlie's heart felt like it was in a death grip.
"Oh..." She blurted out, her voice cracking from the emotional swell of grief that overwhelmed her. "I am so... sorry."