"Maddie?" Harry is holding my elbow, worry plastered on his face. I look at him in confusion. "Maddie, what the fuck is happening?"

I don't know. I shake my head. Fuck. "I...I'm sorry. I just got lost in a memory." The crowd departing our airplane parts around us, staring first angrily and then excitedly when they realize it's me. I wipe at the tears on my face. Fuck.

"Come on, baby. Let's get you home." He guides me toward the VIP lounge, where a porter meets us, and leads us out to the VIP parking lot. I'm not feeling much like a person right now, let alone very important. I feel numb. Scared. I really want to talk to Doctor Kline. And Jenna. And Matt. Fuck. Harry has to buckle my seatbelt because I am just sitting there, staring. I am conscious of the fact that this must be freaking him out. I should smile. I should cover this, whatever this is. I should fake it.

I look over at him. "Harry," my voice cracks. I can't fucking fake anything around him. "I'm really freaked out about that video getting posted to my account. I know this might sound stupid. Like it's a stupid thing to be upset over. But I feel...violated." Tears are pouring down my face, and I feel like a fucking idiot. Like a weak fucking idiot. I'm not even sure that's what I'm upset about.

"It's not stupid. I get it." He takes my hand as he pulls out into traffic.

"Promise me it wasn't you."

"Maddie, it wasn't. I swear." He squeezes my hand, and I nod. But I don't feel the courage of his convictions. I don't understand how my trust in him has crumbled. Maybe it was how excited he got when he saw the view count rising before his eyes. Maybe it's that no one else could have done it. Maybe I'm just a fucking idiot. Please let me be a fucking idiot.

When we get home, I go into one of the guest bedrooms with my phone and close the door. I really need to talk to the shrink.

"Maddie, what's up?" Her voice is calm. I wish I were calm. "Are you okay?"

"No," I sob. Maybe everything that happened in England is just catching up with me now. Maybe I've never really been okay, and it has just been a façade, like my fake tv house. Maybe I'm pmsing. No, too soon.

"Come in," she says right away.

"I just got home from England," I whimper.

She sighs. "Maddie, you need to come in. Have someone drive you."

"Okay." I hang up. She's right. This is a face-to-face level meltdown. I get up to look for Harry. He's sitting outside the door, his head resting on his propped up knees. He raises his head when the door creaks. "Can you drive me to my shrink?" He nods, panic so clear on his face. Poor Harry. I think he still doesn't realize just how fucked up I am. Maybe he's starting to see. Maybe he will love me anyway. He already does. Maybe I am losing my fucking mind.

We walk back out to the car. I buckle my own belt this time. But we just sit there, and then I remember he doesn't know where it is. I go to the programmed list of destinations on my GPS and pull it up. Shrink, it's called. He starts to drive. I continue to cry. "Please tell me what's wrong, Maddie."

My whole body convulses in a sob. Fuck fucking fuck. Stop this shit now, Madelyn. I breathe. "I can't. I will, but right now I can't." The tears still roll down my cheeks, but I am breathing more evenly.

He nods and stares out at the road, following the computerized voice. Turn right on Mull. Haul. And. Drive.

Doctor Kline is waiting in the outer office when I come in. "We're going back here," she points to the interior office where she does medical exams, further in from her usual therapy office. Office office office. My brain is not functioning correctly. "Sit down," she points to the exam table.

I sit, confused. "Why are we back here?"

"You sounded close to a panic attack. I thought I might need to sedate you."

Well, shit. "You don't. But I was." I stare at the ceiling. "I might still be, but you won't have to sedate me."

"Okay." She sits opposite me. "What's happening?"

Tears start streaming again. "A lot." I don't even know where to begin. I just bury my face in my hands and cry. I have this unidentified ache in my soul.

"Maddie, you need to breathe. Or I will sedate you. You're going to hyperventilate."

I breathe, gasping mouthfuls of air into my lungs. My heart slows a bit. I should have recognized the panic. Shock. Panic. Fuck.

"I had sex," I blurt.

"Today?" She asks so casually. I laugh. A wild laugh. I feel crazy. I guess I'm in the right place.

"No. Last week."

