“What the fuck are you talking about? Of course not!” Logan said suddenly, getting to his feet. “There’s nothing wrong with your body, Neil. I think it’s…” He paused, looking meaningfully into my eyes. “Psychological,” he finished.
Psychological?
What he was saying made sense. Ever since I was a child, I’d had a strange relationship with sex. I could never completely let myself go and could never feel truly emotionally involved with my partner. I was always more concerned with “giving” than receiving. I always needed women to feel good, to achieve orgasm. I focused on lasting as long as possible for them, keeping my erection until they were done. I was concerned about “quality” as well as quantity and gave it everything I had without ever getting emotions involved. It was all somewhat methodical, practiced, and carefully calculated. The fact that I almost never gave into requests for oral was a sign of the intense control I maintained with all of them.
Basically, women shattered underneath me while I thought about Kim, about the weeping Boy and my damaged soul. And, eventually, my mind abandoned me. I regressed into the past. Distant but somehow still very present.
“So you think it’s like a mental block?” I asked Logan, scrubbing a hand over my face before looking away, out the French windows to the blue sky beyond.
I wasn’t dumb; I knew I had mental problems. The constant showering was proof of that, as was the talking to myself, the hallucinations of the Boy, the insomnia, the rage I struggled to control, and the constant thoughts about why all of this had happened to me.
Why me?
Why had Kimberly chosen me?
I asked myself that question every day, even though she was the one I really wanted to ask.
“I think you should talk to Dr. Lively about this,” Logan suggested, sounding pained. For once, I agreed with him.
I hated the clinic, my shrink’s antiseptic office, and following the course of therapy.
I had been confident in my choice not to go back there, but, at the same time, I knew that my doctor was the only person who could help me shed light on my problem.
It was important that I resolve it.
Sex had always been a tool I used to survive, the only way I had of shutting up the Boy and drying his tears. How was I supposed to do without it? How would I live? How would I keep myself under control?
I didn’t know any other way to balance my adult self with my child self: two parts of the same soul that had no desire to work with each other. Sex was the thread that bound them together, kept them connected, and prevented either one from prevailing over and erasing the other.
What would happen if the Boy won that fight?
I was afraid of the answer to that question and the possible consequences, which was why I fought so hard. I fought to keep a war from breaking out and to keep the peace between the two opposite, contrasting sides of me.
“You’re right,” I told my brother, banishing all my other thoughts. Then, I left him, taking all my misery along with me.
***
That afternoon, I had to take Chloe to her last appointment with Dr. Lively.
My sister was doing much better, and Carter had become a distantmemory for her. She had even gone back to school and was getting her grades up again. She was going out with friends and smiling more and more often.
I was happy for her. Dr. Lively had done a great job with her, and my sister had revealed an enviable strength that she’d long kept hidden beneath fragility.
I sat in the waiting room while she finished up. As usual, the pudgy woman at the front desk checked up on me constantly, regularly throwing quick glances in my direction. Meanwhile, I leafed through a car and motorcycle magazine. It was boring, but at least it wasn’t some useless gossip or fashion magazine.
I sighed and tossed the magazine down on the low table in front of me. I already owned a Maserati that was the wet dream of any guy my age, so I really didn’t need to drool over pictures of other cars. I was happy with my baby, and driving her was one of the few things other than boxing that could relax me. Whenever I got into that driver’s seat, I knew I had a marvelous panther in my hands and that it was my responsibility to keep her under control.
“And you can come back any time you want, especially if the anxiety or the nightmares return.” Dr. Lively’s voice jolted me out of my thoughts. I stood up to meet them.
“We should go. Madison will be here any minute,” Chloe said, smiling. She was ready to go out with her friend to celebrate the conclusion of her therapy.
I looked at the doctor, who had, in turn, fixed his bright eyes on me. He was obviously wondering if he should seize this opportunity to talk to me, considering that my sister had finished with her standing appointment. Truthfully, I needed to talk to him, too, and I tried to communicate that with my eyes.
From Dr. Lively’s look in return, I knew that he understood.
I walked Chloe out like always and waited with her on the corner a few yards from the clinic to make sure Madison and her parents were actually coming.
“You’re being paranoid,” she huffed, arranging her woolen hat on top ofher head. It was cold enough now that no one was leaving the house without layers of heavy clothing.
