Page 11 of Stealing His Cupcake
“Then perhaps we can just talk. I know people are sometimes intimidated by the thought of sharing their feelings with a stranger, but I can assure you I won’t judge you and whatever you say will stay just between the two of us.”
“You won’t tell Kayla anything?”
“Of course not,” Miranda assures me, not even sounding affronted. “Unless you committed a crime against a child, elderly, or a dependent adult, or you’re a danger to yourself or the others, I’m not even mandated to report you to the police. If I talked about my patients with other people, I’d lose my licence before you could say ‘breach of confidentiality’.”
“Oh. I didn’t know that.” God, I probably sound like a paranoid idiot. “I’m sorry, Doctor, I didn’t mean to offend you.”
Miranda waves her hand. “No offense taken. You’re not the first to have such worries. In fact, it’s quite common for people to be afraid to share their deepest thoughts without knowing if they can trust them. Natural, too, if you think about it, so don’t worry about it. Also, I’m not a doctor. Psychiatrists go to medical schools and are able to prescribe medication. They are the doctors, and they’re quite prickly about us ‘couchprofessionals’ assuming that title,” Miranda adds, grinning. “You can just call me Miranda.”
“Okay. I’m Amy.” And just like that, a good portion of my nervousness vanishes. I expected a stern doctor frowning down at me over the rim of her glasses, but Miranda is too friendly to fit that image. With her casual attitude and a warm smile, she reminds me of Kayla, which instinctively makes it easier to trust her. “So,” I clear my throat, “you’re going to ask me about my mother, right?” That’s what they always do on TV, don’t they? Talk about their messed-up childhood. Well, they got nothing on mine.
Miranda raises a brow. “That depends. Does your mother come to mind when you think about what’s been going on?”
“Uh, not really, I just thought…” Dammit, I’m really making an idiot of myself. Perhaps I should stop watching TV and start reading or something. It’s just so dull. The books they had us read in high school were dreadfully boring and I could never focus on them for too long. Even if I found one that I thought might be interesting, I struggled to get through the pages. The letters always jump around, seemingly switching places despite being printed on the damned paper, and my stupid brain has trouble sorting them out and deciphering their meaning. I’m not illiterate! I just find reading hard, so I don’t do it often. That’s all. Unfortunately, as a result, my brain is filled with tons of crappy TV shows and movies and it seems that I don’t even know how to act like a competent human being anymore. Damn, perhaps I really ought to be locked up somewhere.
“Amy?” Miranda’s soft voice pulls me out of my reverie. I look up to find her smiling again. She must think I’m completely nuts. “We can talk about anything you’d like, Amy, but you’ve been through something very traumatic recently. Perhaps you’d like to start with that?”
My hand flies up on a reflex, touching my tender temple. The swelling has gone down, but the bruises are vivid purple, making me look like a domestic abuse victim. Which I am, I guess? Then I realize that Miranda doesn’t mean my little fight with Craig. She means his death. Right. That’sthe major traumatic event I should be thinking about, not a few minor bruises.
“I…” What am I supposed to say? “It’s terrible. I loved Craig. I don’t know how I’ll go on without him.” That’s what a grief-stricken girlfriend would say, right?
Miranda settles back in her chair. Her eyes feel like they’re scanning my soul, seeing through my lies. “Losing a loved one is always difficult,” she says. “Especially someone so close to you. Grief is complicated. It’s never just one feeling, is it?”
I shift uncomfortably in my seat. “I guess?”
“You lost someone who was a big part of your life.”
“I did.” But did I? Was Craig really such a big part of my life? I saw him once a week at the maximum. He’d come over, eat what I cooked, drink whatever I had in my fridge, we’d have sex, and then he’d leave. I could count on the fingers of one hand the times he stayed till morning. I knew it wasn’t a typical relationship, yet I still clung to it. “He made me feel like I wasn’t alone.” I didn’t mean to say those words out loud. What’s worse, I feel myself tearing up, like I haven’t already cried myself dry in the past three days.
Instead of laughing at how pathetic I am, Miranda pushes a box of tissues my way.
I sniffle. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay to cry, Amy. In fact, it’s quite normal to cry during therapy, even for people who haven’t been through something as heartbreaking as you. I keep an entire stack of tissue boxes in the closet. The manufacturer gives me a discount because I’m their prime customer,” she jokes.
Despite the pain tearing me up from inside, I laugh. It’s a hoarse laugh, a little hysterical, but it lifts some of the tension from my shoulders. Miranda’s next words bring it back, though. “You feel alone?”
Such a seemingly innocuous question. “I’m fine,” I find myself answering automatically.
“Are you?”
“Yes. I mean, I’m not the one who got hurt. Craig did. He is the one who suffered. I can’t make it about myself.”
Miranda doesn’t look away. “Craig got hurt, yet that doesn’t mean you weren’t hurt too, Amy.”
I touch my bruises again. “This was an accident. He didn’t mean to.”
“Actually, I meant the emotional toll of losing a loved one, but yes. You were hurt in more ways than one, Amy. We talked about grief, and how it’s never just one feeling. It’s always more complex than just sadness. Other emotions come into play as well, and while we would rather ignore them, it’s important to recognize them and see where they’re coming from.”
“I’m scared,” I admit. “I don’t want to be alone. Kayla has moved away and I can’t ask her to put her life on hold because I’m weak.”
“Humans are gregarious in nature,” Miranda says. Before I can admit I have no idea what the word means, she continues, “There are exceptions, of course, but most people seek companionship in various forms because the primal parts of our minds know very well that it takes more than one person to hunt down a mammoth. Wanting a connection isn’t a weakness, Amy. It’s human. And losing someone, even someone who wasn’t always good for us, can make that need feel stronger. You have no reason to feel bad about it.”
I don’t? I always thought the way I craved company and was unable to be alone was weird. It never occurred to me that other people might feel the same.
“What about other people in your life?” Miranda asks. “Family, friends?”
I lower my head in shame. I hate sharing this part of my life. “My mother is an addict. She says she’s clean now, but when I was a kid, she was always high. Sometimes she would go out and not return for days.” And I’d sit by the door in that deafening silence of the empty apartment and wait for her to return. Back then, we didn’t even have the TV to provide white noise.
