Hello, friend.
It's been a while. Things have been kind of…well, crazy.
Am I crazy? I have to be, right? What kind of sane person sees their dead father walking around?
I guess all those sessions with Krista were really for nothing. We didn't make any progress, and she knows it.
This is so messed up. Really messed up.
But at least I have you.
He doesn't talk to you.
Elliot walked down the sidewalk, his hoodie pulled up over his head as usual. Flipper was walking ahead of him happily, eager to get all her pent-up energy out. Thoughts raced through Elliot's mind at a thousand miles an hour. After learning the truth about Mr. Robot, he didn't know what he was supposed to do now.
"Kellan, calm down," a woman's voice said.
Elliot looked ahead of him to find a man yanking a woman out of the passenger seat of the car.
"Geez, I'm coming!" the woman yelled to him.
"Well, hurry up!" the man shot back. He roughly pushed her in the direction of the stairs to the apartment complex.
"Hey!" Elliot called.
The two people turned to look at him. The woman's eyes looked rather…surprised.
There was tense silence between the three people on the sidewalk. The two strangers seemed to be waiting for Elliot to continue, but he couldn't articulate anymore words.
"Kellan," the woman finally said. "Go on up. I'll be there in a minute."
"Don't take forever."
As Kellan went up the stairs, the woman turned to face Elliot. "Thank you."
"Is that your boyfriend?" Elliot asked.
The woman smiled a little. "Uh, no. No, he's my brother." Elliot nodded a little. "Look, he's really not a bad guy. He's just…in a rough spot right now. He's been really out of sorts ever since our dad died a few months ago. He's been seeing a therapist. But I don't know how much that's actually helping. Um, he's always been a little hotheaded. Our mom died in childbirth with him. He was never the same after he found that out." The woman furrowed her eyebrows. "I'm sorry, I don't even know you. You probably don't want to hear all this."
I would've found out eventually anyway.
"Well, anyway, thank you for your help. See ya."
Elliot started to walk away as the woman turned to go up the stairs.
"I'm Mara, by the way," she called after him.
Elliot turned around. "Elliot."
Mara smiled before disappearing into the complex.
"Elliot?"
Elliot looked up from his view of the pavement in front of him to see Mara. He hadn't even realized he was by the same apartment complex from a few nights ago.
"What are you doing here?" Mara smiled.
"Just giving Flipper a walk," he answered.
Mara knelt down next to the small dog. "Is Flipper a boy or a girl?"
"A girl."
She began to pet Flipper. "She's so cute!"
Elliot smiled a little. Mara was kind of cute when she was excited about something.
"Would you like to come inside for a moment?" Mara asked. When she saw Elliot's hesitant look, she quickly added, "Uh, Kellan's not here. He's at work right now. Flipper can come too."
"Sure."
Elliot followed her inside her apartment, hoping to find out a little bit more about her. Things he couldn't find just by hacking her which he had done the night he met her. Once inside, he took off his hoodie, running his fingers through his hair as he did so.
Her apartment was larger than he expected, and it was incredibly pristine. She seemed to be a bit of a neat freak. When he walked in, there was a living room to his right and a kitchenette to his left. Straight ahead was a small hallway that led to three rooms and a bathroom. He concluded that two of the rooms were for her and Kellan and an additional room as extra space.
"Can I make you some coffee?"
"No," Elliot answered quietly. "I don't really drink coffee."
Mara smiled a little. "It's okay, I don't either. I'm that loser who gets a hot chocolate in the middle of July. Well, can I get you anything?"
"No, I'm okay."
"Are you sure? I can make pretty much anything. I'm a whiz in the kitchen."
"I'm not hungry."
"If you say so. I'll just get you a glass of water then." Mara grabbed a glass from the cabinet and filled it up with water before handing it to Elliot.
"Thank you."
Mara went to the living room and sat on one of the sofas. "Flipper!" She patted the seat next to her, and Flipper eagerly hopped up on the chair. Mara smiled as she began petting the dog again. "So, Elliot, what do you do for a living?"
"I work at AllSafe."
"Doing what?"
"I'm a computer engineer"
"Oh, really? You're good with computers?"
"You could say that."
"Maybe someday, you can help me work mine. I'm a complete idiot when it comes to technology. I haven't really had much time to learn when I'm working at the hospital all the time."
She works at Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan and has been a nurse for ten years. She takes shifts all the time, even when it's too much for her to handle. It makes her feel like she's making a difference.
"Which hospital?" Elliot asked, playing dumb.
