Close; \ˈklōs\ to be near
A/N: Written for the prompt: "memories"; uses an outside character from a prior story of mine - "Faith"
"Were you close with your brother?" The departmental shrink sits in a chair opposite me. His legs are relaxed, slightly open, as are his arms. He is watching me intently. So, I sit with my legs relaxed, slightly open, and keep my arms that way as well. Body posture, an important tell as to how someone is feeling.
"Close?" I copy cat his words, reflecting them back to him, in the same analytic style he is trying to use with me.
"Close. Were you close?" He sticks to the question, his posture doesn't change. I do not change my posture either, though I really would like to cross my arms over my chest and I can feel a scowl wanting to form on my face. I have no patience for this. Unfortunately I have the time. Or I should say, the time is required of me. An hour a week for 8 weeks. 8 hours for this ya-hoo psych degree to crack my skull.
"Close." I say the word again, as if I'm giving it some thought. I am not - I am not giving my relationship with my brother any thought with this guy.
My brain starts with the rapid fire questioning of myself. What does it mean to be close? Talking regularly? Sharing good times? Was I close to Frank? Who am I close to? What am I close to? I skip to the fact that I was close to grabbing a hold of Captain Ross and throwing him up against the wall. That's part of what landed me here.
"A memory perhaps. What comes to mind when I ask you about Frank?" the guy asks me.
This time I break posture, I shift slightly in my seat. A memory. I hate this part. When it comes to my family, my personal life, my memory is like swiss cheese. For work, I can remember if a suspect's shoes are laced differently, I can recall the slight almost imperceptible increase in the speed with which they are talking that lets me know they are getting uncomfortable in the conversation, I have a clear memory of the smell of them, when they break from neutral to sweaty as I get close to the truth.
"A memory." I repeat, but this time I'm not being strategic and purposefully reflecting the word back, I'm stalling for time.
"With Frank." The shrink stays on message.
"I remember him teaching me how to throw a football." I offer. The image floods my brain.
"Uh-huh," the shrink mumbles some neutral noise indicating I should say something further. I hadn't planned on it. But, I realize that keeping me talking is part of the game.
"I remember Frank placing my fingers across the laces, showing me how to hold the ball in my hand." As I say my brother's name, it feels heavy in the back of my throat. The thought of my brother makes me feel heavy.
Strangely, I watch the shrink's facial expression lighten. He feels he is getting some where with me. I like that he thinks that. He needs to think that. I figure that by the end of our miraculous 8 hours together, he needs to think that I'm the picture of mental health. Well, he at least needs to think I'm coping.
"Good, good," the shrink says, and I suppress a smile. The football was too big for my hand, I could never seem to get my grip quite straight. So, when I would throw the ball, it was always off kilter and never achieved any semblance of a spiral. Frank grew frustrated quickly, and sent the ball in a perfect super sonic spiral directly at me, it hit me in the head, knocking me down, almost knocking me out. I feel like saying – no, not good, good. In fact, the memory is rather a bad one. It's not about sharing good times. Was I close to Frank?
"Yeah, it took a while, but I got pretty good at throwing a football." I say, and that part is partially true. I spent the next months teaching myself to throw a football, with images of returning the favor to Frank. The shrink is nodding, as if we are really getting somewhere.
"Were you close?" I'm sitting at my desk in the squad, looking at Eames. She rifling through some papers, this is the third time through them.
"What?" She's distracted by the task at hand, her tone is short.
"Your family, would you describe it as close?" I ask. I don't know it means – to be close. I've been searching my memories, trying to figure out what makes a family close. Eames stops what she's doing and looks at me. I watch her lips compress as she thinks. I wonder if she's thinking about whether or not her family was close or if she's thinking about why I'm asking.
"I guess," she says, and I want to point out that's not really an answer. "Why?" She turns it around to me.
"What's your earliest memory, with your brother?" I ask, trying out a rendition of my shrink's question on someone else. Maybe a memory of hers will show me what it means to be close. "
My earliest memory is with my sister," Eames replies, without hesitation. "We are in the bathroom, she has me sitting on a stool. She's cutting my hair. I'm like 2 or something. So, I don't have much hair. But she's cutting it anyway. Beauty shop, she calls it." Eames is back to looking at the papers.
"Your sister cut off all your hair?" I say, wondering why Eames is smiling over that particular memory. I'm still thinking about what it means to be close, and this memory of hers does not seem like an example.
"It grew back," Eames shrugs, and starts rifling through the papers. I reach out and retrieve a piece of paper from the pile of papers in her hands. The piece of paper she is looking for. She looks at me, shakes her head, but she smiles a bit, appreciating that I helped her find what she was looking for.
I'm restless so I get up to walk around, hating that I can find a piece of paper among 50 without giving it any thought, but I cannot seem to organize the memories of my life, I can not figure out what it means to be close. I cannot figure out why I miss my brother. I shouldn't miss him. He was a mess, he was a drain, he wasn't around for our mother, his drug abuse made him a parasite. But, he wasn't always high. When we were kids he wasn't high.
"…about your brother," she says, but I've missed the first part of the sentence. I snap my mind back into focus. Well, as much focus as I can muster. She's looking at me, her hazel eyes focused on mine.
"What about my brother?" I ask. I'm still not back in focus, so I shake my head slightly, rubbing the heel of my hand across my forehead. My head hurts.
"Bobby…" she says my name, her voice - compassionate. I smile to myself. I'm talking with a nun. Well, not just any nun. I think of her as my nun. I wonder if that's what makes her compassionate – the fact that she's a nun. I decide against that. I've known plenty of religious people, and not many of them are compassionate. But, she is. And, that's why I keep coming back to this place. That's why I turn up unannounced and knock at the back door to the bakery and hope that she is there and she will let me in.
"You asked me, about my brother." I say, and for the life of me I cannot remember what we were talking about. I look at her. She's young, much younger than me. I wonder how she chose her life. She says her life chose her. I'm not sure that I believe that. She rarely talks about herself. I wonder if she has a brother. She looks down, away from me for a moment, and I study the freckles sprinkled across her nose.
"What are you thinking about?" She asks, returning her gaze to mine. I realize that she is not going to repeat what she said before.
"Nothing," I reply, and that is the truth. I am thinking about nothing. I'm at that point where I've spent so much time thinking about everything at once, my brain has seized and I'm thinking about nothing.
"How do you do that?" Unexpectedly, she smiles as if she knows that I cannot actually think about nothing.
"I'm thinking about the freckles on your nose," my words surprise me, "and about whether you have a brother."
"I do," she admits, "two, in fact. Both older."
"Are you close with your brothers?" I ask, using my shrink's question on her.
"Not close in age, they're 8 and 10 years older than me. But we are close. We share a life. Some of it good, some of it bad, but shared all the same. Is that what you mean? By close?" Her words cut straight through all of the noise in my brain.
I lean forward onto my hands. I sigh, I can feel the weight of myself rise and fall. I filter through the scattered memories of my brother, of my mother, of my life. I was close with my brother. I miss my brother. Not an easy life, but a close life. A shared life.
Close; \ˈklōz\ to come to an end