by Kelly Fox
“I’m also falling for a guy I’ve had a crush on forever, and he likes me back, but—and this will shock you not in the slightest—I’m pretty sure he has PTSD from his time in the Rwandan genocide, and I fucking triggered him yesterday, and I feel like the world’s worst person for doing that.
“Oh, and I became a Buddhist, which will probably hurt my dad’s feelings.” I say the last part on a gust of air, exhausted by even the Reader’s Digest version of what is going on with my life.
She’s been nodding this whole time, listening intently. Her eyebrows pinch together for a moment, and she makes another quick note on her notepad, then looks at me with—oh fuck, is that… is that compassion? No, that’s… I don’t want these emotions. She better not fucking say anything nice right now.
“You must be exhausted from having to grapple with so many challenges. I am so sorry.”
I feel my face do the crumple thing that it does when tears are inevitable, and I officially hate this therapist. I dig deep and shake off the impending tears, then nod. That was close.
After a few moments, her voice is gentle as she asks, “Is there anything in particular that you’d like to talk about today?”
Grabbing the branch she’s extending, I’m a little too cheerful with my answer. “Well, my crush and I went on a date last week, and I complimented him for not being a cigar-burning asshole, and he went unfocused on me for a bit. Disassociated, I think you’d call it.”
She notes this studiously in her notebook. I get the distinct feeling she knows exactly how close I came to losing it before, and she’s decided to play along. “How did that affect you? What did you do?”
“I asked him if he was okay; he said that he’d been triggered, but that he still wanted to walk, but that he didn’t want to talk about the specifics because he’s a well-known athlete and needed to be able to handle people coming up to him. He did a weird little countdown under his breath. Something like five, four, three, two, one in French.”
“And French is a native language for him,” she asks, looking over her glasses at me.
“Yes.”
“Sounds like he might have used a panic tool—name five things you can see, four things you can feel, three things you can hear, two things you can smell, one thing you can taste. It’s a grounding technique. But that doesn’t answer my question. How did that make you feel?”
“Um. Annoyed. Kinda,” I say truthfully, sounding petulant.
“Why were you kinda annoyed?”
My talkative hands come back out, and my gestures grow with my frustration. “He came out of it so quickly, for one. And before you say anything, I know that it doesn’t make any sense that I’m annoyed that he has such a good technique. But… I’m annoyed that talking about my experience set him off. Like, I said something flippant about having my skin used as an ashtray, and he shut down right away. I don’t know how smart it is to have two people working through a minefield of triggers trying to make a relationship together.”
She thinks for a second, makes another note, and responds, “It’s not uncommon for two people with PTSD to gravitate towards one another.”
“Okay, but that sounds… bad. Right?”
She knits her brows together. “Not necessarily. I mean, it sounds like you’re both working a solution and living well despite the trauma. And hey, he has PTSD—you didn’t mention a drug or alcohol problem.”
“Nah. He’s a sipper.”
“Okay, so that’s pretty big. You’re not falling for an out-of-control drunk. Sounds like progress to me.”
“He also promised not to torture me.”
Her smile is a slash of red across pale skin. “Reasonable boundary.”
“See! That’s what I thought,” I say, gesturing to myself. “And then he goes all bad robot on me for a second.”
“So, he scared you.”
“Well, yeah. He’s nearly seven feet tall.”
Again with the pinched eyebrows as she picks up a manila folder and riffles through it for a few seconds, pausing at something on the page. “Your file says that larger men can sometimes be a trigger for you.”
“I’m working through it.”
She tilts her head from side to side. “Sounds like y’all are pushing each other to be better. Not a bad scenario.”
I lean forward, forearms on my thighs. “So, really, I’m not crazy to pursue this?”
Her smirk is starting to annoy me. “Can’t tell yet if you’re crazy, Jake. As far as pursuing this, I would say go forth and be gentle.”
“Erm.”
“Jake?”
“That brings up another thing.”
“More torture jokes?” Yep. My trauma therapist is definitely amusing herself at my expense. And dammit, has the woman never heard of a filing system? What are all of these papers on her desk?
“No. I’d never done anything with Jean-Pierre until last week. And I had a minor moment of panic,” I say as I count the beautiful, green potted plants along her windowsill.
Seven, if you were wanting to know.
“You thought that he was going to take advantage of you?”
“No. I needed him to… I didn’t want to… I couldn’t be the one in charge,” I finally spit out. “I didn’t know how to ask for it, and I panicked thinking that it was too fucked-up. Like, that was going to be the step too far and he was going to dump me. And then he… I dunno, gathered context clues? And then asked me to kneel.”
The scratching of the pen on paper halts, and she looks at me over her glasses. “He asked you to kneel?”
“Yeah.”
“Without having a conversation ahead of time. You just… went into it.”
I thought through the events of that night. “No, he stopped first and said he was going to try something. We agreed on parameters right before, and he checked in with me throughout, though neither of us was anticipating a…” I pause, fumbling for the word.
“A scene?”
