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You're welcome then, I'm glad I'm good at writing. My co-worker said I had a talent for it and I was giddy all day. I'm not really use to getting complements.
Here is the next chapter, I'll hurry but don't expect it this weekend. It's long to type.
--He’s subdued today. Something is causing him--
--great misery. He’s quiet and timid, like usual--
--but more so. Seems less sure of self.--
“You alright, Cinth?” I ask the young man who sit solemnly in the chair across from me as I write in his book. I watch him rock slower than usual, slower by half. I look at the young man, noting that he has changed greatly in his time with me.
He has gained some weight; mostly at the stomach, but it make him look healthy rather than fat. He has also started to wear more formfitting clothing. This is probably because he is becoming more comfortable with who he is, with his body, though I can tell he is not completely comfortable, I doubt he will ever be. His clothing will never become tight as a second skin but maybe he will wear clothing that is his own size.
He is changing for the better before my eyes, what a wonderful thing to happen.
“I… I’ve been thinking about Judas,” he whispers looking up at me, peeking from through his messy bangs. His fingers shake slightly as he tries to warm himself, rubbing his thin arms. Hycinthus always seems cold, it’s most likely the lack of body fat.
I rest my head on the back of my left hand, pushing my sunglasses up and away from my eyes to rest in my hair. I gently rotate my other hand, attempting to get him to continue to speak.
--Becomes more timid when under pressure and/or stress.--
He closes his eyes, wincing slightly and says to me, “I don’t think what Judas did to me was right.” His whole body shivers and quakes at his own words as if he is a Catholic speaking outright blasphemy.
--Realises things done to him aren’t his fault but--
--does not truly believe. Knows things done to hurt him--
--are wrong but does not stop them. Feels injustice--
--at pain dealt to him but does not express this--
--very often or well.--
“Will you tell me more about Judas?” I ask the swaying man, mentally cursing the bastard and writing in the book without looking at my hand. My eyes catch the child’s and his rocking returns to its equilibrium, shoulders drooping and he visibly became less tense.
“He was popular, if a bit of a bully.” he says softly, his gentle voice lulling my mind into a state a relaxation. It would be good against some of my patients, the ones who never relax. “But he was kind to me, unnaturally so, when he asked me out. I was so happy; someone asked me out. Me. Not Helena,” he says, smiling softly. “Most people just thought I was a nerd ‘cause I was always studying alone or a freak for being gay. So they avoided me, I was a leper to them. But Judas, one of the best looking guys in school asked me out. Me.” Hycinthus pauses and then asks, “Did people think you a freak or dirty for being gay?” He tilts his head and gazes at me with his nearly black eyes.
“I never really came out,” I say. “Very few people know I am a homosexual. My parents still don’t, they don’t even know who Alex is.” I close my eyes and slide my sunglasses back in front of them, to hide them. I wait, silent, until he continues. He does, eventually.
“But after a few weeks, it started to get bad. I… I wouldn’t… wouldn’t…” I notice the man is gnawing on his bottom lip when I open my eyes. After a few minutes of him rocking silently, I slide my sunglasses off my noses and lay them safely on my desk. When I raise my arched eyebrows, almost smirking at him, he continues. “I wouldn’t ‘put out’ as he called it.” He shivers slightly at the thought going so far into a relationship. “I wasn’t ready to go that far, so he started to pressure me. But I didn’t give in.” He looks at me as if trying to convey his honesty, his sincerity. “I didn’t…” I nod one at him, believing him. “He started to try to humiliate me, he’d trip me in public, put me down, call me ‘stupid’, belittled me and sometimes he’d hit me too.” He stops rocking abruptly.
“When did that start, Cinth?” I ask, my anger becoming tempered and hot like a sharp blade being forged on a white hot anvil. Again, I am not angry with the man who sits before me but rather what has been done to harm him. I am angry for him; at the injustices done unto him.
“In the sixth month,” he says, sitting as stiff and still as a statue except for his mouth.
