Chapter 51- The Truth About Lies

            The next morning Alyssa sat up in bed mentally rehearsing in her head exactly what she had planned to tell Sean when he came in to see her later. She'd talked to him briefly over the phone the night before and requested to see him today saying that she thought it would be a good idea if they talked. Sean had agreed. They hadn't yet had the opportunity to discuss her infidelity and she hoped that now that he had a few days for the news to sink in that he would be calm enough to discuss it rationally. She was unsure how he was going to react to the news of the baby. She knew that he was sure to be angry, but she hoped that being that she was choosing to have the conversation in the hospital would ensure that he hold back on his aggression.

            Honestly, she wasn't sure how he had been handling himself the past couple of days. He'd been to see her a few times, but definitely not as much as Nick had. As far as she knew the two men had been avoiding each other like the plague, which she was thankful for. She just hoped that Sean wasn't engaging in any counterproductive behavior. She knew that he was probably upset about the baby and dealing with it on his own. She just hoped that didn't mean finding solace in a bottle of alcohol, although she had a bad feeling that may have been the reason that had been keeping him away in the first place.

            Although she did not feel much better emotionally about the loss of her daughter, her doctors and nurses seemed pleased with the rate at which she was physically mending. Yesterday she'd been allowed to get out of bed for the first time since she'd woken up and the nurse had made her take a short walk. Actually it had been more of a painful shuffle for Alyssa between the soreness from her ribs and the aching in her stomach from the c-section. As much of a struggle as it had been, the nurse had insisted that it was important for her to get up and walk around so that she did not develop blood clots. Alyssa wasn't sure what those were, but they didn't sound good and she knew that she had enough health problems at the moment to worry about adding something else to the list. Dr. Spencer still insisted that she should be ready to go home within the next day or two, but Alyssa wasn't sure if she could see how. Hell, after the way things were probably going to go down with Sean she'd be lucky if she'd have a place to go home to.

            The sound of footsteps outside her door jarred Alyssa from her thoughts. She looked up just in time to see Sean enter the door looking slightly uncomfortable with a bouquet of flowers in his hand. "These are for you," he told her. "Thought they'd make you feel better."

            "How sweet..." Alyssa gave him a half smile, feeling guilty that while was preparing to pretty much rip his heart right out of his chest, he was bringing her flowers. "You can put them on the windowsill where all the others are," she instructed, pointing towards the various cards and flowers she'd accumulated in the past few days from friends and family members.

            Sean crossed the room to put the flowers away making sure to close the door behind them so that they could have some privacy. Once the flowers were on the windowsill he went back around to her bedside and settled into a chair next to her bed giving her a serious look. "So, I think you and I need to have a serious talk here."

            Alyssa just nodded in agreement. Just be honest and don't hold anything back, she mentally coached herself. She'd already prepared herself for the most obvious questions that she knew he was going to ask. The hard part would be telling him about the baby though; especially when he'd already spent the past two or three days grieving her.

            The way he started though was not at all how she expected. Instead of asking the inevitable questions that she had been expecting from him, he came right out with an unexpected zinger of his own. "I bumped into Dr. Spencer in the hall on my way here."

            "Oh?" Alyssa asked slightly uneasily, not sure where this was heading.

            "Yea... It was pretty interesting. I know this is probably is the last thing you want to hear about right now, but I stopped her to ask who I'd speak with about making any arrangements for Katherine. Imagine my surprise when she frowned and said ‘Katherine? Don't you mean Zoey?' Care to explain what that was all about?" Sean's eyes narrowed in her direction.

