Just for Now

Chapter One

Allison's situation was a bit different. Her parents had gotten divorced when she was in high school. They had both dated a bit since, but neither had seemed to find the one yet. Thought she never would admit it out loud, it seemed like Alli had something to prove almost. Alli wanted to prove to herself that love could last. Getting a divorce would go against that. Cole knew that what was going through her mind as she sat on the couch next to him currently.

"What would you recommend?" Cole asked weakly, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his thighs. "This... this isn't getting better."

She tilted her head at them, analyzing them in a way that made Cole want to fade away into the couch. "How have things been since what happened a few weeks ago?"

The two instantly shifted on the couch. Allison was the one to speak up, "I don't think either of us want to talk about that, okay?"

Emma held her hands up in surrender. She never said the words with exactly what happened, likely because she could see how uncomfortable it made the two of them. And if she couldn't see how it made them feel, one of them always vocalized their disdain with talking about it. They both knew they had to talk about it, but refusing to seemed like the easier option.

Cole cleared his throat. "Please... what do we do?"

Emma shrugged helplessly with a gentle smile. "I can't tell you what to do here. It's clear you both have a lot of love for each other, but it's okay if that love isn't enough anymore."

It felt like a punch to the stomach to hear those words.

Whenever Cole felt like he had nothing, he had his love for Allison. When he had nothing... he had Allison. Always his Alli. He couldn't fathom not having her. It had to be enough, because somedays it was all he had. That love had to be enough.

"I just... I feel like we've failed," Allison whispered out weakly, squeezing her hands together.

"You haven't failed," Emma assured her in a kind tone. "If you choose to do this, you doing this for yourselves. You get to put yourselves first."

"I just... hate the idea that something like what we had can just fade away," Allison insisted, staring at the therapist desperately.

"You two met when you were four years old. You were each other's best friends throughout your entire childhood and then were your first romantic relationship. You started dating in high school, and stayed together throughout college," Emma recited slowly, the two of them nodding as they followed along, waiting for her point. "You got married young. Neither of you have ever been with anybody else. You've never even taken a break. Your lives have been one in the same. It's natural to want to know who you are outside of that."

Cole thought about the truth behind her words. From the second Cole met Allison, even at such a young age, he knew he would do anything to make her happy. He didn't realize it was love at the time, but it always was. It almost felt like they happened in reverse. It only took seconds for him to fall in love with her, but it took years for him to fall out. Cole sat back in the couch, his arm resting loosely behind Alli. She leaned forward and he pretended not to notice.

"And... sometimes you find yourself just wanting different things." There it was. One of their biggest issues at the moment. Cole would never pressure Allison into anything she didn't want to do, but he did want to start to think about having a family. Allison didn't want that yet and wasn't open to the conversation. He understood, but something about the idea of waiting made his chest feel tight and his breathing pick up. Something about letting time pass didn't sit right with him.

They were always on the same page, until they weren't.

"There's no right way to go about marriage," Emma continued slowly, which Cole thought was very 'therapist-like' of her, as he liked to say. Don't get him wrong, Cole saw the benefit of therapy. But this just felt like going in circles. He knew she wouldn't tell them what to do, but sometimes he just wished she would. Because he had no idea what to do.

"Well, there's a wrong way, and it feels like this is it," Cole commented in a murmur. Neither of the two women in the room responded to that. It wasn't often they found their therapist at a loss for words, but maybe that was because she was running out of things to say to them.

Every week, Emma had them close the session with three things they loved about each other.

She didn't bother having them do that this week.

Maybe that was how Cole knew it was over.

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Hello everyone! Welcome to the final book of the "Just for" Series! I hope you all enjoyed the beginning of the book. I'm hoping to post the next chapters soon and maybe get a bit of consistent posting going on. But we'll see! See you soon :)