Lean on me

Chapter 20

As soon as the three were off the stage, Jensen turns to Sloan. "What the hell, Sloan?" He whisper-yells. "You were supposed to be in the green room resting! Not out here doing a panel!" 

"A fan wanted to see  me!" She tells him. "What was I supposed to do? Stay in the green room because I had a minor break down?" 

"Minor?!" He asks, eyes wide. "You were hyperventilating. You couldn't breathe. Bandit couldn't even calm you down! There was nothing minor about that! And it wasn't a breakdown. It was a full-blown panic attack!" 

"You're overreacting." Sloan says calmly. "I'm perfectly fine. I feel fine." 

"You can barely stand up right now!" He says, pointing at her visibly shaking legs. 

"I'm fine." She tells him again. "It's just the shoes." Jensen sighs and looks down for a moment before looking back up at his daughter. 

"Sloan, you need to get some help." He tells her calmly. "It's not up for debate anymore. As soon as we finish filming this season and you have time to come home, we're finding you a therapist and you are going to talk to them, not just sit there the whole time." 

"I don't need a shrink!" Sloan says angrily. "I'm fine! You're making a big deal out of nothing!"

"You've had four panic attacks in two months." He says disbelievingly. "Nothing about that is fine! When we get back to Austin, you're seeing a therapist." 

"You can't make me!" She tells him. "You can force me to talk to a shrink who doesn't even know me!" 

"Well you're not talking to any of us. You're not talking to Grayson, or Jared," he says, pointing at Jared who's just standing there, making sure things don't get too out of hand,  "you sure as hell aren't talking to me! So it you won't talk to us, then you're going to talk to a therapist."

"You can't make me!" She repeats. "You can't make me do this!"

"Yes I can." Jensen says calmly, trying to get her to see his point. Trying to convince her that he's just trying to help her. "I'm the parent, you're the child. What I say goes and I say you're talking to a therapist."

"You're not my dad!" She tells him, angry tears welling up in her eyes and spilling over her cheeks. She sees the anger and hurt flash in Jensen's eyes but she's too angry to care. "You're not my dad. Maybe legally but not really. You're just the guy who took me in because my mom trusted you."

"Sloan." Jared says quietly, taking a step forward, but the two ignore him. 

"Is that what you want?" Jensen asks angrily once he got over his shock at the girl's words, tears in his own eyes. "You want your dad? Well let me tell you something, kid. Your dad was an abusive ass who didn't care about you or your mother long enough to stick around! But if that's what you want, fine! I'll find him and send you to him!" 

"Jensen." Jared tries again, only to go ignored again. Sloan stares at Jensen in a combination of shock and anger. In all of their arguments throughout her life, he's never once told Sloan he would send her to her biological father.

"Is that what you want, Sloan?!" He asks again. 

"No!" She tells him, breaking out of her shock enough to say the one word. 

"Then what do you want?" Jensen asks angrily. Sloan feels more tears start to fall as she says the words she's been thinking for the last four months that she hasn't said since she was four years old and was scared of a lightning storm.

"I want my mom!" She yells at him, not caring who heard. 

Jensen takes a step back as if he'd been slapped, all the anger gone from his face. Sloan pushes past Jared and runs down the hallway through the green room. She ignores all the calls she gets from her costars as they try to ask what's wrong as she runs all the way to the elevator and to her room, slamming the door behind her and her dog before collapsing face first onto the bed.