Take My Hand, Just Hold On

It was Sunday afternoon when Robert gets off the couch and says, “I guess I should probably go check into a hotel room finally.”

I laugh as I respond, “Why don’t you just stay here, at least until we know if you got the house or not?”

“Are you sure that it’s not a problem?”

I nod, “Of course. You know I sleep better with you around, anyway.”

He smiles and sits back down, “Alright. Kick me out when you get tired of having me around, though.”



Two days later I received a text while I was at work: “I got the house! Come to dinner with me tonight to celebrate?”

I send him a quick “Of course!” as I see Tom walking in from the meeting he had over lunch. “Brenna, can I see you in my office?” he asks with a smile. I nod as I get up from my desk and follow him into his office. “Take a seat, please,” he motions to the chair before sitting in his own.

“Er, what’s this about?” I ask, looking at my knees. I was still afraid of getting fired – I had been doing better at work, but maybe it wasn’t enough.

“I just wanted to say I’ve noticed how much better you’ve been doing recently. Is the therapy helping a lot?”

I breathe a slow sigh of relief before I respond, “Yes, it really has. Between that and a friend of mine coming back into town, it’s been a lot easier to… Deal with everything, I suppose. Thank you for giving me the chance to get better, and for pushing me into therapy. I can’t explain how grateful I am to you for everything.”

“Oh, well, you are very welcome. I must admit I didn’t do it for completely unselfish reasons, as I really didn’t want to lose you. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I have noticed how much better you’ve gotten and to let you know I appreciate all your hard work.”

After thanking him once more, I returned to my desk to complete the calls I had to make and finished up the day flipping through a few manuscripts.

Robert was in my apartment when I arrived home; I changed quickly before we went out to eat.

“So, you heard back pretty fast about the house, eh?” I say to him as we settle into our table.

He nods, “Yeah. I got a call early this morning asking if I was willing to wait until the middle of next month – instead of the first – to move in, and I said yes. I got a call back maybe half an hour later telling me I’d gotten the place.”

“Wow, that’s fantastic. You must be excited to be getting your own place!”

“Definitely. It’ll be nice to finally have somewhere to start… I don’t know, accumulating things. Right now I pretty much have clothes and stuff in a storage locker that I haven’t seen in probably a year.”

“So you’ll be needing a place to stay for another 3 and a half weeks, yeah?” I question, steering the conversation in another direction.

“Yeah, look, I really don’t want to inconvenience you in any way. I mean, it’s a couple weeks longer than you expected, I’m sure.”

“No, Robert, seriously it isn’t a problem. By all means, if you need your own space don’t feel like you have to stay, bu-“

“-I’d love to stay, Brenna.”

I smile, as I tend to whenever my name slips out of those lips. Soon after, we order and eat and are then on our way back to my apartment.

“So, Brian is having – what I’m told is – a relatively small party this Saturday. I was hoping I could convince you to come with me?” Robert asks on the drive.

I sigh and answer, “I’m not sure I’m up for that, Robert.”

“Please? If at any point you feel uncomfortable, we can leave. Even if it’s only been five minutes, we can just walk out.”

“You know, you can go to these things alone. You don’t have to drag me along,” I tell him, feeling like a giant burden.

“You know that’s not how I feel, right?” he questions, taking his eyes off the road.

I put my hand to his cheek and turn his face back to what’s ahead of him. “Well, it’s how I feel. I don’t want you to constantly have to be dealing with all my shit,” I tell him.

“I honestly just enjoy having you around, Brenna. And, I happen to think going to a party might be a good thing for you. You pretty much just go to work and come home, and I know that you’re not comfortable around a lot of people you don’t know, but you’re never going to get better if you don’t at least try.”

I laugh and then say, “Sorry, I shouldn’t be laughing. It just seems like you’re some expert on completely fucked up situations. I don’t know, Robert. Why don’t we see closer to Saturday? Maybe I’ll talk to Joan about it tomorrow…”



“Hi, Joan,” I say as I step into her office for our regular appointment.

“Brenna, hello. How has your week been?” she asks as I take a seat in my regular chair.

“Not too bad. Robert put a bid in on a house and got it, so he’ll be moving in next month,” I tell her.

“Wow, that’s a big step for him. You said he was in movies?”

I nod, “Yeah, an actor.”

“He must be doing pretty well for himself, then. Have I seen him in anything?”

I shrug, “You might’ve.”

“Hmm, okay. Well, did anything else happen this week?”

I tell her a little more about my week, but honestly, not a lot happened that was noteworthy. Eventually, I brought up the subject of the party, and asked her opinion on it.

“I’m not sure you’ll like this, but I’m kind of in agreement with your friend Robert. I think you need to start living your life the way you used to. You need to push yourself to do things out of your comfort zone or you will get stuck with the way things are right now. And you aren’t happy with how things are, are you?”

I shake my head as a response. I still haven’t talked to her about my slightly more-than-friendly feelings I have for Robert, and I’m not sure I want to broach the subject. I’m still pretty certain Robert just wants to help me through everything, and so I’m mostly trying to quash these feelings I have been having, rather than talk about them at length. Eventually I respond to her with, “I guess I‘ll try it out. See how it goes?” I say in a questioning tone.