            Alyssa could practically feel her stomach flip flop. This wasn't at all how she wanted the baby subject to come up, but it looked like she had no choice, but to give him some sort of explanation. If Dr. Spencer had suspected anything strange about her friendship with Nick (and how could she not, he'd came with her to almost all of her appointments) she kept her suspicions to herself. It was almost as if the two women had a very strict don't ask, don't tell policy. She had a feeling that Dr. Spencer knew more than she let on, but she seemed to take her doctor/patient confidentiality very seriously. When Alyssa had awoke and was asked what name she wanted on the birth certificate, she'd gone with her instinct and went with Zoey Michelle Carter, the name she and Nick had agreed on together. She'd left the father's name blank on purpose for the time being. At that moment, she knew for sure that Dr. Spencer knew of her situation, but thankfully the older woman had not questioned her decision. That's why she honestly felt that this was an honest mistake from her. She just wasn't sure how to go about in answering her husband's question.

            "Why did you change the name we agreed on like that?" he continued to question. "It just strikes me as shady. Between this and the shit with Nick? I feel like I don't even know you anymore."

            Alyssa sighed and looked over at him and was surprised to find his expression more pleading than angry. He genuinely seemed to want to know the truth and she knew him well enough to know that deep down he was clinging on to hope that she'd have a perfectly logical explanation for him that was far from what he feared to be the truth. She had no choice, but to tear his hope apart. "Sean... The reason why I switched the name on you is because..." she paused, staring down at her fingers before blurting out the awful truth. "The baby, she wasn't yours."

            She watched slowly as a thousand emotions seemed to come over Sean's face. First shock, then disappointment, and then anger. "Are you trying to fucking tell me that this thing you had going on with Nick started even before I was deployed?"

            Alyssa slowly nodded already feeling tears stinging her eyes. "I'm so sorry Sean. I didn't know when I first told you and then you were so happy I didn't know how to break it to you when I did find out. Plus, I didn't want to tell you about Nick over the phone or through an e-mail and since flying out to Iraq was out of the question it had to wait until I could see you again."

            Sean stood up and pushed the chair backwards with so much force that it almost hit the wall behind him. Not being able to bear to look at her he strode over to the window, gazing out at the view below him. "I can't fucking believe this," he murmured, almost to himself. "How? How did you find this all out? Obviously you've known for quite a while now. How do you know it's his? Maybe it is mine, after all. Not like you could've had a paternity test while the baby wasn't even born yet!"

            This was the part that she was regretting telling him the most. "Remember when we went to the fertility clinic and had those tests done? Well, not long after I discovered I was pregnant I got a phone call inquiring about rescheduling our follow up appointment. I told them that we didn't need the appointment because I had just found out that I was pregnant. An hour or so later Dr. Beard called me personally. He asked if I was sure I was pregnant because our tests indicated that you... Oh God, Sean I'm so sorry!"

            "That I what? What did the tests say? Tell me God dammit!" his voice thundered.

            "That you can't have children! You're sterile Sean!" There she'd said it, but it did not make her feel at all any better.

            The expression on Sean's face looked as if someone had just stabbed him the gut. All the color drained out of his face and he looked completely shocked. "You're lying," he accused her. "That can't be. You're just saying that because you wanted Nick to be the father. You're making all this up! It's not true!"

            "Sean, you can call them up if you'd like or seek a second opinion, but the reality of it is that we tried for eight months and nothing happened. What are the chances that we were just magically able to conceive the night before you left for Iraq? One in a million?" she softly told him. "Face it Sean... It makes sense."

            "No... No... I refuse to believe that shit!" he pounded his fist angrily against the window ledge beside him. "It's not fair that you've been fucking him behind my back all this time now and he's the one that gets you pregnant! It's fucked up. It's totally fucked up! How long have you been doing this anyway? Ever since we bumped into him and his wife on our anniversary?"

            "No," she honestly replied. At least this was one question she had been prepared to answer. "It actually wasn't until back in June. Do you remember that night we had the big fight a few weeks after I had that false alarm? The night I ran out?"

            "You ran right into his fucking arms?" he cried. "That's so completely sleazy!"

            "It wasn't like that!" she insisted. "He has this condo that he bought for me back when we used to date. I was supposed to move into it, but then we broke up. Anyway he still has it and gave me the key if I ever needed anyplace to stay, so I went there and he just happened to be there as well."

