Operation Phoenix

Chapter Fifteen

"Our mother has been absent,
Ever since we founded Rome,
But there's gonna be a party when the wolf comes home."

"Why do you sing that?"

Rapunzel looked up from her knees, meeting the gaze of the brunette before her. Between the woman's hands was a clipboard, various notes written across it in lengthy, cursive letters. Zel couldn't exactly make out what they said, though she wished she could.

"I... I'm not sure." Rapunzel answered shyly, pulling at her hair.

Belle tapped her pen and smiled softly, looking at Zellie from the tops of her glasses. She could tell that her patient wasn't being completely honest, not that she was lying, more like avoiding a certain topic. It itched at Belle a little.

"Rapunzel," She sighed and lowered her clipboard, clasping her hands together and setting them atop the papers.

Now Zel could make out a little of what they said. 'Nervous' and 'quiet; out of character' and off to the side, a quickly scribbled 'song?' With a quick whip of a question mark.

"Do you want to know what I think?" She asked sweetly.

Zellie shrugged.

"I think you sing that when you're scared. Are you aware of where it came from, of where it may have originated?" Bell had a hunch, a small one but if she was right, she'd at least get a little bit of progress from the girl.

"My mother used to sing it to me." Rapunzel whispered, looking towards the window.

Belle noticed this. It was something that often happened when people were uncomfortable, it's a type of disassociating. The person or patient begins to look for an escape from the situation at hand, avoiding eye contact with the counterpart of the conversation. It was a sign that the person didn't want to continue, as if they were looking for freedom from the intolerable environment.

In other words: progress.

"Ah. Do you happen to know what it means?"

Rapunzel shook her head, feeling very similar to a child in that room, with that woman.

"It's very interesting to me that your mother, of all people, chose to sing this to you." Belle began to dig through her notes in Rapunzel's file, having remembered scribbling something down about it before. "As I understand, the first lyrics begin with, 'there's bound to be a ghost in the back of your closet, no matter where you live, there'll always be a few things, maybe several things, that you're gonna find really difficult to forgive.'?"

"Yes." Rapunzel agreed with a soft nod.

"Are you aware of the 21st century term, 'skeletons in the back of your closet'?"

Rapunzel nodded again, this time looking back at Belle, now a little more interested.

"It's basically referring to secrets or fears that people have, which they find 'hard to forgive' and hide within themselves by 'pushing it to the back of the closet'." Belle used air quotes to signify the connection. "What confuses me about it, is that the writer of the song—whoever that may be, used the word 'ghost' instead of 'skeleton'. What does that say to you?"

Zellie looked up to meet the woman's eyes, hugging herself while she worked out what it may mean. "Maybe that, whatever it is, haunts them a little more than a skeleton."

"I think you're correct. In fact, that's exactly what I was thinking. I think these lyrics are relative to y—" the brunette's explanation was cut short with a loud, high toned 'BEEP BEEP'. Belle ruffled her eyebrows and took off her glasses, glancing at her watch in confusion. "Well, that time flew by pretty fast didn't it?"