Dr Evans had an opening this afternoon. I should have already been seeing her but keep putting it off.
It’s hard to admit that you need help for mental health, but I do. Living with past trauma takes work, strength, and willpower to keep on breathing, trying, wanting, living.
Coming out of my apartment, I find Gavin waiting for me.
“Hey.”
“Did you get an appointment?” he asks.
“Yeah, but I have class first.” I thought about blowing class off, but I’ve missed too many already.
“Okay, well I’m free all day, so I’ll drive you.”
A frown creeps over my face. “And do what while I’m in class?”
“I’ll get coffee. It’ll be fine.”
“You don’t have to babysit me.”
“It’s not babysitting, it’s hanging out and making sure someone I care about gets to where she needs to be.”
I hold my car keys to show him I can get where I need to be. Not needing the sleeping pills from the doctor this last week means I can drive myself places again.
Snatching them from my fingers, he slips them into his pocket.
“Gavin!” I snap.
“Just shut up and let me take you,” he says, before leaning forward and throwing me over his shoulder.
A scream escapes my lips but he doesn’t put me down. Instead, he pushes the stairway door open and proceeds to jog down them with me flailing over his shoulder. When he pushes through the exit, I demand he puts me down.
“Are you going to come peacefully?” he jokes, so I pull his hair and he quickly releases me, lowering me to the ground.
“I nearly threw up down your back!” I slap his chest.
“I’m glad you didn’t.”
“Come on,” I groan, defeated. Secretly, I’m glad he’s coming with me. The thought of driving and having a panic attack scares me.
My skin feels tight over my bones and I almost feel like I’m underwater, and the weight of it keeps me from being in the now. People talk to me but my mind is so pre-occupied with thoughts of the past and the facts about James. It’s too much.
That stupid note has brought back the hollow pit in my gut. It was just a damn mistake.
“How’s the piece coming on?” Looking up to see the teaching assistant looking down at me, I fidget in my seat, annoyed that I didn’t hear or feel his presence.
The second piece in the series I’m creating is almost finished, but I hate showing my work until it’s completed.
“Powerful,” he comments, and it makes me focus on the painting before me. It’s a little girl in the eye of a storm, all the chaos around her, but she found a calm. Her arm is reaching toward the viewer and it’s almost real, like you can actually take her hand in yours and lead her through the painting.
“Do you think you’ll get the third piece ready in time?” He taps his watch and pulls a face, slanting his lips. There’s three weeks until we have to submit our series.
“There’s plenty of time.” I shrug, but that’s not a lot of time at all and I need to be able to focus.
Gavin is waiting for me when I leave class with a coffee and a sandwich. “I may get used to this,” I tease.
“You may not when you taste the coffee.” He shivers.
“I’ll be here when you’re finished,” he tells me when we get to Dr Evans’ office.
Having him wait causes guilt to niggle at me but I know he will refuse if I tell him to go home, so I just agree.
I’m shown straight into her office and take a seat opposite her.
Pouring me a glass of water and placing it in front of me, she pushes her glasses up her nose and crosses her legs.
“I’m glad you made an appointment. What prompted you to do so?”
“Fear. I’m scared.”
She scribbles something down before asking, “What scares you?”
“Everything.” My eyes close and I take in a deep breath. She gives me the minute I need and allows me to continue. “I don’t want to hurt anymore. It’s enough.”
“What’s enough?”
“Everything that’s been taken from me. I’m not sure I can take anything else.”
Finlay hasn’t called tonight, instead just sent a text saying how busy he is and that he will call when he can.
After the day I’ve had, I’m exhausted, but needed him to tell me the mistake with the flowers was just that a silly mistake from his own lips, so when I close my eyes tonight, Jackson’s face won’t taunt me.
Lying awake, staring at the ceiling is maddening, but I don’t want to go back to relying on sleeping tablets. They trap me so deep in my dreams that there’s no escape.
My eyes go to the bedroom door when it begins to open. Mary’s silhouette comes into view. She’s holding a pillow against her body.
“What’s up?”
She crawls over the bed and plants herself next to me, wrapping her arm around my waist. “Can I sleep in here tonight?”
Willing my tears not to come does no good. A sob builds in my throat and I hate how easy I tumble backwards.
Turning my body so I can face her, I laugh/cry. “Sure you can.”
TWO WEEKS, FIVE DAYS, I’ve used every excuse possible for not calling her. Having to hear her voice will break me further. The thought of having to go home and tell her about Julie is soul destroying. She won’t forgive me, and Julie, no matter what promises she makes here, there’s no way she will keep the indiscretion to herself. Even if I denied it, the doubt would be there and the lie will consume the fragile pieces of us and turn us into people we don’t recognise.
Julie can say she’s pregnant, but until I see her pee on the stick, I’d never believe her word. There’s no way if she is that it would be mine. The voices in my head scream at me for being so careless when drinking so much. How can I not remember being with her?
My sober self tells me it’s because I’d never fucking do that to Antonia, to myself, but the evidence and the patchy flashbacks I get contradict what I want to be true.
“You’re back,” Brad says, walking into my office.
No one knows I’ve been back for the last five days. “I had an impromptu meeting I could not miss.”
After the information Julie gave me about the partners wanting to vote me out of my own fucking company, I put a deal in place that I always wanted to do but didn’t feel like I could give up the business. If I’m honest with myself, my dad wouldn’t want me to run his company if I didn’t want to be doing it. It’s not what I planned for myself and I’ve finally come to peace with the fact that letting the company go doesn’t mean I’m letting my dad go. He’s a part of me and will always be.
“Oh, what meeting? I thought I was covering everything.” He stutters and it gives away his nerves. The fucking two-faced motherfucker. After every opportunity I gave him, trusted and loved him like a brother, and this is how he repays that friendship.
“This I needed to do myself. I have something for you though.”
I take out the contract he had me sign, giving him shares in the company, and push it towards him.