Inhale. Cinnamon, old leather, and a dash of perfume saturate the office. Pause—it's more than a dash of perfume. Much, much more. Inhale, a bigger breath, focused on the scents of the fragrance. They are: peaches, vanilla, and musk from an animal.
"…Hayden, you're drifting off again." He blinks twice, comes back down to Earth. "Sorry," he says, thumbing at the growing hole in the knee of his jeans. He really needs to buy a new pair. "Where were we again?"
Dr. Murphy sits up. Her first name is Montserrat, and she has never worn a wedding band at any of these little sessions. Hayden doesn't like to pry, though, so the Mystery of Murphy will stay just that until she ever decides to tell him anything about herself. And that'd only be fair; after all, he's told her plenty. Although, he muses, plenty by my standards probably isn't that much. And besides, that's not how these things are supposed to work. She is the doctor—psychiatrist, he reminds himself— and he is the patient. It's his job to bare his soul so that he can "get better," not hers.
"Your brother invited you to his birthday party this past Saturday. Did you go?"
"Yes." A lie.
"Really?" The smile comes easily enough to Dr. Murphy, though it doesn't quite reach her eyes. Hayden grits his teeth. Caught.
But he decides to continue anyway. "Yes," he says again. "It was fun, too. I got a girl's number and everything."
The easy smile is gone, turned into a pitying frown. "Hayden, this is a safe space. You don't have to lie to me. It's not good for you, and it's a waste of my time."
Is it him, or has the hole in his jeans gotten even bigger since he's been sitting here? "Sorry," Hayden says again.
"Could you tell me why you didn't end up going to the party like you promised you would?"
"Business came up."
"I see." Murphy's not convinced, of course. "Don't bullshit me, Hayden."
He sighs. "I arrived at Claw, walked in, and then promptly walked out."
"Why, Hayden? Why did you feel the need to leave?"
Oh, I don't know, Dr. Murphy. Maybe it was the incredibly loud, incomprehensible trap music; or the smell of sex and sweat, even in the VIP section; or the fact that by the time I got there, Zane and Peter were already so drunk that they were nearly having an orgy with two barely-legal girls—and one barely-legal boy—in front of their wives. Taking all that into consideration, I don't know what could've possibly made me leave, Dr. Murphy. Hayden wants to laugh at himself; he sounds like a curmudgeonly old man. "It hurt to be there," he tells her. That's the truth, when you get right down to it.
"It was too much," Dr. Murphy says, nodding as if she's waiting for him to confirm the assessment she's made of his feelings. He nods for her in return, and she continues, "A sensory overload."
"Yes."
"Would you consider it to be a triggering experience?"
"I would."
She sighs, but her easy smile returns. "That's okay. You tried. Let's take it as a sign of progress…"
Dr. Murphy has beautiful bookshelf, furnished with equally beautiful books, Hayden realizes, all leather-bound and gilded in gold and silver. Must be where the leather smell comes from. It certainly doesn't come from the cheap IKEA couch he's been sitting on for the past 30 minutes. The bookshelf, along with its leather books and their leather smell, is a new addition to her office. And a nice one, too.
"You like Machiavelli?" he asks. That catches Dr. Murphy off guard. "E‑excuse me?"
"You have The Prince up on your bookshelf." Hayden points to where the book is: third shelf, at the very end of the row on the right-hand side, smaller than most of the others but bound in red leather. Impossible to miss, really. Dr. Murphy seems embarrassed, and he feels embarrassed for embarrassing her. "There's nothing wrong with liking Machiavelli or The Prince—"
"You drifted again. We're not here to talk about me, Hayden, we're here to talk about you." She sounds angry now. The anger is measured, controlled, but it's there, roiling right beneath the surface of her genial façade. Hayden almost apologizes again, but he knows that'll be the third "sorry" he will have said during this session, and words lose their meaning if you say them too often. Instead he says, "You're right, Doctor. Please, continue."
Not skipping a beat, Dr. Murphy asks, "How have your nightmares been?"
Unbearable. "Manageable."
"And the migraines?"
Also unbearable. "Also manageable."
"Any more hallucinations?"
"…They still come and go."
"So their frequency is about the same or less?"
"…About the same."
"But you can still tell when you're hallucinating."
"Yes. Well, the dog brings me out of it."
"And these hallucinations have remained consistent? That is, content-wise, they're the same?"
"I still see fire and war." And sometimes the sky looks like its about to fall and crush me.
"And the nightmares have remained the same as well?"
A dark basement, heavy steps on the creaking staircase down, down, down, into the gloom where He put them; He, who itches and irritates in Hayden's mind and soul without a day of reprieve. "Yes." The hole in the knee of his pants has definitely gotten bigger. Serves me right for picking at it…
"I see," Dr. Murphy says, more to herself than to him. She takes out her pen, starts writing on a small notepad. "Well, you've only been taking the sertraline and paroxetine for about seven weeks, so I'm not too surprised that we haven't seen much improvement yet." She writes and writes and writes her notes. The room doesn't smell like cinnamon and leather anymore. It smells like nothing.
