Cecil was wearing a Grateful Dead T-shirt today. He’s a walking, talking hippie stereotype.
“I was worried about you when you didn’t show up last week,” he said once I’d sat down.
“I wasn’t feeling well,” I lied.
“If you can’t make it, leave a message with the front desk, okay?”
“Okay.”
Then he put his feet up on the desk. His big toe poked through a hole in one of his purple-and-yellow striped socks. He tented his hands under his chin and looked at me intently, waiting for me to “start the dialogue.” (“Start the dialogue” is another one of his favorite expressions.)
The thing is, I was one step ahead of him. In last period, I’d made a list of topics to discuss, so that it would look like I was opening up; but they were safe topics, things that wouldn’t give him an opportunity to ask leading questions about IT. So I told him about the Reach For The Top Team (“Great that you’re getting involved, Henry, great”), and I told him a little bit about Farley (“Holy Moly, you have a friend already! Fantastic.”). Then I told him about the Crazy Lady.
“She’s missing a lot of her teeth,” I said. “And she sings these made-up songs.… Her voice is terrible. And her guitar is plastic. It’s from a dollar store.”
“She makes you uncomfortable.”
“She makes me sad. I keep thinking, was she always like this? Or did something happen to her along the way? Maybe she has a husband somewhere, and kids. Do they know where she is? Do they know she’s lost her marbles?”
“Some people fall through the cracks in the system.”
“Well, they shouldn’t. There shouldn’t be any cracks.”
“No. There shouldn’t.” Then he leaned forward in his chair and looked me in the eye. “Henry, your mom is in good hands.”
I felt a flash of anger. “Who said anything about my mom? I’m telling you about the Crazy Lady!”
Cecil means well. But he keeps trying to find meaning in things that have no meaning.
I suspect that he’s smoked a lot of pot.
“Have you started writing in your journal yet?” he asked, changing the subject.
“A little,” I said. “But only ’cause you said I had to.”
“I didn’t say you had to. I just thought it might be helpful.”
“Well, it isn’t.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“It’s dumb.” I was still feeling mad about the Crazy Lady.
“No one’s forcing you to do it, Henry.”
“Then maybe I’ll stop.”
“Okay. If that’s what you want.”
“You have no idea what I want.”
“I didn’t say I did.”
“Well, good. Because you don’t.”
“What do you want?”
I want time to rewind back a year. I want to change the course of history. I want to change what I did the night of April 30.
“I want our session to be over because it’s boring and you’re stupid,” I said.
If I’d hurt his feelings, he didn’t let it show. He just said, “Okay. I’m going to grant you your wish.” He stood up. “Bye, Henry. See you next week.” Then he started sorting through a bunch of papers on his desk, acting like I wasn’t even there.
Not very professional, if you ask me. I bet he’s going to charge the province for the whole hour, too, even though we had a full ten minutes left.
I should write his bosses a letter and tell them to dock his pay.
I just had both of my recurring nightmares. Call it a two-for-one special.
In the first dream, I’m hiding in the yellow tube slide and I can hear Jesse’s cries. Then that one morphs into the second dream, and I’m suddenly at the scene of the crime, and I can’t figure out who I should help first.
Half the time, I pick Scott. I use SpongeBob SquarePants Band-Aids to try to stop his bleeding, and no matter how many I use, the blood keeps pouring out of his chest.
Half the time, I pick Jesse. A piece of my brother’s head lies on the corridor floor, by a bank of lockers. It’s a neat break, like a piece from a porcelain doll. I gently pick it up. I line up the piece of his head that I’ve found with the part that is still on his body, trying not to look at his brain, which is on full display. Then I pull out a bottle of glue and glue my brother back together.
“Thanks,” Jesse says with a smile, “You’re not such a worthless turd after all.”
Then his smile falters because the glue doesn’t hold. It’s like the nightmare version of “Humpty Dumpty.”
“All the king’s horses and all the king’s men Couldn’t put Jesse together again.”