Chapter 28 REFLECTIONS
“The cuff too tight?” Craig sat at the kitchen table with Jack, occasionally flicking a look up from the blood pressure monitor he held, then to the clock on the wall that called out 8:00 a.m. to Gray. As Simon and Raif started work intel on the location where the phone lay, the debate into the early hours with Jack over what had gone down with Martin had taken its toll on them all, but Jack, he’d still made the call to Halliday and Craig to get them here this morning.
The aggressive in-out switching, that was something else… new, but Gray stood back by the kitchen door, easing a touch with how Jack could still make that call despite the upheaval over what had gone down between him and Martin.
“S’all good.” Jack sat back in his chair, resting his arm down to get a good reading of the blood pressure monitor, but his body language still looked off to Gray. Jack didn’t look Craig’s way as he took the usual health checks. His attention stayed solely with Halliday, who sat to his left, and all that tenseness in Jack’s body as Gray had forced him into the corner was back. That drop of feeling and unwillingness to listen to anything but his own head and push anyone’s offer of control away. Halliday himself hadn’t spoken a word beyond the usual light conversation over morning well-wishes and politeness. He seemed to pick up on the change, because he didn’t press forward with serious conversation either.
And there lay one serious problem if Halliday saw talk wouldn’t lead to a solution yet.
From over by the unit where Jack’s photo lay untouched, Jan frowned Gray’s way.
Go back a month with Jack’s meeting with Halliday over going down memory lane to trigger Martin, Gray hadn’t sat in on that meeting, nor Jan, and being asked to now… it wasn’t good. He knew Jack had previously spoken about everything but putting Chris in hospital. Withholding information would always come with a sting in its tail: it kept Jack safe, away from court and a cell, but it denied Halliday full access to all of Jack’s head. Halliday’s long look at Jack called that out: that he was missing something despite being told about Jude.
“Okay,” said Craig, taking off the cuff. “Everything’s normal here.” He looked at Jack. “The reading you took last night after the nosebleeds. Was it an accurate reading?”
Jack narrowed his eyes Craig’s way. “You think I’m into lying over keeping medical records as well now?”
“At the moment, if it benefitted your end goal, yes.” Craig’s tone lost any of its usually light-heartedness. “Over the past six months, you’ve hidden facts from my team and tried to trigger Martin in ways that have prevented us from working with a correct diagnosis and medication, so you remember: I’m your named nurse here, Jack. I’m not your friend. If I ask you if the reading is accurate, remember I can and will take the reading card from your machine and check it out if I feel you’re deliberately giving incorrect details. But I haven’t, not yet. The fact I’m asking and not taking it shows I still trust you to be honest with me when I ask you. So this is me asking you.”
Jack held his look for a moment, then shook his head and looked away as he pulled his shirt sleeve down. “The reading was accurate: one-fifty over ninety-five.”
“Any blurred vision? Headaches?”
“Headaches.”
Craig flicked him a look. “Before or after the switch?”
“After.”
“Any pain now?”
Jack shook his head. “I took some pain meds last night.”
“How long did the nose bleeds last?”
“Three, maybe five minutes. Just light.”
“Was that the same for Martin?” Craig directed the question to Gray.
“Martin’s lasted a little longer. About ten minutes, but just light too.” It was Jan who replied, and Craig passed him a smile.
“Thank you.” He nodded and folded the cuff away, then looked at Halliday. “Along with the headaches, Martin’s BP was recorded at one-forty over ninety on switching, but with no nosebleed. Jack’s have been a steady one-twenty over eighty after switching back. No previous recorded headaches or nosebleeds.”
Halliday didn’t write anything down, but then he never had needed to. He watched Jack for a moment, almost as if he hadn’t heard Craig. But it was there in Jan’s uneasy shift against the unit, also in Gray’s own inner restlessness.
Blood pressure had crept up on Jack switching back from Martin, which meant Jack’s anxiety levels spiked, or he found a way to push for a spike, showing some kind of awareness that Martin was in control, and that Jack wanted to take it back. And with the switches coming so fast, that meant Martin’s anxiety over fighting back against Jack to retain control spiked his BP too, in part causing Martin’s nosebleeds. Maybe, Gray couldn’t really be sure on the effect of high blood pressure on the blood vessels in the nose, but it was a new occurrence for both of them.
So too was acknowledging each other and a physical push back from Jack. But mental struggles sometimes manifested in physical hurt as well as the psychological and emotional.
