“Okay I have just a few more questions to ask you, just so I can get to know you and your situation sort of thing. That okay?” He asks as he clasps his hands together. I nod.
“Okay, so what is your medical history, have you been diagnosed with any mental health issues?” He asks. I adjustmyself in my seat before I answer. It’s a hard seat, not very comfortable.
“Well, I’ve not been officially diagnosed with anything,” I reply, my fingers rubbing the back of my left hand.
“Any suicidal thoughts?”
“Not right this second.”
“But you have a history?” He asks, his voice rising up an octave.
“Well the reason I came home from university was because I was about to jump off a building. My friend convinced me to come back here and start fresh, get a job, that sort of thing,” I explain, my heart beating faster and faster. My palms are wet. My voice quivers as I talk.
“And are you working now?”
“Yeah I just got a job at the bookshop?—”
“The one down the road?” Doctor Satin interrupts, pointing in the general direction to the bookshop. I nod as he gets his pen out again.
“Yeah, I know the one you mean. So can I just go ahead and write down gay as your sexuality?” He asks and I raise my eyebrows at him.
“Why do you need to know my sexuality?”
“Oh, I don’t make the paperwork.”
“Who does then?” I ask, my tone surprises me. Doctor Satin chuckles to himself quietly as he places the paperwork in a drawer.
“You don’t seem very trusting of people, Noah, even someone like me, who is just here to help you. Where do you think your trust issues have stemmed from?” He asks, and my heart skips a beat. I don’t know how to reply to that. It could be anything. My mother told me that we had all the time in the world before she was killed. It could be that. Or it could be the fact that Jonathan was supposed to be a friend, but he took advantage of me. Maybeit was that. Or a combination of these things. I’m not sure what to say to him though.
“You’ve sussed me out that quickly?” I chuckle nervously, trying to get off the topic.
“Yeah, I guess I did,” he smiles.
“I think it started when my mum died. I just stopped trusting that the world was… fair… I guess.”
“Why do you think the world is unfair?” He asks, his eyes staring into my soul the entire time. Eye contact makes me nervous, so I look down at my fidgeting hands.
“I think it’s because I keep getting hurt. People I don’t even know have hurt me, people I trust have hurt me. It’s just been… a lot to deal with,” I say, my eyes threatening to spill over.
“I say this to everyone, but it’s because it’s true. Yes, the world is unfair, but it’s about how we deal with the unfairness of it all. I think you just have to look at life like a running track. There’s hurdles you have to jump over every so often. After jumping over so many hurdles in your life, you begin to get tired. It gets harder to jump over them with ease. So you half-ass it. You land funny, your ankles get sore. You don’t think you can finish the race. You might even want to give up. But the more you learn about running, and how to jump over the hurdles better and faster, you’ll begin to get into a flow. There’s always going to be hurdles, they don’t just clear them away halfway down the track. But it gets easier to manage because you’ve taken the time to learn about the art of getting over them. Do you get what I’m trying to say Noah?” Doctor Satin asks as my mind processes all of that. I come to the conclusion that it’s actually really good advice.
“I think I made the right decision coming here. I’m just trying to learn how to get over the hurdles,” I tell him as he gives me a soft smile.
“That’s good. So you mentioned your mother’s passing. How are you dealing with it?” He asks, taking a sip of water. I feel my brain scramble for something to say. HowhaveI been dealing with it?
“Not very well, I think. I keep having these dreams, but they feel so…real,” I say, thinking back to the other morning. I can’t help but feel like I’ll have nightmares for the rest of my life.
“That sounds like PTSD,” Doctor Satin tells me, grabbing the paperwork again and writing something down.
“Sometimes I have nightmares about other things though, it’s not just my Mum,” I tell him, flashes of Jonathan’s face appear in my mind. I wish I didn’t remember the details of his face so vividly, or remember the feeling of his breath on my naked flesh.
“You can have flashbacks to any trauma in your life, in fact, it usually doesn’t focus on one single thing. What are theseother thingsyou are referring to?” he asks, his eyes piercing through my soul again.
“I was… um…” I trail off, struggling to get the words out. My eyes want to drip crimson, but I take a deep breath and hold it back.
“I had a friend at university, he had invited me and my roommate to a house party he was having. Part of me wanted to go, while another part of me didn’t. I was never one for parties, especially ones that I didn’t know anyone at. So I found myself talking to this friend,” I explain, Doctor Satin listening intensely.
I think back to the party, about how there was a bonfire in the back garden. The heat it gave off made me relax to the point I didn’t realise how drunk and high I was. The room was spinning and my head was heavy. Someone’s arm was around me while the fire crackled and popped in front of us.
