I get out of my car and stare up at the medium sized building in front of me. I expected it to look like a hospital but instead it looks like a fucking kids school.
I sigh.
This is way worse.
The building's covered with muted colored mosaic. The windows are odd shapes like triangles and circles and the door is rounded and says 'Welcome' on the wood with a huge yellow sun drawing next to it.
I want to go back.
Aron offered to come but I told him no. Doing this alone is embarrassing enough.
Defeated, I slump into the building and I almost vomit from the interior.
The wooden walls have mosaic details at the bottom and the furniture is all kinds of muted colors with some bright ones every now and then.
Some of the walls have drawings and paintings unmistakably made by kids. This is so much worse than a clinical psych ward.
I reach the front desk.
"Hi, I have an appointment today. My name is Sky." I sigh. "Oliver Sky."
"And what's your date of birth?" The woman behind the desk asks.
"November eleventh two thousand—"
"Ah, I see. Your appointment is with Jennifer Dawson. You can wait in the waiting room to your right. She'll be with you shortly." The girl smiles with a whole lot of pep.
It creeps me the fuck out.
"Thanks." I say as I walk away from her as fast as possible.
I go into the waiting area and I'm met by a bunch of weirdos.
One girl is dressed in black head to toe and anxiously biting her huge sleeve while her eyes dart left and right. She has light skin and a black ring through her right nostril. Her eyes are dark brown, almost black. And her hair's dark too, though I can barely see it because of the hoodie.
The guy across from her is sitting still like a statue. He seems to be about my height and he has light blue hair and brown eyes. He's not unattractive but his demeanor is so weird. He barely blinks.
And the third person is a guy with long dark brown curls with matching eyes. His skin is olive and he's tapping his foot against the floor in the most annoying way while smiling at me like I'm food.
I have to get out of here.
I turn around and then I remember what I promised to Steve.
"Dammit." I mutter to myself.
"Too cool for therapy?" I hear a male voice behind me.
I turn around and face the guy with the curls.
He smirks again.
Everyone in the waiting room stares at me now.
This guy's already working on my nerves.
"So, what happened to you? Let me guess, your girlfriend pays more attention to her outfits than to you." He smirks.
"What the hell is your problem?!"
Goth girl's gasps in fear upon me raising my voice.
WHAT DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS?
"Now, now. Don't upset sweet little Heather." The guy giggles.
"So anger issues, I gather?" He smiles.
"And you're here for being a fucking sadist, right?" I fire back.
Heather curls up in a ball. "Don't fight." She says quietly. Her voice is a lot softer than I thought.
I roll my eyes.
"In my opinion Harold is just trying to get to know you. He has issues with popular people so that explains his rather rude attitude. Please excuse him." The blue haired guy says.
"Tony! I told you time and time again, don't discuss my issues with the commoners!" Harold exclaims.
Kill me. Now. Please just kill me so I can get away from these freaks.
"Your problems aren't so subtle to begin with." Tony mutters under his breath.
Harold turns to me.
"Excuse my brother, his intellectual abilities aren't too high and therefore he often times forgets to keep his mouth shut." Harold gives Tony a glare. "Though I'm sure you can relate to that." He smiles.
Wow. I've seriously had enough. I take back everything I said. This is a psych ward.
And I don't belong here.
I move towards the door, ready to run the hell out of this place when a tall brunette lady in her forties enters the room. Her skin is brown and her hair is made up of perfect small dark brown curls.
"Oliver Sky?" She smiles warmly.
"Of course he's called Oliver Sky." Harold mutters under his breath.
I roll my eyes.
"That's me." I sigh.
She holds her hand out to me. I shake it.
"My name is Jennifer and I'm going to be your therapist from now on."
That's just great.
"Why don't we go to my office?" She turns around and leads the way.
I follow unwillingly.
I notice her hair is really long. It reaches just over her lower back.
She matches the place perfectly cause she's wearing a long dress with different colored patches and some bedazzled flip flops. Half of her hair is put up messily in a clip.
A complete hippy.
We enter the office and it's just the same as the rest of the building. Warm, cozy, toddler vibes. How awful.
"Why don't you take a seat." She points to the chair across her desk.
I sit down.
Here we go. My first therapy session. With a hippy.
She closes the door and sits across from me.
"So, Oliver—"
"I go by Sky." I correct her.
"Sky." She smiles. Her eyes are big and happy. Her eyeliner is an ocean blue color.
