Lili & Alexander
The call had been too easy, like he’d already cleared a space for her. Lili hadn’t even finished explaining before Dr. Beacham’s voice, low and unhurried, answered: “Of course, Lili.” Like he’d been expecting her all along.
Now, she feels oddly weightless crossing the courtyard. The pool glimmers turquoise in the sunlight. She stops outside his door. Smooths her Rosie Assoulin blouse with fingers that won’t stop trembling. Inhale. Count to four. Let it go.
It was Gareth’s idea, originally. Earlier that morning, on their way to yoga, she’d vented, words tumbling out too fast about Casey.
“He’s staying out late again. Another charity thing, another meeting. Sometimes he’s not home till after midnight. Straight to the shower, like he’s—”
“Washing something away?”
Gareth gave her a look. Not smug. Just… clear-eyed.
“God. I must sound insane.”
“No,” he said. “You sound like someone finally tired of being Casey’s doormat.”
At hot yoga, she’d tried to sweat it out, inhale, exhale, child’s pose, but that clipped eleven p.m. phone call the other night looped on repeat.
“Just a work thing,” he’d muttered. And under it, faint, but unmistakable: a woman’s voice.
Outside the studio, still damp with sweat, Gareth had held the door for her. “If you ever want to talk to someone…” he said, coaxing, “Alexander lives in the building. AKA Dr. Beacham. He’s legit.”
“Oh, yeah?” she replied. “Funny, I never see him around. Didn’t realize he still lived there. I heard he’s… who was it… Sandra Bullock’s therapist?”
“Supposedly. Relationship and trauma. Helped Ben and J.Lo too. The second time.”
“Shouldn’t his clients stay confidential?”
“It’s just rumors, I guess.”
Lili laughed then. Therapy. How quaint. Because when Casey first cheated, therapy was the bandage they never even bothered to unwrap.
“Maybe it’s time I go on my own,” she said, surprising herself.
Gareth nodded, like someone speaking from experience. “Sometimes you just need help sorting out what you already know.”
And maybe that was true. Maybe that’s why she’s here now, outside Dr. Alexander Beacham’s door. It opens before she can knock.
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“Lili,” he says. His voice offers the same warm comfort it did on the phone. “Welcome. Please, come in.”
She follows him down the corridor, taking in the apartment’s pristine, almost austere order before stepping into his office. He gestures to the leather chair across from his desk.
“I’m not even sure why I’m here,” she begins, exhaling a shaky breath as she sinks into the seat.
“Sometimes it’s not about fixing,” Alexander says. “Sometimes it’s about naming.”
“My husband… Casey. He’s distant. Always working late. I’m not stupid. I know what that means.”
He doesn’t respond. Just nods, listening.
“It makes me feel like I’m losing my mind. Like everything I’ve worked so hard to build is just… slipping through my hands.” Her marriage. Her career. Her identity. She doesn’t say it out loud.
Alexander leans in gently, like he’s offering a hand without expecting her to take it. “You don’t have to hold it all together alone, Lili.”
“I don’t even know who I am without all of this.”
He lifts his chin slightly, a hint of a challenge in his voice. “Then maybe that’s where we start.”
The session unspools slowly. Her words stutter at first, then begin to gather momentum as she recounts the story of their marriage. Young love in New York. How, from the very first day, she decided he was perfect, because even if it was true only on paper, she wanted to believe it. The ambition that pulled them west, followed by the slow awakening to the limitations of her talent, her connections, her experience, and the delusions of her fashion career with each new roadblock.
Then, Casey’s parents’ deaths. The grief. The cancer that chewed holes in their marriage. And the affair. Always the affair. Lili tries to skim past it. But Alexander doesn’t let her.
“Tell me what happened,” he says.
“It was about a year ago. We almost didn’t make it. He said he wanted an open marriage, said it might bring us closer. I wanted to be understanding. The cool wife. The brave one. But he already had someone. A twenty-four-year-old marketing assistant named Allie.”
She swallows, her voice softening. “And I was just… tired. Jaded. Wondering if the twenty-something idiot could give him what I couldn’t.”
“What you couldn’t…?”
Their eyes meet. He sees it: the thing she’s trying not to say.
“A child.”
“So it’s not just about him. It’s about you. About believing you weren’t enough.”
“I told him it was over. Then I took him back. Who was I kidding? I don’t want to start over. I don’t want to pretend men never cheat or that women are weak for forgiving them. Sometimes I wonder, do I even care if he cheats, or have I just been conditioned to think I should?”
“Your feelings are real, Lili. You haven’t been tricked.”
“We promised therapy. A fresh start. But life got busy. Promises… they slipped away. And now? I’m here. Alone.”
“Choosing yourself.”
“I hope so.”
“Do you regret forgiving him?”
“Yeah. Sometimes. More than I should.” Her lips lift, not quite a smile. “We were just kids when we got married. That girl in her twenties thought she had it all figured out: career, husband, her whole life, including every tragic pair of skinny jeans. But looking back, I treated everything like a resume. Fashion seemed fun and glamorous. Casey seemed perfect. Handsome, confident, successful. And yet… now I’m questioning what it was I actually valued back then.”
Alexander’s eyes stay on hers, taking in the confession, the faint vulnerability she doesn’t hide. He doesn’t look away. Then, finally, he glances at the clock.
“Our time’s up, I’m afraid.”
From his window, he watches her cross the courtyard.
They all had their uses—his patients, his neighbors. The more broken, the better. Sometimes, it took time for the pain to show itself. But Lili had offered hers freely, like a gift, wrapped and waiting.
Her front door slams. Alexander exhales and turns from the glass. No need to rush. The moment would come; it always did. A slip, a tell, the smallest fracture. He’d be there to catch it. To pull it gently to the surface, like coaxing a secret from a child.
Then he’d turn it in his hands, examine it from every angle. And use it—exactly when she least expected.