“Not… really? I’ve done scenes before with safe words and the whole bit, but I didn’t want that. It would have made me numb, and I just needed to feel something, you know?” I make eye contact with her, awaiting her disapproval, but she seems… understanding? I continue. “This was very light. He told me what to do, and I did it, and it made me feel…” I pause again, the words seemingly insufficient.
She paused her note taking to make eye contact with me, grounding me. Okay, fine, she’s not some brunch therapist.
“… seen. Um, appreciated? Cared for.” I shrug, though saying it out loud brings up the ugly in my head.
“You seem unsettled by him seeing you. Caring for you. Why is that?”
I roll my eyes as though the answer is obvious, and tears spring up again. “I’m a mess, Doc, and a total fuckup. I don’t want him seeing that. I don’t want him knowing that the reason he can’t say my first name is because I gave it to the man who was drowning me. I don’t want him to know that I’ve fucked I don’t know how many guys since Paris, looking for something and never finding it. Like, if he sees all of that, then he won’t want to take care of me in the same way.”
“Do you feel that you deserved for him to care for you in this way?” Her warm smile is discordant with her cool exterior, and that feels… familiar. And helpful.
“In the moment, yes, because he was the one in charge, I felt like I deserved it. And we even talked after, and that felt great, but after after, I started…” I let the words… the fucking insufficient words, die off.
“Getting in your head about it?” she asks, smirking.
“Yeah. You know, I even claustro’d right at the end, and that usually fucks me up for days, but he responded so quickly, got my breathing back on track so carefully.”
She riffles through the papers again. “So, what you’re feeling now doesn’t feel like the typical aftereffects of the claustrophobic reaction?”
I shake my head. “I definitely just feel like an agitated, worthless piece of shit who
doesn’t deserve this man’s sunshine.”
Hoo, yeah. Ouch. That was more truthful than I’d planned on being today. Ingrid would be so proud.
She resumes scratching out notes on her pad. “Sounds like he was responsive to your needs.”
“Yes.”
“So, he seems to disagree with your—frankly dramatic—assessment of yourself.”
“Uhhh… are you calling me a drama queen?”
She cocks another eyebrow at me. “If the angsty subplot fits. I mean, don’t you work for your sister? And it says here that you volunteer a significant amount of your time teaching yoga classes at Wrecked.”
“You know Wrecked?”
She lifts a shoulder, twirling her pen through her fingers. “I’ve sent a couple of people that way. For a gym full of overmuscled jocks, they do a great job of creating community and space for people who feel like worthless pieces of shit,” she says, eyeballing me to make her point before she continues. “Question. Would you ever call a student in your class worthless?”
“Of course not. Not even Morris, who is an entire pain in my ass.”
“Even the ones missing limbs or who can’t do every pose perfectly?”
“Come on, now,” I answer, rolling my eyes. “That’s ridiculous.”
“Exactly. Tell me—when those thoughts of worthlessness come up, what’s your process?”
“Le duh, torture jokes.”
“Because that’s so effective,” she responds, with more than a teaspoon of snark.
Fine. “I’m assuming that you want me to say something along the lines of interrupt the thought, give myself examples of how I’m not a piece of shit, remind myself that I’m worthy of love, blah, blah, blah.”
“Oh! So, you do know how to steer the ship away from the rocks.” She opens the folder again. “Aren’t you a Buddhist? Isn’t honoring your practice one of the major tenets?”
“I never said I was good at it.”
“And that’s why you practice. Le duh,” she says, throwing my words back at me.
“Okay, fine. I’ll practice. But now you tell me something. You don’t think it’s stupid for two people with PTSD to have a relationship with one another? And what about the kink?”
“No, for the third time, I don’t think it’s stupid at all. And, frankly, I like that you’ve both figured out a way to make a lovely, delicate bit of kink work for you. I think we need to talk through the best way to get into that mindset. You got a little lucky with how well your first time together went; let’s remove the luck and make it intentional.”
I lie back with my head on the arm of the love seat, staring at the ceiling. “Oh god, I don’t want the fifteen minutes of conversation that happens before a scene. I just… want him to be in charge.”
“Oh, god, you are so dramatic,” she says, theatrically placing the back of her hand on her forehead. Sitting up straight, she rearranges the papers on her desk, then looks at me. “Heavy scenes require a lot of prep and conversation; what you’re doing is light. The conversations and intentions are inherently different. You can come up with something responsible without adding weight or taking you out of the mood.”
“Fine,” I toss back, matching her attitude. We look at each other, both of us breaking into wide grins. Man, I’m so fucked. She’s not going to let me get away with jack shit. I sigh, dramatically, of course. “So, I guess what I needed to unsnarl the shit in my head was a snarky kink therapist.”
“Nah, you just needed someone who gets what a fucking slog this is, and someone to call you on your shit. I happen to be good at both.”
Her self-satisfied grin is… hell, it’s making me think that it’s possible. All of it. Living a good life. Loving Jean-Pierre. Working through my shit.
“I apologize for comparing you to a manmosa. You’re pretty cool, for a therapist.”
“Apology accepted. You’re pretty cool for a tortured, barely kinky whack job.”
So, yeah. She’s my new therapist.
Jean-Pierre
Jake’s number on my phone fills me with longing and dread. I hesitate, then connect the call.