"Bellevue. I'm a nurse there. It's a hard job, but I love it more than anything. I've wanted to be a nurse ever since I was little. Did you know that you always wanted to work with computers?"
Elliot thought back to the first time he had ever hacked. It had been a library website when he was 11.
"Yes."
Stopping by Mara's apartment eventually became a regular thing for Elliot. He didn't even really realize it until the fourth time he visited her apartment. Then he came to see that unlike before when he and Flipper just walked wherever, he now had a set path to Mara's place. Each time, she welcomed him with open arms.
Mara quickly learned that he wasn't a talker, and he didn't like to be touched. She respected that, and to his relief, she never pried when he didn't answer her questions as much as she would've liked.
There was a knock on Mara's door, and she went to answer it, expecting it to be Elliot. Instead, a woman stood there with messy hair and a lot of makeup on.
"Can I help you?" Mara asked with a polite smile.
"I heard you're friends with Elliot."
"Um, do I know you?"
"I'm Darlene. His sister."
"Oh! Well, come in." Darlene slowly stepped through the doorframe. "Can I get you anything?"
"No, I won't be here long." Mara turned to find that Darlene hadn't moved an inch from the door. "I'm here to tell you to stay away from him."
"Excuse me?"
"Look, Elliot is very quiet and reserved which I'm sure you've noticed by now. He had a girlfriend a few months ago who was the first person he truly opened up to in a really long time. She ended up getting killed, and it destroyed him. If he loses another person, I don't think he could take it."
"Well, I don't really plan on dying any time soon."
Darlene sighed. "Elliot isn't who you think he is. Something happened to him that I still don't fully understand. But long story short, he's been seeing our dead father for the past several months."
"What…what are you talking about?"
"I hate saying it this way, but it's sort of like a Norman Bates thing. Sometimes, he loses himself and the part of his mind that pretends to be our dad takes over. When he comes out of it, he can't remember anything that happened. He didn't even remember that I was his sister for a while. I can see that you care for him because of the way you're reacting to this news right now, but I'm telling you for both of your sakes that the best thing for him is to just stay away from him."
Darlene left Mara's apartment as the girl stood there, still in disbelief at what she had just been told.
Mara had every intention of telling Elliot that for his own safety, he needed to stay away from her. But when he came knocking on her door again, she was reminded of how fragile of a person he really was. It was almost like the tiniest little thing would shatter the inner parts of his mind. She couldn't just keep him from seeing her as she didn't know what his reaction would be.
She began constantly wondering if Elliot saw his dead father in her apartment. Surely she would've realized by now if he was seeing something that wasn't there. Did that mean Darlene was wrong?
There's something wrong with Mara. She used to always be happy to see me. Now whenever I stop by, she looks at me like at any second, she expects me to beat and rob her.
Did she hack me? Was the whole not knowing anything about computers just a cover?
No, that can't be. I hacked her first and I saw that she barely had any time to do anything. Besides, someone like her could never find something on me.
Even still, I don't like the way she's looking at me. I know what I have to do.
He told me.
Mara opened up the door to her apartment and smiled when she saw Elliot with Flipper.
"Hi!" she said brightly. "Come in. Would you like anything to eat? I keep offering thinking that maybe one day you'll change your mind."
Elliot didn't answer as he stepped inside. But only a little bit.
"Why do you do it?" Elliot asked.
"Why do I do what?"
"Look after your brother when he clearly doesn't care about you."
"Excuse me?" The first time she got more than ten words out of him at a time, and this was what he said? "For your information, Kellan does care about me. I know he doesn't exactly show it, but deep down, he cares. We care about each other. Because that's what a family does."
"How do you know though? What if he's only pretending so he gets to push you around and make your life a living hell?"
"Elliot, where is this coming from?"
"If you were to suddenly lose your job, would anyone really care at the hospital? Your coworkers may miss you for a couple days, but life will soon go on. None of the patients you worked so hard to save will ever remember your name."
"Maybe not, but those people are alive because of what I did to help. And even though they may not remember me, I know that I made a difference."
She's lying. I can see her eyes beginning to water. She's grasping at straws, trying desperately to prove me wrong, but I can see that I'm hitting several nerves.
That's good, right? It's what I wanted.
Then why does something inside me feel…guilty?
"Look, I…I think you should go," Mara said with a shaky voice. "Now."
Flipper barked a little as Elliot left Mara's apartment. Mara quickly shut the door behind him before wiping away a tear from her cheek.