Leashed | • • • | Blue Exorcist

Professional Opinion

It's been about an hour since Shura left me here. And while it's not the worst experience I've had - kinda hard to beat witnessing the death of your father, after all - it still was uncomfortable. Dr. Tanaka left and his place was taken by a psychologist. She was friendly, and even brought in a few toys to mess around with. There was a stress ball that I didn't really care for, as well as a little cube with buttons and switches all over it. I found myself attracted to this weird plastic device. It was like a bunch of colorful macaroni noodles latched together. They twisted in all sorts of directions and I toyed with it incessantly as she slowly pried into my mind.

"Rin," she stated, "why do you think you're here?" My eyebrows furrowed and I asked her to rephrase her question. I was obviously here because everyone found out about everything. She hummed, "what lead to you being here? Unlike what you may believe, coming here wasn't involuntary." I'd have argued that with her, but she kept talking so I couldn't interject. "You could have reached out to someone before it got to this point, but something prevented you from doing so, what was that?"

"Oh," was all I said. I didn't really know, if I was being honest. "I mean, I was scared obviously, no one wants to talk about this kind of stuff." She asked me to elaborate and I sighed, twisting the brightly colored plastic in my palms. "I didn't want anyone to know because nothing good will come of it."

She scribbled something down and then proceeded to click the back of her pen against her clipboard. "So, since people know now, does that mean bad things will happen?"

"I mean, I don't like being here, so yeah. And I've made everyone else upset with all this. I've caused more problems than anything." I huffed, sinking back and mumbling, "I'm never good at anything other than destruction." I suppose that's all I was ever meant to be. The spawn of Satan can't be angelic, it's not physically possible.

"Okay, we'll change the topic, then." She jotted something else down before placing her pen and clipboard on the table next to her and leaning forward. "Rin, why did you try to end your life?" I froze, not exactly expecting to have such a sudden jump in conversation. I became uncomfortable and she caught wind of it. "Was it for the same reason both times?" She pressed, but I didn't budge, it was too much to talk about right now.

She hummed and leaned back once again, and I let out a breath. "How about something a little easier?" I hummed and she nodded along, "how about the self harm, mind telling me anything about that?"

I opened my mouth, about to answer her when a memory flashed to me. "You did that on purpose, didn't you? She rose an eyebrow, and I continued. "In class, I don't know when, but we learned about it." Memories of the details flooded my brain and I recounted them, "the door in the face technique. It's where you ask someone something they'll most likely refuse, so then you swoop in and ask something slightly smaller. They'll more than likely answer it since it's not as much of a deal as the first request...."

I watched as she looked me up and down, a few moments of silence passed between us before I saw the corners of her lips quirk. "Yes, that's exactly what I did."

I smiled inwardly, continuing on my train of thought. "You've been doing the opposite this entire time. Foot in the door, where you gradually build up to your answers, but-" I stopped and smiled slightly, "you haven't been getting the answers you wanted, so you switched on me. Right?"

Again, she was silent before a small chuckle escaped her lips. "You say you aren't good at anything except destruction, however, you seem pretty good at reading people. So I wouldn't say that about yourself, Rin." A bit or pride sparkled in my heart and fidgeted with the plastic toy once again, a small smile dancing on my lips. "No matter your ability, you didn't answer the question."