Chapter Text
Leg shaking, clock ticking, too much talking. Shaking, ticking, talking. Shaking ticking talking shaking ticking-
Talking. "Ralph, where've you gone?"
Snapping out of his trance, Ralph looks to his therapist, Sean, and shrugs. "I'm not sure, really." It's a lie and they both know it, but Sean just nods and writes something down on his notepad, handwriting loopy and barely legible.
To distract himself from the definite bad news of Sean’s notes, Ralph looks instead to the inspirational posters around the office, some of them with pictures of flowers and grass, others with photos of cricket and football players, all of them laminated and blue-tacked down. A poster above Sean’s head shows all the symptoms and signs of anxiety, Ralph taking particular notice of the ‘shaking legs,’ ‘hyper-fixation on sound’ and ‘ easily agitated.’
Swallowing spit that isn’t there, Ralph looks instead to the exposed wire running from the computer to the ceiling, disappearing into a large black hole. Given the reasonably smooth appearance of the rest of the office, Ralph isn’t too concerned, though the image of the wires is burnt into some odd corner of his mind, some sort of threat he can’t decipher. Prophecy, his mother would have claimed jokingly when he was little, you’re a prophet, Raphy. It would’ve made him giggle.
It certainly couldn’t now, that’s for sure.
He turns to look at Sean again just in time, catching his eye when he looks up from his writing to make sure Ralph is still with him - that’s the impression Ralph gets, anyway, given how surprised Sean always appears to see him still sitting. It’s not like he’s ever run away before, but sometimes he gets the feeling that everyone is waiting for it, prepared to get up and take after him the moment he does. It feels like a prisoner being given time in the yard; free to run around and exercise, but constantly monitored ‘ just in case.’
A prisoner to my own mind, he thinks, voice drawling with all of the sarcasm and none of the humour.
"Now, tell me: what's been happening recently? Just in your everyday life, what's going on?" Sean asks.
"Not much, really," Ralph says, now telling the truth, "I go to school, do my work, go home. The usual."
"Have you been catching up with friends at all?" Sean asks.
Ralph shakes his head. He doesn’t have any friends anymore. They took one look at him and decided he was too broken to play with, like a childhood toy that was a hand-me-down from an older sibling. "Just hanging out with the cat."
"The stray that you've been feeding?"
"Yes."
"Have you ever considered getting a cat of your own?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"I don't really want one."
"How's about a dog?"
"I'll be 'right, thank you. Don't need another person demanding my father’s attention when I’m already enough of a burden."
Sean doesn't laugh at that, which is unfortunate, because Ralph isn't sure what else his therapy lessons are good for if he can't act as a comedy routine. There must be people with problems much worse than his, people more demanding of this lonely hour spent in a dingy little office with a man that’s neck must run on springs, that’s how often he nods. Ralph isn’t important, compared to them.
“You feel as though you’re a burden on your father?” Sean asks.
It’s a stupid question, but Ralph was raised to be polite, not honest. “Yes, I do.”
Sean nods and writes a few words down in that infuriatingly stupid handwriting he has. He’s a nice enough guy, really, but Ralph can’t help but feel some disdain for him, peeved particularly by the slightly off-centre parting in his dark, curly hair and the subtle left lean of his jaw when he speaks.
Ralph remembers the first time his father requested him to see a therapist: someone without glasses or red hair. He’d been met with a funny look by the receptionist, who probably thought him a bit of a demanding snot, though she worked something out for him all the same, telling him Ralph would be seeing a psychologist by the name of Mr McConahey. “A child psychologist,” the receptionist had whispered to his father, eying Ralph warily, as though the term would set him off. His father had only nodded and said, “that’s fine, thank you.”
Upon their first meeting, Mr McConahey had been asked to be called ‘Sean’ and Ralph, eager to not have to address anyone by their surname - damn that Merridew - happily complied. Things went from there and now, only just short of a year later, Ralph sits in this cramped, cold couch, avoiding doing the very thing his father is paying money for. It’s typical of Ralph to be this ungrateful since the island, but his father is trying to understand and be patient. His father is trying hard enough that Ralph feels guilty every time he sees his ashen gaze after an appointment, searching his empty husk of a son for some kind of feeling, some grasp of his old self, some flicker of life. Each time, there’s nothing.
“There’s no miracle cure for trauma,” Sean is fond of telling him.
The issue is, Ralph has accepted this fact and doesn’t know where to go from there. ‘There’ being this emotionless hole he finds himself stuck in, scratching his hands at the sides as though that may contribute to his escape. Only, it’s like the walls around him are made of glass, not hurting when he scratches but just slipping away, not even dignifying him with a scrape or handprint. The sense of failure is more infuriating than any pain.
“You know, Ralph,” Sean begins and Ralph knows exactly what he’s going to say next, because he says it every damn session, “I can’t really help you if you don’t talk to me.”
He feels guilty - of course he does - but that doesn’t stop him from also feeling angry. It’s mostly directed at himself, this inability he has to express himself, though he also is a little angry with his father and the world and that boy that he can’t bring himself to speak the name of. “Then maybe you should cancel our sessions,” Ralph mutters. “Use the time for someone who actually needs you help.”
