Chapter 25 Caleb #2
“I know,” she says. “Your nervous system has lived in constant threat mode for a long time. Anticipating danger was adaptive, remember? It kept you safe when you were younger.”
“Yay, survival,” I mutter.
She smiles slightly. “The problem is that same alarm is now going off when the danger is hypothetical. Your father could still respond poorly down the line. He could also surprise you. Right now, what we have is… ambivalence. Discomfort. And some genuine effort.”
Her eyes soften. “How did it feel, hearing him apologize?”
I chew on my lip. “Good,” I admit. “And awful. Like some part of me wanted to believe him, wanted to let that apology fix ten years at once. And another part was like, nah, we remember all the times he didn’t say that. We remember the stat sheets. The speeches about discipline.”
“So there’s a tug-of-war,” she says. “Between the part that’s desperate for his approval and the part that doesn’t trust him not to hurt you again.”
“Yeah,” I say. “And then there’s the part that’s like, ‘Hey, you have Miguel. Why do you still care what Dad thinks?’ And then another part that’s like, ‘Because his opinion is oxygen, obviously, do you even know us?’”
She huffs a quiet laugh. “It sounds crowded in there.”
“You have no idea.”
She leans back a little. “Where is Miguel in all this for you right now?”
The question hits me sideways. “Here,” I say before I can overthink it.
“Like… anchored. He was the one who talked me down last night when I got home. I told him everything. I almost had a full panic attack on his couch and he walked me through the breathing and the stupid five-senses check. He kept saying my worth doesn’t belong to my dad.
That I don’t need approval to love him.”
“How did that feel?” she asks.
“Like he’d been spying on our sessions,” I say. “In a good way, I guess.”
She smiles. “Maybe he’s been listening to you more than you think.”
I stare at my hands. “He told me he called here,” I add. “For himself. He’s getting his own… support. So he can, quote, ‘keep loving me without breaking.’”
Her eyebrows lift. “He did?”
“Yeah.” My throat tightens. “I didn’t know whether to cry or… run.”
“What did you end up doing?” she asks.
“Both?” I say. “Internal scream, external gratitude. Mostly I felt guilty.”
“Because?” she prompts gently.
“Because now someone else needs therapy because of me,” I snap, then wince. “Sorry. That came out—”
“Fast,” she says. “And honest. Don’t apologize.”
I deflate. “Of course he needs a counselor because I’m his personal disaster zone. He would be fine living some normal life if he’d never met me.”
Dr. Kaur’s expression shifts to that sharp-soft look she gets when I’m being particularly cruel about myself.
“So the story your brain is telling you,” she says carefully, “is that you corrupted him.”
“Didn’t I?” I shoot back. “He was your classic golden eldest son—good grades, good kid, no major anxiety issues, no… stepbrother issues.” I gesture at myself. “Then boom. Here comes the trauma gremlin. Now he’s making emergency calls to campus counseling and panicking every time my phone dies.”
She waits a beat. “Is there any part of you,” she asks, “that can see another interpretation?”
I glare at the bookshelf. “Like what?”
“Like,” she says, “he watched someone he loves nearly drown. More than once. And now, when the water even looks choppy, his alarm system goes off. Not because you’re inherently damaging, but because you matter to him.”
The back of my eyes burn.
“And the choice to get support,” she continues, “could be read as ‘I care about this relationship enough to take care of myself so I can stay in it.’ Not ‘Caleb is so awful he broke me.’”
My throat closes.
“I’m not saying your guilt is irrational,” she says. “It makes sense, given how responsible you feel for everyone’s emotional state. But I am challenging the idea that Miguel going to therapy is proof you are toxic.”
I stare at my hands, and they’re visibly shaking.
“What if he realizes, in therapy, that I am too much?” I whisper. “What if he goes in there and starts talking and some professional looks at him and goes, ‘Wow, this is co-dependent and unhealthy, please exit the situation.’”
“Ah,” she says softly. “There it is.”
“There, what is?” I snap, more defensively than I mean to.
“The fear that if someone neutral examines your relationship, they’ll tell him to leave,” she says. “That is a huge fear, Caleb. And it makes sense. This relationship is your primary source of safety. Losing it feels like annihilation.”
Annihilation. Yeah. That’s a good word.
“I’m not gonna sit here and tell you there’s zero risk,” she says.
“Therapy is about honesty. Sometimes, people realize they need different boundaries. But good therapists do not rip support systems away from clients without serious, careful consideration. Especially when that support is literally keeping someone alive.”
I blink fast because tears are starting to gather.
