<< Sessions, continuation of Moonlight Dance (Chapter One) >>

2004-12-21
6:47 p.m.

"Are you sure this is what you want to do, my love?" Juls spoke softly into the phone as Chrissi told her girlfriend that she was going to stay with Stevie and Sheri after Juls went back home.
"Yes, love. They have offered and said there is plenty of room. Generous people, with a kind heart. It only saddens me that you can't come along."
Chrissi sighed into the telephone receiver ashamed of her own insecurities fearing that she may do things with Stevie and Sheri without her girlfriend.
"Relax, love. Everything is going to be fine. I have immense peace knowing that you will be somewhere safe, rather than with Ben. I hate that man. I'm glad you filed for your divorce. He never deserved you."
"I worry too much. I worry that they won't like me when I get there, or that I will cause friction. And, I just don't want that. I want them to like me as a person, a friend. And it scares me to go there without you by my side."
"Shh love. You know that I'm always with you. No matter where you are, or travel. In your heart and soul you know that I'm there. Always."
"I know. It's just not easy being somewhere else without you. It seems so final, this departure, almost too surreal. I can't believe I'm actually doing this."
"It's time for you to do something for yourself. You've always put yourself last. It's your turn now. And remember, I'll call you every night. I'll be there in spirit and mind, always. Stop worrying so much, or you will be stressed before you even get there. And you're taking your kids with you, right?"
"Yes, but they don't want to go. They are mad at me. They want to stay here."
"Well, they will realize that this is better for all of you, together. I have to go now love, Travel safely and phone me when you stop for the night."
"I will."
"I love you Chrissiface. To the moon, across the stars and back again."
"And I love you sweetness."
Chrissi slowly placed the phone on the receiver and wished she was already speaking to Juls again. Her voice had become her biggest comfort in the past month.
3 months later.....
"Chrissy, come with me please."
She follows her into the room and stands at the door as she takes her seat behind her desk. The room, so formal its informal. Stark white contrasted with boring blues. Fake flowers and pictures of happy people. Real flowers and fake people. Everything feels so fake. Chrissy leaned against the door, unsteady, unprepared.
Thoughts compounding in her head, thundering against her skull pounding like an incessant hammer against her memory. Words, memories, pictures, voices, emotions, silence; all too much to handle. And so she sank to the floor and placed her hands on her knees and lowered her head as the tears fell.
"How did I get here, why am I here?" She wanted to scream, why couldn't she? her head hurts from thinking too much and she feels thin; almost hollow to the core of her existence. How did it all get so out of hand, why didn't she back away when it became unhealthy. For her, for me; for us.
"Take a seat, Chrissy."
"I am sitting," Chrissy said in a hushed sarcastic tone.
"Don't be banal."
Chrissy lifts her head and bore burning holes through her body, wishing her away, wanting to run away herself. Trapped, broken and unable to move, thinking what she has done to herself.
"Do you know why you're here?"
"Of course I know why I'm here. Don't be obtuse."
"Bitter are we?" she says in her authenticating tone. Chrissy said, "Fuck you," and walked across the room and looked out the window into the dreary gray shouting prominently at her as if the weather was telling her everything surrounding her was unoriginal. Maybe it is, maybe it's just her. She's unoriginal. No, she's broken. She's been broken for far too long to remember. Everything was a lie, is a lie. Why was she still holding on? Why can't she let go? She needed to, but won't. Fear. Everything surrounds fear, her weakness, her number one anxiety.
"I'm not bitter, thank you."
"Just what are you then? Angry? Resentful?"
"Those meanings are two in the same. I'm not stupid. I'm not in the mood for word games. You want to use big words on me, try me. Just because I'm manic doesn't make me illiterate."
"Don't be all-superior. You're regressing and you need to address your dilemma."
"Don't talk down to me. I'm not an infant."
"Don't act like one, and I won't feel the need to treat you any differently."
"Are you always this bitchy towards your patients? Or does this behavior just come naturally to you?"
"Are you always this cold and shut people out?"
"Yes. When I have to."
"Why?"
"Because it works for me."
"No, it doesn't, it works against you."
"Perhaps it does. It's my choice, isn't it."
"Yes, it is. You have a choice in everything," she walks across the room and takes Chrissy's hand and walks her over to the sofa. "Unclench your fist, please."
"I've tried, I have, but I keep doing the same thing."
"You want to hurt someone, or something?"
