by Penny Reid
“What does Beau look like?”
Instead of answering, I asked, “We’re working on how to stop obsessive thoughts?”
“Yes.”
“Then help me to stop.”
“Thinking about Beau?”
“Yes.”
She smiled weakly. “Shelly.”
“Your tone is very sympathetic.” I smirked at her, the curve of my mouth feeling rusty from disuse.
Her smile widened. “I hate to break it to you, but your thoughts about Beau don’t sound like a part of your OCD. That’s not how OCD works. Obsessive thoughts are completely irrational, they have no basis in reality and that’s why we never look for a root cause. They’re meant to be ignored, and eventually, you’ll be able to ignore most of them. Whereas, it seems like, based on how you described Beau a week ago, these thoughts and feelings you are having are completely rational. He sounds wonderful.”
I’d been so focused on her statements and readying my response to them, I forgot to count her words.
“They’re not rational. Beau has an identical twin. And I don’t have the same thoughts about him.”
Dr. West’s expression didn’t change. “What’s his name?”
“Duane.”
“And what is he like? Is he similar to Beau?”
“They’re almost identical, except Beau’s face looks older, wiser. Beau has laugh lines, wrinkles—does that make sense?”
“Yes. But other than what Duane looks like, what is he like? Does he smile, like Beau?”
“No. He never smiles.”
She nodded, looking to her notes and writing something down. “Is he always helping people? Is he friendly?”
“No. Duane is not particularly friendly.”
“Does he joke around . . . Shelly?”
“No, he doesn’t.”
“Do you think maybe it’s not just what Beau looks like that has you attracted to him? Maybe the strength of your attraction is because you like Beau? As a person?”
I glanced over her head again to the blank wall.
“You’ve been with men before? Yes?”
“Yes.”
“Haven’t you ever met someone—other than Beau—and had difficulty pushing them from your thoughts?”
“No.” I hadn’t hesitated in my answer, though it wasn’t strictly true. There had been other people I couldn’t stop thinking about. But not in the way Dr. West meant, not like Beau. So I added, “Not like Beau.”
“You have dated?”
I shifted my gaze back to my therapist, sliding my teeth to the side.
“Not really dated.” Once again, I didn’t lie, yet my response wasn’t entirely accurate either. I debated what to do, uncertain whether it was necessary to clarify that I’d gone on dates, but never because I liked the person.
“You’ve been intimate?” She started thumbing through her notes on our previous conversations.
“Yes. I’ve been intimate with lots of men.”
“And no one has occupied your thoughts like,” she paused, glancing at her first page of notes, “like Beau has?”
“I like sex, but I don’t like people.”
“That’s not true. You like people. You fear being close to people. Most of your fears, your obsessive thoughts and therefore compulsions, center around unintentionally hurting others. You have grown used to pushing people away—pushing people away is the compulsion—because you think it’s safer for them to keep their distance—concerns for their safety is the obsessive thought. People are not the problem. Your irrational obsessions, your worries about hurting people are the problem.”
“So, what do I do about Beau?”
She shrugged. “Ask him out.”
“Out?” My voice cracked and I was seized by panic. But this panic felt strange, different than my usual anxiety.
“To a meal. Ask him to have coffee, or dinner.”
“Eat food together?”
“Yes. Food. Together.”
“No, I can’t.” My voice cracked again.
“Why?”
“I think he might have a girlfriend.”
“You think, Shelly? Or you know?” Dr. West peered at me, and I understood that she thought I was making up an imaginary love interest for Beau.
“I think so.”
“But you don’t know so?”
“It doesn’t matter. He knows about . . .” He saw my arm.
I scratched the raised lines even though they didn’t itch, recalling the look in his eyes—equal parts fascinated and horrified—earlier in the afternoon. My stomach had dropped and pitched. It did the same now, like I was plummeting from the highest arc of a roller coaster.
“What? Beau knows what?”
“He speaks in even sentences,” I blurted.
Her lips twitched and then she promptly rolled them between her teeth, her eyes growing suspiciously bright. I got the sense she was trying not to laugh.
A year ago, just that small gesture would have made me shut down and check out.
But not now.
Now I had an odd desire to hear her laugh, and laugh with her.
“And I can’t tell him,” I gestured widely to the air. “I can’t tell him that I need him to speak in sentences with an odd number of words. Then he’ll know I’m crazy.” He already knows.
“You’re not crazy.” She said this firmly, pinning me with her gaze. “You need to stop referring to yourself or thinking of yourself in that way. Calling yourself crazy is giving up. You are in control, of your obsessions, of your compulsions, because you know they’re irrational. And you want to change.”
“But what if he wants to touch me?” The thought was both terrifying and thrilling.
“You have been intimate before.”
“I don’t want anything bad to happen to him.”
“That is an irrational thought. Now, say it.”
“Believing something bad will happen to Beau if I touch him is an irrational thought,” I said dutifully, breathing through the surge of fear. Irrational fear.
