Chapter 34 – “warm glow” - Hippo Campus
VICE
“WARM GLOW” - HIPPO CAMPUS
A tension headache pounds against my eyelids as I pull into one of the parking spots in the employee lot behind the boardwalk.
Lowering the visor, I wipe beneath my eyes to clear any last remnants of my tears—profuse sobbing the primary source of my headache—before snapping it shut and getting out of my car.
I finally saved up enough money to buy myself a car. Well, to afford the down payment on a car. It’s used, and ten years old, but it has decent mileage, and I’m guaranteed a lifetime maintenance warranty at Ramos Automotive on account of my last name being scrawled across the front of the building.
The most important thing was having reliable transportation for myself, because I was so goddamn tired of walking everywhere, borrowing cars from one of my brothers, or having to ask for rides.
I’ll be thirty in a couple of months, and I desperately needed something that could help me feel independent.
I was ready to finally begin getting back on the right track.
So, I told the love of my life that I do, in fact, love him. The next day, I scheduled my first therapy appointment, and then I bought myself a car. It’s a burgundy Kia, and it’s kind of ugly, but I love it anyway.
My first therapy appointment was supposed to be last week, but as the day approached, I began feeling irrationally anxious and exceptionally emotional. So bogged down by my own mind, I ended up canceling the session entirely, and had no intention to reschedule.
Then, about ten days later, my period appeared, and everything clicked into place.
The anxiety-ridden distress was because of my PMDD, and I hadn’t even realized it at the time.
It looks so different every month, and when I’m not tracking my cycle, it can be hard to understand what’s going on in my body.
Plus, those days tend to feel drawn out and beyond reality—I’m fully convinced I am as crazy as I think, and my anxiety is as warranted as my mind tells me it is, so it’s difficult to rationalize anything at all.
The funny thing is, in those moments, August never once suggested I reschedule my appointment.
He never told me to calm down, or that I was overreacting.
He came home the first night with a couple of pre-rolled joints and curled up with me in bed while showing me dozens of videos he saved on his phone that featured people being injured in the most hilarious of ways, because he knows they make me laugh when I’m high.
He made me food when I didn’t want to eat, held me when I couldn’t sleep, and never complained about watching my favorite television shows.
He ran me baths and washed my hair. He never touched me without asking and didn’t initiate sex until I did.
Even then, he continued asking me if I was okay until I got borderline annoyed about it, pinned his hands above his head, and rode him so hard he went cross-eyed.
A couple of days ago, when my period ended and I was feeling much better, I told him I planned on rescheduling my therapy session, and he merely kissed the top of my head before whispering, “I knew you would.”
I’ve never known someone to have such confidence in me. I’ve never known someone who knew me well enough to see through my mind in ways I myself am blind to.
Though, therapy itself ended up being far more painful than I had anticipated.
First, she asked me about my childhood, my relationship with my parents, and with my brothers.
But we spent most of the session talking about why I canceled before.
It was easy enough to open up to my therapist, Jocilyn, about my PMDD, because it felt less heavy than all of my other trauma.
She suggested I start tracking my cycle again so I can better anticipate it, and that I see a doctor to get checked out and see if a switch in birth control may help, or potentially explore antidepressants.
She validated the way my symptoms have changed over the years, and how life’s stressors can contribute to the severity of the illness.
That’s when she asked me about my trauma, and why I’m seeking therapy.
For some reason, I immediately broke down.
I didn’t know where to begin. The words spilled from me like vomit.
It was wretched and painful. I gave her the surface level of my past, and the trauma that came with it, along with all the consequences I’ve been facing since.
My poor excuse for a life in New York, my poor coping with alcohol, and my guilt for allowing the same boy I ran away from to save me.
She said there is a lot to unpack, and she looks forward to seeing me again, but that she wants me to remind myself that my grief is valid, and so is my happiness. I can feel both emotions at once, I can hold space for them, but they need not cancel each other out.
I think it’s too soon to know if therapy is going to help me or not. All I know right now is that I’m fucking drained, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to work the remainder of my shift after an hour of trauma-dumping all over a stranger.
Taking a deep breath, I get out of my car and head inside the back door of The Wicked Wildflower.
It’s a Friday afternoon, and the weather is stunning—as to be expected in early May.
