My Cheating Mate (Emma and Jeremy) novel Chapter 52

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Chapter 52

*Dr. Chen asked me today I

stuck in self plishment. If I’m using guilt as a way to avoid moving forward. I didn’t have an

answer. But sitting here now, alone in this house that should have been ours, I think maybe she’s right.

*I’m stuck. Stuck in the guilt. Stuck in the self-loathing. Stuck in this pattern of working late and avoiding home and sleeping on my office couch because facing the empty house feels like accepting that Emra might never come back.*

* And maybe she won’t. Maybe I’ve destroyed something that can’t be rebuilt. Maybe all the therapy and honesty and commitment in the world won’t be enough to overcome the betrayal.*

*That thought terrifies me. But what terrifies me more is that I might be using that fear as an excuse to not fully engage in healing. If I’m stuck in the guilt, stuck in the self-punishment, I don’t have to risk really trying and failing *

*Dr. Chen says I need to forgive myself. But how do I forgive myself for the unforgivable? How do I move forward when Emma still looks at me like that sometimes-like I’m something disgusting she has to tolerate?*

I stopped writing, my hand cramping. Three paragraphs. More than I’d managed in weeks.

It wasn’t insight. Wasn’t breakthrough. But it was honest.

And Dr. Chen said honesty was where healing began.

t

My phone rang. Emma’s name on the screen.

I answered immediately. “Hey. Everything okay?”

“I’m sorry.” Her voice was thick, like she’d been crying. “For today. For looking at you like that.”

“Emma, you don’t have to apologize. You have every right to be disgusted with me.”

“But it’s not helping,” she said. “Dr. Chen says we both have patterns we’re stuck in. Mine is punishing you with my anger. Yours is punishing yourself with guilt. And we’re just-we’re stuck, Jeremy. We’re not moving forward.”

She was right. I knew she was right.

“So what do we do?” I asked.

“I don’t know. But I think-” She paused. “I think maybe we need to try something different. The separate houses, the carefully maintained distance, only seeing each other in therapy-maybe it’s making it harder instead of easier.”

My heart started pounding. “What are you suggesting?”

“I don’t know. Maybe we try spending time together outside of therapy? Not dates or anything romantic. Just-existing in the same space. Remembering how to be around each other without it being this huge, heavy thing.”

“I’d like that,” I said carefully, not wanting to push. “What did you have in mind?”

“Coffee? Tomorrow morning? At that place near the pack house.”

“I’ll be there. What time?”

“Seven. Before your council meeting.”

“Okay.” I paused. “Emma? Thank you. For calling. For-for trying.”

“We’re both trying,” she said. “Even when it’s hard. Even when we’re stuck. We’re both still trying.”

After we hung up, I looked at my journal entry. At the words about being stuck, about using guilt as armor, about being too afraid to really try.

Maybe Emma was right. Maybe we needed to stop hiding behind therapy and distance and carefully controlled interactions.

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Maybe we needed to actually spend time together. Reftiember why the Moon Goddess chose us. Remember who we could be to each other when we weren’t both drowning in trauma and gun.

It was terrifying. The idea of sitting across from Emma in a coffee shop, trying to make conversation, risking another one of those disgusted looks.

But it was also necessary.

Because we couldn’t heal in isolation. Couldn’t rebuild trust without actually being in each other’s presence.

I looked around the empty house one more time, then made a decision.

I grabbed my laptop, some clothes, and headed back to my office. Not to hide. Not to sleep on the couch.

But to work. To focus. To actually engage with pack business instead of going through the motions.

If I was going to meet Emma for coffee tomorrow, if we were going to try something different, then I needed to be present. Actually present, not drowning in guilt and self-loathing.

Dr. Chen had given me exercises for that too. Mindfulness techniques, grounding exercises, ways to pull myself out of the spiral

when it started.

I’d been ignoring them, convinced that I deserved to spiral. 1

But Emma was right. The self-punishment wasn’t helping. Wasn’t moving us forward.

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