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Week 1: Open Topic
Sep. 22nd, 2026 10:19 amI knew my day was going to be an absolute shitshow the moment a graying and pudgy Peter Pan walked into my office.
“You must be Mr. and Mrs. Welton,” I say, wishing I was anywhere but here. “Come in and have a seat.”
The man in leather ankle boots, green tights, and a green felt cap, sits at one end of the long sofa in my office. His wife, in a dark blue pantsuit, white blouse, and string of pearls, sits at the other. Evel Knievel wouldn’t have attempted to jump the distance between them.
I sit across from them trying not to sigh. “Mr. and Mrs. Welton, I’m Dr. Sparks and—”
“Please,” he holds a hand up. “I’m Peter, and this is Wendy.”
I flip through my notes. “I’m sorry, your names are not Douglas and Veronica Welton?”
“Yes. They are,” she snaps.
Mrs. Welton whips her driver’s license out like she’s done it a thousand times before. Maybe she has and that’s why she has it at the ready. This is all so ridiculous, part of me is hoping that I’m just being Punk’d.
“No,” he says evenly. “My name is Peter and this is Wendy.”
Well, shit.
“This situation is unbearable, and it’s your fault, Dr. Sparks. I demand you do something about…” she says as she gesticulates wildly at her husband. “… this.”
Douglas quietly sings to himself… “This won't do. What's the matter with you? All it takes is faith and trust…Oh, and something I forgot, dust. Dust? Dust? Yep, just a little bit of pixie dust.”
Veronica, aka Wendy, grinds her teeth and softly counts to ten.
I frown. “Is that—”
“From Peter Pan. Yes,” she grumbles. “I’ve had to listen to the goddamn soundtrack more times than I can count!”
I clear my throat and sit back. “Let’s… start from the beginning.”
Mr. Welton raises his head. “Well, Wendy here—”
“My name is Veronica, and you damn well know it, Douglas.”
“Mrs. Welton, my office is a safe space for everybody,” I say calmly. “Within these walls, if Douglas wishes to be called Peter, that’s all right. And Dou—Peter—by the same token, you cannot force your preferences on her. Within these walls, she’s Veronica.”
“I am Peter Pan,” he says. “Just so you know.”
Dear God.
“Jesus Christ,” Veronica mutters.
The Weltons were referrals from the Delacroixs—former patients of mine who found themselves in trouble when Mr. Delacroix came down with an acute case of Diddling-the-Nanny-itis. I got them through it, mostly without bloodshed, but it made me realize some people just should not be together.
Of course, if it weren’t for couples like the Delacroixs and the Weltons, I wouldn’t have this beautiful office on the thirty-seventh floor of one of the city’s oldest and most prestigious professional buildings with a view to die for.
Because of crackpots like these, I’ve got a home in the Hamptons, a trendy loft here in the city, a retreat in Connecticut, and a skin care routine that costs more than a Tesla. I’ve got a recurring segment on The View, two book tours, and a reputation as the nation’s premier relationship specialist.
America’s Love Guru is what they call me.
The truth is, I need dysfunctional people. I quite like the life they’ve given me. Even still, some days it’s hard to deal with these loons. Douglas here is the CEO of a Fortune 500 company and apparently now thinks he’s the Eternal Boy. It’s not Peter Pan Syndrome, and it’s not just some weird sex game. That I might be able to deal with.
I mean, what the actual fuck?
It reinforces one truth I’ve learned doing this work: the richer a person is, the weirder they are. Exhibit A is sitting right in front of me.
“All right, Veronica,” I begin. “You said this is my fault. Let’s talk about that.”
“Douglas—”
“Peter. Remember, remember, Dr. Sparks said in this office you have to call me Peter,” he reminds her in a sing-song voice.
She grits her teeth and pinches the bridge of her nose, looking like she’s trying hard to keep from stabbing her husband in the eye with the heel of her Louboutin.
“Fine. For fuck’s sake,” she hisses. “Peter here attended one of your speaking engagements about eight months ago at the Times Center.”
“Ahh, yes. I remember that engagement. It was about how finding your inner child and learning to play again can be a boon for your mental health and your relationship.”
“That’s the one,” Veronica snaps, her tone icy. “Well, ever since that seminar, my husband has been going through some… phases.”
Douglas crosses one green-tighted leg over the other and fingers the red feather in his felt cap as he quietly sings to himself.
“Tell me about these phases,” I say.
