Therapy

The waiting room is small, functional yet intimate, a quiet and respectful place with a handful of seats set around three of the walls.

You take a seat and glance at the clock on the wall, there's 5 minutes until your appointment.

With a deliberate, slow, deep breath you check in on your heart, feeling her familiar race and willing her to be calm, she's safe here, the anxiety of being on time is behind us now.

With a slow exhale you sense her pulse soothing, slowing with your assurance, yet remaining defiant, the anxiety of getting here giving way to the apprehension of arriving, and waiting.

Glancing around the room you remind yourself of the familiar details. In one corner there's a small alcove with a complimentary water cooler and coffee urn, set up. In the other two corners, a small coffee table for each, a scattering of magazines, a small box of tissues.

You catch yourself instinctively thinking to reach for one of the magazines and flip through its glossy pages to pass the time. But you stop yourself, recognizing your own nervous energy and reminding yourself it's only a few minutes. You close your eyes and again will your heart to be still.

~ Part II ~

The road is long, hard and dry. Her twin yellow lines, split down her centre, stretching to infinity.

The land is flat, wide, and uncluttered. There's no sign of civilization out here, no sign of a home or a cabin, any clues to finding even the smallest of towns, remain hidden beyond the horizon, any memory of a city is long gone.

My motorcycle thrums between my thighs. I squeeze her frame beneath the scoop of her wide black fuel tank and push my weight down through my legs, pressing my boots down into her pegs, flexing and relaxing my muscled buttocks, keeping the blood flowing, essential to fighting the fatigue of all day riding.

I glance down at the dials, rev counter and speed, a steady 80 miles per hour at 4,000 Revolutions Per Minute. This bike is bullet proof, the arid heat doesn't faze her.

The odometer reads 75 miles. She's good for 150 before her fuel light will come on. I look back up, staring down both barrels of this long black road, stretching out into the nothing of Nebraska.

It's been four hours on the road, an hour since the last fuel stop, and at this pace I have to stop every couple of hours, less if a gas station presents itself sooner, because I'm not willing to risk running dry in the distance between the last stop and the next.

~ Part III ~

You hear the latch, the turning handle, the base of the waiting room door brushing the carpet as it swings open. Your heart skips, it could be for me?

Inside, your lifted spirits sink a little as a stranger walks in, nervously glancing at you, too polite to ignore you, but too self conscious to be more gracious. A social etiquette dilemma, ever so British, as two strangers now sit in a shared silence, waiting to see their respective therapists.

The waiting room door swings open again, you both glance in the direction of the doorway, you're more cautious, and then relieved, seeing the familiar smile of your therapist.

"Ready?" he asks with a warmth and confidence that quickly begins to put you at ease.

You gather your coat and bag and head out through the open door, turning immediately right and toward the open door of your therapist's office.

His door open, revealing the interior, allowing you to easily recall the setting, welcome and familiar, reassuringly unchanged since your last visit.

The soft couch, finished in a dark tobacco leather, cracked and worn, and so comfortable. And across the open room, a single deep armchair, where your therapist waits to sit.

You set down your bag and coat, before laying back on the couch, looking up into the wide white ceiling and losing yourself in the void, for just a millisecond.

Glancing over to the door, you watch your therapist gently closing the door, his name etched in bold, black letters, of Times New Roman, set into the brass plaque: Dr. Guy Fox.

"So, how have you been?" He asks, kindly, still smiling, settling himself back into his armchair and allowing you all the time you need to centre yourself.

"Oh, it's been mental as ever."

"How so?"

"Well, that job I took turned into a nightmare, the management were awful, under trained, incapable of support and with ridiculous expectations that became demands, literally shouting and being abusive. Unbelievable."

"Are you there now?"

"No. No, I had to say no, my health is worth more."

"I'd have to agree."

He leaves you space, not expecting you to say more, but he also leaves the door open, so to speak, should you want to continue.

"I just got back from Dubai" you offer, shifting the conversation from how have you been, to what have you been up to?

You notice him making a note, his open A4 pad resting on the upper thigh and knee of his crossed legs.

You imagine him writing Dubai, and suspect him of wondering if he should charge you more for these sessions. But in truth he's written, denial, his shorthand for you choosing to change the subject.