--Remembers pain avidly. It is my hope that he--
--learns to deal with this pain and not allow it to--
--harm him. Seems to… not understand that pain--
--of others should not be placed on him, takes blame--
--for being abused, despite feeling it as an injustice.--
--Accepts abusive behaviour as normal.--
I wait another few minutes in silence, placing my anger behind a curtain, then I speak to him. “Please continue,” I murmur gently to the boy, hoping to calm him by keeping my voice low and soft; to persuade him to tell me more. To confront his woes and deny his assailants, like King Arthur denied his half-sister the throne.
“He liked to slap me instead of hit me with a fist. He didn’t want to leave bruises that Helena could see, she’d look me over sometimes to see if someone was hurtin’ me. He knew I wouldn’t tell, I just wouldn’t,” he says, giving a half-shrug and when he opens his eyes I can see they are far away and glassy. Hycinthus is lost in his memories, most likely overwhelmed with once felt sensations. Alex has a tendency to do that too. “There was this one time, though,” he tells me. “Three weeks before he dumped me. I had said no again and he got mad. Really mad.” He sighs, bowing his head in submission to his memories that overwhelm him and his past that pains him incredibly. Submitting to Judas Zephyr once more; even going as far as peeping through his curtain of hair instead of looking straight out at me like he has been lately.
“By allowing his memory to hurt you, you allow him to win over you again. You give him another victory,” I explain, drawing him gently into our reality, patiently, like a fisher pulling in a fish on his line. “A victory that’s unknown to him, yes, but it’s a victory for him none the less. You are giving him a hold on you still. Allowing him to have dominance over you, even if only in your thoughts.” His thin head snaps up as I say the word ‘dominance’ and an angry scowl mars his usually attractive features, a look such as that does not belong on his kind face. “Conquer his memory and do not submit to it, just as King Arthur did not submit, even when faced with certain death. He fought ‘til his fall to defend his beloved wife and child.”
I notice him shyly smiling now and I raise a single eyebrow in response. He giggles like a small child and says, “You’re a mythology buff, aren’t you? That’s why you like your job, it’s finding the stories of others and helping them understand how it affects them.” I grin at the perceptive young man and give him a single jerky nod.
He then continues to say what he was telling me, starting to rock again. I am quite relieved. “When I said no, he hit me. With a fist. We were both shocked, he stared at his hand and I gaped at him.” The man before me begins to cry silent tears as he says, “The slaps didn’t hurt, not really. But that punch to my cheekbone did. It hurt, a lot. Then Judas smiled, not a nice smile either.” He stops talking and breathes in deeply, his body quivering again as he swayed, crying harder; his sobs causing a pain to well in my chest.
My heart aches for him and I wish I could tell him to stop, that he does not have to relive this; that he does not have to remember how cruel human can be, how cruelly he has been treated. I want to but I can not. Hycinthus must tell me; he has to relive his past to heal properly.
He calms down a bit, but he is still crying after a few minutes and he starts to speak again, sounding frightened, “It was the kind of smile a wolf gives a little bunny; the kind of smile that says ‘You’re so fucking dead’.” I am startled by his use of profanity; he has said once to me that he views the use of profanity is a sign of an unintelligent person. “A predatory grin, a killer’s smile. He hit me with his other fist… and again… and again… I doubled over in pain and he started to slam his fists into my back. I tried to stand and stop him, talk him down but his fist crashed into my jaw. I heard a distinct CRACK and I saw these blinding white spots in front of my eyes, almost like close up stars. I fell to the floor as my jaw erupted in pain. Then he started to kick me, my head most frequently. He use to wear these steel-toed boots, really painful. I think I passed out from pain,” he says. “I couldn’t have run.”
“I know,” I coo softly, knowing with his personality, submissive and trusting, he would never have run from the man whom he was dating. “What happened when you woke up?” I ask, keeping my voice calm.
“I woke up in the hospital,” he murmurs, mumbling a bit. “Three days later. The doctor came in and said Judas had brought me in and said that I had come over to his house all beat up and that I passed out there. The doctor said that Judas seemed very worried. ‘Worried’ I couldn’t help but think, ‘He just wants to save himself.’ At the time, I just pushed that thought away, and denied it as false. I managed to convince myself that he was genuinely worried about me.” Then he looked up at me fully, tilting his head to the side, “I shouldn’t have, should I? I should have listened to my instincts; they have never lied to me.”
