The new office of Dr. Linda Martin, Baltimore, MD, Sunday

[betterthanaplan]

Duke was finally doing it. He'd made an appointment and everything, and dragged himself to the mainland to keep it instead of calling out at the last minute or just. Not going. (Lucifer would pout if he hurt his favorite therapist by being a no-show. And . . . and Octavia was proud of him for trying to do therapy again at all. He was, to use a very old fashioned term, so whipped by his partners.)

But he had some very lovely photos texted to him to lift his mood a bit as he made his way downtown, at least. So there was that. . . .

[NFB due to distance. For the lovingly NPC'd therapist!]

Comments

[exasperangel]

Was Linda happy about being stuck in Baltimore because her favorite client had a meltdown and dragged her across the country with him, an act he was currently avoiding owning up to? No. Not in the slightest.

Was she trying to make the best of it?

... Well, after about two weeks of drinking, complaining to Amenadiel, and taking care of Charlie, she had at least gotten the ball rolling on getting a Maryland counseling license so she'd have something to do while Lucifer figured himself out. And... an office. Of sorts.

An extra suite she was renting, basically.

"Hi, Duke," she said, flashing him a smile as she held open the door. "Come in."

[betterthanaplan]

Well, it wasn't like Duke knew the difference between a "proper" office and an extra suite, so.

"Hey Linda." He gave her a slightly awkward wave as he found somewhere to sit. "How's, uh. How're you liking Maryland?"

[exasperangel]

"It's..." Linda's face did a number of interesting things before she settled on, "...nice?"

She nodded at the sofa on the other side of the room. "Please, sit down."

[betterthanaplan]

"If you have to be forced to live anywhere, Baltimore's not too bad," Duke agreed, and had a seat. "Uh. I almost feel like I should apologize for you being stuck here, though I'm pretty sure I'm not the patient that was in mind when you guys got dragged across the country."

[exasperangel]

"I'm... working on him," Linda said, rubbing at the bridge of her nose as she settled the notepad in her lap. "But can you please ask him to hurry it up so we can go home?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Will do," Duke lied.

What? He wanted her to be where she wanted to be, but he did not want his boyfriend to be God.

"Um. Anyway. What, uh. What should we talk about?"

[exasperangel]

"I don't know," Linda said, settling both of her hands over her notepad. "Let's start with... how have you been?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Honestly . . . things are really good. We're back on my boat, and even Octavia doesn't seem to be struggling as hard as she used to."

[exasperangel]

Linda nodded. "And are you enjoying it?" she asked. "Things... being good?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Yeah. I mean, it'd be pretty fucked up if I wasn't, right?"

[exasperangel]

"I wouldn't say 'fucked up'," Linda said, looking at him. "Sometimes people who are used to a great deal of instability in their lives can be... uncomfortable when things seem to go well. Anxious, even."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke snorted. "Like, what, they're just sitting around, waiting for the other shoe to drop?"

Waiting for one universe or another to reach out and grab them and screw them over again. . . .

[exasperangel]

"Yes," Linda said. "Sometimes that's how people feel when they finally find stability. Do you think that's 'fucked up'?"

[betterthanaplan]

"I mean, kind of. You spend all your time trying to make things go right for once and then when they do, you can't even enjoy it properly."

[exasperangel]

"But can you understand why someone might feel like that?" Linda asked gently.

[betterthanaplan]

"I mean, sure. The bottom drops out from under you enough, you'll start to expect it. That's not surprising. Doesn't mean it isn't kind of fucked."

[exasperangel]

Oh, Duke.

"Why?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Because when good things happen, you should be able to enjoy them. Especially if they don't happen very often."

[exasperangel]

"But why does it make you 'fucked up' if you can't?" Linda asked. "Feeling that way isn't something you do on purpose, is it?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Is that supposed to be better? Not being able to, I don't know, find the happy?"

[exasperangel]

“Duke,” Linda said, leaning backwards a bit. “What’s the difference between something you feel, and something you do?”

[betterthanaplan]

". . . Is that supposed to be some kind of zen coen?" Duke asked. "Feeling is something you do."

[exasperangel]

Linda was finding it generally easier to deal with Duke when you ignored the defensive snark.

"We don’t make an active decision to feel the way we do. As opposed to when we make a deliberate choice to act. We can only decide how we handle those feelings," she said patiently. "You might as well decide someone is 'fucked up' because they were born with brown hair."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke raised an eyebrow. "Or in a cursed family with a murderous trouble?"

[exasperangel]

"Yes," Linda said, without missing a beat. "So if someone is finding it hard to fully enjoy a good patch, it's more useful to ask them what they're scared of, than to write them off as broken just because they feel something."