𝐆𝐎𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐍 | jj maybank

LII. Kook vs. Pogue

"It would help if you did."

"Maybe," she wagered. "Or maybe it would make it worse."

Dr. Wolff wrote something in his notebook and returned his attention back to her. He tried to be a pacifist and that didn't work, so maybe a different approach would. "Is that why you don't want to talk about your experiences? Because you fear that reliving them by vocalizing them will hurt you more?"

His bluntness caught her off guard. A feeling grew in the back of her throat where her neck met her shoulders and suddenly she felt frozen in her seat. The threat of nausea hung in her esophagus but she swallowed it down and hid her discomfort with sardonic humour. "I'm feeling very attacked right now," she said flatly, her face stoic and never betraying her true intentions of deflecting.

The corners of Dr. Wolff's lips quirked upwards. "You're stubborn," he almost chuckled, "I'll give you that. But I don't want you to feel attacked when you come in here. We'll work up to talking about the big stuff, yeah? Let's start with something smaller."

The successful evasion of talking about her feelings brought her comfort and for the first time since entering the room, she felt okay. She was able to outsmart Dr. Wolff. Maybe she could get through this without experiencing too much emotional distress.

"My mom told me to tell you that you owe her a bottle of vanilla coffee creamer," Stella stated. If Dr. Wolff wanted a smaller topic to talk about, then she would give him one. "She knows it was you who finished the one in the attending lounge fridge."

He let out an amused huff. "You are a lot like your mother. Did you know?" He watched as her head tilted in confusion. "When you were missing, her boss sent her to see me too. I would ask her about herself and she would talk about a TV show she hated. I would ask her about you and she would talk about the weather."

Stella could sense where the conversation was going. The point he was trying to make was that he knew she was deflecting. He had seen it before in her mother and now he can see it in her. He could see through her. Perhaps she underestimated the Austrian man.

"You both don't like talking about your feelings," he stated. He didn't give her time to respond before speaking again. "I'll get your mother's coffee creamer after we discuss why you're here."

It was a checkmate moment. There was no room for argument anymore. No more moves that Stella could take to get out of this situation.

"Fine," she said defeated. "But we'll only talk about it on my terms."

Dr. Wolff nodded. "Of course."

Stella took a deep breath, held it in her chest, then slowly exhaled. "I'm here because I went missing for six weeks and my mom thinks that going to therapy will help resolve any trauma I've accumulated."

He nodded again. "And how is your relationship with your mother?"

"...It's good?" Out of everything he could've gotten from her statement, her relationship with her mother was what he focused on? She supposed it could've been worse. He could've asked her to unpack all of her baggage and lay her experiences out to dry. "Honestly, she's my best friend and I'm really lucky I get to say that."

"Why's that?"

She shrugged. "A lot of people have bad relationships with their mom." Kie. JJ. John B. Sarah. "If they even have one at all."

Dr. Wolff hummed. "And what about your dad? Do you have a good relationship with him?"

Stella almost laughed. "My dad is an abusive self-serving prick."

Two avenues of possibilities opened up before Dr. Wolff and he considered each one carefully. He could ask about her father—which seemed to be a complex topic—or he could ask about the people she knew who had bad parental relationships. One of them was more invasive than the other.