Therapy
To Live Again
It took three weeks before I ran into Kris again. After I had finally snapped at him that day at the therapists office, he hadn’t been there when I left my appointment. I assumed that he had started coming a little later to avoid me, and I had made many mental notes to thank God, or whoever, later on.
My therapy sessions were coming to an end soon, and Dr. Bailey was hinting at the idea of me signing up for some more, just in case I wasn’t as held together as I appeared. I agreed with the proposal, to some extent, but was also well aware that I simply didn’t have the money to keep going to therapy sessions for another year. I admitted the problem to her at the end of what would be my last therapy session, picking up the self-help book she had handed me and stuffing it into my purse. “I just don’t have the money for it without having to sacrifice on something.”
She raised her eyebrow at me. “What would you be sacrificing?”
“Rent.”
She laughed, walking me to the door. “Well, I can look into maybe seeing if there’s a way to get you some financial help for this, if you are interested in continuing our sessions. Otherwise, I hope you take care of yourself, and don’t ever hesitate to call me if you find yourself in dire need of talking to someone, okay?”
I smiled, my hand already on the doorknob. “I won’t. Thank you so much, Dr. Bailey. I honestly have no idea how I would have even managed to get out of bed if I hadn’t come here. I really appreciate it.”
“You deserve just as much credit as I do, Kaitlin,” she told me, causing me to stop after I had already pushed the door open, turning to face her once more as she added, “a person can only be helped as much as they’re willing to be helped. You actually wanted to heal and return to living, despite the tragedy. Most people, especially girls, only use therapy as an escape. It’s why so many of them find themselves back in counselling of some form years later.”
I nodded again, sighing. “Well, thank you anyways.”
I turned to leave, stopping when I noticed Kris standing just outside of the door, his gaze already on me when I noticed him. He didn’t say anything, only stepped out of the way so I could exit the doorway. I paused, glancing at him and knowing from the look on his face that he had caught the tail end of our conversation. “I hope you managed to catch what she told me,” I told him quietly, watching his eyes flicker to my face before I moved away from him, hearing Dr. Bailey greet him.
“Kristopher, you’re on time. I’m actually surprised,” she said, ushering him into the room before offering a wave to me.
I smirked at his retreating figure as it disappeared into the room, feeling smug for a moment. I knew that it would pass by the time I had arrived back at my apartment, but for the moment, I had managed to scare off Kris Letang enough that he was purposely showing up late to his counselling sessions just to avoid me yelling at him once more.
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“You’re officially done therapy!” Sara yelled, throwing a handful of torn up napkin in the air as soon as I stepped through the door.
I frowned, picking a few pieces out of my hair. “A napkin? You celebrated my completion of counselling by tearing up a napkin and throwing it at me?”
Sara shrugged, bending down to gather up the other pieces. “I didn’t have time to buy real confetti, so this is all you get, for now.”
I tossed my purse onto the couch, passing her as I headed into the kitchen to grab a bottle of water. “You’re planning a party for me now that I’m emotionally stable enough?”
She grinned. “Maybe. I might have called up a few of our mutual friends and suggested a casual night of clubbing.”
I nearly choked on my water, turning to face her with wide eyes. “Clubbing? Sara, I’ve never enjoyed being packed into a building and having some random guy gyrate against me, and on another note, I’m not sure alcohol is a safe fit for an emotionally unstable person.”
“No, no. You just finished your counselling. You’re stable now!” She reminded me, laughing when I sighed at her. “We’re not planning on drinking a whole bunch, we just want to go out and have fun. You can mock all of the people there with no standards and bad hair.”
“That is all of the people there." I reminded her.
“All except for our group!” She yelled, fist pumping. “Come on, Katy. You need to have some fun. I’m really happy that you’re taking care of yourself, but you still need to live a little more.”
I took a drink from my bottle of water, letting out a small sigh afterwards. “What time are you planning on ruining my life?”
She grinned, looking at me over her shoulder as she was making her way into her room. “Eight. And don’t worry, I picked up some clothes for you.”