            "How convenient," he spat. "He was probably just waiting for you to show up so that he could pounce on you!"

            Alyssa knew that she had to keep herself together while still defending herself to him. She knew that she had been wrong in what she done, but she needed to be the bigger person and take responsibility for her own actions and not pin all the blame on Nick. "You're wrong. It actually went quite differently than that. It was both very mutual."

            Sean sighed, the frustration on his face quite evident. "I guess my big question is why? Why him? Why then? What was it that drew you to him? I mean I can almost understand why you would be unfaithful to me after I left. I was halfway around the world... You were lonely... He was available... I don't accept it, but I can at least see your logic. But right under my fucking nose? Why? It wasn't like I was denying you anything! We were having plenty of sex!"

            "That was just it Sean! I know this is going to sound really hurtful to you, but I need to be honest here!  I don't think you realized it, but everything turned into ‘let's try to have a baby' and ‘we have to keep working at it' that our entire relationship became centered on trying to produce a baby that as it turns out was impossible to produce after all! Do you know the pressure that was put on me because of that? With every failed attempt I felt worse and worse because I thought that it was my fault somehow. Sex entirely stopped being a way to express how we feel about each other and became a ‘job' to do. You didn't even seem to care if I enjoyed it or not! Just as long as I got pregnant!"

            "How come you didn't tell me about this before?" he shot back. "If I wasn't doing something for you, all you had to do was fucking tell me!"

            "I tried! You wouldn't listen! You let your fucking ego get in the way. Face it Sean, you dug your own grave. It was only a matter of time before this happened." Alyssa sighed, choosing her next words carefully. "I'm not intending to throw anything in your face or put you down, but Nick was way more attentive to me than you had been in months!  I honestly felt like shit afterwards about it, but as selfish as it sounds it was something I needed."

            Sean seemed to give up trying to defend himself and quickly changed tactics. "I don't see what he could've possibly done that I haven't ever done for you. He practically broke you Alyssa! It took me months to get you to the point that you could trust me enough to be truly intimate with you. I didn't put all that work on you, just so that you could try out your new found confidence on him!"

            "You put shit on me... In the end, I was the one who decided to ultimately let my guard down, so don't pin medals on yourself," she reminded him.

            "So, he did everything that I didn't huh? He went down on you? Did you suck him off?"

            "I don't think that's any business of yours," she briskly answered, feeling her cheeks redden with how ugly he made it all seem.

            "Tell me, dammit!" he demanded sending one of the vases of flowers on her windowsill to come crashing down to the floor below and breaking into a million pieces. "You apparently have nothing to hide, so tell me!"

            Alyssa swallowed hard, knowing that he wouldn't let up until she gave in. It was probably just easier to answer him. "Yes," she just simply replied. "Is that what you wanted to hear?"

            "Did you ever fuck him in our home?" was his next question.

            "I don't understand why you want to know all this," she commented, trying to avoid the question he was directing at her. It was almost as if he was like asking for all the details on purpose. Why would he want to know these things?

            "Answer the damn question!" he growled.

            Alyssa sighed; feeling tears of guilt escape the corners of her eyes. Feeling like a criminal she gave in. "Yes."

            "Where? Did you fuck him in our bed?"

            Finally losing her patience with him she exploded, giving him exactly the reaction he was looking for. "Yes! I fucked him in our bed! Are you happy now? I fucked him all over our house. In the guest bedroom, in the bathroom, on the couch, on the floor... Everywhere! Why are you fucking doing this?"

            Sean just a pompous looking smirk on his face as he rubbed his hands together, obviously pleased she had given him the reaction he had been looking for. "Makes you feel a lot like a whore when you put it that way doesn't it? That's all you are anyway. Only whores cheat on their husbands. And to think... I was out fighting for our country and you were at home fucking your ex -boyfriend.  You had me fooled. Here I thought you were such a sweet, genuine, girl and you turned out to be some trashy, low class, lying, whore!"