“Also,” she adds, “I would be very surprised if any competent therapist listened to Miguel talk for five minutes and then said, ‘You know, the problem here is that you care too much about your traumatized partner. Dump him.’”
A startled, half-sob laugh snorts out of me. “You don’t even know him,” I say. “You’re already on his side.”
“I know what you’ve told me about him,” she says. “And I know you. That’s enough to trust that this relationship, while complex, is deeply important and deeply mutual. That doesn’t make it automatically healthy in every single way. It makes it worth working on, not throwing away.”
I stare at the carpet until the pattern blurs. “Can I ask you something?” I say finally.
“Of course,” she says.
“If you—” My voice cracks. “If you thought this was… irreparably messed up. He and I. Would you tell me?”
She considers me, her gaze steady. “Yes,” she says. “I would. I would never say it in a way that left you alone with that, but I wouldn’t lie to you to protect your feelings.”
My heart stutters. “And you haven’t,” I say slowly.
“I have concerns,” she says. “We’ve talked about some of them—weight of responsibility, intensity, the way you both sometimes equate ‘love’ with ‘emergency response.’ But I don’t see this as some doomed, catastrophic situation that needs to be shut down.
I see two people who love each other very much, both carrying a lot of history, trying to figure out how to do this without losing themselves. ”
She leans forward a little. “That is messy. It is also very human.”
“Okay,” I whisper.
She nods. “Now, about your father wanting to talk to both of you,” she says. “How do you feel about that?”
“Terrified,” I say immediately. “And also… weirdly relieved? Like, if he’s willing to sit in the same conversation as Miguel and not pretend he doesn’t exist, that’s… something. But I also feel like I’m walking him into an interrogation.”
“What does Miguel think about it?” she asks.
“He said he’ll do it,” I say. “Phone, in person, whatever. He said he’ll be respectful, but he’s not going to act like we’re something I’ll ‘grow out of.’ He’s… so calm about it. I’m the one losing my shit.”
“Is he calm,” she asks, “or is he containing his fear so you don’t have to carry it too?”
Ouch. I didn’t even consider that.
“I don’t know,” I admit. “Probably both. That’s… kind of his thing.”
“Is there a world,” she says slowly, “where you let yourself be a support for him, too? Instead of only the other way around?”
Guilt pricks. “He has his mom,” I say. “He has his crew. He has—”
“He also has you,” she cuts in gently. “And while it is not your job to fix his feelings, mutual vulnerability is a key piece of a healthy partnership. You being honest with him and him being honest with you is vital. That includes fears about your father. About therapy. About the future.”
Pushing my hands through my hair, I let out a breath. “I don’t want to add to his load,” I say. “He already has so much of me in his hands.”
“Then part of the work,” she says, “is learning how to share the load instead of handing it all to him. Trusting that he can hold pieces of your fear without breaking… and trusting that you can hold pieces of his.”
I stare at her. “That sounds… really hard.”
She smiles a little. “Most worthwhile things are.”
“Here’s what I’d like to suggest,” she says. “One, we plan for you to have a session where Miguel joins us, if he’s willing. A space where we can talk about support, boundaries, and fears with a mediator present. Not this week. Not as a surprise. When you both feel ready.”
My stomach flips. “Okay,” I say, voice faint.
“Two,” she continues, “you and Miguel talk—gently—about how you want to handle this upcoming conversation with your father. What your limits are. What you’re willing to answer and what is off the table. We can even write it down if that helps.”
“And three,” she says, “I’d like you to consider the idea that your father’s reaction yesterday, while imperfect, was a beginning, not a verdict. Can you hold that possibility? Not as a certainty. Just as… one option among many.”
I swallow hard. “I can try,” I say.
“That’s all I’m asking,” she says.
When the session ends, I’m wrung out and buzzing at the same time. Dr. Kaur walks me to the door as usual. “You did something incredibly difficult yesterday,” she says quietly as I’m about to leave. “I’m proud of you.”
My throat tightens. It’s different hearing it from her than from Dad.
“Thanks,” I manage.
“Text your support system today,” she adds. “Let them know where your head’s at. You don’t have to carry this alone.”
I nod and step back into the hallway, the fluorescent lights harsh after the soft lamp glow. By the time I hit the sidewalk outside, my phone is already in my hand.
Caleb
Therapy done, survived. Brain = soup. Heart = cooked to a medium-rare.
Miguel
10/10 medical report.
You wanna talk in person or can I DoorDash comfort and memes via text?
Caleb
Practice in an hour.
Can I come over after?
Miguel