-------------------
I hadn’t realized it, but during the last year of coping, mourning and counselling, I had lost some weight. Not a great deal, but enough that my clothes had been hanging off of me, and my eyes had begun to look more sunken in. I would have never noticed the change if Sara hadn’t thrown the clothes she had bought me out on my bed. I took one look at the sizes and told her they wouldn’t fit, only for her to point out the way I was constantly pulling up my jeans, tugging up at the collar of my shirts and tightening my sweaters around me.
I sat awkwardly in the new outfit I was wearing, my left hand occasionally playing the with the bottom of the silky blue shirt. The jeans were fine, but they felt stiff, and as I watched some of my friends move around on the dance floor, I shifted uncomfortably in my spot, trying to wear in the jeans a little more.
“Katy, are you just going to sit there and look stunned all night?” Claire asked me, leaning over the table with a grin. “The least you could do is get a drink.”
I smiled at her, a hand reaching up to tug the small curl of my ponytail before brushing away the stray pieces of blond hair that were dancing across my face. “I’m not much for the drinking, actually.”
“Then at least come with me to get a drink,” she compromised. “I don’t want you to just sit here all night.”
I debated the idea for a moment before nodding, sliding out of the booth and standing next to her for a moment so I could smooth out my top and tug up my jeans a bit before I smiled at her. She nodded, seeming to glance over me once before turning and leading me through the bustle of people and towards the bar counter. I apologized to every person I bumped into, feeling my face heat up each time the incident occurred. I hadn’t done much socializing since Evan had… since the incident, and being in such a public environment was just about enough to push me straight over the edge.
Claire leaned over the bar counter, pressing her palms down so she could lean over even more, yelling above the sound of other people around her. The bar tender nodded his head, grabbing two glasses and setting to work.
Claire turned around to face me once more, her dark hair resting around her shoulders as she raised her eyebrows at me. “You hate this, don’t you?”
I let out a small laugh. “I don’t hate it, I just would have been okay with eating ice cream and watching some bad television on my couch. Preferably in sweatpants and an over-sized shirt.”
“Wow, that does sound like the ideal night,” Claire said, rolling her eyes afterwards and having to turn around as the bartender set down the drinks she had ordered. She thanked him, tugging a few bills out of her pocket and sliding them to him before she picked both drinks up and turned to face me holding out one of them.
I made a face, shaking my head. “No, I don’t want to drink anything, I told you that.”
“There’s hardly anything in this, Katy. It just takes like chocolate milk.”
“Then why didn’t you just order me chocolate milk? It wouldn’t have cost as much.” I mumbled, eying the drink in her hand. It did look enticingly delicious, and the longer I let my eyes linger on it, the more I wanted to grab the glass and down the whole thing. “What is it?” I asked, pulling my eyes away from it and looking up at Claire.
She grinned. “It’s called a White Russian. It’s vodka, some Kahula and cream. Have you seen The Big Lebowski?” She waited for me answer, smirking a bit when I admitted I had not. “This is his drink of choice. It’s how I heard about it. Take a sip. If you don’t like it, I’ll just have two.”
She extended a hand to me, shaking the glass a bit to make it seem more desirable. I opened my mouth to object but stopped when I heard someone calling my name, glancing behind me to see who it was. As soon as my eyes landed on him, I turned back to Claire, reaching out and grabbing the drink and taking a large gulp from it, wincing a bit from the first taste of alcohol I’d had in almost a year before nodding. “That actually is delcious.”
“Wow, you just downed half of that,” Claire observed. “What caused tha-” she stopped, her eyes clearly falling onto the approaching figure before she forced a grin onto her face. “Marc, what a surprise.”
Marc-Andre Fleury smiled at her, coming to stand beside me. “You too. It’s been a long time.” He greeted.
I stared down at the cup in my head, suddenly wishing it was just a glass full of whisky or something strong enough to make this moment more bearable.
Marc cleared his throat. “Katy, I haven’t seen you in a long time.”
I sighed, looking up at him. “Yeah, I haven’t been out much.”