Halliday was hard to read, but his silence wasn’t. He was… concerned. He shifted, just slightly and tilted his head. “I know there was no need to continue prescribing BP meds after displacement with Martin, but if I prescribed them now, would you take them?”
Gray frowned. The question was odd, more so in the fact it was framed as a question. Halliday usually prescribed, and Jack, he’d follow the course of medication to the T, barely any questions asked beyond how it would affect him at work and beyond, or if it would conflict with anything he was already taking, but now…?
Jack shook his head, and Jan shot Gray a look.
“Can you tell me why you refuse?” Halliday said quietly.
“I don’t think I need to, Doc.” He offered a shrug into the quiet of the kitchen. “You asked because you knew I’d say no.”
Halliday nodded. And there it was. “Thank you for being honest with me. I’d have been more concerned if you’d been open to continue lying.” He dipped his head, searching Jack’s look. “So can you tell me why you’ll decline the prescription?”
Jack folded his arms and stretched out his legs, crossing them at the ankles. He looked comfortable, but it looked an unsure relaxation into waters he didn’t feel comfortable within, not fully. “If there’s a way to feel what Martin’s thinking, I don’t want that blocking.”
And there it was. Somehow Jack had found a physical way to put a collar on Martin, and he didn’t want it flatlining with medication.
Fuck. It hit home with Gray now why Halliday had wanted him and Jan in on this meeting.
Halliday nodded after a moment. “You said if there’s a way to feel Martin. You didn’t say stop Martin.”
Jack frowned as Gray turned his ear.
“I just said feel,” Jack said eventually, and he shook his head before rubbing at it. “Audio… maybe it’s the fact there’s no audio to go along with the security cameras I’m pushed into viewing things from that’s….” He struggled, so badly. “That’s adding to my mistrust in him. If getting a way in to transcribing audio between us is the only way to finding a way into trust him again, I’m not losing it.”
Halliday narrowed his eyes, not looking happy over something, then eventually said, “There’s room for trust in there?”
Jack snorted. “DID, Doc. I don’t get to pick and choose who answers my call when I crash. Martin answered mine long ago, but he chose to stop. I get that same choice now because I don’t give a shit what excuse he pulled out of his ass over the whys and whens, he was a dickhead to throw a kid into all this shit. If all we have left is co-existence, I’ll make damn sure it’s a safer and saner walk from here on in, one I can damn well hear and keep my dick out of.”
“But with the audio on, all memories shared? With one comes the other, right?”
Jack frowned. “I…” He paled a little. Gray was right there with him. DID wasn’t a certain path, personalities could be aware of each other or not. And with the latter, there were therapies to try and get the personalities to recognise each other. Jack had tried them all over the years and not managed to break through to Martin. But with how Martin was fashioned through trauma, it seemed like it had taken another trauma to initiate change, for them to show emotional signs of recognition beyond videos and scribbled texts. But would Jack really want to remember everything Martin did? Would he want Martin knowing every part of his life when Jack hid away from most over going social himself? Jack had had years of fighting to clean social off his skin.
“I haven’t thought that far,” Jack said quietly.
Halliday nodded. “Can you take a week to think the different scenarios over, then? Just what you both might be given access to? Then meet me again then to discuss medication?”
Gray stiffened as Jack looked up at Halliday.
“A week?” Tension drained from Jack’s shoulders. “Yeah. Yeah I can do a week of thought, me.”
“Good. I’d like to prescribe painkillers in the mean time to help with the switch now it’s coming faster and causing hurt to you both. That goes for Martin taking them too.” Halliday spoke that last one Gray’s way.
Jack nodded, and Craig handed Halliday his iPad. Something was filled out, no doubt the prescription, and after Halliday handed it back, he got to his feet. “Call when you need it, Jack.”
Not if… when.
“I’ll order these and have them delivered later today.” Craig got to his feet too, then he tapped the table to get Jack’s attention. “Make damn sure you call me too.”
Jack sat up, and it was more the Jack Gray knew sitting there: sorry for all the shit, resigned to all the shit, but breathing an uneasy sigh of relief on how more shit hadn’t come his way for saying no to something that his look cried out he knew he should be damn well taking. He offered a fist-bump Craig’s way, and Craig eventually returned it with a shake of head, a smile.
