Page 52 of Chosen Road

It irritated me that I needed therapy from experiencing second-hand trauma from what my kids went through. It was the helplessness, I think, that bothered me the most. Shit happened to them that could not be erased, but worse than that was the fact they had little to no say in their immediate futures. On top of that, most of these kids had no loving, responsible adult advocating for them.

Not like I had with Yiayia and Pappou.

Since taking on this contract, I thought a lot about the years leading up to my mother leaving. I wasn’t so obtuse that I couldn’t see the connection, that I couldn’t see why the situation these kids found themselves in was so triggering. So many of these kids were abandoned. But I wasn’t. Not really. I had my grandparents.

Alex was almost the same age I was when my mother left. He seemed so much younger than I remembered feeling. Looking at him, realizing how young he was, made me realize just how young and ill-equipped I was to deal with all the tragedy that had been handed to me.

God bless Yiayia and Pappou, but they were not proponents of psychotherapy. It never crossed their minds to arrange for Ruby or me to talk to someone about our losses.

When I first began to suspect this history was at the root of my issues with Gus, long before I left him, I made an appointment with my therapist. Unfortunately, other than the rudimentary details, I could not force any more words past my lips.

No words expressing the sudden bouts of anxiety that plagued me when least expected.

No words explaining how I, seemingly overnight, made Gus into the enemy.

No words describing the despair that threatened to keep me in my bed every day when I didn’t know where Gus was, or worse, when he was away.

No words that could describe the utter devastation that buried me at the invasive thoughts of Gus leaving me.

Especially no words depicting the images of Gus and Jacqueline that my brain conjured up. How much worse would it be to talk about it since it became a reality? Those images, that had become a reality, maintained an almost daily assault on my mind.

No words.

I trusted her with my business issues, those wounds that belonged to others, but I could not give her my own. It would strip me naked, exposing more than I could tolerate.

I tried to explain to Gus once when he first started asking me to go to counseling. I mean, obviously he knew the factual details of what happened, but I’d never confessed what it did to me. I even had the words formed in my mind.

He wrapped his big arms around me. “It’s you and me, baby. We can handle anything.”

It’s you and me, baby.

Maybe he could handle anything, but I could not.

In the end, it didn’t matter.

Even though I wanted Gus, even if I wanted to try, I did not trust myself not to pull away again and I couldn’t handle having him back only to lose him again. I absolutely could not jerk Alex back and forth. The most loving way forward was to let Gus go and give Alex the stability of at least knowing what the future holds. Even if it initially broke his heart, it would be less devastating than the alternative.

I snorted to myself. I waffled back and forth, almost daily, over what to do. I knew what I wanted. I wasn’t sure what I was capable of. I worried over what I was capable of. How much of my mother was in me?

Yiayia was already busy in the kitchen when Ruby and I rolled in. We took our places at the counter and grabbed our cutting boards.

“What are we making today, Yiayia?” I asked, my voice sounding as small as I felt.

“We gonna make pastitsio for Gus,” she answered. Then she turned and lightly pinched my cheek. “I gonna make roast beef and lemon potatoes, too, koritzaki mou. Yes?”

She was happy to have Gus back, and I did not deserve her thoughtfulness towards me. “Yes, Yiayia. That sounds good.”

Yiayia patted my face before turning away to get something from the fridge. “Is good he is coming home, poulaki. Is no good to leave a man out in the cold like a dog.”

Shame burned my cheeks and drained just as quickly leaving me light-headed. Her pointed words more accurate than she knew.

Ruby reached down between us and grasped my hand. She interlaced her fingers with mine as I breathed slowly through my nose.

Ruby vibrated with emotion. As I squeezed her fingers to let her know I was okay, she blurted out, “Vander got tattoos.”

Bucket mouth! I looked at Ruby, incredulous. Our yiayia hated tattoos, and here was Ruby, throwing Vander under the bus to distract her from her current line of thinking. She gave me big eyes and I began to shake with laughter. No matter how far down I sank, Ruby was always there. We had always been there for each other.

“What you mean, Vander got tattoos?”

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