He nodded, seeming to study my face for a moment. “You know, there’s a few of us here, and we’d all love to-”
“No, I’m with my friends tonight celebrating, so I’ll have to pass on seeing the others." I interrupted, taking another drink from my cup.
“Oh, okay,” he said. “What are you celebrating, may I ask?”
Without even giving it a second thought I answered, “I just finished my counselling sessions. Ten months of them, actually, so I’m confirmed to be emotionally stable now,” I said, glancing down at my almost gone drink and then up at Claire. “Are you sure there’s not much in this?”
She nodded, seeming amused by the current situation. “It’s probably because you haven’t had any alcohol in so long, and I’m not sure you’ve eaten much of anything.”
Marc cleared his throat again from beside me. “Well, I’m happy to see you, Katy. Don’t be afraid to call me, you know?” He said, tugging his phone out of his pocket. “Do we have each others numbers?”
I glanced from his phone to him and then back up. “Marc, listen-”
He shook his head, cutting off the sentence before I could say it. “I will not let you push us all away anymore. I know you are still hurting, far worse then everyone else who knew him, but you shouldn’t lose everyone who was a part of your life back then.”
I studied his face for a moment, seeing the same kindness that had always been so vibrant in Marc’s face. He and I had never been close friends, in fact I hardly knew any of Kris and Evan’s hockey friends, but Marc had always been nothing but kind to me, always inviting me to the games and always telling Evan to send me his greetings. I chewed on my lip for a moment before leaning over so I could give my number, and then being told to hand him my phone so he could punch in and save his number.
Claire cleared her throat, catching both Marc and I’s attention as she smiled at the two of us. “Well, Katy and I should probably get back to our friends.” She said, reaching out her free hand to tug me towards her. “But it was super nice to see you again, Marc.”
He nodded, raising an eyebrow at her odd behaviour as he did so, but smiled after. “It was. Katy, I hope to hear from you soon.” He gave a half wave to us, turning to head back over to wherever he came from.
I shot an odd look at Claire. “What’s your deal?”
She shrugged, “What do you mean? Do you want to dance? Get another drink? You definitely need another drink, that one’s almost gone.”
I laughed, “Claire, I’m fine. I’ll just head back over to the table, and you can go get another drink or whatever.”
I turned to head back over to the table, ignoring Claire as she tried to convince me to come back with her. I had only gotten two feet when I sighed, glancing at her over my shoulder. “Now I see why you didn’t want me to come this way.”
Kris stood about ten feet away from me, a stunned expression on his face as he simply stared at me. His dark hair wasn’t constricted by his usual backwards hat this time, and the loose fitted, dark blue shirt he was wearing hung loosely around him as he held a half-empty beer bottle in his right hand. Without taking his eyes off of me, he lifted the bottle to his lips, taking a swig of it before he took a few steps towards me.
There wasn’t much left in the glass that Claire had ordered me just a short while before, but I lifted the glass up and gulped the rest of it as I waited for him to arrive in front of me. The rage that I had been so overwhelmed with when I saw him last was vacant from my bones, and as I looked up at him, I could only feel the longing of sleep creep up into my face. I sighed, brushing the stray pieces of hair out of my face. “What do you want? Are you mad that I ended up at the same club as you? Is this your territory, too?”
Kris didn’t say anything, lifting his bottle up again to take another drink from it. He cleared his throat, his eyes moving so they were looking just past me as he mumbled, “I’m sorry.”
I leaned my head back a bit in surprise, shaking it a bit. “What did you just say?”
He sighed, meeting my gaze again. “I said I’m sorry. I was a dick, and I’m sorry.”
I was silent for a few seconds, mainly because of how shocked I was by the apology, but once I shook myself from the daze I gave a curt nod. “Thanks.”
There was a tense silence between us, both of stealing quick glances at the other one, unsure of the situation. I finally took a step back from him, glancing around me. “Well, I’m going to go back to my friends now.” I waited for him to say something, but after at least a full minute of him simply staring at me with this lost look on his face, I turned and headed back over to where Claire was still standing with a worried look splashed across her face.
