Page 64 of The Sound of Him

I believe he believes it, so I nod.

“Good. It was important for me to establish that. Can you nod or give me a thumbs-up if you understand that everything to do with your therapy and what we discuss here is entirely inyourcontrol?”

Haven’t I already told him that I understand that? Maybe he just wants to make double sure, since he says it’s so important? Or maybe he thinks my head is too messy to remember?

My headispretty messy…

It suddenly feels hard to move my head, even just to nod, so I pry my hand off of my bunny one finger at a time and pull it out of my pocket until I can give him a thumbs-up.

“Good. That’s very good.” He looks relieved, but it doesn't feel itchy to see it like it usually does with the others. Probably because his relief doesn't make me feel like I got the right answer. There's no weight to it.

“Now that I’ve explainedwhyI asked the question about speaking, I’d like to explain why I shouldn’t have. Is that okay, or do you want to put it off for later and take a break? Nod if it’s okay, or give a thumbs-up, or give me one finger. Shake your head, give me a thumbs-down, or give me two fingers if not and we can discuss it the next time we meet instead.”

I hate that he’s offering to put stuff off again.Why would I want to spend even more time dreading something when I can just rip it off like a band-aid?

Then again, this has felt like a lot of words, especially for only getting a few simple points across to me. One more point will probably be a lot more words. Maybe too many.But I might as well get it over with, right?

Even that line of thinking just felt like too many words.

I am so tired.

And hungry.

Dios mío, my stomach hurts.

“Matt?”

I force one of my thumbs-up, hoping my expression tells him something along the lines of,Let’s please just get it over with.

He hesitates, or maybe he’s just doing one of those pauses when you’re supposed to be reflecting on your feelings or something. I’m too tired to reflect on anything.

I’m starting to think I’m too tired tofeel. Or too dead. Too much of a ghost.

I put my hands back in my pocket, grabbing my bunny.Soft.So soft, even with the sticky sweat from my skin.

I canfeelthat. I can feel my bunny. I can feel my aching stomach. I can feel that I’m tired. I am not dead. I am not a ghost.

I’m real, I’m real, I’m real -

“Therapists should not try to tackle hard topics with their clients until they have a better relationship with them. I needed to take the time to build trust with you before asking you something like that. Yes, it was important for me to know what you want out of our time together, and your mutism would be a very important part of that if you wanted it to be, but I pushed too hard and too fast. I needed to wait.”

Oh.

Okay.

That’s… yeah. Yeah, that kind of makes sense.

“How things ended last time was entirelymyfault, Matt.Mine. You did absolutely nothing wrong. Okay?”

But - well… it’s my fault that I can’t keep it together long enough to answer his important questions, isn’t it? And my fault that -

“I’mthe professional,” he continues. “I’mthe expert. I’m not perfect, I’m human, which means I’ll get things wrong, but I promise you that when I do, as long as I’m aware of my mistake, I willalwaystell you and take responsibility for it.

“That's why it’s also important for you to understand that if you ever think I made a mistake, you can tell me. It won’t matter if you’re right or wrong. Right and wrong aren’t really important, in the grand scheme of things. If it’s a feeling you have, then it's valid and we should discuss it. We’ll look at it from every angle and navigate it together. I want us to have the kind of relationship where we can openly communicate about those things. About anything, actually. This works best when we’re on the same page. I want to be a team. I would never ask you to go through therapy on your own; I will be next to you the entire time. But that kind of relationship, that kind of building of trust, will take time. I tried rushing it and I am very, very sorry about that, Matt.”

The apology is… nice. That kind of relationship and trust would be nice, too. But I don’t know how to build that. Not without trauma. All of my relationships in the last decade, every relationship I have today, have been built on trauma.Is that what this will be built on, too? My trauma?

That makes sense, but it's just that I’m so tired of trauma.