After a few more minutes of "Why?" and "How does that make you feel?" Dr. Murphy finally—finally—lets him leave.
The Metro ride from Union Station to DuPont Circle is only a few stops, but by the time he gets home, Hayden's ready to collapse. Eat, then sleep. Cerberus nuzzles against thigh, clearly wanting a taste of the rigatoni pasta dinner he's making.
"Nuh-uh, dogs aren't supposed to have pasta." Another nuzzle. "No, Cerberus." This time, the black lab barks. "Okay, okay, fine. You know, I thought that they trained you service dogs not to beg?"
Cerberus barks happily when Hayden fills his food bowl with pesto-covered pasta. "I guess this is what I get for spoiling you."
"How's the dog working out?"
"The dog is the only thing that's worked out pretty well."
Hayden feels a hesitant smile tug at the edges of his mouth. "Finish up dinner and then we'll go sleep, buddy." 6:30pm is early to go to bed, even for him, but he feels a great tiredness in his bones. "Yeah, eat, then sleep."
Reclining back on his couch with a bowl of pasta, Hayden pulls out his phone to check his messages. Shit, my phone's been on silent all day?
The home screen displays five texts from Peter, a voicemail from Zane, 100 unread emails, and a battery at 35%. Hayden decides to check Peter's texts first:
Pete (10:00am)
hey hayden where were u on sat?
Pete (12:00pm)
i know ur bad at checking your phone but cmon man
Pete (1:00pm)
hayden answr me plz
Pete (2:00pm)
HAYDEN. HAYDEN, ARE YOU ALIVE?
Pete (3:00pm)
okay, u don't want to talk. I just want to know how youre doing. zane says you haven't shown up to work in a while. I'm here for you brother
Hayden's ribs make a cracking sound when he exhales. He writes, "I'm okay," then backspaces just when he's about to press SEND, and decides to listen to Zane's voicemail instead.
Sup, Hayden? We missed you at my birthday party on Saturday. My wife says
she saw you come in for a few minutes and leave looking a little green. Man,
are you still sick? I haven't seen you at the office for weeks, and Lizardi is
starting to worry about you. What's going on with you, Hayden? I went over
to your house today and your butler told me that you moved out? …Call me
when you can.
Just as Hayden is about to dial Zane, his phone starts to ring with his brother's name in the caller ID. Hayden clears throat, presses ANSWER.
"…Hello?"
"Hey, there he is! Sup, Brother? Pete's been trying to reach you all day."
"Er, I've been—"
"Busy, we all know. But busy with what, exactly, nobody knows. You haven't come in to work for almost two months. You working for another firm or something? I heard that Lizardi wanted to make you partner…"
Hayden feels a migraine coming on. Heavy drums pound at the back of his eyelids. "No, I'm not working for another firm."
"That's a relief, haha! I was only screwing with you, you know. Still, two months is a long time, Hayden."
"I know. I've decided to—," Take an indefinite leave of absence,"—take a year-long sabbatical."
Loud laughter on the other line—gregarious, obnoxious, Zane.
"You're not some tenured prof at a university, Brother. We have cases, the Hamilton Group just did a megaton document dump on us; you can't just up and leave."
Pounding, pounding, pounding drums. Go away.
"I'm sick, Zane. I can't work right now."
"And that's another thing, you haven't told me or Peter or Lizardi or even our sister what you have. Sis is convinced that you've come down with cancer or lupus or something."
"I don't have cancer or lupus."
"Then what the fuck, man? What are you so sick with that you can't work?"
Pounding, pounding, crACK! "It's really none of your fucking business, Zane."
"None of my business? None of my business? I'm your brother, asshole. But if you don't want to talk, then fine. By the way, I'll be borrowing your Bentley for the time being."
Wait. What? "Don't touch my car."
"Too late. Besides, it's not like you really need it in DuPont or Foggy Bottom or wherever the hell you're living right now."
"Zane."
"Don't worry, I'll be paying you a visit tomorrow, soon as I get that butler of yours to tell me your new address, and you'll get to see her. But until you come back to work or tell me what the fuck is wrong with you, I'll be driving her around."
"Zane, you get the hell away from my car right now. Zane. Zane! ZANE!" The other side of the line clicks and then dies. If that kid scratches my car…
Hayden looks down at the bowl of pasta in his lap; it's cold now, and he's no longer hungry. "Leftovers for tomorrow. C'mon, boy, let's go to bed." In the morning he'll try to go to the gym. That'll be pleasant. He hasn't exercised since he got Cerberus. Three weeks without going to the gym…tomorrow is going to be pain city. After that, he'll head to the bookstore; maybe try to make some light conversation.
"Have you always had social anxiety?"
"No. Er, well, at least I don't think so. I've always been a little shy, but that's not abnormal…right?"
"No, shyness is not abnormal. But these feelings that you're having around people, even family members—that's abnormal. From now on, every day until we are done with our sessions, I want you to have a long conversation with a stranger."
Oh yes: tomorrow is definitely going to be pain city.