“For a couple of weeks, he thought it was great fun to ask people at social functions to pull his finger. I don’t need to tell you what happened after they did,” she groans. “Suffice it to say, it will be quite a while before we’re invited back to the Met Gala.”
Douglas giggles like a schoolboy and shrugs.
“After that, he thought he was a magician,” Veronica says.
“And what was that like?”
“Horrible.”
“Can you elaborate?” I ask and take a drink of water.
Her cheeks turn bright scarlet, and pure mortification crosses her face. “One night, while we were being… intimate,” she starts in a horrified whisper. “He asked if I wanted to see him pull a rabbit out of my… vagina.”
I cough, choke, sputter—and spray a mouthful of water all over the coffee table between us. My face on fire, I grab a box of tissues and wipe it up, then sit back and try to reclaim some semblance of control and professionalism.
“I see,” I croak.
An awkward silence descends as I try—and fail—to banish the mental image of Peter Pan here yanking a rabbit out of his wife’s nethers.
“After that, he was a pirate for a couple of weeks. And I can’t tell you how quickly I tired of hearing him ask if he could shiver me timbers.”
Douglas titters, thoroughly enjoying the walk down memory lane.
“And then he was a policeman. And a construction worker,” she says. “I actually think he went through all the Village People and boy, was that a treat.”
“All right,” I finally say. “And how have we arrived at…. this?”
“Douglas—”
“Peter,” he chirps.
She grimaces like she’s got a mouthful of lemons. “Ever since he watched Peter Pan with our grandkids, he’s been like… this.”
“It put me in touch with my inner child,” he sighs dreamily. “I truly connected with him—just like you said I should, Dr. Sparks.”
“I was speaking metaphorically.”
“Everything fell into place and for the first time in my life, I realized exactly who I am,” he says, sounding awestruck. “I am Peter Pan.”
For fuck’s sake.
I run a hand over my face. Clearly, he’s fully entangled in his delusion and I’m not getting through to him, so safe space be damned.
“Mr. Welton, you understand that Peter Pan is a fictional character, right?”
“I am not,” he says, sounding offended. “And it’s Peter. You said so.”
“Okay, let’s try it this way,” I say. “When you say you’re Peter Pan, I assume you’re speaking metaphorically?”
He turns to me and smiles. “Of course not. I am Peter Pan.”
“Peter Pan isn’t real, Mr. Welton,” I say.
“I assure you, Dr. Sparks, I am very real.”
“Do you see what I’m dealing with now?” Mrs. Welton asks. “And this is happening all because he heard your inner child garbage.”
“To be fair—”
“I want to know how you’re going to fix this mess?”
Right. Because it’s my fault her crackpot husband bent my metaphor so far out of shape that it’s unrecognizable. But of course, I don’t say that. I rely on these people passing my name around their cocktail parties as freely as they pass around their Xanax.
“Well?” she demands.
I clear my throat. “Mr. Welton—”
“Peter. You said—”
“I know what I said, but we need to embrace reality for a moment,” I snap. “Finding your inner child doesn’t mean losing yourself in a fantasy. Peter Pan is not a real—”
He leaps onto the coffee table and sings at the top of his lungs, “The second star to the right, shines in the night for you, to tell you that the dreams you plan, really can come true,” with a little gyrating shimmy that is all kinds of wrong.
Veronica buries her face in her hands and shakes her head. I stare at him completely dumbfounded. And utterly horrified. I think I may need therapy myself after watching his little shimmy.
Enough.
With a sigh, I get to my feet and cross my office. Staring directly into Mr. Welton’s eyes, I open the window. It’s time to call his bluff.
“Mr. Welton, one of Peter Pan’s defining characteristics is his ability to fly, yes?”
“Of course.”
The sight of the street thirty-seven stories below will surely slap him with some cold, hard reality and pull him out of this fantasy. It’s high enough that it makes me queasy to look at. As I stare at the street so far below though, I briefly wonder if my insurance covers defenestration. But hey, in for a penny, in for a pound.
“Can you fly?” I ask.
“Of course I can. I am Peter Pan, after all.”
“Great. Let’s see it,” I say. “If you can fly, Veronica will apologize, take back everything she’s said, and we will both believe that you are, in fact, Peter Pan.”
Veronica eyes Douglas, her lips curling into a wolfish smile. “That’s right, Dou—Peter,” she coos. “If you can fly, I’ll take it all back and be your Wendy… darling.”
He grins as he hops off the coffee table then struts over to me. Douglas Welton tips me a wink and with a song on his lips, he leaps out the window.