"How was it?" I mean...really doc? My face apparently mirrors my thoughts because she goes on, "Not like that, Maddie. Emotionally."

"Oh. Good. Scary."

"Why good? Why scary?"

"Good because I felt loved. Scary because it required all my trust."

"And he had that?" I nod. "Does he still?" I shrug. "What happened?"

I breathe. And breathe. And explain the whole video situation.

"Is there something else that has caused you to doubt him?"

I shrug again. "I met his ex. And she's so much prettier than I am." She waves her hand to elaborate, so I tell that whole story, too.

"How does that create doubt in your relationship?" She has a gift for asking these questions without any bias or emotion. Just words.

"I don't know. Because I don't get why he would stay with me if he can have her back."

"How does that relate to the video? Or doesn't it?" She frowns.

"That could be a reason he would stay with me, even if he wanted her."

She crosses her legs at the knee and stares at me. "When did you start to feel this doubt?"

"When she said that shit about me to him."

"Tell me exactly how you felt." I describe my imaginary wall made of ice and bricks. She nods. "I can see your wall again." It's not imaginary. She can see it. I can only feel it. I'm fucking crazy. And then she shakes her head. "You can't listen to people like her. You have to listen to the people you trust and to yourself. Who do you trust, Maddie?"

"You."

"Who else?"

I start to cry again. The last time she asked me this, Harry was the first name I thought. Fuck. "Mitch."

"Anyone else?" I shrug. "Maddie, I want you to imagine that you hadn't met Flower."

"Fern."

"Whatever. Imagine she never said those things," she waits for me to nod. "And then this video thing happens. Would you still be questioning him?"

I answer right away. "No." Then I rush to change my answer, "I don't know. Maybe." I pause to think it over. Really think it over. Before fucking Fern freaked me out, I would have believed anything Harry said. Did that make me stronger or did it make me a fool? "No, probably not. I would have believed him."

"Why does she have more credibility than he does?"

"She doesn't."

Doctor Kline stares at me. I know her fucking tricks so well. I'm supposed to be fine now. Because I have talked myself around to realizing that I've given this bitch Fern more influence than the boy I love. What the fuck is wrong with me?

I nod. "Okay."

"You're okay?"

"I guess."

"What else?"

"I still feel like my privacy has been violated with this youtube shit."

"What can you control?"

"I can take it down, or be okay with it, or maybe contact google to find out who accessed my account."

"Okay." She leans forward. "Maddie, you need to continue your work. Let your guard down with people you trust. Be yourself. Your true self. And focus on what you can control."

I nod.

"He was good to you?" I frown. I don't know what she means. "Harry, he treated you well, for your first time?" Oh. This is not a normal Kline kind of question.

I blush, I mean as if anyone could tell, my face is so red from all this crying. "Yes. He was sweet. He took care of me, held me. He told me he loved me. Often." I don't want to hurt you, he kept saying.

She is nodding. "Don't let other people into your head." Listen to the people you trust.

"Okay."

She follows me through her therapy office to the outer waiting room, where Harry is sitting, looking forlorn. He stands when he sees me, and I crush myself against him, my arms wrapping around his waist. I press my face against his chest.

"You must be Harry," I hear Kline behind me. Harry takes one arm from around me, I assume to shake her hand. "Thanks for the pay raise." I laugh, still keeping my face against his body. His hand returns to my back, rubbing slow circles.

"Doctor Kline, you're worth it," he answers, and I can hear his voice in the air and in his chest. I laugh again.

"Be patient with her," Kline says. I can feel Harry nodding. And then I hear her door close.

Harry his kisses the top of my head. I hold him tighter. "I love you, Maddie."

"I love you, Harry," I cry against his shirt, and it comes out sounding like, ahh low yoo ay ree.

"Baby," he kisses my head again, rubbing his hands up and down my back. "Oh, my sweet girl."

I pull away and wipe my tears, "thank you for bringing me, Harry."

"Are you okay?"

"Yes. I just had a panic attack," I sniffle.

"Can you tell me what triggered it?"

"I will." I take his hand and head for the door. When we are back in the car, I say, "On the plane, I remembered a particularly bad moment with Matt from the year he died. A moment I wish I could go back and change. I wish I could go back and tell him I love him," the words hiccup into a sob.

