I looked at his wrists. With his sleeves down, his leather cuff on, I couldn’t see his scars, but I knew that they were there. Shoving my hands in the pockets of my jacket, I spoke—my voice hushed, as if we both shared a secret. Which, when I thought about it, we did. “But you’ve been there. You’ve been to that place.”
“If you mean I’ve peered into the darkness and seen what lurks on the other side? Yeah. Yeah, I have. So I guess we have that in common.” He smiled, and I wondered what his lips might feel like against mine.
As Duckie approached, just yards from us now, I said, “Thanks for the talk.”
Reaching out, he took my hand in his and pulled a marker out of his back pocket. Then he wrote a phone number on my palm and said, “My cell. In case you ever feel like talking.”
I took the marker from him and wordlessly wrote my number on the back of his hand.
Derek started to turn away. Still wearing that same smile on his lips, he said, “Welcome to the afterlife, Brooke Danvers.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
The rest of the week flew by—probably because school was boring and my mom kept me busy weeding the flower gardens all weekend. Duckie was happy to come over and help, but even someone as funny as Duckie couldn’t brighten the mood at Casa de Danvers. My dad spent much of the weekend in the garage, but I was pretty sure he wasn’t really fixing or building anything. He was avoiding me. Because I wasn’t his daughter anymore. I was just a painful reminder that he’d failed as a parent.
Before I knew it, it was Tuesday again, which meant another fun-filled hour of getting my head shrunk. Fidgeting in my seat a little, I glimpsed the crappy, outdated magazines on the table next to me. Nothing but Hollywood gossip rags, with not one book in sight.
I hated the smell of Dr. Daniels’s waiting room. It smelled like old magazines and the dusty, fake Ficus tree that stood in the corner. But worse than that, it reeked of desperation. One by one, patients would enter the door and close it behind them, flitting a glance around the room to see if they were alone. But they were never alone. No one was ever alone. And no one ever spoke. We all just sat there in shame and hopelessness, occasionally thumbing through an old copy of People magazine or messing around with our phones. I didn’t know why the rest of them were there, but I knew that none of us thought we were fixable and that all of us thought we were somehow better than everyone else in that room. Like, I might be crazy, but not as crazy as the lady in the corner muttering to herself, and certainly not as crazy as the old man with his eyes locked solidly on his untied left shoe. Maybe I was nuts. Maybe I was unfixable. But at least I wasn’t them.
Maybe that made me a bitch.
Maybe the doc had a pill for that too.
The small glass window slid open and I heard the receptionist say, “Brooke Danvers?” And then it was time for the walk of shame.
There was something so terrible about standing up in the waiting room when your name was called and making your way to that window. Whether or not it was true, it felt like every eye in the place was on me, judging me, wondering why I was here. And why wouldn’t they? I was judging them. Maybe I deserved it.
I handed over my insurance card and followed the receptionist’s nod to the now-open door, where Dr. Daniels was standing. He wore a kind smile—the sort I imagined a predator wore right before it struck its prey.
Yeah, I was being dramatic, but what did you really expect from a crazy person?
To go along with his killer smile (pun intended), he wore khaki pants (again), a white shirt, a dark blue tie, and a tweed jacket. As we stepped inside his office and he closed the door, he said, “Good afternoon, Brooke. How are you?”
I sighed. “Crazy, apparently. Otherwise, why would I be here?”
He shook his head and offered me a bottle of water. “You’re not crazy. You may be struggling with mental health issues, but that doesn’t make you crazy.”
“So what does?” I took the water from him, but I knew I wasn’t going to drink it. Was he worried I’d get dehydrated from crying? Not likely, doc. Not likely.
“That’s a good question.” He took a sip of water from his own bottle and said, “Typically, when someone is referred to as ‘crazy,’ they’re considered mentally deranged in a really aggressive manner. But I don’t care for the word. It’s outdated and insulting. It insinuates that whatever is going on with a person cannot be treated. I don’t believe in that. I believe that with enough time, effort, behavioral modification, and possibly medication, everyone with mental health issues can be helped.”
I stared at him for a moment. Then decided to call him on his bullshit. “So you’re saying I can be cured. Pardon me, doc, but I think that’s a load.”
“I never said you could be cured. I said you can be treated.”
“And the difference would be?”
He sat forward and met my eyes. I hadn’t noticed during our last visit how young he seemed. He couldn’t be out of his thirties yet. He said, “You have clinical depression with suicidal tendencies, Brooke. Think of it like having diabetes. You’ll always have these health issues, but they can be managed. You can go on to live a happy, normal life with the proper treatment. You will never be cured, but then, there’s nothing to cure. Just something to treat.”
I sat there for a moment, hating that the doc was offering me a tasty treat of possibility and really hating that I was tempted by it. He couldn’t help me. No one could. “You think you have all the answers.”
He smiled, seemingly charmed by me. I hated him for it, but liked him at the same time. Then I hated myself for liking him. “So, let’s get on with our talk. How’s everything at home?”
Good. Back to business. “Peachy. Perfect. Rainbows and sparkles.”
“Brooke.”
“Let’s just say it’s being managed.”
He frowned at my snotty remark and said, “How’s your dad handling things since you’ve been home?”
“He isn’t. He spends a lot of time in the garage when he’s home, and won’t even look me in the eye. And my mom is watching my every move . . . when she’s not giving me chores to keep me busy.” I hadn’t realized that I’d yet to sit down in the floral chair until that moment, when I found relief in the fact that I was standing. I raised my voice, hoping to drive my point home for him before I got the hell out of there. “Is that what you want to hear? That my home life sucks? Because it doesn’t, okay? I have a typical family and a typical life.”
“That sounds—”
“Don’t, okay? Don’t say something all shrinky or psychoanalytical or any crap like that, okay? Because I don’t want to hear it.” I was almost shouting. I wondered if any of the people in the waiting room could hear me.
The doc lowered his voice to a really calm tone, probably in an effort to chill me out. “I was going to say that that sounds like a pretty shitty way to treat their daughter after she’s just been through one of the most painful experiences I can even imagine.”
I knew where this was headed. Textbook. “You mean a suicide attempt.”
“No. Surviving it.” He held my gaze after he spoke, and I felt surprise fill me again.