            Alyssa finally had enough of his slandering abuse. He definitely was making her feel more and more degraded by the minute and she knew that she didn't have to put up with this any longer. "Please, get the fuck out of here before I get security to drag you out," she very calmly threatened.

            "Oh, but I'm just getting started," he responded with a wild look in his eyes. He was beginning to lose it and before he could do anything crazy, her fingers dove for the call button beside her bed. Thankfully, within a few moments a tough looking, heavyset nurse had arrived at the door, prying it open.

            "Is everything all right in here, Mrs. Robinson?" the nurse asked, eying Sean suspiciously.

            "Actually no, it's not. I was hoping we could get security to escort my husband off the premises. He's harassing me," she reported in a clear, businesslike voice.

            The nurse eyed Sean and Sean held up his hands willingly as he backed away from her. "No need for that. I'm leaving on my own." He started heading for the door, but turned around last minute. "I don't care where you go once you're released, but it's not going to be back home with me. Have one of your great friends stop by to pick up all your shit. Expect a call from my lawyer about divorce papers. Have a fantastic life!" With that said he was out the door.

            As soon as he exited the room Alyssa couldn't help, but to burst into tears, the intensity of the showdown being too much for her to handle. "Are you okay?" the nurse asked, sympathetically patting her on the shoulder. "He's not blaming you for the baby, is he?"

            Alyssa just shook her head, not wanting to blurt out her personal business to a perfect stranger. "No, it's a long story. Is there anyway that you can prevent him from coming back while I am here?" She wasn't worried about herself as much as she was worried about him hanging around to start shit with Nick or any of her other friends.

            "I'll see what I can do," the nurse replied as she headed for the door. "You should get some rest though. All this stress is just going to delay the healing process."

            "You're right," Alyssa agreed. "I'll try to do that." She closed her eyes as she waited for the nurse to exit the room and then sighed loudly, opening them again. There was definitely no way that she could possibly get any sleep when her argument with Sean playing on constant rewind in her head. No matter how hard she tried she couldn't seem to get his awful words out of her mind. Finally with tears still slipping down her cheeks she forced her eyes closed and willed all her concentration to focus on falling asleep.

************

            After laying there for almost half an hour, Alyssa finally managed to slip into unconsciousness, but didn't get much rest. She was haunted by bad dreams and squirmed restlessly in her sleep. When she finally did open her eyes an hour or so later, she was surprised to find Nick sitting beside her bed obviously waiting for her to wake up so that he could hear how her conversation with Sean had went.

            "Hey," he greeted softly as he watched her awaken. "I'm glad you finally woke up."

            Alyssa sat up, stretched, and rubbed her still puffy eyes with her hands. "Hi," she echoed back. "Sorry... I was just trying to get a little rest."

            "That's perfectly fine. What you should be doing." He looked at her for a moment in obvious concern. She definitely looked a lot more tired and rundown then she had yesterday. Her face was pale and her eyes looked swollen from more than just sleep. Judging from the dark circles underneath them and the blotchiness in her cheeks, it almost looked as if she'd been crying recently. "How did things go with Sean?" he tentatively asked.

            Just at the mention of her husband's name, Alyssa seemed to go limp and Nick could tell just by her reaction that the confrontation hadn't gone well. "It went," she dully replied. "We're done."

            Even though Nick knew that she probably didn't want to talk about it right now, the matter needed to be discussed. He needed to be made aware of what had gone on between the two of them. "So, I'm guessing you told him everything, huh? How'd he take it?"

            Alyssa sighed, seeming more interested in the pattern on her hospital gown than looking at him. "It started off with him taking it pretty well, as well as could be expected I guess. He already knew something was up with the baby because I didn't name her Katherine like he wanted me to. When I told him about him not being able to have children, he kind of flipped and accused me of making up lies, and it kind of just downhill from there." Already she could feel fresh tears building up in her eyes.

