Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
Iris closed her laptop, putting it off to the side.
She smiled, the same smile she’d had at our last two sessions.
I wondered if she ever got disappointed.
Even though I was about to tell her I hadn’t done my homework for the week, I was sure she’d still smile.
It was a comforting one, either way. “How have you been since our last session?”
I shrugged. “Fine, I guess. I didn’t do what you asked me to, though.”
“Okay. Why not?” Her voice was level and smooth, not even a hint of raised tone in it. The true example of patience.
For a moment, I thought about just how honest I wanted to be with her. How deep into my mind did I want Iris to see? I’d been playing that same game for years now. Keeping things just vague enough or deep enough to keep someone from being too curious.
Sighing, I shifted on the couch in front of her.
Therapists and couches. I never understood why a therapist always had a couch for clients to sit on.
Was it to give false comfort? I grabbed one of the throw pillows beside me, holding it in front of my chest and stomach.
“I think it’s dumb. How could that possibly help me? ”
“I guess you’ll never know if you don’t try.”
I rolled my eyes. “Sure. Writing words on my skin in red fucking marker will totally alleviate any and all urges to cut my skin instead. You really got me there.”
She tilted her head, her eyebrows furrowing just slightly. “Why don’t you think it’ll help?”
“Because it’s the pain I’m looking for. I need the pain and the blood. I need the shitty healing process after. And once they’re healed, I need to be able to slice over them again. What don’t you understand about this?”
“You haven’t even tried, Moon. If you aren’t ready to fully stop, it’s okay—”
“I am, though. I’m ready. I want to.”
“Do you?”
“Of course I do. Why do you think I’m here?”
“Why do you think you’re here?”
I gripped the pillow in my hands, tugging on the sides while I squirmed where I sat.
She was the therapist here—why wasn’t she answering these questions herself?
It was a damn miracle I’d even told her I cut myself.
It was a miracle I’d told her I’d been struggling with mental health for years after a vague trauma I briefly mentioned.
It was a miracle I was alive, and here she was, trying to get me to think about shit I had no reason to think about.
Emerson was my reason. He was the entire reason I was here.
The idea that, maybe, I’d be able to love him the way he deserved, without all the broken and caged pieces of my heart getting in the way, was enough.
Crescent and Elio had been trying to get me into a therapist’s office for a while, but when Emerson asked, it was different.
They were stuck with me, no matter what.
Emerson was choosing to be with me. He had a choice where they didn’t.
He saw me in ways they never had, and never would.
Iris leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “What would you write on your skin if you were to do it? What kind of things do you feel when you’re about to self-harm?”
The question made the very skin she was asking about line with goosebumps. Little tingles of unease settled in, crawling along every scar and into the fresher cuts that’d finally healed. I looked to the side, avoiding her gaze entirely. “Failure. Murderer. Worthless. Mistake.”
“Why failure?”
“I couldn’t protect my siblings. I never accomplished much during school for my parents to be particularly proud of. I’m here, in this office, talking to you. No offense.”
“So, you’re talking about other people. You think you’ve failed other people. What about yourself, Moon?”
I jerked my head toward her. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Iris pointed her finger at me. “Do you think you’ve failed yourself? By not giving yourself enough grace.”
Scoffing, I shook my head. “Fuck no. I don’t deserve grace.”
She nodded slowly, clasping her hands together. “Okay. You gave me quite a few words I want to eventually get to, but I’m going to focus on this one for a second. If you aren’t ready to get better, then you never will.”
“Oh my god, not that again. I told you, I’m ready to stop.”
“I didn’t say stop self-harming, I said get better.”
I glared at her. “That’s the same thing.”
“No, it isn’t. You know that, right? Self-harm is just a small part of the overall equation.
You aren’t suddenly healed once you stop self-harming.
We can tackle that issue, but we won’t fix a thing unless we find the root cause and heal through it.
You’ve got a lot of rewiring in your brain to do.
And that could take months, if not years. ”
I frowned. I didn’t like the idea of digging through my brain like that, finding all the different possible reasons for me being this fucked up. Doing that for years, though? That sounded even worse.
