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“Of course. Especially after he left.”
“It wasn’t your job to make her happy, Aiden.”
“Yeah? Tell her that,”Aiden snaps.“Sorry,”he apologizes immediately.“That was uncalled for.”
“Was it?”
“Yes. Can we talk about something else?”
The therapist nods.“When was the last time you saw your father?”
“I can’t remember. It’s been a long time. To be fair,”Aiden continues without prompting,“my mother didn’t make it easy for him. She was furious at him for leaving, and she was the one with the money—her parents had left her very well off—and she just inundated him with legal shit. When the courts insisted I had to see him, I made sure things didn’t go smoothly. After a while, he got the message and gave up.”
“What about now?”
“Whataboutnow?”
“Have you tried contacting him?”
“Why would I do that?”
“Curiosity, maybe. You’re older now. Circumstances change.”
“No, I haven’t contacted him.”
“Why not?”
“It would be too upsetting for my mother.”
“And not upsetting your mother is more important to you than seeing your father?”
Aiden feels his heartbeat quicken. He shrugs, says nothing. He fights the conflicting urges to bolt from the therapist’s office or tackle the man to the floor.
“He’s never tried contacting you?”
“He tried. Birthday cards, Christmas cards, that sort of thing. I actually got an email from him a few years back.”
“And?”
“I didn’t open it.”Aiden stands up.“Look. I really don’t get where you’re going with this. I thought the point of Cognitive Processing Therapy was to examine how I feel about the trauma I experienced in Afghanistan so I can figure out ways to live with it.”
“Exactly,”Dr. Patchett confirms.
“Well,my trauma,”Aiden insists,“was watching my friends and fellow soldiers get shot or blown to bits.My traumawas blowing the head off a twelve-year-old boy I thought was holding a grenade that turned out to be a rubber ball!”He swipes at the sudden appearance of unwanted tears.“It has nothing to do with my parents.”
Aiden moans and flips onto his other side as Heidi stirs beside him.
“What’s up, babe?” she whispers, her voice coated in sleep.
“Nothing.”
“You okay?”
“I’m fine. Go back to sleep.” Aiden closes his eyes.
The therapist is waiting.“Look,”Dr. Patchett begins, uncrossing his legs before re-crossing them in the other direction.“The point is that you’ve been blaming yourself for a long time about things that were beyond your control.”
“Such as?”