“Alright," I said, handing her my empty glass and making long strides past her, "I think I’m ready for another drink.”
My therapy sessions were coming to an end soon, and Dr. Bailey was hinting at the idea of me signing up for some more, just in case I wasn’t as held together as I appeared. I agreed with the proposal, to some extent, but was also well aware that I simply didn’t have the money to keep going to therapy sessions for another year. I admitted the problem to her at the end of what would be my last therapy session, picking up the self-help book she had handed me and stuffing it into my purse. “I just don’t have the money for it without having to sacrifice on something.”
She raised her eyebrow at me. “What would you be sacrificing?”
“Rent.”
She laughed, walking me to the door. “Well, I can look into maybe seeing if there’s a way to get you some financial help for this, if you are interested in continuing our sessions. Otherwise, I hope you take care of yourself, and don’t ever hesitate to call me if you find yourself in dire need of talking to someone, okay?”
I smiled, my hand already on the doorknob. “I won’t. Thank you so much, Dr. Bailey. I honestly have no idea how I would have even managed to get out of bed if I hadn’t come here. I really appreciate it.”
“You deserve just as much credit as I do, Kaitlin,” she told me, causing me to stop after I had already pushed the door open, turning to face her once more as she added, “a person can only be helped as much as they’re willing to be helped. You actually wanted to heal and return to living, despite the tragedy. Most people, especially girls, only use therapy as an escape. It’s why so many of them find themselves back in counselling of some form years later.”
I nodded again, sighing. “Well, thank you anyways.”
I turned to leave, stopping when I noticed Kris standing just outside of the door, his gaze already on me when I noticed him. He didn’t say anything, only stepped out of the way so I could exit the doorway. I paused, glancing at him and knowing from the look on his face that he had caught the tail end of our conversation. “I hope you managed to catch what she told me,” I told him quietly, watching his eyes flicker to my face before I moved away from him, hearing Dr. Bailey greet him.
“Kristopher, you’re on time. I’m actually surprised,” she said, ushering him into the room before offering a wave to me.
I smirked at his retreating figure as it disappeared into the room, feeling smug for a moment. I knew that it would pass by the time I had arrived back at my apartment, but for the moment, I had managed to scare off Kris Letang enough that he was purposely showing up late to his counselling sessions just to avoid me yelling at him once more.
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“You’re officially done therapy!” Sara yelled, throwing a handful of torn up napkin in the air as soon as I stepped through the door.
I frowned, picking a few pieces out of my hair. “A napkin? You celebrated my completion of counselling by tearing up a napkin and throwing it at me?”
Sara shrugged, bending down to gather up the other pieces. “I didn’t have time to buy real confetti, so this is all you get, for now.”
I tossed my purse onto the couch, passing her as I headed into the kitchen to grab a bottle of water. “You’re planning a party for me now that I’m emotionally stable enough?”
She grinned. “Maybe. I might have called up a few of our mutual friends and suggested a casual night of clubbing.”
I nearly choked on my water, turning to face her with wide eyes. “Clubbing? Sara, I’ve never enjoyed being packed into a building and having some random guy gyrate against me, and on another note, I’m not sure alcohol is a safe fit for an emotionally unstable person.”
“No, no. You just finished your counselling. You’re stable now!” She reminded me, laughing when I sighed at her. “We’re not planning on drinking a whole bunch, we just want to go out and have fun. You can mock all of the people there with no standards and bad hair.”
“That is all of the people there." I reminded her.
“All except for our group!” She yelled, fist pumping. “Come on, Katy. You need to have some fun. I’m really happy that you’re taking care of yourself, but you still need to live a little more.”
I took a drink from my bottle of water, letting out a small sigh afterwards. “What time are you planning on ruining my life?”
She grinned, looking at me over her shoulder as she was making her way into her room. “Eight. And don’t worry, I picked up some clothes for you.”
