The Silver Linings Playbook - By Matthew Quick Page 0,4

and really, I'm not depressed at all.

When Dr. Patel sits down, he pulls the lever on the side of his chair, which makes the footrest rise. He leans back and laces his fingers behind his tiny head, as if he were about to watch a ball game.

"Relax," he says. "And no Dr. Patel. Call me Cliff. I like to keep sessions informal. Friendly, right?"

He seems nice enough, so I pull my lever, lean back, and try to relax.

"So," he says. "The Kenny G song really got to you. I can't say I'm a fan either, but ..."

I close my eyes, hum a single note, and silently count to ten, blanking my mind.

When I open my eyes, he says, "You want to talk about Kenny G?"

I close my eyes, hum a single note, and silently count to ten, blanking my mind.

"Okay. Want to tell me about Nikki?"

"Why do you want to know about Nikki?" I say, too defensively, I admit.

"If I am going to help you, Pat, I need to know you, right? Your mother tells me you wish to be reunited with Nikki, that this is your biggest life goal - so I figure we best start there."

I begin to feel better because he does not say a reunion is out of the question, which seems to imply that Dr. Patel feels as though reconciling with my wife is still possible.

"Nikki? She's great," I say, and then smile, feeling the warmth that fills my chest whenever I say her name, whenever I see her face in my mind. "She's the best thing that ever happened to me. I love her more than life itself. And I just can't wait until apart time is over."

"Apart time?"

"Yeah. Apart time."

"What is apart time?"

"A few months ago I agreed to give Nikki some space, and she agreed to come back to me when she felt like she had worked out her own issues enough so we could be together again. So we are sort of separated, but only temporarily."

"Why did you separate?"

"Mostly because I didn't appreciate her and was a workaholic - chairing the Jefferson High School History Department and coaching three sports. I was never home, and she got lonely. Also I sort of let my appearance go, to the point where I was maybe ten to seventy pounds overweight, but I'm working on all that and am now more than willing to go into couples counseling like she wanted me to, because I'm a changed man."

"Did you set a date?"

"A date?"

"For the end of apart time."

"No."

"So apart time is something that will go on indefinitely?"

"Theoretically, I guess - yes. Especially since I'm not allowed to contact Nikki or her family."

"Why's that?"

"Umm ... I don't know, really. I mean - I love my in-laws as much as I love Nikki. But it doesn't matter, because I'm thinking that Nikki will be back sooner than later, and then she'll straighten everything out with her parents."

"On what do you base your thinking?" he asks, but nicely, with a friendly smile on his face.

"I believe in happy endings," I tell him. "And it feels like this movie has gone on for the right amount of time."

"Movie?" Dr. Patel says, and I think he would look exactly like Gandhi if he had those wire-rim glasses and a shaved head, which is weird, especially since we are in leather recliners in such a bright, happy room and well, Gandhi is dead, right?

"Yeah," I say. "Haven't you ever noticed that life is like a series of movies?"

"No. Tell me."

"Well, you have adventures. All start out with troubles, but then you admit your problems and become a better person by working really hard, which is what fertilizes the happy ending and allows it to bloom - just like the end of all the Rocky films, Rudy, The Karate Kid, the Star Wars and Indiana Jones trilogies, and The Goonies, which are my favorite films, even though I have sworn off movies until Nikki returns, because now my own life is the movie I will watch, and well, it's always on. Plus I know it's almost time for the happy ending, when Nikki will come back, because I have improved myself so very much through physical fitness and medication and therapy."

"Oh, I see." Dr. Patel smiles. "I like happy endings too, Pat."

"So you agree with me. You think my wife will come back soon?"

"Time will tell," Dr. Patel says, and I know right then that Cliff and I are going to