"How was that?" he asks, his warmth and sincerity undented.

And in a slightly anxious panic you fluster to convey how it was sort of paid for, or mostly free, because you have a friend in the airline business, Virgin in fact, and well, when you get these crazy opportunities you can hardly pass them up, can you? After all you only live once.

"Sure" he soothes, nodding and listening while glancing back through his notes to remind himself of observations made from earlier sessions. "So, how does it feel to be back home?"

Home. The word catches in your mind, and sticks. Home. What is that? Where is that? England? Not now the girls are grown and moved on. Europe? It was once, but what's left? America?

He watches you, his kind hazel eyes reading you, but he doesn't speak, he only smiles and waits gently for you to settle and relax.

~ Part IV ~

My eyes squint, stretching to the limit of the horizon. Reading nothing. I lift my focus a few inches above the horizontal line of flat land, reading the cloudscape that smatters the enormous canvas of blue that fills the vast dome of my perception.

I'm looking for clues, signs of a storm or some other hazard. Nothing. I take a moment to look deeply into the small circular rearview mirrors, each extending either side of my handle bars.

I see the road reaching relentlessly back behind me. Her long black surface reminding me of the sheer finish of your stockings.

Catching the memory of you, my eyes return to the road ahead, my mind drifting, set free, I begin to play with my memory, rummaging through an archive of erotica and recalling moments of our deep connection.

Looking down, the road whipping away under my front wheel, my hands relaxing their grip beneath the thin armor of their leather gloves, the outdoor air feels clean.

Reminding me of your hair, flowing, recalling the squeeze of your thighs around my hips, riding with me into the who knows where.

This open road, peeling away, like layers of our past, bringing you into my present and molding you to me, we move as one through a forest of fantasies, a library of confessions, all as yet unwritten.

~ Part V ~

"Might I suggest a guided meditation" your therapist offers, his warm hazel eyes gesturing for you to relax further, to lay back on the soft leather couch and allow his words to wash over you.

You lean forward, reaching down with your hands, unhooking your shoes, before bringing your feet up onto the couch, turning to lay back, closing your eyes, and listening for his voice.

He dims the light to a soft and mellow twilight, his words carefully chosen, drawing your attention to the tensions in your forehead, around your eyes, and in your jaw, neck and shoulders.

Slowly his confident voice, deep and direct, works its way down your whole body, each instruction taking the requisite time to untie one knot, and then another. Until finally you feel mentally massaged, a motionless marionette, entirely unstrung.

Your breathing has reached a rhythm, a state of hypnosis, open to subliminal suggestion, where neural linguistic programming could easily and effectively be applied.

"What can you feel?" he coaxes you gently.

"Softness" you answer, as if talking in your sleep.

"Like the moss in the forest?"

He observes your brow crinkling, just a little, enough to reveal to him an expression of confusion.

"What can you hear?" He soothes, shifting his line of inquiry.

"Waves, gentle and calm"

"And what can you see?

"Hmm, the sun is low, and yet the air is warm. My skin is smooth, sun kissed, bronze-brown. My bones feel supple, filled with the heat of a long and lazy day."

"Are you alone?"

"No. He's here. He's gathering drift wood. He's dug a fire pit in the sand. The fire is lit, and he's gathering more fuel, before the light fades and the air cools."

"Anyone else?"

"No. just us. This island is ours.

"Have you been here before?"

"Yes, many times."

"What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking I'd like to take a swim, one last one before the sun touches down onto the horizon."

"That sounds lovely, could you describe how it feels?"

"The sand is soft, dry and hot, the heat stings my bare feet as I step toward the water. But now the sands are cooler, where the waves have reached up over the sugar smooth grains. They're glistening in the light, ground crystals shimmering like glitter."

"These soggier sands indent beneath my footsteps, leaving a trapper's trail behind me. The tide foams and fizzes as it finds my toes. The shallow water, as warm as a bath."

"The water feels so good, covering my feet and climbing my calves. The sunlight is softening, sinking between white clouds, so distant on the horizon, and tinged with pink and gold."

"The shallow waves are lapping, so intimate and gentle, their sound as soothing as their touch. They're swelling around my thighs, my hands dangle down beside me, the warm water dragging at my wrists, as the tide slips in and out between my legs and stretches out over the soft swathes of rippled sand sinking beneath my feet."

