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27. Counsellingthe whole human mankind is fit for it

R.

"You're kidding right?" I can't believe that, what he told me minutes ago was true. While he was telling me a wave of dizziness hit me, and I don't know whether the reason for it was the fact that I constantly feel like shit since months, or what he told me.

"I'm not." He says. I look at him, our eyes lock and I see what I haven't seen for so long: worry and concern. I feel the world spinning around me and his words are swirling around in my head. There is only confusion and no matter how clear the words were, I can't embrace them. I don't understand them, not their meaning. I take a deep breath, hoping this will clear my mind. I'm rubbing my temples in circles, hoping for relieve in my pounding head. Had this pounding been there before he told me, or is this just some kind of shock I'm in? Shock; This is the best explanation.

"But you don't have to worry. I and my…our older brothers will get tested and I'm sure one of us will be a suitable match and…" Sandy starts rambling, and even more words are dancing around in my head and I'm running short on space up there.

"Stop right there. This is not about the donation thing right now." Honestly, what is this about anyway? Sandy was the father figure I was craving for, since I can think about it. The desire of wanting him as my father never stopped, even after he behaved just like all the others. And now? Now I have to put him on the same level like Seth and Trey. How is this possible? He never had seemed like a brother to me. Like a friend, yes, but brother?

"And about what is this?" Kirsten asks me.

"I…I don't know, but this …is twisted, I…oh God." I can't express what's pressing against each wall from the inside, cracking what I've built up as protection and now making me want to explode. I try to find words so the pressure will subside, but I seem to choke on the few meaningless words I can express.

"Ryan, honey." I feel Kirsten's hand on my arm. I feel Sandy's pressuring look burning my skin. He wants a sensible reaction, but I can't offer him one. Hell, I need a sensible reaction from myself, but I can't find one. How to react when you find out that the man you've been picturing as your father for so long is actually your half brother? I'm Seth' uncle, how mad is that? And Kirsten? She'll never be a mother, because she's my sister in law. I feel sick. Nausea is slowly creeping into my guts.

"Ryan honey, say something." Kirsten starts pleading. I look at her, and I look into those never ending worried eyes. Since we met again, I haven't seen another expression than this concerned one and it makes me furious. Since I'm back, everyone's life is turning upside down again, and I can't but think that I might be one reason for that. I'm not only a reason. I'm the core of all those life shaking events. It's me who is sick and thus dictates the others' lives turning around my sickness, and added to that it's me who's having a half brother everybody used to refer to as my almighty father, who just turned out to lose it like everyone else. I feel the nausea win the battle over my still calm stomach.

"Sorry." I excuse myself and flee into direction of the bathroom. On the way my stomach performs flip flops and I my guts are churning. I can reach the toilet bowl just in time as my stomach starts to throw out what has settled in just half an hour ago. My stomach doesn't need long for getting rid of almost everything I've been eating over the last few days, as it nearly comes to nothing anyway. The only fight, which remains, is the one to calm down my stomach, which is still cramping. I take several deep shaky breaths. My nerves are on the edge. I never thought that such few sentences containing any mean words could get to me like that. Great, now I'm not only physically weak, but even mentally. Everything seems to be too much. I have to block the shit from others only because they're useless protecting themselves and now when I have to fight my own battle and really could use some peace and quiet time – me-time – another bomb explodes and my whole inner life, including thoughts and feelings, is shredded into pieces. It's not like it took me never ending time to get all this shit back into order. Everything is a mess again, and I know that I have to get it back into order if I want to make my peace with it, but I can't. How to?

I hear a soft knock on the door. I want to be alone right now, but I can't do this to them. Their expression told me that they've been at least as shocked as I've been. I can't run away from them, because this is not about me, it's about them as well and anyway, physically I'm not capable of anything right now.

"Are you okay Ryan?" I hear Kirsten asking me.

"Not sure." I answer her. This is absolutely pathetic. This is like begging for help. This can't be me talking. I never needed help with anything and I'm reluctant to be needy now. I watch the door crackling slightly open.

"Can I come in?" She's peaking through the slit that she'd opened. I shrug my shoulders, aware that she sees it and she'll take it as a 'yes'. She sits down next to me. It's strange. It used to be Sandy who came after me for 'the talk'. Now it's Kirsten and I've never thought it would be her I'd trust more.

"It's quite a shock, huh?" She asks me. I shrug my shoulders again, as I'm not ready for talking yet. Not only because I'm lacking of matching words for expressing what I feel, but also because my head isn't clear yet.

"But you know nothing is going to change, unless you want it to. We're still the older ones and thus the ones, who have to take care of the young ones. We …should consider this as some kind of confirmation of our family. We are undeniably a family."