-------------------
I hadn’t realized it, but during the last year of coping, mourning and counselling, I had lost some weight. Not a great deal, but enough that my clothes had been hanging off of me, and my eyes had begun to look more sunken in. I would have never noticed the change if Sara hadn’t thrown the clothes she had bought me out on my bed. I took one look at the sizes and told her they wouldn’t fit, only for her to point out the way I was constantly pulling up my jeans, tugging up at the collar of my shirts and tightening my sweaters around me.
I sat awkwardly in the new outfit I was wearing, my left hand occasionally playing the with the bottom of the silky blue shirt. The jeans were fine, but they felt stiff, and as I watched some of my friends move around on the dance floor, I shifted uncomfortably in my spot, trying to wear in the jeans a little more.
“Katy, are you just going to sit there and look stunned all night?” Claire asked me, leaning over the table with a grin. “The least you could do is get a drink.”
I smiled at her, a hand reaching up to tug the small curl of my ponytail before brushing away the stray pieces of blond hair that were dancing across my face. “I’m not much for the drinking, actually.”
“Then at least come with me to get a drink,” she compromised. “I don’t want you to just sit here all night.”
I debated the idea for a moment before nodding, sliding out of the booth and standing next to her for a moment so I could smooth out my top and tug up my jeans a bit before I smiled at her. She nodded, seeming to glance over me once before turning and leading me through the bustle of people and towards the bar counter. I apologized to every person I bumped into, feeling my face heat up each time the incident occurred. I hadn’t done much socializing since Evan had… since the incident, and being in such a public environment was just about enough to push me straight over the edge.
Claire leaned over the bar counter, pressing her palms down so she could lean over even more, yelling above the sound of other people around her. The bar tender nodded his head, grabbing two glasses and setting to work.
Claire turned around to face me once more, her dark hair resting around her shoulders as she raised her eyebrows at me. “You hate this, don’t you?”
I let out a small laugh. “I don’t hate it, I just would have been okay with eating ice cream and watching some bad television on my couch. Preferably in sweatpants and an over-sized shirt.”
“Wow, that does sound like the ideal night,” Claire said, rolling her eyes afterwards and having to turn around as the bartender set down the drinks she had ordered. She thanked him, tugging a few bills out of her pocket and sliding them to him before she picked both drinks up and turned to face me holding out one of them.
I made a face, shaking my head. “No, I don’t want to drink anything, I told you that.”
“There’s hardly anything in this, Katy. It just takes like chocolate milk.”
“Then why didn’t you just order me chocolate milk? It wouldn’t have cost as much.” I mumbled, eying the drink in her hand. It did look enticingly delicious, and the longer I let my eyes linger on it, the more I wanted to grab the glass and down the whole thing. “What is it?” I asked, pulling my eyes away from it and looking up at Claire.
She grinned. “It’s called a White Russian. It’s vodka, some Kahula and cream. Have you seen The Big Lebowski?” She waited for me answer, smirking a bit when I admitted I had not. “This is his drink of choice. It’s how I heard about it. Take a sip. If you don’t like it, I’ll just have two.”
She extended a hand to me, shaking the glass a bit to make it seem more desirable. I opened my mouth to object but stopped when I heard someone calling my name, glancing behind me to see who it was. As soon as my eyes landed on him, I turned back to Claire, reaching out and grabbing the drink and taking a large gulp from it, wincing a bit from the first taste of alcohol I’d had in almost a year before nodding. “That actually is delcious.”
“Wow, you just downed half of that,” Claire observed. “What caused tha-” she stopped, her eyes clearly falling onto the approaching figure before she forced a grin onto her face. “Marc, what a surprise.”
Marc-Andre Fleury smiled at her, coming to stand beside me. “You too. It’s been a long time.” He greeted.
I stared down at the cup in my head, suddenly wishing it was just a glass full of whisky or something strong enough to make this moment more bearable.
Marc cleared his throat. “Katy, I haven’t seen you in a long time.”
I sighed, looking up at him. “Yeah, I haven’t been out much.”
He nodded, seeming to study my face for a moment. “You know, there’s a few of us here, and we’d all love to-”
“No, I’m with my friends tonight celebrating, so I’ll have to pass on seeing the others." I interrupted, taking another drink from my cup.