“Have you considered that there’s someone out there who might not consider these things about you crazy? That someone might take the time to understand your disorder, take the time to understand and therefore appreciate you?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Is that why you haven’t told anyone about the cutting? Or about your aversion for touching others? Because you don’t think they would understand?”
I glared at my therapist, irritated that she was making me discuss this. “Do you know how many times a day—over the course of my life—I’ve asked myself, ‘Why do I have to be so crazy all the time?’”
“You’re not—”
“I couldn’t figure out how to put it into words or admit it to myself, what I was doing. What I needed. It’s easy to make excuses and lie to yourself when you are already lying to everyone else. But I have always known—always felt—how embarrassing it is, to be this way. To admit that I can’t touch people without wanting to cut myself, to keep them safe from me, just in case. Because though you say I am not crazy, I know how I sound.”
Dr. West’s expression was thoughtful; she gave me the impression of someone trying to plan their next chess move.
Eventually, she said, “I urge you to consider the possibility that people exist who will not judge you for your disorder, but rather will see and value the strength required to master your compulsions.”
“I do not want to tell anyone.” Especially not Beau.
“What are you afraid of?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“You tell me.”
I ran my fingertip along the raised scars of my forearm. “How he looks at me, it’ll change.”
“How he looks at you?”
“Like I’m normal.” Like I’m whole.
She sighed, sounding frustrated, giving into a rare moment of emotion. “Do you trust B— this man?”
“I don’t trust anyone, Doctor.”
“But do you think he would knowingly hurt you?”
I didn’t answer right away. Instead, I thought about the question, thought about Beau and what I knew about him, what I’d observed over the last several weeks. He was nice to everyone. Everyone. Even when they didn’t deserve it.
He went out of his way to help people. He had an extraordinary work ethic; staying late to fix a last-minute emergency or coming in on the weekends; calling all over Tennessee and the Carolinas trying to find a rare car part.
And I thought about his expression after he’d called me a narcissistic pariah. I didn’t blame him, not after I’d treated him and others poorly. I hated that I’d treated him poorly, that I’d ignored him, that I couldn’t shake anyone’s hand.
But the depth of his remorse after the words left his mouth, how he’d reached for me, revealed much of his nature. Beau Winston was impossible to dislike.
After substantive deliberation, a certainty I rarely felt settled deep in my bones, and I spoke the truth. “I don’t think Beau Winston would purposefully hurt anyone.”
9
“Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.”
― Aristotle
* * *
*Beau*
I did a lot of googling on Friday night instead of going to the jam session.
Cutting.
Specifically, why people do it.
The search results returned a whole lot of scary stuff, and basically added up to the fact that folks cut themselves as a way to gain a sense of control. Often because at some point in their life, control was taken away without their permission. Which didn’t make much sense to me.
But okay.
Sure.
I didn’t sleep well that night. I kept seeing Shelly’s scars, her face after I’d yelled at her, kept picturing the woman slicing into herself, lying in a hospital bed in our library downstairs. I called her name. She looked up from her bleeding arm. Instead of being Shelly, it was my mother, and she couldn’t reach the morphine button.
And then I woke up with a racing heart, feeling sick. The nightmare was reminiscent of the weeks leading up to my momma’s death. I shoved it away.
Sleep was elusive from that point forward.
After much debate, I decided to talk the situation over with Duane, even though I’d scaled back asking my twin for advice these last few months. I needed to get used to his absence, grow accustomed to making decisions without considering his thoughts first. But this situation with Shelly seemed serious. Thus, I decided to make an exception.
I’d also thought about asking his opinion on Christine St. Claire’s request for a meeting, but decided against it. The thing with Christine was something I’d ultimately resolved to settle on my own. Drill had been texting and calling every other day over the last week. He’d originally said I had a month to think the matter over. Apparently, he’d lied.
Intent on the coffee I could smell coming from downstairs, I closed the door to the room I shared with Duane, careful to be quiet. Even though he and Jess were planning on traveling the world together come November, they hadn’t moved in together. She still lived with her parents, and he still lived with us.
Nevertheless, sometimes Duane slept at the house, sometimes he didn’t. I didn’t know where he slept when he wasn’t at the house, and I saw no reason to ask.
None of my business.
Then I saw Cletus strolling down the hall toward his room. He was in a towel and his hair was damp. Which meant he’d just showered. Which was unusual. Cletus preferred to shower at night, saying he didn’t want to slumber with the dirt from the day.
I stared at his door, now closed, for several minutes, deliberating.
Did Cletus know about Shelly’s scars? Was that why he was forgiving of her rudeness? What else did he know about Shelly and not seen fit to share?
And why was he showering early in the morning? Why was he even up? Cletus was never up early.
Was it for this woman? The one he’d been fixating on? And who was she anyway? He’d been acting squirrelly since . . . since . . .
I blinked.
A shadow of a thought inserted itself in my brain, growing, until it emerged as a fully formed suspicion.