            "What did he say to you?" Nick demanded.

            She just shook her head, this time turning away from him and burying her head in her pillow as she began to cry. She couldn't bear to look at him and repeat the awful things he had said to her. She was almost embarrassed at how dirty he had made her feel, how ugly he had made their actions out to sound. "It was horrible," she muttered. "He was such an asshole."

            "You can tell me Lyss," he assured her, reaching over to rub her back. "It might help to get it all out."

            She took in a deep breath before everything came spilling out of her. "He wanted to know everything. First it was why and I knew that it was going to be like a complete blow to his ego, but I had to be honest. He needed to know the truth. Only that just infuriated him more I guess, so then he just kind of went crazy. He kept asking me all these horrible questions and demanded that I answered them. He wanted to know what we did and where we did it and he wouldn't stop until I gave him answers. He made me feel really dirty, like he was trying to degrade me or something. He even called me a whore. He said that ‘only whores cheat on their husbands.'"

            Nick could already feel his blood begin to boil. What he and Alyssa had done to Sean was fucked up, but there was no reason for him to be so vulgar to her. There was no excuse for a man to ever talk to a woman like that, and even though Nick knew he would be calling himself a hypocrite if he claimed to be the type of guy who had always treated women with respect, he knew better now. Even though he had said some hurtful things to Shayla, he thought that he had handled the situation with class and dignity, two things that Sean obviously did not have. "Please tell me you got security to haul his ass out? Because if I see him anywhere within ten feet of this hospital -"

            "I handled it," she insisted, cutting Nick off before he could finish making his threat. "I called one of the nurses to get security, but when he saw that I wasn't joking he left willingly. Of course not without warning me that I'd be hearing from his lawyer and that I'd better send someone over to the house to pick up all my belongings because he's throwing me out. Nice, right? Like I don't have enough shit right now to stress over."

            "Well, you know that you're completely welcome to move into the condo for the time being. The place was supposed to be yours originally and you're going to have to stay somewhere," he offered. "And I'm sure a few of the guys wouldn't mind stopping over to get your things and moving them into the condo for you."

            "Thanks," she told him. She wasn't thrilled about moving in the condo where so many fresh memories of their affair would be sure to haunt her, but it wasn't like she had a hell of a lot of other options available either. It would be good enough for her at least while she recovered. "I just fucking hate this," she sighed.

            Nick frowned, not sure what she was getting at. "What do you mean? Being kicked out of your own home?"

            "It's more than that... I was never so embarrassed in my life then this morning when I had to actually ask to have Sean escorted out of the building," Alyssa confessed. "I know the doctors and the nurses here don't know the full story, but they've got to be wondering what's going on by now. I'm probably the talk of the nurse's station on this floor! I just hate having all my dirty laundry aired out for everyone to see! It's not me! I hate being talked about and gossiped about."

            Nick looked at her sympathetically. "It sucks Lyss, but it's not like you've never been gossiped about before. Remember back when we first started dating? It took you a while to get used to all the fans hating on you for no reason. And when you started dancing with us on tour? You remember how cruel the other dancers were to you because they were jealous of you and thought you were getting special treatment."

            "That was different Nick! I didn't do anything wrong in either case. It was just ignorant people who chose not to like me for superficial reasons beyond my control," she pointed out. "This is completely the opposite. This time I did do something wrong and I already feel like I'm being wrongly judged because of it. And then to add insult to injury I'm trying to get over losing my daughter which is bad enough alone, but now I have to deal with all this external pressure of everything falling apart all at once! I'm going through such a rough time as it is, I don't need an audience!"