"Why don't I start by telling you a little about myself and then you can tell me a little about you if you want." Her voice is exactly what you'd expect a flower to sound like. Feathery, high, pretty, soothing.
"Sure." I answer.
"Well, like I said, my name is Jennifer. I've been a therapist for twenty-five years though I only started my own practice five years back. My passion is to help people through the past so they can regain control of their future,"
She frases it the exact same way as Steven did.
"My friend Steven, who you know, often takes on some of my patients after they've dealt with their trauma. He helps them let go and loosen up a little through healing arts. I guess you could sort of say we work together. I have two beautiful boys and I'm happily married to the love of my life, Karen."
Oh.. she's married to a woman.
"In my free time I also love to paint."
"Wait.. so.. the paintings on the walls here are all..?"
"Yes, they're all my work." She smiles proudly.
Oh God. If her therapy's as good as her paintings I will leave this place with more traumas than before.
"Now. Tell me all about Sky." She leans forward.
"Um..." I fidget with my fingers. What am I supposed to say? I'm not just gonna skip straight to the depths of my soul..
"It's hard talking about ourselves, isn't it?"
I nod.
"Why don't you start by telling me about the people in your life?"
Right, that seems easy enough.
"Okay.. I live with my mom. My dad.." I sigh. "Left when I was around two."
Jennifer nods understandingly.
"Um.. then there's my friends: Shawn, Evan, Mikey.. Jimmy, I guess."
She smiles. "Why the 'I guess'?"
"Well, Jimmy isn't really a friend anymore. He's a real fuckin― I mean"
"No, it's okay. You can swear, let it out." It's hard not to wanna confide in her. She's so inviting and she seems like she really cares.
"Well, he's a real fucking jerk."
"Why's that?" She chuckles.
"I guess he's homophobic or something? When I started dating my boyfriend he started acting like an asshole."
"You have a boyfriend." She perks up.
I smile a little and nod.
"Spill."
I sigh. Talking about him is kind of embarrassing. My cheeks get hot.
"His name's Aron. He's over a year older than me and.." I sigh again while I look at anything but her. "He's.. perfect. He's kind, caring, protective, gentle. He's an angel, really." I look down at my hands.
"I don't deserve him." I mumble.
"Now why would you say that?" She frowns.
"Cause I'm like the opposite of an angel. I'm this explosive bomb that just keeps hurting people. And I try not to but it just keeps happening."
"Can you give me an example?"
Ha. I have too many to choose from.
"Well, I had a girlfriend, her name's Loren, and I cheated on her all the time. Because I didn't see her as my girlfriend but I knew how she felt about me and I didn't correct her when she started calling me her boyfriend. And the worst is.."
I groan and cover my face with my hands.
I wanna tell her the truth but than I remember she's Chase's dad's friend.
"Whatever it is, you can tell me." Her soothing voice coaxes me to talk.
"What I say in here is confidential, right? You won't tell anyone?"
"I won't tell a soul without your permission, I promise."
"Not even Steven, your friend?" I urge.
This takes her aback a bit. I knew it.
I cover my face again.
"I wouldn't even tell my own family. I promise whatever you say here, stays here."
Kind of surprising.
I sit up.
"I.. was dating Loren and we were supposed to hook up but she wasn't home so.. I had sex with Chase." I keep my eyes on the floor.
"I didn't know at the time he liked me as much as he did.. So since then he's been kind of clingy with me and.. I don't see him that way at all. I just used him." I frown. "It was his first time too. How heartless can you be?"
I curl in on myself a little.
"Then I started treating him really bad and he tried to.. Well, you probably know. That was because of me."
I sniff as a tear rolls down my cheek.
She still doesn't say anything.
"See? I'm awful."
"Because you make mistakes?" Jennifer asks.
I look up at her and unlike what I expected, she's smiling at me and holding out a box of tissues.
I grab one and blow my nose.
"You can't be responsible for someone else's decision, Sky. It's not your fault."
I chuckle darkly. "That's what Aron said. I don't buy it though."
"I know." She nods. "But you will. We'll work on that." She looks up at a big owl shaped clock beside me.
"Well, our session for today is coming to a close. How about we plan the next meeting?"
I walk out of the building feeling listless and drained.
That was terrible. It was like pouring out all my emotions and not getting any response back. Like talking to a wall. And all this talk about how awful I am really didn't help much either.
I'm dreading next week already. How much longer do I have to do this? I asked Jennifer this and she just answered 'Everybody heals at their own pace' What kind of crap answer is that?
I kick a stone on the concrete and then I spot Aron leaning against my car.