Ink and Ash

04: Comfort in routine

ZHENYA

The late afternoon light cut through the half-closed blinds in horizontal slats, striping my desk in warm gold and soft shadows. It was that quiet hour between pretending to be productive and admitting you’re done for the day. My coffee had already gone cold, but I kept sipping it out of habit, bitter and lukewarm, just like most of my exes.

I tucked my legs beneath me on the chair, oversized sweater swallowing me whole, hair scraped into a lazy bun. The sleeves dangled over my fingers as I flipped through the first manila folder on the stack.

Patient: Gillian Mae, 41
Diagnosis: Generalized Anxiety Disorder.
Notes: Overthinks everything. Fears social interaction but joined a knitting club to “expose herself.”

I snorted lightly. “That sounds like a bad headline waiting to happen.”

I jotted down a few observations with my favorite pen, the one that glides just right and doesn’t smudge unless I sneeze mid-sentence, which has happened more times than I’ll ever admit.

File after file, name after name, each one with their own shade of sadness, trauma, chaos. Some were quiet disasters. Others were loud, messy wounds dressed in expensive perfume and big smiles.

That’s the thing about being a therapist. People think we fix others. But really? We just learn how to read between the silences. How to recognize that tight smile for what it is. How to see the tremble in a hand before it reaches for the coffee cup.

I paused and looked at the fourth file on the pile.

Wesley, 22. PTSD.
Not ready to talk. Sits in silence for the full 45 minutes.

“Same, honestly.” I muttered, scribbling a note to switch up the environment next session, maybe bring in fidget toys or let him sketch instead of speak.

Half the time, therapy isn’t about the words. It’s about letting someone exist without judgment. Silence can be healing, too.

A buzz interrupted my thoughts. My phone lit up on the corner of the desk with a text.

Hannah:
“What do you want? I’m in the snacks aisle.”

I blinked at it for a second, trying to remember if I asked for anything. I hadn’t. But Hannah had a habit of impulsively buying people food when she was overwhelmed. Snack-based generosity was her love language.

I typed back.“Surprise me. But not nuts. You know how I feel about anything crunchy that sounds like bones breaking. Or chocolate, you know I hate it.”

It wasn’t a picky thing, okay, maybe it was, but chocolate made my mouth feel like I was chewing on guilt wrapped in wax. People always gasped when I told them I didn’t like it. Like I’d just confessed to a felony. I’d stopped explaining myself years ago.

Besides, chocolate was for people who believed in comfort. In sugar as a cure. I never did. If sweetness could fix anything, I wouldn’t be staring at a pile of broken people’s lives every night like bedtime stories for the emotionally wrecked.

And the nuts? Yeah, no. That crunch always reminded me of dislocated joints. Snaps and cracks and memories I didn’t want. Once you've heard real bones break, you never forget the sound. It echoes.