“Mon ange, do you have a moment to talk?”
My breath catches, happy that he’s using his nickname for me. “Yes, of course. What would you like to talk about?”
“I just left my new therapist, and she’s fucking awesome.”
His happy mood practically vibrates through the phone, and my smile widens. “I’m glad to hear it. I knew that you were concerned about whether or not you’d like this new therapist.”
“Let me tell you, I hate having to find a new therapist, but I got lucky. Usually takes me a couple of sessions to determine if the therapist is a good fit.”
“So, tell me. Why do you like this new therapist so much?”
“Well, first of all, she’s really snarky and she gets me. Second, she’s right next to a sex club. And she’s affiliated with it, which is weird and… kind of cool? She has shibari art on the walls.”
“I’m surprised you’re okay with that. I would think images of people being tied up would be difficult for you.”
“Me too!”
I look down at the display to verify that I am, in fact, talking to Jake Koenig. “Jake, I mean no disrespect, but… have you taken something?”
His laugh through the line doesn’t really assuage my fears. “Jean-Pierre, she said that she likes us together. She thinks that we are good for each other.”
“Even though…”
“Yeah, even though! Can you believe it? And she wants to meet you, have us do a therapy session together, and, you know, talk through our power exchange thing that we do. What do you think?”
I’d spent the last few days bereft, trying to come to terms with the fact that he and I might not be able to be together, but his hope is contagious, and he’s asked me to join him in his sex club therapy sessions.
America, am I right?
“Honestly, my love, I would do anything to hear you so happy.”
“I have a lot to work through, and she is so not going to let me take any shortcuts, but… I don’t think she thinks I’m that fucked-up. She said I was being dramatic.”
“You sound weirdly happy about that.”
“Dramatic is way better than irretrievably broken, you know what I’m saying?”
I let out a laugh and wish I could put my arms around him. “Yes. I like this new therapist of yours, mon corbeau. She’s got your number.”
“She really does,” he says on a laugh, then goes quiet for a moment. I let him filter through his thoughts, and he continues. “None of this is easy, you know. It’s just… she didn’t seem to feel like I was a waste of space. That I was too broken for you, or that a good life just wasn’t in the cards for me. She’s not sweet, not really, but she does have faith in me. I think.”
“Having a therapist that believes in you make all the difference.”
“So does having someone in my life who looks at me the way that you look at me.”
My cheeks feel hot, and my eyes get a little wet. “I have faith in you, Jake. You know that, right?”
“I do.”
I smile at his word choice, and after we chat for a few more moments, layering support on each other, we say goodbye, and I know that he is smiling.
An incoming text interrupts my thoughts, and it’s my buddy Lucas. He’s in the area and wants to catch up. Technically, he used the phrase “get into trouble,” but for two guys in our late thirties, getting into trouble looks more like finding a bar with good beers on tap and a quiet enough space in which to talk. You know, with the kids and their loud music these days.
We end up at Pearl Snap, grab our beers, and sit outside, where the temperature is in the upper fifties. In Montreal during the winter that would be a heat wave, but here it’s an excuse to wear jackets and scarves. It makes me think of Jake and his wool coat.
I smile at my friend. “So, Lucas, what’s going on with you?”
&nb
sp; “Oh, not much. My contract was temporary, and it’ll be up by the end of the semester, so I’m just trying to keep my ass in town.”
“What happens if you don’t get an extension?”
“I’ll have to go back to Chicago, with its cold-ass winters, and I’ve grown fond of Texas. I hope I get to stay here.” Shaking his head, Lucas continues. “Enough about my pathetic life, Sehene. What about you? You’ve been smiling this whole time. Can I assume things are going well with your new boy toy?”
I roll the bottle between my hands and smile. “Yes, you can.”
Lucas holds up his fist, and we tap-finger explode. “Sehene! Oh my god, did you…?”
“Yes, but no, not all the way. I’m waiting for the right time.”
“Oh, you’re one of those. A true romantic,” he says, a teasing look on his face.
“Guilty as charged.” I shrug, not particularly concerned if he appreciates my romanticism.
“So, what’s he like? It’s Jake, right—the yoga guy? Is he nice?”
“He can occasionally be a little bit skittish, given his past, but when we are alone and when he feels safe, he is very nice to me indeed.”
Lucas’s eyebrows shoot up. “Jake has a rough history?”
I’ve shared a few things with my other friends, but sharing those things with Lucas still feels wrong, so I keep it generic. “Yeah, but he won’t say much about it. He’s with me now, and I’ll make sure that he is treated well.”
“Yeah, I bet you will,” Lucas says, popping his eyebrows.
We clink our bottles together, and I shake my head. It’s nice to share my happiness with a friend. I hope he doesn’t have to go back to Chicago.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Jake
So… Jean-Pierre wasn’t thrilled that I’d been hiding the breath play from him. Riley insisted that I tell him so that he could monitor me “if I felt the need to self-asphyxiate.” That led to an argument and then kissing, and he asked me to let him practice with some gentle choking. He’d of course read up on that already and was immediately, like, amazing. I came so hard I shot him in the eye. Good times.