"No. I'd never intentionally bring harm to someone. Ever."
"Just on yourself then," she mumbles looking down at Chrissy's wrists and runs her finger along the scars left from just a few weeks before. "And these? You're a self injurer?"
"Yes."
"Why would you bring harm to yourself and not to others? I never understood that about self injurers."
"You wouldn't understand."
"Wouldn't I? Try me. I'm here to help you."
"No, you're here to analyze me. I don't want to be analyzed. I know what's wrong with me."
"Do you really? Enlighten me. Tell me what you know so well about yourself and your mental state."
"No. I want a cigarette."
"You don't smoke."
"How would you know?"
"I've read your file."
"So. Read it again. Maybe you missed something."
"Like what? I haven't missed anything."
"Of course you have. I lie."
"Everyone lies, it's human nature. But you don't smoke."
"Yes, I do."
"Since when? Your chart says you haven't smoked in 2 years."
"It lies."
"I see."
"I hate that phrase."
"Well, don't be juvenile and I won't have to use it."
"Damn, you're rude."
"And you're mildly irritating."
"And you're malevolent."
"Sometimes, or only when I have to be." She gets up and goes back to her desk, then sits in her chair facing Chrissy as if she's posing for a picture. Arrogant forms in her head and Chrissy decides she doesn't like her at all.
She looked down at her hands and notices her hands are clenched again. Dammit. She didn't want to be this way. Why was she so angry? What happened to the happiness she knew a few weeks before? Then she remembered her words, again and she felt her heart lock up as the chains inside of her veins tightened against her body. She can't breathe and begins to feel suffocated. She slowly begins to feel her chest tighten and her hands begin to shake.
"You're trembling. Are you cold? Would you like something warm to drink?"
"How about a sedative?"
"If you feel you need it. But you're already on Wellbutrin, Zoloft, and Paxil."
"No. I don't need it. I just want to forget. Everything. Everything hurts. I can't breathe. I feel like I'm suffocating, and I don't want to be here." Chrissy can feel the heat in her eyes sting as the wetness slowly starts to trickle down her face. Dammit she didn't want to cry. But she can't stop herself and she ends up embracing herself as the tears fall faster and harder. Why does everything have to hurt so much? She hated it. She hated it so much.
"Will you tell me what you're feeling?"
Chrissy shakes her head and turns her face into her hands. She feels ashamed, vile, violated and hated. "Please don't hide your face. You're pretty when you cry."
Chrissy feels an instant shudder ignite through her body and looks up at her, stunned, unbelievably confused.
"W-what? What'd you just say?"
"I said you look pretty when you cry."
"Oh damn. Why'd you say that? Fucker." She closed her eyes and drifted back to a moment that was only shared between her and someone else. How could she possibly know that? No one ever said to her except for... no. She can't think about it. Doesn't want to think it. It hurts. Still. Even 4 weeks later. "I have to go. I need air. Please."
"Chrissy, you can't just leave. Our session isn't over yet. You can't keep harboring all of that pain. I saw it. In your eyes and on your face. Just talk to me. I want to listen. I won't judge. Please. Do this for yourself. This is what you came here for. Isn't it? If I am wrong I won't ask again, but if I'm right, just give it a chance. This is what's right for you, and if you don't seize it now you never will."
"I can't do it. I can't let go. I'm afraid that if I do, everything I believed in will vanish and will all have been for nothing. I loved her. I loved her so much and she never knew. Even still the relationship was unhealthy, and I know it now. I didn't then, but emotions just don't disappear. And I'm so tired. I just want to sleep so I don't have to feel anymore. I just .. I wish everything was like it was before, but I know it's not, nor it may never be again," Chrissy turned and looked at her and saw the hurt in her eyes, her own hurt, and it terrified her. "Was I wrong to be jealous when I felt so cheated? No, I couldn't have been that wrong. It wasn't fair to be pushed aside like I didn't count. I was there, I've been there.. For 4 years in January. All I gave couldn't have been for nothing. I refuse to believe that. But her words, they linger and haunt me. She just walked away before she walked away." She closed her eyes and laid her head back against the sofa and whispered, "I just loved her."
"You were in a relationship?"
"Yes. Almost 4 years. I'm tired. I don't want to talk anymore. I don't even want to think anymore. The more I think about everything, the more it hurts, and I lie to myself. I say I'm okay, that I will be fine. But then I don't know what the truth or a lie is anymore at this point. I tried to be her perfect everything. I became her perfect mistake."
