The Meaning of Charlie Armanio

XII

"CHARLIE ARMANIO SNUCK INTO my house through my window everyday around 10," I say, fiddling with the ballpoint fountain pen that I stole from the top of my therapist's desk. "He works at this joint downtown near Fourth Way, I should say worked because by now he must've been fired for not showing, but anyway his shift ended sometime after five, so he'd spend the time until eight finishing up the remainder of his homework then he'd come in. I personally don't know why he sneaks in because there's only ever one person home and that's my housekeeper, and she leaves at nine – thirty. He could just come in through the front door but there's this sort of spontaneity in everything he does, like he purposefully wants to live this like he's in a Bond movie or something."

"And you?" He asks, the back of his snap – on pen exposing the ballpoint every time he hit it against the clip board. I frown.

"And me what?"

"Is there some sort of spontaneity in your life? What do you like to do – tell me something anything at all, something that makes you, you."

My frown deepens, but nevertheless, I answer him to the best of my ability. I'd feel terrible wasting my dad's hard earned money by sitting straight faced and silent in the therapist's office. His name's, Richard Jones – Dr. Richard Jones, and he got his PhD in nurturing loonies in 2005, I think, if my Math is as fine as I'd like to believe.

We've been having these little tête-à-tête's for seven days now at exactly four pm, every day. It's not helping a bit but when I go home; I tell my dad it is, it's making me feel much better.

"I don't really like spontaneity, I'm pretty simple. I want what I have and I have what I want – I don't need more."

"Everyone needs more," he probes on, his eyes getting harder as he tries to open me up more. "More is a necessity in this life."

"Well, I just don't," I sigh, leaning back, "I have a house, a dad and I have friends, I'm alright. There's nothing more I want."

"Think deeper, there's something you want, you know you want," he leans forward a bit more than necessary, his eyes are glowing with intensity I didn't know he had, his hands are fisting the arms of the soft couch and his glasses are slipping off his nose. "I'll start. What I really want is for you to tell me about you so I can help you."

I still, "I've been telling you about me for a whole week!"

"No, you haven't. You've been telling me about Charlie. What he does, where his mom works, his dad, his problems – I want to know you're problem, not Charlie's."

I backpedal, trying to run through everything I've been telling him only to realise that he's right. Our meetings are filled with Charlie, and Charlie, and wait – even more Charlie. I tell him only about Charlie. How much he means to me, what we've done, how we relate to each other – everything. I tell him the good and the bad, the good which is normally ninety-nine per cent of Charlie Armanio, like how he treats everybody fairly and stands up for what he believes in, and the bad, how he hopes to big. I talk about Charlie more than I talk about myself because, I don't know, Charlie is just stitched in me somehow; he's a part of me. And there's this connection between us that can't be severed.

I look into his cobalt coloured eyes. "What's your more, Chloe? What more do you want?"

"I don't have a more," I stammer.

He seems undeterred by my answer, he asks again, "What's your more?"

"I want him to get better," tears sting my eyes as I continue, "that's my more, I think. I know eventually that he'll get better with time, but I wish he'd just get better quickly. Sometimes, I feel lost, like I'm so alone in everything because he used to do it with me. But he's 'gone', and everything in me, he took with him. I feel like I don't deserve it. I've never wanted more. But I want more of him, so much more and him not being here makes it so much harder to function and so much harder to continue with my life as if nothing's happening."