𝘉𝘓𝘐𝘕𝘋𝘚𝘐𝘋𝘌𝘋 | 𝘈.𝘏. ✔️

• Twenty Six

Chapter Twenty Six: Well I Hope I was Your Favorite Crime

Post traumatic stress disorder: A disorder in which a person had experienced or witnessed a terrifying event. This condition may last months or years, with triggers that can bring back memories of the trauma.

This was the third therapist in the past two weeks. You weren't going mad, you wanted this after all. The constant tapping of her pen was enough to drive anyone crazy. With the stupid clipboard and consistent staring contest with the professional across from you, you already knew you'd be onto your fourth.

"And how does Harmony showing up at the house make you feel?" Mrs. Langston- Brooke asks.

"Normal," you mumble. "What do you want me to say?"

Brooke studies the way you sit on the white couch across from her. How you play with the tips of your hair and momentarily braid a piece behind your ear. Anxious, uncomfortable, unbearable.

"Y/N, when a victim is faced with her past, including an active asset, it may bring back feelings of the traumatic event."

You shrug. Her office was on the thirtieth floor of a tall building, showcasing the city buildings of D.C.

"It doesn't feel like Harmony is an active asset. She is a person, she is me."

"A victim?"

You gulp and drop the piece of hair you were braiding to stop yourself from pulling your hair at the roots. With each passing second you were getting angrier at Brooke. Her office was small. It was cluttered. Everything you could ever imagine to fuel a burning hatred for a space was put into these four walls you called therapy.

"Harmony isn't a victim and neither am I," You say solemnly. "We're trying to move on, not be constantly reminded."

You can tell Brooke had imaginary smoke blowing out of her ears. The session only started ten minutes ago and you've already made it harder. She sets down her clipboard and leans back in the chair to relax.

"I'm not trying to remind you, I'm trying to help you accept the fact that though the past is nagging and you'd do anything to make it go away, the first step is to realize what it did to you in the first place."

"I don't understand," you sigh, closing your eyes. "I hear the same thing over and over again. I've tried to accept, I've distanced myself."

"How so?" Brooke ask even though she has heard the answer before. Repetition.

"Forcing myself away from the case. Not allowing my personal feelings get in the way."

"And how has that been going?"

"Fine, I suppose," you whisper, biting the corner of your lip, "Sometimes it hard to live with the man who is leading it all. Especially when I know I have access to Axel if I wanted to that badly."

"But you haven't," she says definitely, "You want to get better. It isn't selfish like you may think it is. You allow yourself to have control because you lost it so long ago," she makes a fist with her hand that forces your eyes to look at it. "That you grasp it so tightly, you wouldn't allow yourself to steer off track."

"I want control. I wanted it with Aaron but it's hard to believe-" you pause for a moment, contemplating your own words.

"Hard to believe what?"

You let your head fall in the arm rest so you can look Brooke in her eyes, "It's hard to believe my love for him isn't built of transference."

"Do you have no trust in the foundation, him, or yourself? That is question you must answer."