Mia meets Paul outside his office as he arrives (late) from a few days in Maryland. Irritated, she wants to know what happened and then explains that she spent the weekend working, which was good because she was supposed to go away with Bennett. Mia starts to ask questions about Paul's life before moving to New York, grilling him on whether he left behind patients who needed him. When she springs a question about Laura on him, Paul counters that he can't discuss it, but Mia explains that she came across a copy of
Laura's Deposition at her firm — and it's clear to Mia, Laura was in love with Paul. Throwing the document on the floor, she exhorts him to pick it up. As Mia's questioning grows more intense, Paul turns things around, informing her that she broke a tenet of her profession and accusing her of goading him as a way of ignoring her own pain. Mia switches tracks and explains how a pretty young receptionist in her office is having a bridal shower, the type of thing Mia will never experience herself because she's not enough of the "whole package" to land a man. When Paul responds by asking whether Mia thinks he chose Laura over her, Mia imagines what a victory it must have been for Laura to own Paul so completely once she'd reeled him in. When he points out that Mia might want him to "comfort and contain" her, she admits to being difficult and pushing men away. In the next moment, she charges him with kicking her out of his practice 20 years ago and never thinking of her again, but Paul answers her by playing the tape of her childhood piano recital that she'd given him back then that he'd been listening to. Transported by the music, Mia tells Paul that shortly after that recital, her parents shipped her off to live with an Aunt, and when she returned, her mother had given birth to twin girls. Paul, suspecting that all her anger is a test to see if she can push him away, tells her that she wants to feel connected but is afraid to be left alone. In a "doorknob moment" at the end of her session, Mia asks whether he slept with Laura, to which he answers "no."