“I’ll see you out.” Gray indicated to the door. Jan didn’t look happy, but he buried it and went and sat next to Jack. Before he could say anything, Jack slipped a hold around Jan’s neck, pulling him in close, and something was whispered in his ear. It won a frown off Jan, then a kiss at Jack’s lips before a look came Gray’s way. Whatever had been said, it hit a nerve in Jan, and Gray nodded he’d be back in a moment.
He held the door for Halliday and Craig, then headed out, scowling down at the Maine as it brushed on through, for once it not making a beeline to disturb the hold on Jan. Good. The animal was learning.
Taking out his phone and putting a call through to let Ray know Halliday would be heading down to the main gates soon, Gray walked the hall and caught up with Halliday and Craig in his reception area. They stood talking in low tones, and as Gray went over, Craig tipped his head Gray’s way, then headed outside.
It left him and Halliday alone, but that was the whole point.
Halliday met him halfway. “I know you’re not happy over the BP prescription. It’s treating the symptom, not the cause, but—”
Gray shook his head. “If he’d lied and told you he’d take them, it would have opened up talk on sectioning again.” Jack had been lucky Halliday hadn’t called it when he’d seen him a month ago. “The pain killers you prescribed.” Gray wiped at his lip. “Are they strong enough to calm his reactions and cut down on the headaches and nosebleeds? I don’t want either of them hurt.”
“Yes. Along with his anxiety meds, they’ll help calm him down. He’ll be a little drowsy until he adjusts, so talk to him about the usual warnings: no heavy manual labour at work. And with the switch causing physical hurt for both him and Martin, Jack’s driving licence will need to be suspended too.”
Gray buried a groan. Fuck. That would only exacerbate Jack’s reactions. “But you don’t want more intervention than that.”
Halliday eased back. “He doesn’t see it yet. Martin’s best protection of Jack is silence. How he keeps Jack emotionally unconnected to, or in amnesiac state over traumatic events, especially the ones Martin creates in order to keep them both protected. That silence has been built between them for a reason, but like with Jan and his cologne after Vince’s rape, that’s not something anyone can tell Jack. He needs to go through it and listen to why they put each other on mute, why neither of them have filled it in the past. And he needs to do it in surroundings he feels secure within.”
“But you heard what I did in there. It’s not just how he’s supposedly found a way to push Martin back and hurt them both in the process and bridge that silence. By not taking the meds, he’s just acknowledged he’s prepared to keep hurting himself and Martin in order to bridge that quiet.”
Halliday nodded. “That’s a serious concern. So too is why it’s happening.”
Gray frowned as Halliday glanced down the corridor, no doubt to see if Jack was close.
“You already know that there are numerous areas to DID,” Halliday said quietly. “Multiple personality disorder is one, dissociative amnesia is another, and Jack crosses both of those with Martin and his missing memories. The third part to it all is depersonalisation and derealisation. With derealisation, it can make the world seem unreal, or like the patient is looking at life through fog. That’s why Craig asked if there was any visual disturbance. Yes that’s a sign of high blood pressure, but it would have also opened up the possibility of derealisation too. But where Jack isn’t showing signs of that, he is presenting with the first: depersonalisation.”
Something hit a nerve in Gray. Jack’s drop in feeling… a look in his eyes that pushed him to a distance, away from Gray when it came to security. “Meaning?”
“When he destabilised two years ago to what happened with who was behind the gas attack, there was no Martin, no alter there to handle the hurt for him like Martin would. Martin backed off. Now usually when an adolescent first presents with DID with no alter formed, they’ll use the likes of an inanimate object, like a stuffed toy, in order to cope and talk through. So with Jack, having no Martin, in comes depersonalisation: or more life through the lens of a security system and this latest need to receive communication back through the audio. In order to cope, Jack sees himself as that security camera: no emotional attachment, no fear, just a system that needs eyes and audio to communicate danger that he thinks Martin can’t… or won’t see…. And if Martin doesn’t switch and is seen to not react to dangers, or he’s seen to react in a way that goes against the security systems program: like Martin has with Jude, Jack triggers his own ‘security’ system to step in, regardless of the danger and emotional repercussions.”
Like going after Chris, hitting Ray… then going head-to-head with Gray. “And if the security camera in him continues to see Martin as flawed, because we all know there’s no cure for DID?”
Halliday held his look, not saying anything for a moment. “Mastery over the past can be used to heal what comes in the future. But mastery of the present can rewrite everything once past.”