“From what I understand,” Sean says, his voice careful, controlled, (it’s patronising, spits an angry little voice inside his head), “before the island,” Ralph stiffens at the term, “you were quite the outgoing young chap. Confident, friendly. I want to help you go back to all that. Don’t you want that?”
Ralph doesn’t answer. Throat dry, words gone. Silence is his only option, the only thing that feels safe in his recently fucked up world.
Where the compulsion to swear came from, Ralph hasn’t a clue. His father never swears (he's too polite for that) and none of his friends do it, but something in Ralph calls for it almost constantly. It's this seething anger that begs to be released in the form of ugly words, one he can’t resist.
"That's the end of our session," Sean says.
Ralph bites his tongue before he responds with something along the lines of ‘that's good’ and instead says, "thank you," like the well-mannered young man he should be.
"I'll see you in a fortnight," Sean says standing up and opening the office door for Ralph.
A part of Ralph hopes he doesn’t, but he nods anyway.
The corridor outside is cold and lonely, full of white walls and steel-knobbed doors. Dull, old paintings line along the sides, few and far between, a poor attempt of adding colour to the environment. Green carpet is on the floor, scratchy-looking and stiff under his shoes. Outside each office sits two chairs, most often only occupied by one person awaiting their appointment, their eyes empty and cheeks hollow as they stare blankly ahead, only occasionally bidding the passer-by a glassy look before returning to the depths of their minds.
Today, Ralph’s father sits in the chair, waiting for him, Beside him is a boy younger than Ralph, one with a snotty nose and big, bright tears in his lashes, bottom lip quivering as he dabs at his cheeks with a handkerchief. Ralph offers him a sympathetic smile, even though the sight of the wretched thing makes his stomach crawl.
His father’s expectant grin fades when he meets eyes with his son, but its dazzle doesn’t falter, teeth still peaking between his lips as a brilliant white. He puts a comforting, heavy hand on Ralph’s shoulder and squeezes, standing up to pull him close. Ralph almost wants to fall asleep, breathing in the familiar cologne.
Not a word passes between them as they leave the building, Ralph’s father only speaking to say goodbye to the nurse standing at the desk. The man responds in turn, giving Ralph a kind smile and a promise of seeing him in two weeks.
“So,” Ralph’s father starts when he pulls out of the institution carpark, “how’d your session with Dr McConahey go?”
“Fine,” Ralph says. He always says that, unsure of why his father continues to bother asking. At his father’s silence, he feels guilty and continues, “we talked about the stray cat.” It’s not exactly a lie and quite frankly, despite how much Ralph loves his father, he doesn’t want to worry him more with the news that he physically can’t bring himself to speak to his therapist. There is already enough fuss over him.
Ralph’s father nods. “We should stop at the pet shop, get it a bed.”
“I don’t think it would like that,” Ralph says.
“Why not?”
“It would make it seem like a burden.”
This habit of speaking in riddles and euphemisms with his father… it’s new. He hates it, wants to stop, but it’s like there’s no other way of getting his own feelings across. His father, of course, misses the subtlety and begins to try and discuss whether cats are even capable of that level of thought.
“They’re only animals, after all,” his father says.
Ralph nods at that, thinks back on the island. He decides that if the cat really were only an animal, incapable of proper thought or feeling, that must mean it’s in a constant state of bloodthirst and lusting frustration, begging to be slaughtered rather than pet. That’s how they were, after all, as only small, lowly animals, fighting and snapping and killing and bleeding and lusting.
Following along with the occasional, “yeah,” Ralph lets his father continue debating with himself about the logistics of feline sentience, listening as the man occasionally breaks the discourse to make some cat-orientated pun that Ralph can only bring himself to smile at, unable to laugh or even scoff in amusement.
They reach home and Ralph’s father opens the door, heading straight for the couch and flopping down, putting cricket on the TV, immediately hollering something at the men on screen.
“Come watch the tele, Raphy,” his father says with a smile.
Ralph looks forlornly at the hallway to his bedroom, but complies with his father’s request. Sinking into the couch, he realises he’s missed it, the familiarity of the cushions embracing him and dipping more than they probably should, worn down after years of use.
A man on the screen hits a six, the ball flying and flying and flying through the air until it lands in the crowd, right inside the cup of some poor, drunken bastard. After a moment of stunned staring, the man fishes the thing out and holds it in the air. All around him, the crowd roars, loud and harsh enough to make Ralph shiver, goosebumps appearing on his skin like a rash, everywhere and anywhere they can reach.
“You cold?” Ralph’s father asks, reaching out to rub Ralph’s arms. He smooths down the bumps and pulls his son in for a hug.
Closing his eyes, Ralph sinks into it. This is his father - he’s safe here, able to relax. In the entire world, his father is the only person he can trust, the only one who hasn’t tried to hurt him. He goes limp, back pillowed against his father’s stomach and falls fast asleep.