“Yes,” I say and start to hear a low roaring in my ears.
“I’m very sorry to hear that. That must have been incredibly hard.”
“Yes,” I say again, but this time a little quieter.
Lucille lets silence fill the space between us for a few seconds and then when she talks again, her tone is very different. A lot more upbeat.
“So why have you come to see me today?”
The roar in my ears gets louder. “I have some problems.”
I don’t know why I can’t just say it. I said it easily enough at Marcello’s house two weeks ago. I told his mother like it was no big deal at all.
But that was completely different. Marcello was by my side when I told his mother. And she is his mother, his mamma, she is by association, a safer person that this woman who has a wall full of certificates behind her desk and is wearing a pair of leather loafers that I know have a four-figure price tag.
“Tell me about those problems,” she says, unbothered.
I draw in a breath. “OCD. I have OCD.”
She blinks and I wait for her to make a note on the open notebook in her hand but she doesn’t. “Tell me about that.”
I do. I tell her about the cleaning. I tell her about the counting. I tell her about the counting and the cleaning when both coincide. I tell her how rationally, I don’t know why I do it. When I look at it from a distance, I don’t actually believe something bad will happen if I don’t count or clean or both. I explain how it’s greater than that. It’s like I’m possessed by some creature or force that insists on me carrying out these tasks, and if I don’t I feel the consequences immediately – a tight chest, a racing heartbeat, headaches and sweating, nausea and dizziness, oscillating extreme body temperature and dense, dense brain fog.
“Well, that’s why we call it ‘compulsive’,” she says, almost casually. “It’s an uncontrollable compulsion.”
I can’t help but snort. “So if that’s the case, how do I stop?”
“You don’t just stop,” she says and finally, possibly right when I need it, she smiles. It opens up her face considerably and I relax a little into my chair. “You treat the disorder and hopefully, if you find treatment that works, you’ll find the compulsions don’t impact your life as much as they do now. I assume you’re here because they are impacting your life?”
I could lie. I could tell her that they’re not. And it wouldn’t even be that big of a lie, because things have been good recently. Really good.
It’s been three weeks since Marcello and I confessed our feelings. Two weeks since I met his mother and spent the whole day with her and Marcello. Two weeks of training with Marcello in the gym, but now rather than sharing high fives or fist bumps after a set, we kiss or squeeze each other’s butts.
Last week, Marcello slept over three times and left some of his clothes – and two alarm clocks – at my place. On one of those nights, we finished the Edinburgh puzzle and then messed it all up again when he bent me over and fucked me over it. Tonight, I’m going back to his house for dinner and this weekend we’re going for drinks with Radia and Chloe, our first but I’m almost certain, not our last, double date all together.
Life is good.
But it feels like I’m running out of time. Like there’s an expiration date for how great this all feels. And it’s not because I think Marcello is going to leave me or change his mind.
It’s because of me. I’ve had good stretches like this before, if not as uniquely precious as these last few weeks have been. But they never last.
And I want this stretch to last. Or rather to not implode on me, and on Marcello too.
“Yes. My OCD has the very real potential to impact my life,” I admit before adding, “in a bad way.”
Despite feeling stupid for adding that completely unnecessarily, Lucille just nods and keeps looking at me impassively.
“Well, good for you for seeking help,” she says and it’s nothing. Not really. It’s a passing comment, an acknowledgement of the reason I’m here. But it makes my chest puff out and dulls the noise in my ears. “So shall we talk a bit about when your compulsions to clean and count started?”
I open my mouth to tell her the same story I told Marcello, but as I do, I feel a ball of something hot and liquid lodge itself in my throat. “I think it’s because I lost my parents at such a young age,” I say and I surprise myself by how little I care about my voice cracking.
“Go on.” Lucille nods again.
*****
Forty-five minutes later and I’ve finally stopped crying.
My face feels red and raw from the near constant flow of tears and by the end, I'd emptied Lucille’s box of tissues. I apologised for that when I left after agreeing on our next appointment, but Lucille’s face softened again for only the second or third time and she squeezed my arm through my suit blazer.