"Another step and the next wave washes up over my hips, circling my waist with warm water, and suggesting I could soon allow my legs to just let go, and leave my body to float on the tide."

"My knees give, and the welcome warm water lifts me, I let myself fall into her and she carries me."

"I turn my back on the soon to be setting sun, turning my attention further up the beach to where I can see him finishing his gallant, gathering efforts, having built a supply of drift wood, sufficient for the night."

"Does he know you're watching him?" Your doctor asks.

"He does."

"And what do you want him to do?" He invites you to wonder.

"I want him to come into the water with me."

"So, what's he doing now?" He asks,

"He's looking straight at me. And at my back I can feel the sun about to touch the Ocean's horizon behind me. The light is changing. In this light he as if he's cloaked in a halo of gold."

"He's unbuttoning his white linen shirt. Laying it over the wood he's collected. And now he's slipping his shorts down over his thighs."

"He's naked?" Your doctor asks.

"Yes. And he's walking toward the water, walking toward me. His eyes are fixed on mine. Where only my head and shoulders remain above the water."

"But my eyes are absorbing him whole, taking in his hair, his shoulders, thighs and feet, and I can't deny my insides are blushing with the daring hang of his heavy."

"Is the thought of him naked in the water turning you on?"

"Yes."

~ Part VI ~

The road reaches on into the distance, a dividing line, splitting this wild isolation into two halves.

Far away, I focus my line of sight toward the wide, horizontal fold, an imagined crease where I play with the notion of a paper earth, once folded, and now flattened, against an origami sky.

The relentless straight of the tarmac, reaching out to a vanishing point, the pulse of the central yellow line whipped underneath the constant revolution of my front wheel.

The beauty of it all is in the nothing. And the nothing doesn't hide out here. There's no one out here. It's just me, the bike, the road and the sky.

I haven't passed a car or truck since I left the last gas station. I haven't come up on anyone either. I check my mirrors, and they remain empty.

The freedom of this nothing allows me one of my most guilty pleasures. For out here I can cast the hook of my imagination out into a lake of possibilities and wait to see what bites.

And okay, I'll confess, sometimes I'll bait the hook, hoping to attract a certain catch, but regardless of probability, the truth is once I feel the bite, then the fun really begins, and the road just disappears along with the time, as I focus on reeling in the possibilities and wondering whatever will I find on the end of my line?

Patience. I look at the clouds and search for shapes, just as the old tribes would have, pre-civilization. I don't find meaning, but there's endless beauty in the form. Shadows cast across the flat lands, drifting, untethered, cargo ships of rain and thunder.

I toy with the idea of pulling over. Just for the sake of it. To kill the engine and listen to the silence. Is there an anxiety pushing me to get to the next place? Probably, yes. It's not normal to be this alone. It's not normal to stop either, is it?

But I don't feel lonely, not out here at least. In truth almost never when I'm isolated. Much more likely when I'm with people.

FOMO, a fear of missing out. Is this my problem? Whereby to stop, to pull over, would mean to arrive later, and I might miss out on something? But then to not stop might mean I miss out on something here? But what could I miss out on out here?

Nothing.

I could miss out on nothing.

Huh. I check the mirrors, then a long look along the verge to be sure there's no risk of debris, I don't need a puncture.

I let the throttle off, work my way down the gears, hearing the engine and road noise giving way to the nothing. Walking speed. Less. I can hear the crunch of loose chippings, the gravel at the edge of this endless road.

I squeeze the brake. Let my feet down off the pegs, my boots finding a confident grip on the ground, confirming she's firm. My bike still balanced between my thighs.

I kill the ignition, ease the side stand out with my heal, turn the handlebars in, and let the bike lean her weight over and down into the road.

I hoist myself off the saddle. Remove my gloves. Unzip my jacket. With my finger and thumb pinched, I tug the foam plugs from my ears, and marvel at the absolute silence.

The engine and exhaust pink-pink their tiny tinny sounds as their heat stretched metals slowly cool and shrink, but otherwise there's nothing.