"You are not a mistake. And don't believe anyone who tells you that are."
"You don't understand. I don't understand. How could everything go wrong in such a short time? It was me. I was over protective, held her too close, pushed her too far away. I wasn't enough. I wanted to be, I tried so hard, but I knew. Things changed so fast and like a whirlwind of chaos that small triangle of jealousy turned into anger. I didn't own her, but I let her own me. And now after giving so much for so long I feel tired. Too tired to fight. I'm tired of fighting."
"What do you think you were fighting with?"
"My emotions. The way I really felt deep down. I never said anything. I just didn't want to hurt her anymore. I caused so much pain for her before, and I finally convinced myself that if I didn't say anything and didn't speak to her that she'd just know how I felt. I wanted her to know, I don't even know if she did. I wanted to matter, to mean something. I just wanted to be... I wanted to be enough."
"Sometimes you have to give yourself the chance to step back and just let things go on in their own way without trying to control it. You can't control things. You just have to let things be. Even if it hurts."
"I know. I thought I had. And when I took those smalls steps back towards things, everything I had believed in, it was gone. I felt replaced, felt second best and unworthy."
"And did you tell her how you felt?"
"No. I wrote how I felt in my diary. She saw it."
"How is that possible? A diary is a sacred document between you and your soul."
"It wasn't a paper journal. It's something on the internet. All of my thoughts are in there. Everything I ever felt about or towards anything, or anyone. It's there. Good, bad, or indifferent."
"Okay. And what did she have to say about how you felt?"
"‘Fuck you and your second place.'"
"Is that all she had to say? Surely there was more?"
"There was. She wrote something to me in her diary."
"And?"
"And nothing. I tried to change myself secretly to be what she wanted, but I was miserable. But I tried again and again, but it wasn't enough. I failed her."
"You haven't failed. You're still here."
"Barely existing..."
"Existing."
"No, I'm not. I'm just hanging on."
"But something keeps you hanging on. You may not feel it, or see it, but something is inside of you keeping you here."
"I guess."
"Alright. Let's try this. What was different for you before? What made you hang on when you had therapy in Illinois?" Shocked, Chrissy looked at her and opened her mouth to speak, but said nothing and looks down as she remembered the events of the things in that long ago, once forgotten place. "I don't want to go back there. I can't. I left that part of my past behind me. When I moved here I confronted those demons and walked away. I can't will myself to go back there. I'm sorry."
"Alright, I understand. But it has everything to do with how you made it through. What you had that helped you then can help you now."
"No."
"No? Why is that?"
"Because that person isn't a part of my life anymore. She said she loved me, that I was her best friend. I believed her. I fought for her. It was never about me. It was always for her because she needed me."
"So, you're lesbian?"
"I was once told that I couldn't say that I was a lesbian until I had lived with a woman for two years."
"And who told you that rubbish?"
"It doesn't matter now."
"Yes it does, because everything that's circling around you is the reason you're here. The reason why you volunteered to bring yourself here. You can't push everything away and pretend it never happened. It's unhealthy, and unstable." "I don't care anymore. I gave all I had and it meant nothing. I'm useless and I have baggage. No one wants a friend that's used, been abused and carries scars and demons."
"That's bullshit and you know it."
"It's how I feel. I can't help it.
"I wonder where you see yourself in 2 years. I wonder if you will just give up everything you love, care for and just let yourself wither away and be controlled by something you should control. You can control it, you just need to work through it. We can work through it, together."
"I had plans. I made plans for her, for me, because I felt it was necessary because its what I believed. Those plans are gone now, but I'd like to think that I'd be the person I was before I lost my soul 4 years ago. I was emotionally confused then, and I am again now. I can't help but wonder if everything was worth it. It was worth it. I loved her. I loved her just because, I didn't have to have a reason to love her. I accepted her for who she was, and she accepted me. We had the perfect relationship, until everything changed."
"And that was what exactly?"
"We crossed a barrier that wasn't meant to be crossed, and here I am. I am the result of what I fucked up, alone."
"We will address that at your next session. I want you to come back in 4 days, okay?"
"Fine."
"By the way, my name is Stephanie."
And instantly it started again. And Chrissy just walked out of the office. Free from thinking, for another 4 days.

Part Two





<< >>