            Nick pursed his lips together and then sighed. He could see exactly where she was coming from, but he couldn't exactly relate. Yea, he knew what it felt like to be under constant scrutiny from the public. Not a day of his life did not go by where he wasn't judged by somebody. That was just part of the entertainment world. When he'd become famous he'd been forced to very quickly develop a thick skin and learn to ignore what people said about him. Sometimes he forgot that not everybody was the same way and although Alyssa had seemed to have made leaps and bounds from the insecurities that had haunted them in the past, they were still a part of her and no matter how much she changed, they could still flare up in situations like this where she felt powerless. If this was how she was reacting about a few raised eyebrows from nurses how was she going to be able to handle a relationship with him once the whole world learned about their affair? "I know where you're coming from Lyss and I don't want to scare you, but this is just the beginning. It's going to get a lot worse, before it gets better. This hasn't even hit the media yet and it doesn't have to right away, but as soon as we become ‘official' there's not going to be any looking back. It's going to be brutal and people will be talking shit about you. You need to toughen up or you're never going to get through this."

            Instead of taking it the way he had intended though, Alyssa immediately misconstrued his words and took them to be a personal insult. "Toughen up? I just lost my fucking daughter and you tell me that I need to toughen up? Like I'm just supposed to all of a sudden be over it? Maybe you can get over these types of things in like two seconds, but I can't!"

            Her reaction was not at all like the one that Nick had expected. He knew that Alyssa was going through a lot between the baby, Sean, him, and trying to recuperate from her injuries, but quite frankly he was starting to lose his patience with her. He felt her pain, but that was just it. She had been so self involved since she'd woken up that she hadn't stopped to consider the fact that he was just as upset as her. He finally felt like he'd reached the point where he had to speak his mind. "Who says that I'm already over it? Correction, we lost our daughter! You've just been so busy throwing yourself one big pity party that you can't see past yourself! I'm hurting just as much as you are! Maybe even more so because this is the second time I've gone through this. I know that you're the one that carried her around all these months, but that doesn't mean that you are the only one affected by losing her!"

            "You don't seem to show it," she threw back at him. "I haven't seen you break down and cry, yet!"

            "Because I've had to be strong for you! You don't see me when I leave here. Ask Howie and Teri! I've been spending the past few days at their house. Have them tell you about how they had to drag me out of bed at first or how they had to sit around comforting me! Maybe I haven't showed it in front of you, but I'm going through just as much as you are!"

            Alyssa did not seem to want to hear what he was saying. "You just didn't have your marriage completely fall apart on you, today!" she shouted, almost seeming like she was searching for a way to one up him.

            "Oh, get off it Alyssa!" He was getting more and more disgusted with her by the second. "You and Sean have been over for months now. He just finally made it official. Oh, and by the way..." he added. "I told Shayla we were through last night and that I was moving out. I did it for you, but you don't seem to want to acknowledge that fact at all."

            "Look at the way we're disagreeing already?" she pointed out, sniffling back tears. "We obviously aren't seeing eye to eye about all of this. I think we both need to do a lot of personal reflection on our own before we can even think about getting back together."

            That's when Nick finally lost it. He knew that the words that were about to come out of his mouth were sure to be hurtful ones, but she needed someone to set her straight. "You're always putting us off, huh? How ironic because if I remember correctly a few years ago I was the one running away from us. Funny, how some things change huh?" He paused, knowing the worst was only just about to come out. "You know, a lot of people warned me that you were always selfish, always thinking about yourself, but I always jumped to your defense. Not anymore... You think that you're the only person who matters in this situation? That your feelings are the only ones that counts? That's bullshit, and you know it!" He looked down at her almost pityingly as he said his final words before storming out of her hospital room. "You know, you really are selfish. I'm just sorry that it took me this long to realize it."

            Alyssa watched as he left her without looking back before frustratingly collapsing into her pillow in a fit of tears. Somehow, in just one day she'd managed to put an end to not only her past with Sean, but potentially cause major damage to her future with Nick. She may have been growing stronger physically, but mentally and emotionally she was beginning to break down and revert to her old ways which was a part of herself that she'd swore she'd never let free again. Once again, she had failed.