“Oh, okay,” he said. “What are you celebrating, may I ask?”
Without even giving it a second thought I answered, “I just finished my counselling sessions. Ten months of them, actually, so I’m confirmed to be emotionally stable now,” I said, glancing down at my almost gone drink and then up at Claire. “Are you sure there’s not much in this?”
She nodded, seeming amused by the current situation. “It’s probably because you haven’t had any alcohol in so long, and I’m not sure you’ve eaten much of anything.”
Marc cleared his throat again from beside me. “Well, I’m happy to see you, Katy. Don’t be afraid to call me, you know?” He said, tugging his phone out of his pocket. “Do we have each others numbers?”
I glanced from his phone to him and then back up. “Marc, listen-”
He shook his head, cutting off the sentence before I could say it. “I will not let you push us all away anymore. I know you are still hurting, far worse then everyone else who knew him, but you shouldn’t lose everyone who was a part of your life back then.”
I studied his face for a moment, seeing the same kindness that had always been so vibrant in Marc’s face. He and I had never been close friends, in fact I hardly knew any of Kris and Evan’s hockey friends, but Marc had always been nothing but kind to me, always inviting me to the games and always telling Evan to send me his greetings. I chewed on my lip for a moment before leaning over so I could give my number, and then being told to hand him my phone so he could punch in and save his number.
Claire cleared her throat, catching both Marc and I’s attention as she smiled at the two of us. “Well, Katy and I should probably get back to our friends.” She said, reaching out her free hand to tug me towards her. “But it was super nice to see you again, Marc.”
He nodded, raising an eyebrow at her odd behaviour as he did so, but smiled after. “It was. Katy, I hope to hear from you soon.” He gave a half wave to us, turning to head back over to wherever he came from.
I shot an odd look at Claire. “What’s your deal?”
She shrugged, “What do you mean? Do you want to dance? Get another drink? You definitely need another drink, that one’s almost gone.”
I laughed, “Claire, I’m fine. I’ll just head back over to the table, and you can go get another drink or whatever.”
I turned to head back over to the table, ignoring Claire as she tried to convince me to come back with her. I had only gotten two feet when I sighed, glancing at her over my shoulder. “Now I see why you didn’t want me to come this way.”
Kris stood about ten feet away from me, a stunned expression on his face as he simply stared at me. His dark hair wasn’t constricted by his usual backwards hat this time, and the loose fitted, dark blue shirt he was wearing hung loosely around him as he held a half-empty beer bottle in his right hand. Without taking his eyes off of me, he lifted the bottle to his lips, taking a swig of it before he took a few steps towards me.
There wasn’t much left in the glass that Claire had ordered me just a short while before, but I lifted the glass up and gulped the rest of it as I waited for him to arrive in front of me. The rage that I had been so overwhelmed with when I saw him last was vacant from my bones, and as I looked up at him, I could only feel the longing of sleep creep up into my face. I sighed, brushing the stray pieces of hair out of my face. “What do you want? Are you mad that I ended up at the same club as you? Is this your territory, too?”
Kris didn’t say anything, lifting his bottle up again to take another drink from it. He cleared his throat, his eyes moving so they were looking just past me as he mumbled, “I’m sorry.”
I leaned my head back a bit in surprise, shaking it a bit. “What did you just say?”
He sighed, meeting my gaze again. “I said I’m sorry. I was a dick, and I’m sorry.”
I was silent for a few seconds, mainly because of how shocked I was by the apology, but once I shook myself from the daze I gave a curt nod. “Thanks.”
There was a tense silence between us, both of stealing quick glances at the other one, unsure of the situation. I finally took a step back from him, glancing around me. “Well, I’m going to go back to my friends now.” I waited for him to say something, but after at least a full minute of him simply staring at me with this lost look on his face, I turned and headed back over to where Claire was still standing with a worried look splashed across her face.
“Alright," I said, handing her my empty glass and making long strides past her, "I think I’m ready for another drink.”
I Love this story!
4/7/14