Miss Yourself

It Kills Me

Nick's POV:

There's about a hundred lights above us here in the poolhouse. It's only us...
Imogen has retired to her room with a big ass bottle of tequila, Kendall had to return to the institution on call, and here he and I are. Charlie's so sweet as he talks about how he loves the trees, the hum of the forest, the lines on my face. He's right here and I'm with him and he's okay. So, I spin him and pull him close and as I kiss him the wasia Project reminds him,

Ur so pretty
when you smile it kills me
ahh oh oh hm...
ur the only
person left so
hold me...
don't leave me...

There's a little pink light left on the horizon. Here, soon a blanket of black and blue will spread out over the sky and shimmer with a billion more lights and I will dance with him. We spin like we're at a ball and he laughs like he has it all and I'm distracted for a moment from the idea that my mother might be dead. He's distracted for a moment that Tori might be dead. We're forgetting for a moment that Tao, Sahar, and the others might not be with us anymore. They're just stars way up there in the sky.
I lift him high above my head and bring him down slowly. Our lips meet and it's sweet and then it's wet with his tears. It's all so much for me that I weep a little too and just hold him to my chest.
Then we venture over to the hammock hung up beneath the cabana's awning. Here we curl up and he rests his head on my chest. I breathe as he breathes and we rest. Slowly... sleep takes me.

Kendall's POV:

