Page 83 of October
I paused, swallowing the knot rising in my throat. "Then you came in. You didn't say much at first. You just looked at me and then you started talking. You told me how proud you were of me, how much you loved me. You kept saying it, over and over in different ways. That I was a good mother. That you could see how hard I was trying, how much I was giving. I remember thinking... it's rare for you to say things like that out loud. But somehow, you knew I needed to hear them right then, even though I didn't ask. I didn't even know how to ask."
My voice trembled, the memory making my chest ache and warm all at once. "When I nodded, because I couldn't speak, you sat behind me on the bed. You wrapped your arms around me, your chest against my back, and just stayed. You didn't tell me to get some sleep, or that it would all be okay tomorrow. You didn'trush me past it. You just held me, kissed the side of my neck, and kept telling me I was doing a great job, even if I couldn't see it."
I let out a shaky breath. "In that moment, I felt loved. Not just for being your wife, or for holding it all together, but loved as me. I felt heard. I felt seen. And I felt... appreciated, in a way that sank all the way in."
For a second, my eyes caught his and I could see the softness there, the faint surprise that I had carried this moment for so long, and maybe that was the truth of it: it hadn't been grand or loud, but it had stayed.
"Thomas? Do you have a specific memory in mind?"
"Yeah," he said eventually, the word catching in his throat. "I remember one."
He shifted in his seat, shoulders tight at first, like it cost him something to let the words come. "There was this train model I used to build as a kid. Beth and I did it together, she never really cared about trains, but she did it for me. It wasn't about the model itself, really. It was... a way to get away. To shut the door on what was happening inside the house. The noise, the silence, the feeling that anything could break at any second."
His gaze dropped to his hands, fingers twisting together. " Then there was this day. My father... he lost his temper. He threw the whole thing. Smashed the carriages, bent the brass rails, crushed the tiny wheels and couplers—pieces so small they'd disappear into the carpet. He forbid them from coming into the house again. Just like that, they were gone. It felt stupid, but I held onto those broken bits longer than I probably should've."
For a moment, he looked away, and his voice went quieter, almost boyish. "I never really talked about it. Not even to Beth, not really. I don't think I ever told you what those trains meant to me. It was just something that lived in the background of who I am."
He took a breath, and when he looked up at me, his eyes had gone softer, more open than I'd seen in a long time. "Then... one day, you handed me this box. Inside was the same train model. Rebuilt. Painted in the exact colors we'd used. You even found the tiny water-slide decals we messed up the first time. Later, I found out you'd called Beth, asked her about the details I'd forgotten, and then spent nights hunting down the exact kit, something that hadn't been made in years. You did all that quietly, without telling me."
His voice cracked, barely above a whisper now. "That's when I felt loved. Because you saw something that mattered to me, something I hadn't even said aloud and you brought it back. Not with a big speech or some grand gesture. But with patience. With care. With all those quiet, stubborn hours you spent at a kitchen table covered in glue and paint."
He blinked, like he was still surprised by how deeply it had landed. "It wasn't just a model train. It was like... you reached back into something broken in me and gently put it back together. And you didn't even tell me you were doing it."
He paused, breath catching. "That's when I knew. Because you loved even the part of me that still hurts."
The counselor gave us both a moment to sit in that.
"You've shared the moments when you felt most loved by one another," she said. "Now I want to shift your attention. I wanteach of you to tell me:What's something you've done for your partner that, for you, was an act of love? A gesture that might've gone unnoticed, but that came straight from your heart."
I felt the question land somewhere quiet inside me. There were a hundred little things I could name. But some stood out like threads in a tapestry, delicate, but holding everything together.
I spoke first.
"For me," I said, "it's... the way I say it every day. I know it sounds simple, but I never want a day to pass without him hearing it—I love you, I'm grateful for you, I'm so lucky you're mine.I say it when we're tired. When we're rushed. When we're okay and when we're not. Because I want him to live inside that knowledge, the way I live inside loving him."
I turned slightly, catching Thomas's profile. "I try to make our home feel safe. I light candles, I play music I know calms him down, I fold the blankets a certain way because I know he notices that. I make sure the space feels soft, not perfect, not staged, just... peaceful. Like a place where he can breathe and relax."
Thomas glanced at me, and I saw something stir in his eyes.
"I massage his shoulders when he's had a long day," I added, quieter now. "I sing for him sometimes when he's falling asleep. I love on him—physically, it's like I'm saying:You are mine, and you are safe here."
The counselor didn't interrupt. She gave the moment space.
"And Thomas?" she asked softly. "What about you?"
He hesitated, then he finally spoke, his voice was low but steady.
"I think... for me, it's the way I adjust," he said. "Quietly. I've changed things for her because I saw what mattered to her, I make sure her days run smoothly, so she doesn't have to carry more than she already does. "
He looked at me then, fully. "You said you love the French language so I learned it . I spent months learning words I'll probably never use anywhere else, just because you wanted to hear it."
I felt a rush of warmth bloom in my chest.
"Also maybe when we were house-hunting," he continued, "I had my eye on a different place. Bigger. Quieter. More practical. But you... you walked intothishouse and lit up like you belonged here. You didn't even say it! you just breathed differently in this space. So I changed my plans. Because loving you meansseeing youand I saw you fall in love with this house. That was enough."
He paused, then added, a little shyly, "and I give, in the ways I know how. I buy the things I know you won't ask for. I fix the things you don't notice are broken yet. I try to carry the invisible weight. So you don't have to."
The counselor nodded, her gaze moving gently between us.
