Page 15 of In Too Long


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There were seven large, upholstered club chairs. Six were in a U and then one was at the top of them. Like half an umlaut. Four of the chairs were taken with students. Two male and two female. Standing behind the empty chair at the front of the room was Marlo London.

My surprise must have shone, and she pointed at me. “You’re in my class, right?”

I nodded and made my way to one of the empty chairs, one that had my back to the door, nodding at the other students, who nodded back. We sized each other up as discreetly as possible, the unease showing in all of us.

God, could I handle this? Sitting around talking about my feelings, when I’d already done my share of it last year in Lincoln? I didn’t think I could bear it.

“Okay, we had one more student— Oh, hello. Come on in. Would you close the door behind you, please? You’re our last arrival.”

I turned around and my eyes met dark brown ones that landed on me. He started to smile, the dimple in his chin becoming pronounced, and then seemed to remember where he was. The smile dropped and he made his way to the empty chair next to me.

Logan Fields was in my grief study.

Maybe I could bear it after all.

Chapter6

“Okay, a few ground rules,”Marlo said as she circled the chair in front of her and sat down. “This isn’t a twelve-step program with the word ‘anonymous’ in the name, but I think it goes without saying that what happens in Grief Group stays in Grief Group with respect to what others share. Everyone good with that?”

We all nodded, not looking at each other, all eyes on our leader.

“Having said that, this is a small campus, and you’ll probably run into each other here and there. I’m leaving it up to you how you choose to acknowledge those moments. But that should be done with mutual respect of each other’s privacy wishes.”

More small nods from us all.

“On a personal note, you have my thanks for agreeing to participate in this study. You will receive two science credits for attending our two-hour sessions on Wednesday nights and taking assessments—both oral and written—throughout the semester. We will be working together in a group therapy session, as well as one-on-one interviews at times. I wanted to do this as a group instead of individually, to see if going through this with your peers adds some value to your recovery. I believe strongly that it will. We have parameters via the college, but it’s being privately funded, so we have some leeway to change things up if the need arises.

“This study is a passion of mine, and I hope to find some honest data on how people in your age group navigate grief when also faced with the challenges of maturing from high school, to college, to therealworld.” She air-quoted “real world,” and there were a couple small sighs of laughter/understanding.

To us, death had thrown us into the real world whether we liked it or not.

“Not only is this instrumental for my study, but I believe you will find benefit as well. Otherwise, it’s not worth it. I’m not putting you through reliving trauma and taking your temperature about it for my own purposes. I love the science of it, but I’m not cruel.”

This time the sighs felt more like relief. I was sure I wasn’t the only one who was nervous about having Band-Aids—nicely covering healing wounds—ripped off, taking my thickening scabs with them.

After meeting each of us with a compassionate look, Marlo continued, “Grief is a moving entity. You may think you have a handle on it, only for something to trigger some feelings you weren’t even aware you still had. Or some completely new ones. So, hopefully in these sessions you gain some tools to help you beyond the semester’s end. Beyond Bribury. Because, though it will be more manageable, the pain of your loss never truly goes away.

“This is how the study will work. We’ll do written assessments tonight before you leave. Basic stuff. How’s your sleep? What signs of anxiety or depression are you experiencing? What do you have in place for support? Those types of things. In our weekly class, we’ll do things like sharing our stories, more of a traditional group therapy session. But we’ll also do things to help you break out of patterns that are impeding your healing. Things to try throughout the week—homework, if you will. And then we’ll put it all together at the end of the semester to put you in the best possible place moving forward. Sound good?”

The nods were small, a couple combined with a shrug, but Marlo blasted on.

“Great. Now, let’s just do a brief intro for everyone. First names only at this point. Your year here and who you’ve lost. If you’d like to say when and how, that’s great, but not necessary if you’d rather not. Though it will eventually come up in some of our sessions.”

She put out a hand, palm up, to the girl seated next to her, like she was presenting her to the rest of us. “Would you like to start?”

“Oh, yeah. I guess. I’m Paige. I’m a senior. Political Science major. Oh, wait, you didn’t ask that, did you?”

She was nervous—we all were, I was sure—and Marlo gentled her voice when she said, “No, but it’s fine to tell us whatever you’d like. Poli-Sci, that’s interesting. Who did you lose, Paige?”

“Um. My sister,” Paige said. A couple of the kids, Logan included, shifted uncomfortably in their seats. I guessed there would be a lot of that. Getting comfortable with our own grief gave no guarantees that we’d be comfortable with the grief of others.

A lot of people I knew who had lost someone close themselves, had said some unbelievably stupid things to me in the past year, thinking they were being helpful.

Paige had white-blond hair that was cut into a chin-length bob, forgoing the long hair the majority of college girls were wearing now. She wore no makeup and had glasses that were overlarge, with dark navy frames. Her clothes were casual and unadorned. A simple white tee tucked into jeans. Sneakers and no jewelry except for a large (men’s?) watch that dangled around her wrist when she moved her hand.

It wasn’t my look, but it was one I thought had its own simple style. Very Poli-Sci. Like she could walk out of here, pick up a placard, and get to protesting. Or like maybe law school was next and she’d be practicing environmental law in five years.

I liked her immediately.