Session Seven: Delilah in the Ramada Lounge
INT. RAMADA LOUNGE – EARLY EVENING
Dim lights. Fake plants. One bartender, two conference attendees in matching polos, and Delilah, queen of the vinyl booth. Her heels are off. Her lipstick is not. She has a voice like a gravel driveway paved in secrets and menthol.
[Therapist note: session requested in lounge after she “refused another sterile room.” Currently stirring her drink with a pen she stole from a Gideon Bible.]
DELILAH (lighting cigarette she swore she quit):
You want to talk about him? Of course you do. Everybody does. Samson this, Samson that. As if I held the scissors.
I didn’t cut the hair. I just made the appointment.
They say I was a seductress. No, darling—I was professional. There’s a difference. He came into my parlor with seven lies and a muscle complex. I gave him dinner, three chances, and a reasonable payout package.
And let’s be honest—he wanted to be caught. Men like that? They always do. They beg you to find the secret, and the minute you do, they make you the villain. I asked him what made him weak. He told me. Eventually. After a little performance art and a lot of pec flexing.
[Therapist note: subject pronounces “performance art” like it involves juggling doves in the nude. Tone is bored-royalty-meets-exhausted-hospice nurse.]
I’m not the villain. I’m the mirror.
He saw himself reflected in my eyes, and it scared the strength right out of him.
And let’s talk about those eyes, since we’re sharing. He was already blind, sweetheart. The Philistines just caught up to what I’d known for weeks.
You think I loved him? Of course I did. The way you love a forest fire. You don’t try to hug it. You watch it burn. You learn how to dance near it without losing your eyebrows.
People ask me if I regret it.
I regret nothing but the upholstery in that suite. Do you know what testosterone smells like at 114 degrees? I do. It smells like goat fur and broken expectations.
[Therapist note: has removed three earrings and one shoe during this paragraph. Claims it’s a ritual. Possibly a lie.]
You want the truth? I’m not mad he died. I’m mad he finished with flair. The big ending. The redemption arc. Pushing pillars like it was all part of some divine script.
And me? I’m the commercial break. The setup line.
The woman with a razor and no legacy.
[She sips. Looks off. Softens for the first time.]
I didn’t ruin him.
He handed me the blueprint.
I just followed directions.
Now I do brunch with Bathsheba twice a month. We swap stories and alimony tips.
She says kings fall faster than soldiers.
I say men write scripture to cover their tracks.
Either way, we toast.
To strong women.
To bad press.
And to stories that never end the way they’re told.