Dear Esme,

Hush, dry your tears. You are in expert hands, even though you are suspicious and gunshy of male authority figures. I don't put the family pictures there to make my clients who lost children or who had bad childhoods or fertility struggles feel less-than. I do it bc being a heterosexual married man is bedrock to my identity, and softens the blank slate off-putting neutrality in a way with which I can live, without exposing anything not bland. You have your own life, and I have mine. We meet at appointed times to speak about unspeakable things. Do not expect more. This is what you pay me for, no less and no more.