--Neglected.--
I write the one word in the book and lay down my pen. I stand up and walk over in front of the squishy chair Hycinthus is sitting in; his legs drawn to his still-too-thin chest and his arms are wrapped around his knees. I kneel down so I am eye-level to him and I softly speak to him, hoping to alleviate the guilt he should feel not but does, “It’s normal to want to forgive those whom you want to care for you. Especially if those around you have not given you the affection that you need to develop properly. Am I right to say your parents… ignore you?” I ask looking him in the eye, wanting him to be able to say no truthfully but hoping he will trust me enough to say yes.
“I-I…” the young man stutters, proving to me that his parents deny him both positive attention and affection. He whispers so low I barely hear him, “Sometimes.”
I look at him barely keeping my jaw from dropping and my eyes from becoming wide as saucers. I have to work to get my face into a slight smile, I just want to beam; he trusts me that much. Enough that he tells me that he is regularly neglected by his parents, which is a criminal offence. When I learn more I will offer to help him press charges against them and Judas if he wishes to. I mentally file the information away for a later date. “Will you tell me how bad you injuries were?” I ask, wanting know and know that he needs to assess the information instead of ignore it to fully heal.
“Okay, yeah,” he whispers, rocking faster. His knees are still pressed to his chest but his arms have slipped to his sides, less protective and more secure with his place in my mind. “It hurt to move or even talk. Three cracked ribs, a broken nose, six ruptured arteries in my stomach, my left arm was broken as well as my right hand, a sprained ankle, bruises that covered more than half my body and in ten places my skin split from being hit so hard. My bottom lip was split, I had a concession, one of my front teeth came loose and both my eyes were blackened and swollen. I still can’t see out of my left eye. I was told that I had a surgery to fix my ruptured blood vessels,” he says quietly, looking up through his curtain of hair, hiding from me. Hiding from his own past. His legs slip away from his chest, so they touch the floor and he asks me, “Was it wrong not to tell them it was Judas? I that said I didn’t remember what happened, I lied to the doctor.”
The steel that I surround my heart in for my job, so I don’t get attached, melts away as I listen and I tell him what I think the truth is. “I don’t think it was wrong, per say. You were just trying to protect someone you cared about; no matter how undeserving of your affections he was.” As my alarm clock rings I wrap my corded arms around his thin frame, comforting the child in this mentally scarred man. “It’ll be alright,” I tell him quietly and then remind him of his promise. “If you want to harm yourself, call me okay?”
“Yeah,” he mutters equally as quiet, standing and wiping his face. “I will remember.” Hycinthus walks to the door, stops, and turns back to me. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” I tell him, smiling and closing my eyes as I stand as well. “See you next week.”
He just waves his hand as he leaves, a flick really; and quietly closing the door. I walk back to my desk and glance at the time. I have fifteen minutes until my next block, so I write diligently in the blue-covered book.
--Puts trust in me after only three weeks. Why?--
--Did he latch onto the first person besides his twin--
--that was kind to him? Possibly. Longs for acceptance--
--and attention but does not know how to achieve--
--this. Very perceptive for someone who is so child- --
--like. Abusive boyfriend made him feel as if it was--
--his fault that the bastard hit him because he was--
--not ready to move to the next step. Hycinthus--
--protected the bastard despite the fact that he put him--
--in the hospital with grave injuries. Has the will--
--and intelligence to heal from abuse if I can successfully--
--convince him it is not his fault and was not his flaws--
--that caused that bastard to snap. He needs to heal.--
I sigh solemnly and slash my pen across the bottom of the entry. I put down my pen and breathe slowly, to calm my agitated emotions and to blank the emotions off my face and out of my mind; having attachments to my sessions can be hazardous to me but I can not bring myself to care about my self enforced rule in regards to Hycinthus. Nothing about him seems dangerous, except in regards to himself.
I must calm myself and replace the steel-mesh armour around my mind, my next session will give me a mind-fuck if I’m not careful.
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