And proves, in fact, that he is not Peter Pan.
Well, shit. This is not going to play well on The View.
“You must be Mr. and Mrs. Welton,” I say, wishing I was anywhere but here. “Come in and have a seat.”
The man in leather ankle boots, green tights, and a green felt cap, sits at one end of the long sofa in my office. His wife, in a dark blue pantsuit, white blouse, and string of pearls, sits at the other. Evel Knievel wouldn’t have attempted to jump the distance between them.
I sit across from them trying not to sigh. “Mr. and Mrs. Welton, I’m Dr. Sparks and—”
“Please,” he holds a hand up. “I’m Peter, and this is Wendy.”
I flip through my notes. “I’m sorry, your names are not Douglas and Veronica Welton?”
“Yes. They are,” she snaps.
Mrs. Welton whips her driver’s license out like she’s done it a thousand times before. Maybe she has and that’s why she has it at the ready. This is all so ridiculous, part of me is hoping that I’m just being Punk’d.
“No,” he says evenly. “My name is Peter and this is Wendy.”
Well, shit.
“This situation is unbearable, and it’s your fault, Dr. Sparks. I demand you do something about…” she says as she gesticulates wildly at her husband. “… this.”
Douglas quietly sings to himself… “This won't do. What's the matter with you? All it takes is faith and trust…Oh, and something I forgot, dust. Dust? Dust? Yep, just a little bit of pixie dust.”
Veronica, aka Wendy, grinds her teeth and softly counts to ten.
I frown. “Is that—”
“From Peter Pan. Yes,” she grumbles. “I’ve had to listen to the goddamn soundtrack more times than I can count!”
I clear my throat and sit back. “Let’s… start from the beginning.”
Mr. Welton raises his head. “Well, Wendy here—”
“My name is Veronica, and you damn well know it, Douglas.”
“Mrs. Welton, my office is a safe space for everybody,” I say calmly. “Within these walls, if Douglas wishes to be called Peter, that’s all right. And Dou—Peter—by the same token, you cannot force your preferences on her. Within these walls, she’s Veronica.”
“I am Peter Pan,” he says. “Just so you know.”
Dear God.
“Jesus Christ,” Veronica mutters.
The Weltons were referrals from the Delacroixs—former patients of mine who found themselves in trouble when Mr. Delacroix came down with an acute case of Diddling-the-Nanny-itis. I got them through it, mostly without bloodshed, but it made me realize some people just should not be together.
Of course, if it weren’t for couples like the Delacroixs and the Weltons, I wouldn’t have this beautiful office on the thirty-seventh floor of one of the city’s oldest and most prestigious professional buildings with a view to die for.
Because of crackpots like these, I’ve got a home in the Hamptons, a trendy loft here in the city, a retreat in Connecticut, and a skin care routine that costs more than a Tesla. I’ve got a recurring segment on The View, two book tours, and a reputation as the nation’s premier relationship specialist.
America’s Love Guru is what they call me.
The truth is, I need dysfunctional people. I quite like the life they’ve given me. Even still, some days it’s hard to deal with these loons. Douglas here is the CEO of a Fortune 500 company and apparently now thinks he’s the Eternal Boy. It’s not Peter Pan Syndrome, and it’s not just some weird sex game. That I might be able to deal with.
I mean, what the actual fuck?
It reinforces one truth I’ve learned doing this work: the richer a person is, the weirder they are. Exhibit A is sitting right in front of me.
“All right, Veronica,” I begin. “You said this is my fault. Let’s talk about that.”
“Douglas—”
“Peter. Remember, remember, Dr. Sparks said in this office you have to call me Peter,” he reminds her in a sing-song voice.
She grits her teeth and pinches the bridge of her nose, looking like she’s trying hard to keep from stabbing her husband in the eye with the heel of her Louboutin.
“Fine. For fuck’s sake,” she hisses. “Peter here attended one of your speaking engagements about eight months ago at the Times Center.”
“Ahh, yes. I remember that engagement. It was about how finding your inner child and learning to play again can be a boon for your mental health and your relationship.”
“That’s the one,” Veronica snaps, her tone icy. “Well, ever since that seminar, my husband has been going through some… phases.”
Douglas crosses one green-tighted leg over the other and fingers the red feather in his felt cap as he quietly sings to himself.
“Tell me about these phases,” I say.
“For a couple of weeks, he thought it was great fun to ask people at social functions to pull his finger. I don’t need to tell you what happened after they did,” she groans. “Suffice it to say, it will be quite a while before we’re invited back to the Met Gala.”
