Page 51 of From the Ashes
BANG.
Three bullets, for my three favorite people. Each one landing straight to their heads, blood and broken skull covering the bed and making me vomit. My cheeks are wet and the cry I try to shout stays stuck in my mouth. It looks like one of those horror movies Beth watches with her friends sometimes, and said I was too young to watch with her.
“Mom… Mom,” I stutter between sobs.
“Here, all done.” My father claps his hand with a strange smile, looking at me with wide, crazy eyes. Will he kill me, too? “I’m gonna let you here, Carter. It’d be good for you. I’ve never wanted my son to be a softy. I’ll make sure you won’t.” He chuckles before closing the door on his way out.
I stay there, chained to the chair, watching my sisters and mom's dead bodies until I’m out of tears and prayers. My father returned two days later and let me out of the room.
He said he needed to clean it while I was at soccer.
He patted my head with a smile and handed me my gym shorts.
I didn’t smile back, nor did I say a word.
In fact, I never smiled again.
“So, it was the first in thirteen years, right?” Dr. Parks asks me as I explain to him what happened five days ago at Lana’s. I haven’t talked to my girl since, and I’m starting to think she has already forgotten me. My neck hurts and I blink several times before answering him. Haven’t slept in days, knowing I had probably fucked up my only chance at happiness with the woman I’m falling for.
“Yes.”
“How did it feel?”
“I didn’t fully smile. But I felt it coming.”
“I see…” he rubs his chin, “and why do you think it did?” Zeroing in on me with his medical gaze, he assesses my reactions.
“Thought I’d smile at her one day, that it would be her. But when I saw Noah, her kid,” I run a hand through my hair, “he was just so…innocent.”
“Innocent? Like you when you were a child?”
“Don’t go all shrink on me, Doc.” I shake my head, staring down at my boots.
“Childhood often holds all the answers we try to find when we become adults. Just give it a try, Carter.”
I sigh. “Yeah, maybe he reminded me of myself as a kid.”
“Could it be because he is around a violent father like you used to?”I sit back in the chair, looking around at the shelves filled with books, encyclopedias, and diplomas in golden frames and I nod. Yeah. Seeing her kid and knowing that I was the one who had made his father go after being a threat to them, it messed with my head, with what I thought I couldn’t deal with anymore.
“Do you want my opinion?” He clears his throat, putting down his notebook on the wooden table between us. I nod again, knowing he’s going to go all deep and dig his fingers into my scars to open the wounds again, but that’s why I’m here.
Iwantto know.
Ineedto know.
"The way I see it..." His voice is calm, measured. "Noah must have triggered something in you because you found yourself in a position to fix a situation from your past where you had no control. When you were twelve, and your father hurt your sisters and your mother, ordering you to watch without being able to help, you were helpless. That must have built up a massive amount of guilt, anger, and frustration. Those emotionswere too big to process as a child, so you shoved them away and decided to distance yourself from emotions altogether. It wasn’t really your decision; your brain made that choice for you to protect you. It’s common for victims of childhood violence and trauma to unintentionally forget the memories, deny them, or block them from their conscious mind. It’s chemical, like a defense mechanism." He moves his hands gracefully, right in his element. I listen, taking it all in, even though we’ve talked about this for the last three years. But the triggering part... That’s new.
“There’s nothing wrong with what you did. Your reaction was normal. You experienced a massive trauma, and this was the first time in a decade that you were brought back to it. That’s why you were overwhelmed, because despite killing your father, you never healed from it. By protecting Lana and her son, you had the opportunity to, in a way, fix the broken pieces of your past, even if it wasn’t directly for you. The simple act of protecting people who were in similar circumstances as you brought you back to who you were before the trauma.” I stare down at my hands, tattooed, scarred, wondering how the hell my past could come back to the surface in such a simple way. Killing my father hadn’t fixed it. Therapy made me human again. But that… That was fucking petrifying. Spreading my palms, I close my eyes.
Who am I?
Dr. Park leans in. “It’s normal to wonder about your identity now that your brain is starting to unlock the emotional part of yourself. But it doesn’t have to be a negative thing. Just because you tried to smile doesn’t mean it changes who you are as an individual. Take it for what it is. Just a smile. And maybe in a few months, you’ll be able to laugh a bit, but…the lack of compassion, empathy, and social cues might stick around. Maybe forever. I don’t want you to get your hopes up and thinkyou’ll be able to fully read the emotional spectrum on people's faces, or have empathy for a character in a movie.”
I nod, clenching my fists, and exhaling ‘cause damn, that’s a lot to take in. But if the doc says I’m good, then maybe not all is lost.
“I don’t want to hurt them,” I admit, my tone is low, serious, weighing what he’s about to say as an important part of my decision in coming back to her, because I’d rather die from a thousand cuts than harm them. Dr. Parks sighs and leans back, crossing his fingers on his stomach like he does when he’s content. I mean, that’s what I saw in a movie. Fingers crossed on the stomach equals contentment.
“The simple fact that you are telling me this means that you won’t. Because you care about her and her son. And from what you told me, this lady seems aware of your emotional limits and could probably handle them with grace if you gave her the opportunity. Don’t you think, Carter?” I remain silent, words bouncing in my head from all sides.
