He hovers, on the brink of a decision. I could say more to sway him. I could let him know I’ve worked with many couples who’ve endured far worse issues than infidelity. I could tell him about my success rate, which is even higher now that I’ve shed the constraints of traditional therapy and created a new method, one that’s all my own.
But I don’t. I wait him out.
“I don’t see how talking about bullshit like my issues with my father and my dreams can help us get through this,” he says.
If I had to lay down odds on whether he’ll storm back out through the door, I’d put them at fifty-fifty.
“Matthew,” Marissa begs. “Avery’s not like that. Please, give this a chance.”
He exhales, his rigid shoulders softening. Then he plants himself on the couch, as far from his wife as possible.
I reclaim my seat as well.
What Matthew doesn’t know is that I’ve just made a decision, too. The Bishops intrigue me; I’m going to take them on.
“Here’s how this will go. You have ten sessions.” Knowing the time frame for our work together is essential for a client. What they can’t know is my agenda.
In my process, each session has a title, beginning with The Confession, then cycling through Disruption, Escalation, Revelation, Devastation, Confrontation, Exposure, The Test, Reconciliation, and concluding with Promises.
“You cannot skip our sessions or be late. No traffic excuses or last-minute deadlines. In between our appointments, you can talk about your son, your careers, the weather—really anything. But it’s best if this space remains pure, so I recommend avoiding discussing what will come up here. I also suggest you don’t reveal information about our time together to anyone else while our sessions are ongoing.”
Marissa nods eagerly. I take Matthew’s stony silence for acquiescence.
There’s a hitch in my energy, which I’m careful to mask. All couples have secrets. The Bishops are no exception. There’s more than just infidelity here. Marissa’s cheating is a symptom, not the source of their fundamental breakdown.
Twelve minutes ago, they breezed into my office—glamorous, affluent, enviable. The golden couple. Now the underlying tarnishes they’ve never allowed the public to see are already beginning to show.
It’s going to get a lot uglier soon.
“When do we start?” Marissa asks.
“We already have.”
CHAPTER TWO
MARISSA
MARISSA FEELS AS IF she and Matthew have hurtled off a cliff. They’re in free fall. She just spoke the terrible words out loud: I slept with someone.
On the drive to Avery Chambers’s office in Cleveland Park, D.C., Marissa almost suggested canceling the session. She knew Matthew wouldn’t have minded. It had been her idea to schedule the meeting, which she insinuated was to talk about their eight-year-old son, Bennett, who had been bullied by a classmate last year.
Marissa reached out to Avery after reading an article in The Washington Post Magazine that described Avery’s unconventional “anti-therapy.” The profile contained biographical details about the forty-one-year-old: she grew up in Chicago, attended Northwestern, is an avid runner, and loves to travel to off-the-beaten-path destinations. Several of her former clients were interviewed—“She literally saved my life,” one proclaimed—and so were a few detractors, including the head of the American Psychological Association, who was quoted as saying, “Avery Chambers does not represent or uphold the sacred tenets of our profession.” An accompanying photo revealed the silhouette of a woman with a tumble of long hair looking out a window.
In person, Avery is more attractive and stylish than Marissa expected, with her radiant olive skin and full lips. She wears a belted green suede dress and three-inch heels that make her almost as tall as Marissa, and a stack of gold bangles adorns her right wrist. Avery doesn’t wear a wedding band. Marissa wonders if this matters. Would it be better if Avery had a husband? Would that enable her to more effectively understand the nuances of a complicated marriage?
And certainly Marissa and Matthew’s union is complicated. A decade into their marriage, Matthew, a partner in a D.C. law firm, spends more evenings at business events than by her side. Marissa feels lost in a constant swirl of activities: running her boutique, Coco; cooking delicious but nutritious meals for her family; staying trim and fit enough to slide into the pair of faded Levi’s cutoffs she’s had since high school; and serving on the auction committee at Bennett’s private school.