I learned more than a few survival skills throughout college:
1) Befriending the dining hall staff is the best thing you can ever do for your college career. If you can’t cook to save your life and your boyfriend thinks ramen can be eaten morning, noon, and night, it pays to have friends in high places…like the kitchen.
2) You can only learn your true alcohol tolerance level through trial and error.
3) Beer pong never ends well, even if you have stellar hand-eye coordination.
4) Taking an afternoon class that has no appeal other than a distinct lack of early morning lectures can turn out to be the best damn thing you ever do.
I never had an overt interest in psychology; I’d pretty much always deduced that people acted a certain way because it’s how they’re wired. In my head, it really was as simple as that. It never occurred to me to analyze their behavior and look for reasons why they acted the way they did. I initially enrolled in the Psychology elective because it fit well with sports science, and, probably the main reason, the lectures happened to fall in the late afternoon. I’d do anything to keep my mornings as free as I could. If it hadn’t been for that one lazy decision, coupled with Ellis pushing me to join Hearts & Minds, I wouldn’t be doing what I do today.
Being a counselor means I’m involved in helping people come to better terms with their lives and experiences through exploration of their feelings and emotions. It’s kind of ironic that I find it almost effortless to help others, and yet I can’t practice what I preach. In my work I’m expected to provide a confidential setting in which to listen attentively to my clients. I’m good at my job, not because of my ability to empathize, show patience and respect, or analyze a person’s issues. I’m good because I care. I genuinely want to help. As cliché as it sounds, I’ve sat on the other end of that big scary counseling sofa. I know what it’s like to feel helpless in your own body and judged for how you handle yourself. I’m not at liberty to give advice, but I can offer help and support.
It’s a mentally exhausting career, but not an entirely selfless one. There’s a certain buzz you get from feeling like you’ve truly made a difference in someone’s life, and it would be a falsehood to claim that I didn’t love that feeling. Because of the intimacy of my work, it’s crucially important I’m fully self-aware. My ability to self-reflect and remain emotionally detached from relationships that develop with my clients is perhaps the single most important trait I possess as a counselor. I’ve never once felt like I was faking it.
Until now.
It’s been almost two months since I spent the evening with Ellis and to say that I’ve overanalyzed every aspect of every damn minute we were together is the understatement of the century. He’s consumed my mind, entirely. I think about him when I’m at home. I think about him when I’m at work, and if I do finally manage to fall asleep at night, guess who pops up in my dreams?
Ellis-goddamn-Hughes.
I made the fundamental mistake of exchanging cell numbers with him before he left. I told myself I’d delete it after a whole night staring at my phone and willing myself not to call or text him. I didn’t delete his number. Instead, I’ve let it sit on my contact list for the past eight weeks taunting me. I wonder if he’s been doing the same thing? I’m not an idiot and I knew I wasn’t over him, not really. We never got to have the closure I needed to walk away and leave that part of my life behind. I just hadn’t realized how completely not over him I was.
“Harlow?”
I scribble in a figure eight at the top of my yellow legal pad, watching the blue ink darken as I retrace the shape over and over again. The symbol of infinity: a never-ending loop, just like my torment.
A cough snaps me out of the trance I’m in.
“Hmm?”
“I said is our time up?”
It takes me an embarrassingly long second to assess my surroundings and regain my equilibrium. I realize that my patient Jennifer, who’s sitting back in her chair, is waiting for me to dismiss our session. A session in which I have no clue what she’s just professed. I don’t think I’ve asked her one solitary question since she’s been in here, and our sessions run for an hour.
I try my best to calm my demeanor and look a little less flustered than I’m feeling. Oh, God. I hope I at least made some form of acknowledgment, even if it was a misplaced nod or hmm to her single-sided conversation… Crap.
I’m further mortified to realize that I haven’t made any notes. Not one meaningful word. The only thing covering the notebook in my hands are random doodles. I tilt the pad toward my chest, hoping she doesn’t see that I’ve done fuck all in sixty minutes except space out. At least I have the foresight to tape our sessions. I’ll need to revisit this one for sure. I feel absolutely terrible.
“Yes, that’s it for this week,” I answer as brightly as I can, standing and walking toward her chair. The slim tightening in her face gives away her annoyance at my falsely chipper response. She knows I have no clue what’s happened in here, and just as I’m about to apologize for my unprofessionalism and absence today, she leans gingerly forward and touches my hand.
“Are you okay, Harlow?”
Jennifer has been coming to see me for just over two years. She’s a sweet woman, only a few years older than me, with a list of medical conditions as long as my arm. She has MS, and her deterioration since the first time we met has been a cruel, steady journey. She’s now wheelchair bound and is slowly losing function of her fine motor skills. Her speech is a little slurred, not so much that you can’t understand her, but enough to make her harder to comprehend than my other patients. She requires more concentration, and this alone makes me want to cry for how this session has gone. She is more than deserving of my full attention. Physical contact and interaction are against our code of ethics. I’m here to listen, not to dole out hugs and false assurances, but Jennifer’s attempt at what I feel like is intended as a hug causes me to pause and smile. I give her hand a quick squeeze in appreciation.
