Waking to Live - Chapter 4

by gracefultree

A/N: As promised, here is a look at what Ianto has been doing since Jack left his flat. I have another Ianto chapter planned next, followed by one of Jack. We'll see where it goes from there, though I have the overarching plot planned out. It's how the various chapters take form that require a bit of tweaking.

Enjoy!

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Ianto shifted nervously from one foot to the other as he waited. He tried taking a deep breath, but it came out fast and shallow. He felt the beginnings of a panic attack as he stared at the door before him.

Can't put it off any longer, he thought.

He opened the door and stepped into a small waiting area, full of uncomfortable chairs and year-old magazines. He let his breath out. Good, just a normal consultant's office. I can deal with that. I can get through this.

After a few minutes, a short skinny woman with elegant gray hair pulled up in a bun opened the inner door and invited Ianto to join her. He gave her a shaky smile. He felt a wash of calmness flooding his system, and realized that UNIT had assigned him to an empathic therapist. Not a bad thing, he reasoned. And I really feel like I can trust her, like she knows what she's doing. She's signed the Official Secrets Act, so I can talk to her about Torchwood. He paused. Of course I can talk about it. That's what I'm here for!

Her office was neat and reassuringly like a sitting room, if one ignored the desk in the corner. Three armchairs, a love seat, and end tables with small lamps and boxes of tissues.

"Where should I sit?" he asked.

"Anywhere you like is fine," she answered. He picked the armchair that faced the door, which was also farthest away from it, and sat on the edge. She took the chair opposite him. "So, as we discussed on the phone, I'm Robin —"

"I think I'm gay," Ianto blurted, interrupting her. "And I know I'm supposed to be here talking about Canary Wharf, but…"

"Whatever you need to talk about is fine," she said with a kind smile. "Have you been questioning your sexuality for a while?"

He blinked a few times. "A few weeks, I guess," he answered. "It's a long story."

She motioned for him to go on.

"So," he continued. "I think I'm gay. But I can't be gay after what my father did to me, but I think I had an affair with Jack Harkness immediately after the Battle, but he must've retconned me, because I can't remember an entire month, but he came to see me and made sure I had his number, and he looked so sad that maybe he wasn't the one to retcon me after all, but even so, he's Jack Harkness, the Jack Harkness, and I have really vivid dreams of having sex with him, but it can't be real because I'd never let a man touch me like that —"

Robin held up a hand to slow him down, since his words were falling all over themselves as he sped through his story, but he was staring at his clasped hands on his knees and didn't notice, fully committed to telling her everything now that he'd started.

"— And it's been a week since he came by, and I haven't had the courage to call him, and now I'm embarrassed to call, and what if he's angry I didn't call immediately? But I'm just so confused, and the dreams are so amazing, and I've never enjoyed sex as much as I'm enjoying the dreams, but what if I call him and he wants a relationship and I'm not ready and then I hurt his feelings, and I don't think I'm actually ready for sex with anyone right now, not until I get myself figured out, but he's Jack Harkness! Can I afford to let him wait any longer? Can I afford to say no to him?

"But I really can't remember anything that happened that month, and all I have is my diary, and it says I had an affair with 'Jack' but doesn't mention that he's Harkness, but I'm pretty sure it's him, and he's so beautiful, and I've never thought of a man as beautiful before, but he really is, and he seemed so sad last week when I didn't recognize him, and I really want to see him smiling again because he's the kind of man who should be smiling, and when he's smiled in my dreams it just kind of melts me and makes me happy and I want to see that look on his face again. And I think about his voice and I can almost hear him whispering to me at night, saying he loves me, and that feels so wonderful, so I must be gay after all, because otherwise why would it feel so good to have a man say he loves me?"

He paused for a breath and then rushed on.

