Page 50 of The Fool

“Don’t,” he says with his jaw tightening and his fists curling up with white-knuckle anger. “Don’t you apologize, Beatrice Summers, just let me in.”

“I’m trying to, Ben,” I whimper, and he grabs hold of my hand to squeeze.

“I think we need to tell Mom,” he says in an agitated whisper. “I’m not…I just…I really think we need to, Bea.”

“No!” I snap, shaking my head with such ferocity, he squeezes my hand harder and starts stroking back my greasy hair. I guess good hair hygiene hasn’t been a priority recently.

“Ok, Bea, ok, I won’t tell anyone,” he says as he leans down to kiss my head, the action causing my emotions to spill over again. But at least his reassurances calm me down enough to stop my erratic shaking.

“Beatrice Summers?” a friendly lady announces as she walks into the reception room. She smiles at me in such a way, I feel a little more at ease with the situation. Being here wasn’t my idea, but if I was going to be forced to divulge all the ugly details of that night, I at least wanted it to be with someone who felt like a friend, not a judge.

“Do you want me to come with you?” Ben asks again, his eyes boring into mine. He wants to give me time and space, but he’s also terrified to.

“I’m sure Bea will be ok,” the kindly lady says, “I won’t let her out of my sight. And you are welcome to stay out here,” she says to him, her expression still kind but also serious, as though she is trying to tell him that she understands, that she will keep me from trying to kill myself for at least the next hour.

He looks at me one more time, seeking my permission above all others. I nod just once, not feeling entirely sure of being able to function without him.

“B-Ben? Ben, I think….ohhhh…I think I’ve done something…”

“Bea? Bea, what’s wrong? You sound weird. Are you drunk?”

“I think so, but I think I might be dying too.”

“Jesus, what are you talking about? What’s happened?”

“It’s ok, Ben, it doesn’t hurt; it won’t hurt anymore.”

“Beatrice, what did you take? What did you take?!”

The chair is comfortable, and I suddenly wish I had one back at Ben’s apartment, my new home. My old home is gone, no longer mine, just hers, all hers. I can no longer think about it without feeling the swell of tears in my eyes. The doctor chooses not to say anything about them while she follows me in. She takes her own seat, one that is similar to mine but with a straighter back.

“Before we begin, Beatrice, I want you to know this is a safe space with impenetrable walls; no one can hear our secrets, and no one can hurt us in here. Anything you share with me and these four walls is for our ears only. We can share everything here, from what makes us sad and angry, to why toast will always land butter side up.”

She smiles, and I try to, but I know I haven’t succeeded. Happiness seems like an emotion that will be forever out of reach.

“Now, my professional name is Doctor Carrow, however, I ask my patients to call me by my Christian name, which is Sonia. But if you would prefer to call me Princess Moonbeam, I won’t question it. I am here for you, nobody else, ok?”

I nod, again just once, before she begins her interrogation, right from the beginning.

_____

Bea

Sonia and I don’t get onto that night until our second session, the first being taken up by small talk, as well as my childhood. It was like the boring build-up to the heart of the story, when everything is infuriatingly nice, easy, and absent of any twists or turns. Fictionally, this part is the decider; do you go on with the syrupy goodness in the hopes that something eventful is going to happen? Or do you give in before the possibility of one of the characters doing something epically stupid to make it worth reading? In reality, it was my world, my happiness, a time I would give anything to return to.

“You told me last time that you had a lot of friends, but that most of them were boys,” Sonia says, looking over the top of her glasses at me. “And that your sister is perhaps your only friend who is a girl.”

“Was,” I mutter, to which she looks at me as if waiting for me to elaborate. “Emmawasmy friend; she isn’t anymore.”

“I see, she hurt you,” she says, forcing me to say what her betrayal was out loud, even though I would hazard a guess that she already knows. When I offer her nothing, she removes her glasses to look at me more intensely. “But things started to go wrong before that, didn’t they?”

Conspiracy theory: Beatrice Summers is a dude and Dean is forcing her to dress up because he’s too afraid to come out!

“Yes,” I reply at the same time as coughing into my jumper sleeve. “Though, it didn’t bother me that much before they did what they did. You tend to think the injured party would garner people’s sympathy, but not even their betrayal softened their blows. If anything, it only made it worse.”

“Tell me about it,” she says, gesturing with her hand for me to continue. “The bullies, what sort of things would they say about you?”

“Anything they could think of,” I reply with an insolent shrug. “I used to get it face-to-face, but it was especially nasty online. I guess it was so much easier to say such things from behind a screen. Even the good kids could turn bad there, and the best part was no one would think anything differently of you in real life. You could be a villain in secret.”

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