“I’m fine, thank you,” I say pointedly, as I move past her and open my office door. “I’ll see you next week.”
She doesn’t say anything further, just fixes me with a stare that speaks volumes about her ability to know when I’m talking crap. I wait until her chair disappears down the corridor before closing my door and letting myself flop down onto the plush patient sofa. I huff out an exasperated exhale, annoyed at how distracted I’ve been these last weeks. I pull my phone from my pant pocket and am about to call and schedule an appointment with my own therapist when my alarm sounds, signaling I need to take my meds. I pinch the bridge of my nose, listening to the incessant beeping and decide I really need a break. Not just from work, but from my own mind—hell, from my life in general. Of course, what I really need is to stop thinking about Ellis, but that’s like telling yourself to stop breathing. You can only hold your breath for so long before your survival instincts kick in and you gasp for air.
Texts I almost send to Ellis before deleting:
Do you want to meet for coffee?
Hey, How are you?
Hi, Ellis. Just wondered if you’d maybe want to meet up to talk?
Why did you give me your number? You knew I’d obsess over using it. You’re an asshole.
Hi, Ellis. Are you free, today?
I press send on the last message before I drive myself completely crazy. Collin tilts his head inquisitively; he probably thinks I’m a nut, shouting to myself. His stubby white tail swishes back and forth as he tries to decide if this is a cue that I’m about to start playing with him. I look up over the rim of my phone, and he must decide it’s not, because his fat little head falls back down on top of his paws, his floppy white jowls spreading out over my floor and no doubt concealing a puddle of drool. I lean forward, ready to pet him when he breaks wind and I quickly need to go and open a window. The lady at the pet store had said that switching him to a dry food only diet would help with his terrible flatulence. I’m still waiting to feel the benefits of that particular piece of advice. I’m not convinced that it wasn’t just a ploy to upsell me on dog food twice the price of the product I was initially buying. Collin doesn’t move, just traces my movements with lazy, contented eyes.
I’m sure I’ve landed myself with the K-9 equivalent of a languid, overweight beer-swilling husband. The type that sits around on the couch all day, one hand down his pants while the other cradles a beer. I never had any intention of getting a puppy. In fact, everyone thought I was insane when I told them I’d taken him on. I’d argued in Collin’s favor, of course. English Bulldogs are perhaps the laziest and most exercise shy breed of dog that there is. On paper we were a match made in heaven. I also kind of liked being defiant. Heart patients and dogs aren’t usually a sensible mix. I’d been assured he was about as much work as a goldfish from the sweet little old man who’d persuaded me to take him. I realized after twenty minutes of getting Collin home that despite the man’s cutesy, little-old-pensioner appearance, he was a liar. He’d won me over by saying he’d have to take Collin to the pound, and me being the complete sap I am, looked into the tiny white bulldog’s wide puppy eyes and was sold.
He ate two pairs of sneakers, one whole rain boot (the left foot) and the bottom step of my staircase in the first week I’d owned him. He wasn’t overly active; at least that part had been true. He hated his leash, and our walks usually ended in me carrying the pudgy little pain in the ass home. Once he’s made up his mind, he’s stubborn as hell. If he doesn’t want to walk, he simply stops and lies down. Even if you attempt to drag him he stays flat, like a dead weight, until you pick him up. I first discovered this while walking across the road a little way from my house. He’d obviously had enough, and collapsed right there in the middle of the street. A cherry red Nissan, almost hit us but the blaring horn didn’t even startle Collin into standing, and I’d almost had another heart attack dragging him to the curb.
Hi. I’m free as a bird, what do you have in mind?
The reply from Ellis feels strange. It’s almost too familiar, and yet impersonal and distant at the same time. I stare at the cracked screen of my cell (another product of Collin’s affinity for chewing) and berate myself after a moment for obsessing over text messages. I’m not a teenager, for heaven’s sake.
Want to meet me for coffee? 11:30 am at Joe Van Gough’s in Durham. It’s the one on Broad Street, not the Duke shop.
JVG is my favorite coffee house. There are two huge coffee chain stores within a half-mile of my home, but I still jump in my car and drive almost all the way to work on my days off for the scent of their fresh ground coffee alone. The place always smells amazing, and just because I can’t drink too much caffeine doesn’t mean I can’t bask in the aroma of it once in a while. It’s where I tend to go when I need to get away and think. It’s gotten me through many long days after little sleep and it’s within walking distance of work, which is both a blessing and a curse. Half my salary must be spent in there. They have local art on display, too, which I love. It’s almost like a home away from home. My mom always comments that if Pottery Barn did coffee shop chic, my living room would be the product.