“Orwell, 1984 .” It came so quietly from back over by the hall, and Gray looked over Halliday’s shoulder. Jack rested against the door as Jan followed him in. “Or a paraphrase of,” added Jack.
“You know the paraphrase?” Halliday looked his way. “If I remember, fiction isn’t your thing.”
Jack frowned. “There’s a novel open in our bedroom. I can picture that. The line’s visible too. Felt like someone was asking what the title was.”
Jan had been the one asking the question. Martin had been the one reading Orwell’s novel, 1984 right before Light’s gas cannister had hit their bedroom.
That… that was one of Martin’s memories there….
Fuck. The security camera at work, struggling to adjust the audio.
Jan looked Gray’s way, recognition hitting his eyes as well.
Jack gave such a deep sigh and rubbed at his head. “I’m not out to rewrite past, present, or future templates, Doc. I wouldn’t know where to start, not when it comes to Martin.” He looked up. “I just need to know I can still count on him to get us through the now without fucking it up again, and the emotionless distance of a camera helps.”
Jan went to say something, but Jack shook his head, his frown serious.
“This is something between me and Martin, Jan, it’s not for you or Gray to translate between us. It’s not something I can trust the usual video link set up for me and Martin to usually use either, because fuck knows he only plays head games there with me as well,” he said gently. “So I think the Doc’s talking sense. Depersonalisation lets me see the danger so bloody clearly through my own internal security system, but I don’t feel my way through it. And that’s when it’s dangerous for me: not caring, not feeling things when I know I should.” He snorted. “I felt Martin back there. And that’s what I need in on, because I’ll damn well take any way back into feeling around Martin in order not to fuck up on my part again and let either of us put you or Jude under threat.” He looked Gray’s way. “So bear with me on this, please. It’s not about taking Martin down, it’s about finding a way back into feeling so we both don’t fuck up again and hurt anyone around us. I don’t trust Martin with anyone around me.”
Gray went over and stopped by him, and a brush of the back of his hand went to Jack’s jaw before he ran a touch along a strand of cowlicked black hair. “May I ask one thing? Please, stunner?”
Jack nodded, then closed his eyes to the stroke of hand down his jaw.
“Don’t pull him back,” he said quietly. “Don’t keep hurting yourself over holding him back. Give both of you time to feel and work your way through this, because if you make it a fight, he’ll do what he’s designed for and fight back, locking you both in a war that’s starting to hurt you physically. Jude—”
“He stays away from us, from here, Gray. And I mean that.” Eyes stayed closed but a drop of emotion came with it, a pull back to… avoid feeling. “He can’t be exposed to what goes on in here. You give me that one thing, please. Just that one goddamn thing.”
Almost forgetting Halliday was there, Gray brushed a kiss at Jack’s lips, and the return came only a second later: warm, tender, almost… almost the need to hide in Gray away from the world, and fuck… Gray needed this. He’d missed this side of Jack so damn much.
“Yeah. I promise,” he mumbled quietly, slipping an arm around Jack’s neck and pulling him in. His hold took Jack out of sight of Halliday as he let out an unsteady breath. He glanced back eventually. Halliday had headed outside, and Jan came over, kissing at Jack’s head.
“Because of what he might have been involved with, we need surveillance on Jude and his crew on a culler basis.” Gray eased back and looked at Jack. “If we do have to get in contact with him, it will only be to talk away from here, nothing more. Are you going to be okay with that? Because I know Martin. He’ll want a say in it all. Like I said: don’t make this a fight between you two, because he’ll do what he’s designed for and fight you.”
Jack ran a hand through his hair, then rested a look on Jan. “Yeah,” he said quietly, then he found Gray again. “I’m okay with that. But only that: culler business and safety. You keep him away from here. Martin threw his head out enough to get him running blind into his streets, and Martin will run just as blindly and aggressively out into them to make sure Jude takes no damage, and he has a history of nearly taking you all down when it comes to end goals and kids.”
Gray roughed a kiss at his cheek. “I’m here to keep an eye on all of us. You focus on you and Martin and sorting this somehow.”
Because a war with Martin he didn’t want, not over Jack. Ever.
“So… walk me through it all again now my head’s a little clearer,” said Jack, but something in his eyes as he watched Gray seemed… off. “Tell me again why you think it’s vital you need to watch Jude and whichever crew he runs with?” He rubbed at his head, looking like it hurt again, looking almost as if Martin turned his ear their way too. “What’s he gotten himself into. What’s the threat?”