“Do you really think he’d not let you see the ones that you care about?”
“At this point, I have no clue. I don’t trust him, and that’s not because of he who he is, but because he’s a stranger to me.”
“Do you want that to change?”
“I don’t know,” I said, letting out a breath. I really didn’t. “I do want it to change. It’s not his fault that I’m messed up. I would like to have some sort of relationship with him, but I don’t knowhow?”
“That’s fine,” Dr. Mayes said gently. “You don’t have to know that right now. But I do want to ask you…” She leaned forward in her seat. “Do you want things to change with any of your family members?”
“I don’t know, really,” I said after thinking for a moment. “It’s complicated.”
“Try to explain it to me.”
“I just figured that everyone would have tried harder to visit me here, even with me telling them that I wanted to be left alone. Sure, they called and checked in often, but other than Zevon and Collin, no one seemed to press the issue much at all.”
“Didn’t Dominic visit just last week?”
“Yeah,” I said with a small smile. “But even with him, I figured he would have made his way here sooner than he did.”
“I think they were all trying to abide by your wishes, though. You needed to learn that you could trust them, and you wouldn’t be able to do that until they proved it. You can’t blame them for not doing what you asked, you need to decide what it is you want and communicate that.”
“But I miss them all so much.”
“Then do something about it. Take matters into your own hands. This is your life, Scarlett. You control your wants and needs. No one else can.”
“But I’m scared,” I said, tears clouding my vision. “What if they’re better off without me? What if Alan is waiting for me to lead him back to the people I care about and hurts them all? What if—"
“You won’t know unless you try. So maybe take a weekend to go back home and visit. See how they respond to you, and let them have the chance to prove that you mean the world to them all.”
Could I really go back? Would they be able to accept me for who I was becoming today, out of everything I’d already screwed up?
“Let’s change the direction of this session,” Dr. Mayes said. “What scares you the most?”
My brain stopped at her question.
“Life,” I said finally, bringing my eyes up to hers. “Living a life, one that I want, scares the shit out of me. I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing. What if I fail at being an adult? I can’t even get a job because of my own mental issues. How am I to live a life that is filled with so many choices?”
“Life is meant to have failures,” Dr. Mayes said. “It’s normal. Anyone your age has the exact same worries. It’snormal. Getting a first job, finding a place to life, going off to college. It’s normal. All part of life, and figuring out how to grow wings without the supervision of parents. Life is meant to have some failure. No matter how hard you try, you never know when the rug may be pulled out from under you. You will fail sometimes. It’s human nature.”
“But I can only take so much.” I took a shuddering breath. “If I…”
“Don’t even think that,” Dr. Mayes said. “You won’t fall that far down again. You have been getting stronger while you’ve been here. Anyone can see that, Scarlett. You won’t let life kill that spark you’re developing. You have one heck of a support team pushing you forward. I’m pretty sure that none of them will ever allow you to travel down a dark path again.”
No. My new family certainly wouldn’t ever let me think of going down that path.
“What else scares you?”
“Not being good enough. Alan finding me. Take your pick.”
“Normal worries, once again,” she said. “But you are good enough. You don’t need to doubt that. The people in your life will agree.”
Right. Normal. I didn’t even know what normal was. I never have.
“Nothing is normal, though.”
“No one is normal.”
“I’m bored.”
