Baby Daddies

Chapter Thirty-Six: Dr. Pembroke

Back and forth, left and right, tick and tock. Cole held his chin in his hand, his eyes locked on the grandfather clock sitting in the corner of the stuffy, smothering room. It moved back and forth, flip-flopping until it exploded with sound. Until it was finally heard. He wondered how old it was. How heavy was it? He wondered about anything other than what the rigid man sitting before him wanted him to mull over. Cole fiddled with his thumbs and bounced his leg, unable to sit still. He caught sight of the man scribbling something down and he cleared his throat. "W-what did you just write down?" The man looked up innocently.

"Oh, nothing. Just some observations."

"Yeah, like what?" he asked, the tone of his voice sharp enough to cut glass.

"Honestly? I'm observing your behavior every time you talk about your parents. You told me last week that the reason you felt like you were going crazy was because of them."

"I didn't say that," Cole said with annoyance.

"I didn't say it was verbatim." The boy wanted to reach across the desk and slash the man's throat with his own engraved letter-opener. Dr. Pembroke? More like Dr. Pem-joke. This was stupid and Cole didn't want to be here. He wanted to go home and sleep more. That's the only thing that he had to do. Sleep and wait for the next night. It was a cycle and he refused to see any harm in it. Unfortunately for him his mother wasn't going to let him stay like that.

"Alright, why don't you read me some of your 'observations'?" Cole put air quotes around the last word, venom practically dripping from his hard expression.

"Why don't I?" Pembroke asked himself, sitting up properly in his chair a moment later. "We'll start with the first week. The fifteenth of July. You told me that you didn't want your parents to get back together. And then the next week, you said you did. I'm curious as to what changed your mind then, and judging from your behavior today, now."

"My dad moved back in. That's what happened."

"And you didn't want him and your mother to fix things because...?"

"I hate this. I hate talking about this. I hate talking to you about anything. You keep looking for what's wrong with me! But I'm completely fine, okay? I'm just a little sad!" Cole couldn't keep his voice quiet. He felt as if the man had guns pointed at him and waiting for the call to fire. Pembroke sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger.

"There is something wrong with you, Cole. I know you want me to tell you that you're fine and all you need is a break, but I'm not going to blow smoke up your ass. Give me that look all you want, but I'm not wrong and I'm not out of line."

"You're way out of line," Cole whispered. He collected his stuff and headed for the door without looking back. He grabbed the doorknob and swung it open.

"You think your dad would want you running away from your problems, Cole?" He stopped dead in his tracks. Cursing at him had been bad, but this was something else entirely. Guilt-tripping someone looking for help?

"Don't you dare talk about Dad like that," he said. He closed the door and stalked back to Dr. Pembroke.

"Why not? That's what you do, isn't it? You talk about how bad it hurt you that he left, and yet when someone else points it out, you snap at them. You snap at the littlest things. You scream and you insult and you lash out at people. And I'm sorry to have to be the one to tell you this, but you have some serious issues. With your anger and with yourself. I want to help you come to terms with what you're going through." Pembroke was sincere, but his kindness just made Cole angrier. It felt like he was being patronized, like he was a child and Pembroke was telling him what he was feeling, only instead of speaking to him normally, he was using baby-talk.

"Oh, that's right. Because you know all about how to help me get through my situation, Mr. My-Parents-Never-Had-Problems. I looked you up when Mom and Dad told me I was going to be seeing you whenever they went in for counseling. You've got the picture perfect family. Ph.D. and everything."

"And you don't think I'm qualified to deal with family and personal issues? I was right about everything else."

"No, you actually weren't?" Dr. Pembroke clutched his head with both hands in exasperation, ready to angrily rip his blonde hair out.

"What are you talking about!? It's so obvious that you flip-flop between emotions. You love your dad, but you hate him for what he did to your mother. You love her but hate how she ignored you. You go back and forth between those two emotions, hate and love. And when your dad came back in the house, he acted as if nothing was wrong and that infuriated you. Nobody realizes that you're hurting too and you hate that but you still suppress it. You keep all of that anger bottled up and it explodes like a volcano. You're depressed, and you have anger issues, and you live with so much regret, and you just found out that your father was unfaithful. You're a mess Cole, but I promise you, if you just work with me, I'm going to fix you. You'll be okay."

Cole stood frozen in his place, his body trembling with anger and sadness. Despite repeating over and over to himself that he wouldn't, he felt a tear break free and speed down his cheek. He laughed sardonically and shook his head. The grandfather clock behind him rang loud. One, two, three...

"No," Cole said. "No. I won't be okay."