"Oh, baby, he knew you loved him." I raise my hand to stop him. I'm not so sure he did, but I just can't get into that now.

"And I was freaked out by Fern and youtube, and I just missed him. I wanted to talk to him about all of this." Harry nods as if that makes sense. "And this is going to sound strange, but I have this wall." He nods vehemently. I tip my head to the side.

"Maddie, that's not news to me." He takes my hand in his.

"That wall has protected me for years, kept me safe. And you somehow got behind it, inside. And I still don't know exactly how you did that." I smile at him, and I'm rewarded with his beautiful soft smile, dimples just barely making an appearance in his cheeks. "And then you tore the fucking thing down. And I was free. And I still felt safe. But then Fern." He shakes his head. "I know I shouldn't have let her bother me. I know it. But I couldn't stop it."

"I could feel the wall going back up that night," he frowns, then looks at me desperately. "I'll tear it back down."

I smile at him. "Please do. I would take it down myself, but I'm just not strong enough."

"Oh, Maddie. Yes, you are. It was really you who took it down in the first place. Not me. You can do it again."

I smirk at him. "You just said you would break it down."

"We'll do it together. You hand me the fucking bricks, and I'll smash them." I laugh picturing him shattering my imaginary blocks of ice and cinder. I nod, squeezing his hand.

"I'm sorry, Harry. You've done all this work to get me to open up to you, to take down that wall, and now we just have to start over."

"First of all, nothing about this has been work. I love you." I smile at him shyly. "And second, we're not really back to the start. You've already taken down a few layers of bricks. But I will be here, Maddie. However you need me to be." I nod. "Home?"

"Yes." And then I remember we are supposed to go to the fucking Golden Globes in two days. "Um, we have that awards show this weekend," I mutter. "I have to go to the stylist tomorrow to pick a dress."

"She's not coming to you this time?" He smirks. I grin at him. He's mocking me, and I am so happy he is. "Can I come with you?"

"Do you want to?" He nods excitedly. "Okay. And, uh, I wasn't sure if you wanted to wear your suit from the wedding, or we can get you one on loan. Whatever you're more comfortable with."

"I don't know. I guess I can see what they have."

I call Zooey. "Hey, Zooey. Yeah, noon." I roll my eyes at Harry. "My boyfriend is coming with me, and I need a suit for him." I cover the phone. "Do you know your suit size?" Harry shakes his head, and I am struck by how normal all of this feels. After my fucking break down, we're back to normal. Are we? "I'll check his other suit and tell you." She asks me what style. Like, I mean, what? "He looks really good in things that are slim fitting. And something with a bit of a rock edge." His dimple deepens.

"The guys are excited about going to the after party," he says after I get off the phone. "Is there a dress code for that?"

"No, anything is fine."

At home, Harry folds his arms around me. "What do you want to do?"

"Shower. And sleep."

"With or without me?"

I frown up at him. "With."

"I don't want to do anything that will make you feel...uncomfortable, Maddie."

"Harry, I will push you away sometimes. And what I need in those moments is for you not to let me. It's one of the things Mitch is so good at. He won't ever let me be alone with my misery. I love you, and I need you."

He kisses me gently, his lips just sliding between mine. "Oh, baby. I love you. I need you, too. You can't push me away."

We shower, and he raises his eyebrows to ask permission to wash me. I nod. His hands slide over my body so delicately. I soap up my hands and wash him at the same time. He washes my hair, I wash his. He washes between my legs. I feel a pulse of fear. But he just rinses the soap without probing any further. My eyes travel down to his erection. "I'm sorry," he mutters. "I can't help it." I shake my head. Why is he sorry? I lather my hands and reach for him. He pulls his hips away. "No." He trails his hand over my cheek. "Maddie," he whispers, "I don't want you to feel like you have to do something about this." He gestures down. "I love you. When I see you, I get turned on. I can't physically stop it. But I'm not trying to get off right now."

"Okay," I whisper.