Dahlia finally got around to adding a few tables outside the front doors on the boardwalk, and with the sun shining down over the Pacific, the view is phenomenal.
Every table out there is occupied. It’s slower inside, just a few customers working quietly in the corner booths.
I walk through the swinging double doors that lead to the kitchen before stashing my bag in the break room and grabbing an apron. As I exit, I find Dahlia standing at the large counter rolling dough for tomorrow’s menu.
“Hey.” She smiles at me as she continues working. “How was your session?”
“Good, but also awful?” I laugh, tying the apron around my waist. “I feel exhausted.”
“That’s normal. A sign that it’s probably working.
” She winks. “I always try and do something relaxing after my sessions, like take a bath. After Lou’s, we go home and make her favorite desserts, and after our family sessions, Everett and I typically take her to do something fun together, like go to the movies or surfing. ”
“You guys attend family therapy?” I ask.
I’d known that Dahlia had helped Darby and her daughter into therapy, and that Everett was seeing one as well to support them, but I didn’t know they went together.
“Yeah.” She smiles. “He wants to make her adjustment to this new lifestyle as easy as possible for her, and he thinks it helps them bond as a father-daughter dynamic, which is important to him.”
“You know, he wouldn’t do this for anyone else,” I say. “He loves you guys so fucking much. It’s sickening.”
“I know.” She nods, smiling to herself. “Anyway, what do you have planned after your shift later?”
“I honestly hadn’t thought that far ahead.” I shrug. “Probably reading.” I’ve been hyperfocused on editing my manuscript after work most days, but after today’s session, I don’t know if I’ll be feeling up to it.
“You should come to the beach with Darby and me. I think your mom is going to join us after she finishes her book club this evening.”
“What do you guys do at the beach?” I ask.
Dahlia glances up at me, smirking. “You’ll have to come with us to see.”
I see Dahlia almost every day at work, and I see Darby often enough when she pops in, as well, but we don’t spend a significant amount of time together outside of family dinner on Sundays. I make time for coffee dates with my mom, and my brothers will often join too.
I’ve never been invited to just…hang out with Darby and Dahlia, though. They’re sisters, and it feels like something I’d be encroaching on. I was friends with Darby one summer years ago, but outside of that, I’ve always struggled to maintain girl friendships, often feeling like the odd one out.
“I wouldn’t want to impose—”
“Shut up.” Dahlia rolls her eyes playfully.
“Sisters can’t impose. It’s impossible. In fact, now that I know you don’t have plans, I’m going to be pissed off if you don’t join.
So, I’ll plan to leave when you finish your shift and ask Peggy to complete tomorrow’s prep, and then we’ll force Darby to sneak away early too. ”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” Nodding toward the front of the bakery, she adds, “Now go back to work.”
“You have some serious mommy energy.”
“I know.”
“I guess I’m just confused about the kiddie pools.”
The sand is still warm beneath my bare feet, wind whipping my hair as I toss it up into a bun and watch Dahlia and Darby lay out two small heart-shaped inflatable pools on the beach. Darby pulls a bicycle pump out of the wagon she brought down, sticking it into the inflation valve.
“Here, let me do that for you.” I step up beside her and pull the pump from her grasp, standing on either side of it and beginning to move the handle up and down, slowly inflating the pool. “If you pump too hard you might give birth.”
“Honestly…” She sighs, rubbing her belly. “At this point, you’re probably not wrong.”
“We blow them up and then sit inside them with blankets and watch the sunset.” Dahlia grabs a cooler from the wagon. “It’s more comfortable than sitting on the ground itself, and we don’t get sand in every conceivable crevice.”
My eyes flit to Darby. “Don’t you fuck on the beach like…all the time?”
“Not all the time,” she grumbles, then references her belly. “Especially not since this happened.”
“Speaking of fucking…” Dahlia laughs, laying out blankets in the pool I just finished inflating while I start on the other. “Can I ask you a question, sister-to-sister?”
There’s a long pause before I finally glance up, realizing that she was talking to me.
“Sure?”
“Is August’s dick as big as I think it is?”
I bite back the smile begging to tease my lips. “Probably bigger.”
Darby blows out a slow puff of air before asking, “Pierced?”