The timing fit. Cletus wasn’t big on forgiving, but he was forgiving of her . . . of Shelly. Hell, one might even say he was partial to her, in a sense, and insomuch as Cletus was capable of being partial to anyone.
Damn.
My feet were moving, carrying me to his door before I’d made up my mind, trying to leave behind the sour turn to my stomach as I thought of Cletus and Shelly. Together.
I knocked, deciding that my sense of discontent was about wanting my brother to be happy. What if he didn’t know about the scars? What if he was half in love already and he didn’t know? What then?
Not waiting for him to answer, I stuck my head in his room, and spoke around the spike of discomfort in my chest. “Hey, Cletus. I was thinking about—”
I was unable to continue, because the sight of my brother in suit pants and a fancy new suit shirt was so confusing, I wondered briefly if today was Sunday.
Meanwhile, Cletus was looking at me funny. Like he’d been caught, or he felt guilty about something.
“What?” He glanced down at himself then back to me.
“Today isn’t Sunday,” I said, 99% sure it wasn’t Sunday. Not unless I’d slept through Saturday.
“I know that.”
“Then why’re you dressed up?”
“I’m not.”
“Yes, you are.” I walked into his room and stood behind my brother as he inspected himself in the mirror.
He was dressed up. He’d put effort and thought into his clothes and Cletus never put effort and thought into his clothes. On Sundays he always wore black pants and a white shirt. He called it his Sunday uniform.
Cletus was dressing fancy for someone.
The discomfort in my chest swelled tenfold and became dread. “Who are you going to see?”
He shrugged. “No one.”
“Is it Shelly?” I asked, unable to stop myself. “Are you two involved?”
Cletus shrugged. “I’m not involved with Shelly. At least, not yet.”
A shock of something unpleasant raced through me, causing me to tense, stand straighter. Hoping to cover the unexpected reaction, I crossed my arms and worked to keep my voice even. “What does that mean?”
“It means, eventually, I’ll see to her. She and I are suited.”
Oh. Hell.
The rubber band around my ribcage squeezed, making breathing a chore.
Damn.
I stared unseeingly at nothing in the mirror. Cletus had been with women, but he’d never admitted to being interested in a person or brought any of his lady friends around the house. This was a big deal.
He turned and walked past me to his bed, sitting on the edge, and put on his shoes.
Still facing the mirror and looking at nothing in particular, I asked, “You think you two are suited?”
“Yep.”
“How long have you, uh, felt this way?”
And also, slightly off topic, why does the idea of Cletus and Shelly together make me feel like shit?
“Since I met her and determined ours would be an ideally placid union. Why?”
“Because I—”
Shit shit shit.
What could I say?
If he knew about the scars, then me bringing it up wouldn’t go over well. It might even upset him, and no one wanted Cletus upset. Life was hell for everybody when Cletus was upset.
But if he didn’t know about the scars, and I told him, well . . . it wouldn’t make a lick of difference. When Cletus made his mind up, there was no changing it. But then he’d definitely get upset.
And besides, was it my place? To tell him? Was it even a big deal? Eventually, he’d find out when they . . . they . . .
Damn.
Now I really felt like
shit. And I’d waited too long to answer. Cletus’s stare was heavy and I needed to speak before he grew suspicious.
Tugging my hand through my hair, I said the first thing I could think of that wasn’t a lie. “I would have made an effort to be nicer, if I’d known you were interested.”
That was true. I would have, for Cletus. Just like I would’ve done anything for any member of my family.
“Beau, you should be nicer regardless of my feelings on the subject. You’re nice to everybody else. You know what Momma used to say: ‘If you don't want someone to get your goat, don't let them know where it’s tied.’”
I nodded absentmindedly, yet the sharp discomfort in my lungs kept me from drawing a full breath.
“Is there something going on with you?”
I met my brother’s searching glare in the mirror, realizing that I’d been standing in the middle of his room, staring at nothing in the mirror for too long. Seeing he looked concerned, I pasted a smile on my face, just a small one.
This didn’t seem to satisfy him.
After a time I shook my head. “Nope. Nothing is going on with me.”
His eyes narrowed, telling me he was doubtful.
“Stop it, Cletus.”
“Stop what?”
“Stop trying to peer into my mind.” Forcing a wider smile, I shoved my hands into my pockets.
“I would never do that, Beau. Your mind is a depraved and dissolute place. I would fear for my eternal soul should I manage a glimpse inside.”
I didn’t have to force anything as my grin grew, but decided to leave before he could question me further.
Turning from the mirror, I said, “That’s right,” as I began strolling out of his room, keeping my steps unhurried, my tone light. “And don’t you forget it.”
* * *
“What do you know about Shelly?”
Duane sent me a look, the question clearly catching him off guard.
We were once again at Genie’s, but this time it was a Saturday night. The place was packed.
Luckily, Patty still seemed pleased with me, which made me wonder whether Darlene hadn’t yet told Patty about our split. Regardless, when we arrived, she’d been all smiles and escorted us to an empty booth marked reserved and had just left to bring us a round of beers. It felt like real VIP treatment.