She offered him a smile from the large, heavy chair she sat in opposite him.
He never imagined that he would find himself here, of all places. He never thought he would be in therapy talking about his feelings and sharing his innermost thoughts. When they hired Sarah, it had been for her to take care of the guests at the lodge, not one of the owners. But he knew, clearer than ever, how much he needed this help, even if he was having a hard time figuring out how to start the conversation.
Seeing the look on Hannah’s face when he woke up from that flashback had been enough to make him certain he needed to be here. He couldn’t keep putting her through having to help him out of his nightmares or possibly even put her in danger from them. It wasn’t fair to her or their newfound relationship. He felt bad enough that she’d witnessed the one she did.
She’d handled the situation well and had done a good job of bringing him back to the present, but he didn’t want to be a burden on her or their relationship in that way. He wanted to be her partner, not have her see him as someone broken and relianton her for help every time he had a nightmare. If they were going to be together, he needed to embrace these head-on and get the help he’d needed for a while now.
And Sarah was offering him a chance to do that. Beside her, on the desk, a small diffuser puffed out scented steam. It smelled like the vapor rub his mother used to put on his chest when he had a cold—menthol and medicinal. Sarah had a notepad sitting just next to her and a pen ready to jot down any observations she might make on what he had to say.
For some reason, this made him uncomfortable—talking about it was one thing, but having it written down and made permanent? That was something else entirely. It made him feel more vulnerable. Exposed in a way he didn’t like at all.
“So,” Sarah began as the silence hung heavy in the room between them, “I’m really glad you came to speak to me today, Xavier.”
He grunted his acknowledgment and shifted in his chair. He was uncomfortable with the thought of spilling his guts to this woman. He’d never told anyone the specifics of the nightmares he’d been dealing with. Not even his best friend and business partner, Lawson, knew the full extent—just what little he’d shared after Max’s death since Lawson had been there at that time to offer his support. And Hannah only knew what little she’d witnessed.
He never liked burdening people with what he was going through, but right now, he didn’t have a choice. He knew he just had to push himself to get started, but he couldn’t find the right words to say what he wanted to.
“You mentioned to me before that you’d received a diagnosis of PTSD from a previous physician, is that right?” Sarah asked.
“I had to see someone before I started working for the CIA,” he explained. “That’s what he told me it was. Never put much stock in it, until…” He trailed off, tripping over his words again.He wasn’t used to talking about any of this, and his instincts were screaming for him to stop. He’d dealt with his nightmares on his own for so long, it seemed unnatural to share his troubles with someone else.
“Until?” she prompted him.
He shook his head.
“It’s okay,” she assured him. “You don’t have to talk about anything you’re not ready to. I just want to get a general idea of how you’re doing and where you’re at with your mental health. Do you mind if I ask a few questions?”
He gestured for her to keep talking, wishing he could pull himself together. It felt like he was stepping in the silt of his memories, all those parts of himself that he had tried to leave behind pressing up against him once more. How could he just talk about it? Say it out loud, when he still felt so much guilt and shame for what he had done?
Or, more accurate, what he had failed to do?
“We didn’t talk much about your diagnosis before,” she continued, jotting something down on her notepad. “But I’ve heard from Lawson that you’ve been struggling with nightmares recently.”
Lawson. Of course he had talked to her about it. Xavier shook his head slightly. “He’s been talking to you about it?”
“Nothing specific, but yes, he has,” she replied. “Your friends are concerned about you, Xavier. They want the best for you.”
He sighed. “I’m concerned, too,” he admitted finally, picking at a loose thread on the chair beneath him. “I… I thought these nightmares were over, you know? I had them a lot right after I got back from overseas, but they started to fade after a while. I would still have these memories, but when I would wake up, I knew it was a dream, and I could bring myself back to reality pretty easily.”
“And you’ve been having more trouble with that recently?” Sarah asked.
He nodded again. “Yeah, it feels like I’m right back there, all over again,” he continued, his voice lowering. He was going to need to get used to talking to her like this; hopefully, it would get easier over time. “Like I’m watching my brother die all over again,” he added.
He hated saying those words out loud. Acknowledging that Max was gone hurt in a way nothing else did—a permanent wound that would never heal, a reminder of how much he had failed his little brother. He had promised his mother he would do everything he could to keep him safe, but when it came down to it, he had failed. He knew he was never going to be able to forgive himself for that.
Sarah frowned, nodding kindly.
He averted his eyes to stare at the floor. What must she think of him, a man who failed to keep his own brother safe? He didn’t even want to know. Logically, of course he understood that she had heard far worse things in her time here at Warrior Peak. He still felt like she would never look at him the same way again.
“It’s really common to face a setback in your recovery after a traumatic event,” she explained.
Xavier shook his head. “I haven’t had a traumatic event.” Not by his standards, anyway. Yeah, the fire wasn’t exactly pleasant, but he had seen far worse in his time. He felt like he would have sounded crazy to compare that to what he’d endured in the service.
“The fire?” Sarah prompted him. “Isn’t that when these dreams really started to cause you problems again?”
He nodded.
“I understand that you may not have felt traumatized by the fire, but chances are that it triggered your fight-or-flight response,” she explained. “It’s a method the nervous systemuses to handle particularly threatening or dangerous situations, whether they’re actually bad news or just perceived by your brain as such. Does that make sense?”
