Playing His Own Games | ✔︎

chapter forty | hearts beat as one

*•*•*•*
"My love for you is everlasting; it will never grow old and it will never fade away. I will forever love you."
*•*•*•*

Carrie

THE SECOND'S HAND OF the clock circles smoothly behind its glass face. I scrape my fingernails up my leg anxiously, watching as the skin turns red and a familiar sting spreads through it.

For the dozenth time since I took my place on this comfortable chair, opposite the wonky clock hanging off the white wall by an iron nail, my hand grapples for a That's Life! magazine. Full of twisted stories, astounding gossip and false facts, I hope it might distract me from my pounding heart and the pool of sweat forming in the dent of my chair.

It's stupid how anxious I am while I wait for my boyfriends psychologist appointment to finish. It's stupid that I appeared to be more nervous than him and I wasn't even the one to be talking to a professional.

Viktors court case finished just last week and as a result he is now cramped in a cold, boring prison cell; right where he belongs. Mason has been more guarded and reserved since then, so I can only hope this appointment will bring the light back out of him.

At that exact moment a lady—I thinks she said her name was Madeline—enters the waiting room with Mason by her side.

"See you next session, Mase," she smiles warmly and Mason returns it before beckoning me out of the room.

I'm on my feet in an instant, following him out into the wide corridor where our footsteps echo loudly against the white tile. I'm weary of the tension in his shoulders and the slight twitch of his fingers.

"So...how was it?" I ask cautiously as the glass doors smoothly part for us and we step into the warm air outside.

Mason pauses for a moment, his steps stalling as we move down the twisting ramp that dips into the car park. "She-she was the one who overlooked the family counselling session Sawyer signed us up for."

"Oh. Do you think it was helpful?"

"I mean...I guess I feel lighter and a bit better in myself," Mason mumbles almost sheepishly, his eyes scraping against the old, dirty carpark surface.

"That's good!" I say encouragingly as we head over to Masons car. "I guess it's all a process, right? You have to start from somewhere and build yourself up."

Just as I wrap my hand around the door handle, Mason blurts out a jumble of words all strung together in one single breath, "Carrie-I-think-you-should-go-to-therapy."

An icy chill passes through my spine and I remain ridged, my back still facing him.

"It's just—I mean I know it's your choice—it will help—I swear. What I'm trying to say is that you've been through a lot with Kane and me and Alina everything and you try to fix everyone else's problems without acknowledging your own." He says everything hurriedly, as though the words are like poison on his tongue, burning a deeper hole into the flesh the longer they stay in there.

Slowly, I spin around, my eyes melting into those beautiful sapphires. "Are you serious?"

"Um...I'm pretty sure. Yeah." Awkward as ever, Mason shuffles his feet and buries his hands into the pockets of his ripped jeans. "I talked about it with Madeline and she suggested a few of her colleagues that could help."