Douglas giggles like a schoolboy and shrugs.
“After that, he thought he was a magician,” Veronica says.
“And what was that like?”
“Horrible.”
“Can you elaborate?” I ask and take a drink of water.
Her cheeks turn bright scarlet, and pure mortification crosses her face. “One night, while we were being… intimate,” she starts in a horrified whisper. “He asked if I wanted to see him pull a rabbit out of my… vagina.”
I cough, choke, sputter—and spray a mouthful of water all over the coffee table between us. My face on fire, I grab a box of tissues and wipe it up, then sit back and try to reclaim some semblance of control and professionalism.
“I see,” I croak.
An awkward silence descends as I try—and fail—to banish the mental image of Peter Pan here yanking a rabbit out of his wife’s nethers.
“After that, he was a pirate for a couple of weeks. And I can’t tell you how quickly I tired of hearing him ask if he could shiver me timbers.”
Douglas titters, thoroughly enjoying the walk down memory lane.
“And then he was a policeman. And a construction worker,” she says. “I actually think he went through all the Village People and boy, was that a treat.”
“All right,” I finally say. “And how have we arrived at…. this?”
“Douglas—”
“Peter,” he chirps.
She grimaces like she’s got a mouthful of lemons. “Ever since he watched Peter Pan with our grandkids, he’s been like… this.”
“It put me in touch with my inner child,” he sighs dreamily. “I truly connected with him—just like you said I should, Dr. Sparks.”
“I was speaking metaphorically.”
“Everything fell into place and for the first time in my life, I realized exactly who I am,” he says, sounding awestruck. “I am Peter Pan.”
For fuck’s sake.
I run a hand over my face. Clearly, he’s fully entangled in his delusion and I’m not getting through to him, so safe space be damned.
“Mr. Welton, you understand that Peter Pan is a fictional character, right?”
“I am not,” he says, sounding offended. “And it’s Peter. You said so.”
“Okay, let’s try it this way,” I say. “When you say you’re Peter Pan, I assume you’re speaking metaphorically?”
He turns to me and smiles. “Of course not. I am Peter Pan.”
“Peter Pan isn’t real, Mr. Welton,” I say.
“I assure you, Dr. Sparks, I am very real.”
“Do you see what I’m dealing with now?” Mrs. Welton asks. “And this is happening all because he heard your inner child garbage.”
“To be fair—”
“I want to know how you’re going to fix this mess?”
Right. Because it’s my fault her crackpot husband bent my metaphor so far out of shape that it’s unrecognizable. But of course, I don’t say that. I rely on these people passing my name around their cocktail parties as freely as they pass around their Xanax.
“Well?” she demands.
I clear my throat. “Mr. Welton—”
“Peter. You said—”
“I know what I said, but we need to embrace reality for a moment,” I snap. “Finding your inner child doesn’t mean losing yourself in a fantasy. Peter Pan is not a real—”
He leaps onto the coffee table and sings at the top of his lungs, “The second star to the right, shines in the night for you, to tell you that the dreams you plan, really can come true,” with a little gyrating shimmy that is all kinds of wrong.
Veronica buries her face in her hands and shakes her head. I stare at him completely dumbfounded. And utterly horrified. I think I may need therapy myself after watching his little shimmy.
Enough.
With a sigh, I get to my feet and cross my office. Staring directly into Mr. Welton’s eyes, I open the window. It’s time to call his bluff.
“Mr. Welton, one of Peter Pan’s defining characteristics is his ability to fly, yes?”
“Of course.”
The sight of the street thirty-seven stories below will surely slap him with some cold, hard reality and pull him out of this fantasy. It’s high enough that it makes me queasy to look at. As I stare at the street so far below though, I briefly wonder if my insurance covers defenestration. But hey, in for a penny, in for a pound.
“Can you fly?” I ask.
“Of course I can. I am Peter Pan, after all.”
“Great. Let’s see it,” I say. “If you can fly, Veronica will apologize, take back everything she’s said, and we will both believe that you are, in fact, Peter Pan.”
Veronica eyes Douglas, her lips curling into a wolfish smile. “That’s right, Dou—Peter,” she coos. “If you can fly, I’ll take it all back and be your Wendy… darling.”
He grins as he hops off the coffee table then struts over to me. Douglas Welton tips me a wink and with a song on his lips, he leaps out the window.
And proves, in fact, that he is not Peter Pan.
Well, shit. This is not going to play well on The View.