"Let's go to bed," he kisses my cheek, and pulls my hand. I freeze. "To sleep, Maddie." He guides me out of the shower. Fuck. A part of me, most of me, wants to make love to him, to feel that intense connection and to feel loved and to feel release.

"What if I wanted to..."

He folds a towel around me, shaking his head. "I don't want to do something you might regret later."

"Okay." Fuck. I hate this distance. I made this distance. I close it, wrapping my arms around him again. "I just want to feel close to you," I kiss his chest.

"Let's tear the wall down first." He kisses my wet hair. I nod. We go to bed, and he holds me so close, we might as well be sleeping in his tiny bed in England.

I wake with the sun, my body tense and my stomach tight with anxiety. I haven't felt this way for weeks. I crawl out of bed and put on my swimsuit. I retract the cover that should have trapped some warmth in the water. The air is crisp outside, but even in January, LA is always sunny. I stick my toes in. It's really warm. Like a cup of tea left on the counter just a little too long to be considered hot still. I swim laps for a long time, playing over in my mind what happened in England, what Fern said, what Kline said, what Harry said. When I get out, I feel better, as if the heat of the water melted some of my ice. Harry is still sleeping, but he is tossing around in the sheets as if he is having a nightmare. I run my hand down his back, and he calms immediately, his breathing steady. I shower and then get my laptop and update my therapy journal, sitting against the headboard next to him. I cry a little as I write it, but as it should be, it's therapeutic, and I feel better after. It helps just to get my feelings out, and read over them, and analyze them.

"Maddie," Harry's voice is scratchy. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," I wipe the small trickle of tears and close my MacBook. "I'm good. I was just doing a little writing."

He sits up and cuddles close to me, resting his head on my shoulder. "Can I read it?"

I shake my head, gripping the computer tightly. Never.

"Is it about me again?" Again. Shit. He remembers the screenplay. He crinkles his forehead to meet my eyes.

"Some." He wraps that tattooed arm around me. "You can read that old screenplay if you want, I guess."

"Really?"

"Yeah, but just don't judge me too harshly. It's really bad. And I never fixed it. I just started over with something else." I set my computer aside and shuffle off the bed. He follows me excitedly. I put my hand in his, smiling up at him. "You're cute."

"Thanks," he makes a weird face. I laugh. "So are you."

I dig through the papers piled on my desk in the office, pulling it out carefully. "I'll be in the kitchen," I say, handing him the stapled pages.

"Stay." He looks at me with pleading eyes. "Stay with me, Maddie."

I sigh. "Come with me," I offer. "I'm hungry."

He plops onto one of the barstools and starts to read, laughing quietly as he turns the page. Ugh. Why did I do this to myself? I microwave a couple of Poptarts for each of us, and sit down next to him with a diet cherry coke in hand. He bites into one of the cherry pastries and coughs it back out, his eyes widening with laughter. I lean over and peek at the page. Oh god. No. Ick. I cover the page with my hand.

He pulls it away. "No take-backs, Turner," he smirks at me. "Or should I call you...Kathryn?" I blush. That was the chubby brown haired girl's name in the stupid script. I reach for the pages again, wanting to rip them. Burn them. Ugh. He's got these long fucking arms, and I don't even stand a chance. "When did you write this?" He flips it back to the first page.

"September."

"Awww. Maddie," he curls his arms around me. "You liked me even then."

"Duh," I scowl.

He looks at the page, then puts one hand on my shoulder and the other on my hip. I smack him. He's mocking me, doing what was written there. He leans down and kisses my lips gently. "You're beautiful," he says. And I hit him again.

"Stop."

"I'm sorry, baby. It's so cute. You're so cute," he squeezes me, no longer using my shitty words as a guide.

"It's shit," I shake my head.

"Cute shit." I laugh, pulling him down to kiss me for real. Real kisses. I remember the first time he ever kissed me. Fuck, if he ever read that journal...like he asked to...the mockery would never stop.

"Come on, Harry. We need to go soon."

"Let me just finish this real quick."

"Later!" I grab the pages and toss them onto the breakfast bar. "I've had enough teasing for one morning." I bite my lip, trying to hide my smile. I actually love it when he teases me.

"Okay, baby. I'm sorry. I love you."

"I love you, too."