Iris was silent with me for a moment before finally breaking the moment. “You’re uncomfortable.”
“Obviously.”
“Is hurting more comfortable for you than the idea of healing and not hurting anymore?”
Taken aback, I squished the throw pillow in my hands closer to my stomach. “Why would I want to hurt? Why would I want to be this way?”
She shook her head. “Again, that’s not what I said.
I asked if it was more comfortable. Think about it for a second.
You’ve been silent, and you’ve been hurting for, what, fifteen years, you said?
We as humans are inclined to stay where we’re comfortable.
It’s hard to get out of that comfort zone.
The idea of healing and no longer having depression as your blanket is out of your comfort zone, isn’t it?
Life without wanting to harm yourself. Life without crippling sadness and fierce protectiveness over everyone but yourself.
It’d be weird, wouldn’t it? It’d make complete sense for you to want to stay within those lines, Moon.
It’s human. It’s normal. It doesn’t make you any less determined to get better.
It doesn’t make you worthless. Or a mistake. Or a failure.”
I stared at her, not totally sure what to say or what to think. It was painful to admit it to myself, much less admit it to someone who was practically still a stranger, but she was right. Being alone was easier than letting someone else in.
Holding my heart by myself was somehow lighter than sharing the weight with someone else—someone like Emerson.
Picking at the stitches on top of the pillow, I cleared my throat. “Maybe. But what do I do about it?”
“You write the words. You give yourself grace. You allow vulnerability. What has been done to you—what you have gone through—does not change who you are as a person, or what you need as a human. Step outside of your comfort zone, take note of the data you receive from doing so, and apply it to your everyday life. Slowly. Baby steps. You’ve never tried to give yourself compassion, so it’ll be brand new.
It’ll be difficult, but that’s what I’m here for.
You just have to be willing to be uncomfortable. ”
She said it like it was simple. She said it like it was okay to not understand. She said it like she believed I could do it. Vulnerability was truly fucking terrifying, but I’ll be damned if I didn’t at least think about trying if it meant I’d feel anything but this.
Emerson made it worth it. Being in love also sounded scary, but being happy, healthy, and in love? Sounded kind of amazing.
Emerson would be home soon. Going to my apartment didn’t feel right, but being at his house also didn’t feel right. At least Emerson would be at his house, and I seemed to always want him, even though I didn’t think I wanted anyone at the moment.
Honestly, I wanted to be alone. But I didn’t at the same time.
It was late, and I’d had all day to think about what Iris said—which was a lot.
I thought about doing some stained glass to take my mind off of it, though I decided not to since that would mean going back to my apartment, rather than staying at Emerson’s house.
I heard the front door open and close from behind the living room couch I was sitting on, Emerson’s footsteps following soon after. He leaned over the back of the couch, kissing me on the top of my head. “Hi, baby.”
I didn’t take my eyes off my phone. “Hi.”
“I’m going to go shower real quick, and then I’ll join you. How was your day?”
Thinking about my day made me want to curl into a protective ball and never come out. “Fine.”
“Hmm. Well, we can talk more about it after my shower. I’ll make it quick.”
“I’m not the shower police, Em. You can bathe for however long you want. Doesn’t matter to me.”
He’d been rubbing my shoulder with one of his hands. It stopped entirely after I’d spoken, Emerson pausing for a second. “Alright. You be good while I’m gone.”
I rolled my eyes. “What am I gonna do? Start a fire in your absence because I can’t be left alone for more than five minutes?”
“I was just joking around, brat. Think about dinner. I can cook tonight.”
I didn’t say anything as he walked away to shower. I couldn’t think of anything important to add to that, knowing that anything I did say would just be some flavor of bratty or just plain rude.
Thinking about dinner was the last thing I wanted to do.
The shower started in the distance as Emerson washed his day away, while I was stuck wallowing in mine with no way out.
It was all in my head, most of it still not making much sense, yet all the sense in the world, and somehow, that made it ten times worse.
Not being able to see the grime, despite being knee-deep in it.