I’ll see you there.
His text is simple and to the point—unlike our relationship. I don’t even know what I want to say to him once I see him. What I do know, however, is that since he showed up again I seem to have forgotten how to function. My therapist thinks that talking with Ellis will be a positive step for me. Talking I can do—that part’s manageable. It’s the same thing I would encourage my own clients to do. It’s what the talking might lead to that has me torn up inside. No matter how inconvenient it is to still have feelings for the person responsible for your father’s untimely death, that is exactly what’s happened.
The attraction has always been there. It had morphed into love long before dad dying, and somehow it hasn’t disappeared over time. I thought that my feelings for Ellis had evolved over the years, not necessarily into hate, but something close—animosity maybe? But, seeing him didn’t validate those feelings, and instead reminded me of what it was like to have your whole body set ablaze by just a look. He’d brought me back to life when I hadn’t even realized how dead I was inside. The feeling was intoxicatingly addictive. The trouble with addiction I’ve found is that if not fed, you slip quickly into withdrawal. I’ve tried going cold turkey for the last two months, and it isn’t working. My work and my mental heath are both suffering. So, now I’m attempting to reintroduce Ellis into my life before weaning myself off of him slowly. At least that’s what I’m telling myself I’m about to do.
But then again, we all know junkies lie.
The coffee shop is uncharacteristically quiet for a Saturday morning, and I’m not sure if that unnerves me or makes me feel better. I guess this way there’s less chance of bumping into anyone from work.
“The usual?” Marcus, the barista, asks me when I make my way to the counter.
“Not today, thanks. I’ll take a spiced chai latte, and a cinnamon bun.”
The adrenaline coursing through my body is enough to have my heart working overtime. I don’t need coffee adding to that. I came here for the familiarity of the place, not the drinks. Anticipation over seeing Ellis has me trembling, and I’m doing my best to appear unaffected by my anxiety. I’m like a swan swimming across a quiet pond. On the surface I appear almost graceful, gliding effortlessly, but if you peeked under the water my legs kicking frantically to keep myself afloat would tell a different story.
I hand over my card to pay and Marcus motions for me to go take a seat.
“I’ll bring your order over,” he tells me, turning to grab a cup.
“Thanks.”
I walk over to a small round table nestled in the corner by the window. From this angle I’ll be able to see Ellis arrive. Knowing that he won’t be able to catch me off guard this time oddly calms me a little and makes me feel more in control. I pull my red parker off, draping it over the back of the worn brown leather chair and take a seat. There’s a tall girl with a slight hint of Asian parentage in her beautiful complexion who catches my eye. She’s sitting at the table across from mine, bent forward in cahoots with a much smaller but equally pretty girl with flame red hair and more freckles than I’ve ever seen on a person before. Their conversation is carrying across the room as they talk animatedly about someone I’m assuming isn’t with them. From the gist of what they’re saying, I’m guessing that they don’t approve of their friend’s lack of interest in choosing a college major. I smile to myself, because once upon a time they could have been talking about me.
Unlike Ellis, I began my first year of college with zero clues about what I wanted to major in. I’d decided to take as many varied and random classes as my schedule would allow until I found something that ignited a spark and made me tick. It was a risky strategy. I’d always planned on swimming through college and had all but decided to major in sports science. I didn’t have a comprehensive plan of what I wanted to do, but the opportunities that a degree like that would have opened up appealed to me. The only problem was that I wasn’t physically able to put that plan into place, and spending my time around people that were doing activities I couldn’t partake in seemed a little sadistic.
Instead, I decided to immerse myself in and amongst activities I could do. Slowly but surely I began to see things in a brighter, more positive light. I didn’t need to be so doom and gloom about my prognosis and finally accepted that my life was what I made of it. That realization set free some of the resentment I’d let fester within me deep below the surface. It was the part of me that I tried on a daily basis to keep locked away, hidden from myself just as much as the people around me. I’d never been the girl who felt sorry for herself before, and I wasn’t comfortable in my own skin when I sensed myself slipping into that persona. I goofed around, made people laugh, even if it was at me rather than with me. It took a while for me to grasp that I didn’t have to stop being that person, and the recognition and acceptance were invigorating.
Over the years I’ve had plenty of reason to slip back into that sad and broken girl. For a while, after my father died and Ellis was gone I slipped so far into the rabbit hole of my despair that I worried I’d never find my way back out. But I did it. I pulled myself out, and every time an issue with my health threatened to push me back down, I managed to summon the strength to stand fast. Maybe that’s what has knocked me sideways about Ellis turning back up in my life. He blindsided me, and my own emotions pulled the rug from beneath me. The contempt I thought I’d feel for him was replaced with relief, which only made me stumble further. I’m hoping that meeting him today will help me find my footing. I can’t deny that his ability to knock me clean off my feet terrifies me, but the tiny adrenaline junkie within me has been awakened and is shouting, bring it on!