Hurricane

March 2005

It was so quiet that I could hear the clock on the wall behind my head ticking. It took everything in me not to turn around and look at it. Instead, I was forced to stare at what (or rather, who) was in front of me. My therapist.

She was not someone I wanted to talk to. She was somewhere in her mid-thirties I assumed. Her blonde hair was pulled back and she had a pair of glasses perched on the tip of her nose. In her lap was a blank legal pen, a pen held lightly in her hand. I knew she was waiting for me to say something. We had probably been sitting here for 20 minutes now.

Every time my eyes met hers, she would give me an encouraging smile as I looked away quickly.

“Molly,” she said quietly after a while. I looked at her. “Our hour is just about up. I wanted to let you know that I’m glad you came. I know talking to someone you don’t know about your own personal feelings is difficult, but I want you to know that you can trust me. Anything that you say in this room stays in this room.”

I stared at her for a moment and she gave me that smile again. I frowned.

“Can I leave now?” I asked.

“Yes, Molly,” she said. “I’ll see you next week.”

I got up off of the couch quickly and left the room. I didn’t rush to leave the building though; just the room. I knew my mother was waiting for me in her car just outside the front entrance of the building. I was constantly being watched. I apparently couldn’t be trusted—though, if I was them, I wouldn’t trust me either. I wasn’t afraid to admit to myself that I had no desire for living.

As I waited for the elevator, I looked out the window. We were pretty high up and I quickly found myself imagining that I was jumping out of it. The satisfying feeling I would get to know that my life was about to end.

“You getting on?” I heard a voice say distantly. I looked at the person who had spoken. It was a guy. Probably about my age. He was holding the door to the elevator, making sure it didn’t close. He was watching me now. I sighed and walked past him and onto the elevator. He took his hand away slowly and stood back. The door slid by and blocked him from my view.

The thoughts of jumping out of that window left me quickly as the elevator slowly made its way to the first floor. I was dreading having to deal with my mom. Hell, I was dreading to have to deal with anyone. Even that guy that had held the elevator for me. I sighed as the elevator stopped moving and I stepped out into the lobby of the building after the doors slid open.

I walked outside, and there, just as promised, was my mom. She was watching me carefully as I made my way to her. I didn’t say anything or look at her as I slid into the passenger seat of her car and shut the door. She was silent as well, as she pulled onto the street.

“So,” my mom said as she put us in the direction of her house. I refused to call it home. It was more like my prison cell. I’d be better off in some mental facility. Or rotting away and dead back in my apartment in New York City. “How was the session?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I mumbled. My mother sighed. I could tell she was already annoyed with me.

“Molly,” she said, trying her best to sound nice and calm. “The doctor said it would be good if you got all of your emotions out. All of this…bottling up, isn’t going to do you any good.”

“God Mom,” I said, sighing loudly. “Can we just not talk?”

“I was only trying to show that I care,” she said. I sighed and shook my head, choosing not to respond. I stared out the window, glaring at the buildings of the city that were starting to thin out—and eventually becoming houses.

I hate my life.