I reach for my saddle bag and the bottle of water inside, shifting my weight as I move, the sound of my heals crunching on the gravel seeming so loud in the silence.

Slowly sipping my water and looking out over the unclaimed land I begin to detect the tinier sounds of the life that must be teeming out here. Crickets, field mice, snakes, birds and butterfly.

The air is still, there's no breeze, and no crop for her whispering wind to tease or hassle. Just dry wild grasses, that seem to hiss with heat. I turn to look down the road and see it haze.

An illusion of standing water, a mirage, the tarmac sun scorched, the arid heat not so apparent when you're moving fast, and creating a cool breeze.

I lean my backside against the side of my saddle and let the bike take her own weight as well as mine, I slip out of my jacket and allow myself a moment to breathe it all in.

Huh? Yeah, I remember. I catch my thoughts in conversation with my memories. The scent and the heat, the light and the silence, reminding me of a tight and twisting back road in the Spanish foot hills of Pamplona.

I'd pulled over and watched you wander down into an open green field, a hilltop farm, where the local labor had harvested golden bales of hay that lay about, as yet unclaimed, almost seeming to us abandoned at the end of a long Harvest season.

I watched you stand with your arms outstretched, set against the sky like a kite of blue and green, as if you were waiting to be caught and lifted away with the wind.

Rust red sneakers, blue denim jeans, and a green sleeveless tee, with that late summer Basque-country air, golden warm, and oh-so sweetly scented, with clover fields and olive orchards, that tender breeze billowing through your sun bleached brunette hair, and bringing us both a romance of riches.

You closed your eyes, and breathing it all in, declared: I love you.

Huh? I catch myself, caught adrift, coming back to the here and now. Wondering how long have I been daydreaming?

I glance at my wrist, but the familiar face and strap of my watch are long gone. I deliberately removed it, not wanting to be reminded of the day, date or time. Not on this trip.

Looking out, my eyes squint as they scan across the relentless flat emptiness of this Nebraska. And I can't help but wonder. I wonder, where might you be right now, and what are you doing?

~ Part VII ~

"I'm watching the water rush up and over his feet, rising around his lower legs, climbing his thighs. A fresh wave rides up on his hips, concealing his manhood from me, his lean torso is twisting, his broad shoulders swaying as his stride comes closer."

"Go on." Your doctor encourages.

"Our eyes are fixed, fused, there's a free flow of love pouring through this light, a forest stream of green amethyst and flecked amber, flowing freely from my eyes and pouring out through his."

"What else can you see in his eyes?" your doctor softly soothes, compelling you to open your heart and confess.

"I see a bonfire of burnt bracken, a haunting of hazel hues, brightly lit, a woodsman felling, a forest now on fire, he's smoldering, beneath a raking of autumn leaves, a pagan sacrifice, a wicker man, a pyre of carbon and ash."

"And you want him?"

"I want to feel his arms closing around me, holding me to him as I float on the warm water, with the sun setting on the edge of the ocean, and our mouths coming together."

"I want our eyes to close, and for the loving light held in our eyes to channel out through our mouths, I want to feel our essential energies pouring in and out of each other."

"And what does he do?" your doctor asks, opening a door inside your mind, where a library of unread, leather bound books wait for you to open them and take in their hidden secrets.

"He draws me to him, the warm water is sparkling under the dipping evening light, his eyes covet the jewel like droplets of water beading down my shoulders."

"And, Ooh, he's unhooking my straps and peeling my swimsuit down over my chest. I'm dissolving from the inside out, melting against him, the warm salty water washing against my breasts, the sun slipping down, baptizing me with the last of her light."

"I'm reaching my arms around his shoulders, feeling an almost equine strength in his neck, cradling him to my breast as he holds me, I'm floating freely in his arms, his mouth pressing around my breast and sucking my nipple hard into his embrace."

"The waves are rippling beneath me, my weightlessness held so tenderly, my breast captured in the motion of his jaws, his tongue whipping and mauling for more of my nipple, beating her to a slow roasting submission."

"And God, I love how hard I bruise, especially when, oooh fuck, when I'm in his mouth!"

Your therapist observes how your body squirms on the couch, reflexes, uncontrolled, your feet stroking their affection, one rubbing against the other, your senses lifting on a tide of erotica.