Letting you go [COMPLETE]

Chapter 2

“How have you been today Alyson?”

As usual Doctor Catherine—I don’t call her that but she likes to think I do—is perfectly calm, her voice even. She doesn’t give anything away, patience radiating off her. I have to admit she’s a good therapist—never getting angry when I say something I shouldn’t. At least that’s what I assume. For all I know she’s exploding with anger every time she has an appointment with me.

I’ve already been here for thirty minutes and it feels like a lifetime.

I don’t bother smiling at her. She knows I don’t want to be here so I don’t hide it. I don’t say anything to her, just stare at her.

“Are you angry?” she continues, as if it isn’t a one sided conversation.

Yes. I don’t want to be here and I don’t want to have cancer.

She seems to sense my anger. I hate therapists because they know everything. I’ve been seeing her for nearly four years and now she can just pick up on my mood. “What are you angry about?”

Her patience annoys me, just like the attention. I’d asked my parents why they hadn’t sent me to group therapy and they hadn’t had a reason. I’d much rather be in a group of people. At least then the attention wasn’t just on you. If you didn’t want to talk to the person just moved onto someone that would talk. With one therapist I’m never ignored. She questions me every second. She doesn’t care that I don’t talk to her.

“You don’t have to talk to me. I’ll get you some pen and paper and you can write on that instead.”

I raise an eyebrow at her and I don’t have to talk because she’ll know exactly what I’m saying: It won’t make a difference whether I’m writing or talking, I’m not talking to you. I don’t want to be here.

I know she has to be frustrated but she doesn’t give anything away—not even a sigh. “Did you go to school today?”

Silence. That’s all I give her. She can change the subject all she wants but it won’t make a difference.

“How was school? Your mother was telling me about it.”

To distract myself I look around her office. I’ve seen it thousands of times but I always study the office anyway. The walls are white and boring, the carpet grey. There’s not much furniture in here aside from the cabinet,—probably full of boring files—her chair, guest chairs and wooden desk. Currently I sit in one of the guest chairs and they’re not all that comfortable. Catherine’s chair is thicker and probably more comfortable but she’s the therapist so I guess she can have the better chair. Her desk is so neat and orderly it annoys me. No paper is out of place. Stacked to the right of the desk is all her paperwork, the rest of the desk bare aside from her laptop she types on whenever I do say something—which isn’t often and rarely what she wants to hear.

You’re new. In all the times I’ve been in her office there’s never been any photo frames. I look at Anna. She’s stopped talking, just staring at me without giving anything away. Pointing at the frames I raise my eyebrow. She understands my question and nods.

 Reaching out—now that I have permission to look (I may not like going to therapy but I’m not rude and I respect her privacy)—I grab one of the four photo frames. I study the two girls in the photo, neither of them over ten. They’re both smiling at the person holding the camera is if they can do no wrong. Both of them look the same—if they aren’t twins, I don’t have cancer—with their blonde hair cascading down their small bodies. Even from a distance, surrounded by green trees, their bright blue eyes are impossible to miss. They’re both stunning.