**************

            The following afternoon was when Dr. Spencer gave her the news that she was anxiously awaiting to hear. The older woman had just pulled Alyssa's hospital gown back down over her stomach after examining how her stitches seemed to be holding up when she made a note or two on her clipboard and smiled brightly.

            "Well, I'm pleased to say that you seem to be healing wonderfully and I see no reason to keep you here any longer than necessary. I'm going to recommend that you be discharged and you're free to go home as soon as we finish up the discharge papers," she announced.

            Alyssa wasn't sure if she should feel relieved or saddened at the prospect of finally being released from the hospital. She wasn't exactly going ‘home.' She wasn't sure where she could even consider her home at this point. She supposed the condo, but it felt weird to be heading there without Nick. She was beginning to find the hospital environment a bit stifling though and knew that she'd be thankful to be on her own again and not have to deal with being poked and prodded by doctors and nurses who were probably gossiping about her behind her back when they wee finished.

            "Of course I have a few instructions for you when you do arrive home," her doctor continued. "Just because you're being released does not mean that I want you returning back to your daily activities. You're still going to be pretty sore and the first week or so is probably going to be rough for you. Take it easy at home; you'll probably need some help getting around the house and such. Get lots of rest, but do get up and move around from time to time. Like I've told you we don't want you to develop blood clots. Definitely for the first two to three weeks you should refrain from any exercise. After that time, you can start with something light like walking. Avoid lifting anything heavy because this could cause your stitches to tear. The stitches should dissolve on their own as your incision heals, but if there's any problem at all, any tearing or unnecessary swelling, please call me right away." She took out her prescription pad and began to scrawl something across it. "I'm going to prescribe you a painkiller to help with the soreness for the first week or so. I want to see you in my office in about six weeks for a follow up appointment. Any questions?"

            Alyssa was quiet for a moment as she struggled to try to process all the information that had just been thrown at her. "How long will it be until I'm back to normal?" she asked, once she was sure had everything.

            "Most women take about six to eight weeks to completely heal from a c-section. With your ribs it might take you slightly longer, but the wrist should only take four to six weeks. I'll be able to let you know more at your follow up appointment," she explained.

            Ugh... Eight weeks seemed like an eternity to her, especially in her current condition. At least if she actually was bringing home a baby, it would make the weeks fly by faster, but she had a bad feeling that now they would drag on relentlessly. "Thanks, Dr. Spencer. I'll call the office to make an appointment when I get home."

            Dr. Spencer just nodded and paused uncomfortably in front of her for a moment. "There is one more thing I'd like to talk to you about Alyssa," she slowly began.

            "Yes?" Alyssa could already feel her stomach clenching. Why did she have a feeling that just based upon the tone of her doctor's voice she wasn't going to like what she was about to hear?

            "I know we talked about how sometimes in situations like yours it helps to have someone to talk to. I hope that maybe you've done a little more thinking about it, since then. I think that you might find it beneficial to get all your feelings off of your chest."

            Alyssa's cheeks grew red with embarrassment. She wasn't some charity case here or anything. Besides, wasn't she humiliated enough? All she needed was to blurt out all her problems to some stranger who she probably couldn't trust for shit.  No, she'd gotten herself into this mess; she'd get herself out... somehow. "I'm sorry Dr., but as I told you before, I'm not interested."

            Dr. Spencer just gave her a small, tight, smile. She was used to this reaction from many mother's who had lost a child due to complications in childbirth and knew that oftentimes they did come around on their own accord. "Well, I'm going to give you the name and number of Julia Phillips. She's a great therapist with a specific focus on grief counseling. I've referred quite a few patients of mine to her and they found her very helpful. You can do what you want with it, but I think it's a good idea to at least have someone you could call if you do change your mind."

            Alyssa sighed, but didn't argue. She was positive that she wouldn't need any help from any therapist telling her that she needed to have a more positive attitude, but some things just weren't worth arguing over. She'd take the number to appease her doctor, but that did not mean that she would have to call it.