"My girlfriend Lisa died at Canary Wharf, at least I think she did, and she's listed as 'dead' rather than 'missing and presumed dead' but my diary, vague as it is, seems to say that maybe she survived and I got a job with Jack to help her, and that I betrayed him for it, but she and I haven't been doing so well lately, and I haven't liked the sex in over a year, and I bought an engagement ring because it's the thing you're supposed to do, but never asked her to marry me, and now I don't think I'd want to even if she were alive and I've got to be the worst person ever, having an affair with a man days after my girlfriend died, but the dreams of Jack are so outstanding that I think I want to meet him again, but I'm too scared to do it yet, but I don't want to wait too long, because then he'll move on and I'll have missed my chance with him, and that really scares me, because I know I don't want to lose him, even if I don't know anything else."

He looked up to meet her eyes for the first time.

"And you should know that my father raped me for four years when I was a child and I've never told anyone, not even Lisa, and if I told Jack, which I guess I must have if we were having sex, then I don't remember it, so it's like I didn't tell him, but maybe I didn't, because the diary doesn't mention it at all, so maybe I had sex with him without telling him, and if the dreams are anything to go by, I loved it, but why would I let him touch me after what my father did?

"And lately I've been having nightmares, too, about the Tower falling, and the battle, and about my dad and what he did to me, and in the dreams it really hurts, but I've spent ten years suppressing the memories so I don't really remember them at all, but if I want to be with Jack, I have to deal with them so I'm not afraid, and I don't want to wake him up with nightmares, so I need to deal with those, too, so do you think you can fix me?" he finished in a broken voice. "I don't want to still be broken when I go back to Jack."

Robin looked at him with compassion. "You're not broken, Ianto," she said firmly. "But, yes, I will help you feel better. We can start with relaxation techniques to reduce some of your anxiety, then look at the memories, or dreams, once you're more stable. How does that sound?"

"Good," he replied softly. "Good, yeah, that might be good. I mean, I'll be a nervous wreck when I go back to Jack, but maybe I won't be as bad, if I can work on this."

"You think you want to go back to him? Start a relationship with him?"

"More than anything," Ianto whispered. "When I think of not having him in my life, my chest hurts." He settled back in the chair for the first time. "I'm just scared."

"It's OK to be scared," Robin said. "You've just been through a major traumatic experience, then lost your memories of a month, all on top of questioning your sexuality and a history of sexual abuse that you've never dealt with. We'll take it slow today. You shared a lot, and it sounds like you've been doing a lot of thinking, too. Can you tell me why, aside from the dreams, you think you had an affair with Jack?"

Silently, Ianto handed over his diary. It started with the single entry that started this whole thing, then continued with his thoughts. He'd also taken to writing down his dreams and nightmares, even the erotic ones. Robin read over the first entry while Ianto fidgeted in his chair.

"This is very powerful stuff, Ianto," she said at last.

"You can call him, if you want, just to make sure he doesn't want to hurt me for the betrayal, whatever it was."

"And you'd like to know if he's thinking of you still?" she guessed.

"Well, um, yeah. Didn't think I was being too obvious about that."

"Why don't we talk about that next week? It might be too soon to bring him into the room like that."

Ianto sighed and nodded. For the rest of the session, they talked about anxiety, trauma, and how those things could be affecting his emotional and physical states. She explained that ongoing trauma like he suffered as s child could 're-wire' the brain, and that a lot of their work would be setting the neural pathways back to where they would have been, had all that not happened, as best as they could. He balked at that, but she told him that it was through talking, not alien technology, so he didn't have anything to worry about. She also told him that his overall personality wouldn't change, since so many people worried about that when they did this kind of work. They didn't discuss medication, though Ianto figured it was only a matter of time. He'd probably need something to be able to sleep, after all.

"Keep the diary for the week," he said as she escorted him from the room at the end of their meeting. "It's almost full and I can just start a new one anyway."

"Thank you, Ianto, for trusting me," she said. "I know it must be hard."

"I think it's time. I have a reason to look at all this stuff. I have a goal to work towards."

"And that goal is?"

"Jack."