PART ONE: INITIATION TO THE DEAD DAD'S CLUB
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-Chapter 1-
The first thing she'd told her was to call her "Veronica." With those three little words, combined with searching, sympathetic eyes and two stifling squeezes of her hands, any chance of Cristina Yang giving this woman respect flew out the window.
She was a doctor, for Christ's sake.
And besides. The most desirable thing to do after you've just watched your father bleed to death is not be forced into some confined, toy-infested psychiatrist's office and be instructed to call a woman "Veronica."
The grief counselor at the hospital and the therapist from school recommended a solid six months of therapy. Her mother was mortified, but realized her appearance would deteriorate much worse were she to not respect their wishes.
An hour a day and three days a week, every week without fail for six months. It was 72 hours, and Cristina was mute for all of them.
At home, she would lock herself in the bathroom for hours, sinking to the floor and digging her now perfectly-manicured nails through her arms, trying to squeeze herself into nonexistence just like he had been. It wasn't a comfort. There was no comfort. Everyplace that she ran dripped with the blood of him, drowning her and blinding her with its brightness.
Veronica often talked about "triggers."
Things would be thrown at her that ripped it all open again, she lectured, things she wouldn't be able to run from or pretend didn't exist. She had to acknowledge it, face what had happened, let the people around her be allowed to love her.
Cristina scorned her.
The key to memory is making connections, bridging liaisons and developing patterns.
There were no fricking triggers.
Every particle of matter that surrounded her, every farfetched grab of symbolism her mind could muster, related back to the thoughts of her father. They weren't so much triggers, as catapults.
So it was, Cristina Yang had become an active member of the Dead Dads Club. And like all major clubs, this one had an initiation.