She pops up at random times.

But mostly when I’m lonely and I do something and I think, “What would she think?”

I find it pathetic really.

I want to let it go.

I’m 57.

I’m not throwing the world over for a fantasy lark.

We talked about it once or twice. It wasn’t thorough enough. It was just a lot of clinical stuff about transference. Surfaces that didn’t really mean much.

I got the impression she didn’t have experience with it.

I started to hide it, even from myself. I know because every once in a while I could feel myself holding back. (Who says during EMDR — I’m thinking of you giving me a handjob because of the way your fingers moved back forth?)

I couldn’t really hide it. Occasionally, I spoke when I noticed it — the places I couldn’t go because I didn’t want her to think too lowly of me.

Once, I imagined her walking through the house. I wondered what she’d think of my life. My kids, My furniture. Nothing sexual. Just a person walking through my life. Judging.

I was proud of all that. Which is why the fantasy of her seeing my place was an offering.

Ultimately, I think she didn’t like me.

Ultimately, I don’t think she did like me.

Ultimately, I should’ve left much earlier.

Ultimately, ultimately, ultimately.

But ultimately, it ended the way it ended. And she said, “I thought we were going somewhere else with you.”

I’m sorry I didn’t have the presence of mind to ask: And where is that? The answer would’ve said a lot. (Just its asking said a lot - yet it was unexplored.)

So now I send her Season’s Greetings cards of my life of amazing Instagram-ness to her office and wonder if she ever thinks of me.

Which tells you just how self-centered I really am.