I sit in my office. How I'm not fired I'll never know, I directly confronted the chief. Dr. Swanson isn't the forgiving type.
It's apparent there's something from me she needs. Or wants. There's not much a difference in her eyes and she doesn't take no for an answer. She wants Charlie. I can't let her take him. I won't. He's much safer healing at home with Nick and Imogen.
I'm not sure why Mr. Nelson hates me so much. Given everything we've both been through he looks at me the way I look at the producers who still have their hooks in Carlos. Like I'm a pedophile.
I can't say I blame him. I'm from Hollywood, I grew up in the system. I was in an episode of House M.D. once and I've known pedophiles my whole life. Any estranged grown man I met when I was seventeen was a potential problem.
I can't waste my time thinking on all that, I'm here to do a job.
So I finish typing out my latest report. I have an interview tonight with a new inmate. Lola Cornish is her name.
She's no older than the kids who are currently living in my house. She presents sanity and my first assumtion with any new patient is always innocent until proven guilty. She's a server down in the little tourist town of Gatlinburg. Or she was until her 'incident'.
"You're not a shrink." She says, her mousy brown hair is thicker the glasses she wears. It balances on her head and wraps around her face like a lions mane. She's skinny but not too skinny. Her shoulders are broad and make her appear taller than she is. There's a dimple in her left cheek but not her right.
"No... I'm not." I confess.
She leans forward in her seat confused, "Then what's the point of me talking to you."
"I'm not here to cure you. I'm here to get your side of the story." I say, my pen moving to gather the details of her as they present.
She pauses between her words. She's legible enough to allow the person she's speaking to understand what she's saying. There's no nervous ticks. She hunches her shoulders because she's tired and otherwise presents healthy.
"I snapped." She says, "I'm sixteen, I'm supposed to be getting ready for formal. I- I'm killing myself to take care of my mother. She dying of Alzeimers and no one seems to care."
"No one seems to care." I repeat back to her.
Her eyes are as brown as her hair and in them I see my own reflection. The only lights in my office come from the oil lamp on my desk and the door is open so as not to make her feel trapped. A billion freckles dot all over her face like a sky full of stars and she nods.
"Have you ever been in the service industry? People, who you'll never see again, can make you feel so inhuman." She's not wrong. I've never been a server but I have given services. I've sold my mind, my body, my voice.
"I think people lose sight of what's important when they're pushed too far." I offer, "Just because a person is on vacation, spending money it doesn't mean they want to be. Keeping up appearences is hard. Budgeting is hard. Being a parent is hard. Dying of Alzeimers is hard. When a person sits down in your section you have no way of knowing what happened to them before they walked through the door. A conversation could have happened while you were fetching their drinks and it could have nothing to do with you."
"Yet they make it feel like it's my fault." She sighs.
I nod, "It's the uniform. It's unspoken permission to see you as a part of the service. People excersize power where they can. Let's talk about the specific table in question."
"I stabbed a guy." She says, "Tall, handsome, on a double date. The parents were obviously his and the girl was a mute. She seemed further away that the front door of the resturant and I got in my head... My coworker Johnny (he's my gay best friend)-"
"Best friend" I correct her, "Gay people aren't pets and sexuality is only a small part of our story."
She nods, "Yeah. Best friend... I hope that's still true..."
"You were talking with Johnny..." I say to get her back on track.
She shifts in her seat looking over my desk at all the little knicknacks I've collected, "We come up with theories when we're in the kitchen, about every table. I suguested he was abusive. He dismissed her in front of me. As if what she had to say wasn't important."
"The parents were calm people I imagine?" I offer.
"Yeah..." She whispers.
I nod, "They have enough money to sustain them. A bad experience at a resturant wont affect them in the long run. This young man may have been trying to impress her parents or prove himself to his own parents. We'll never know."
"He spoke at me; like I was stupid, over napkins or ranch. Maybe both. Then he insinuated that I was crazy. Asked me if I was on my period." She presses her lips together and looks away from me.
There it is, "He insulted you. Took away your dignity. With all the stress you've had on your shoulders the world was spinning, you fell into a panic attack, and you acted; not out of malice but out of fear. Fear that you had fallen into purgatory and this cycle of clocking in and clocking out would never end. This man you stabbed represented the keeper of the keys to your cell in Hell and you broke."
She chokes on a sob.
"May I touch your hands?" I ask
She lets me.  Then I tell her, "You need to hear this because the next couple of weeks will be painful and it's got to come from somewhere. I forgive you."
Her tears spill down her face and into her lap. She closes her eyes and tilts her head. She's hopeless.
"Thank you for your honesty. I'll have this typed out..." I pull away from her, "It will be published in the local paper. It doesn't obsolve you of your crimes but it does play on peoples sympathy. While you battle this out in court I'll drum up donations to help take care of your mother's medical bills and in home treatments. What the community doesn't pay for I'll make up out of my own pocket." I snap a photo of my page transferring out my article into a word document on my open laptop that casts a soft blue glow on my face and submit it to my editor right away.
She's shaking as she looks up at me, "What?"
A soft mousy whisper.
"People need people, Miss Cornish. As for your own care I can't do anything. That's up to your doctor. Like you said I'm not a shrink. You're dismissed, they should be serving dinner about now." She rises and tries to find the words but I just smile and wave her on.
When she's out the door I sit in my own feverish confusion. Tommy's phone sits on my desk, I haven't heard from him all day. No one's come looking for this. Why was I covered in blood this morning? Did I snap?
"Do you know why I let you keep your job?" I nearly jump out of my skin at the sound of Dr. Swanson in my doorway.
I shake my head.
She gestures down the hall, "Because of that. Her, people like her. I'm a doctor and I want to cure my patients. Sometimes medicine doesn't always do that. You have a way with people, Mr. Knight. Your words, your kindness, people respond to that. I don't have that. What I do have is a medical liscense and the means to treat people. I'm right about Charlie Spring. If you had any sense at all you'd bring him in and admit him."
"Usually, Chief... I would agree with you... However given the practice I've seen taking place down in the basement has me hesitant. I respect you, I know you're brilliant. The thing is, I'm not Charlie's parent, I'm a guardian and until such time that I know if his parents are alive or dead I have no means of giving him into your clinical trials. It wouldn't sit right with me. If they show up one day and he's died because the medicines weren't perfected I would never forgive myself." I close my laptop and grab my bag.
She lets me leave. Her face expressionless. I don't know what she's trying to prove. OCD and Anorexia are mental illnesses and they're far off from a cure that you can take orally. She's got all kinds of potions down in that lab of hers but I see madness in her. For now, I'm going home.