"Right and …exactly this is the problem." I spout out.

"Well, given the fact of what had happened, I don't blame you. You gave up hope on us being a family and I understand it. But maybe this is another argument for giving us a second chance."

"You're talking about chances, but would you mind to explain to me, what exactly this chance is supposed to look like, as letting you back into my life and allowing you to treat me like a handicapped child doesn't seem to be enough for you." I didn't mean to sound bitter, but right now I don't have control over this. I've lost the ability of covering up my emotions years ago, at minimum when I started to be sick. There is the urgent need to get the truth out as long as it is possible. I don't want to leave people in limbo they never can escape from, because I didn't talk the truth when I've been still able to. It's not because it is unfair, but it's what I wanted if it wasn't me who was actually dying, if I was the one remaining. There shouldn't be any unanswered question, though I don't believe in ghosts or anything like that. Therefore I shouldn't care about things like that, but I care about the people and I don't want to leave them restless. They deserve the peace after I'm gone. It is as simple like that.

"Hey, what's this supposed to mean? I thought we had called truce. I thought we had worked things out, and now that?"

"It just doesn't feel right anymore, no matter how hard I try and now with this news on top, I doubt I can even force myself for making it feel right. I can't any longer pretend anything."

"So you've been pretending all the time."

"No…well, I'm not sure. Look: you're friends, very good friends, but that's all I can feel for you. I'll never be able to feel for you as my family. But with this above my head I feel obliged to feel that, but I just can't." It's so hard to explain these things to someone, who has an entire different point of view of things. She didn't live what I lived. It's impossible for her to understand.

"And you couldn't have said something earlier? I mean, it would have made a lot of things easier for me – us. I'd known when to back off and what to expect and probably had lowered my expectations in you." She's scolding me and I can understand it. For months they were walking like on egg shells around me, only because I'm some kind of ticking time bomb nobody is sure whether it'll explode some time or not.

"No, I couldn't. I'm sorry, but for me it's not as easy to…somehow make sense out of my emotions."

"Because that's so difficult." The irony in her sentence doesn't go unnoticed by me.

"Yes, for me it is. My Mom never comforted me and asked me what was wrong, when I was sad. I got a beating instead. Nobody ever made an effort to find out what was making me angry, beating me up instead, and when I came here nothing changed. Your and Sandy's outburst were nothing different. When I expressed my concerns about what was going on I was screamed at, slapped into the face and insulted. Not that you ever showed too much concern about how I felt anyway, 'cause every teenager enjoys being abandoned by his mother and put into an environment in which he converts from human being into an alien. I was entirely alienated and nobody cared. Nobody cared that I didn't fit in, let alone from helping me to fit in a way which didn't make me forget who I was. Everybody kept and keeps stomping on my feelings, but never anybody cared helping me to cope with them. And learning it now is a fucking hard process and instead of supporting me, you blame me, because it doesn't go fast enough for you. I'm sorry, but I simply didn't learn how to express my emotions and how to find out what they're telling me, or where they're coming from." I have to get rid of this, because for far too long it felt like poison intoxicating my mind and body. I needed to purge my system from this. It made me sick. I can only hope that she understands now and that this is enough for her. I can't give her more, not now.

"Did you get counselling?" I should have seen this coming.

"I had some trouble in my first semester…well…and my professors said if I wanted to stay, I had to give it a shot. Hadn't been my favourite course, but it helped me to understand some things, though." I admit.

"I'm an asshole." I'm stunned; these words from her mouth? What's that? I look at her confused.

"I knew from the beginning that you're life before us hadn't been peachy and I listened to it with my own ears and I saw it with my own eyes. I know that life here had been far away from being nice, after I started drinking and I can remember every single mean word I said to you and every inappropriate name I called you and every accusation I made about you. But still. I can't warp my head around that fact that you're different from Seth and all the other kids around here. I still expect you to behave and react like them. I'm stupid." Wow, Kirsten Cohen blaming herself for something. I've never witnessed that before. This is odd and awkward at the same time. And it's cruel. It's easy to say 'yes' and tell her, it's her fault, but I cannot deny my own responsibility. My silence about my past life and how I experienced it caused some of the uneasiness between all of us.

"Let's share the blame. I could have been more explicit about how I grew up. Probably would've saved some of the trouble we went through." I watch her cracking a smile. At least I rescued this situation. She shifts a little closer to me and wraps an arm around my shoulders.

"You said friends?"

"Very good friends" I reply.

"Very good friends, like you and Seth are?"

"We're rather like a symbiosis, but yeah."

"I think I can live with that, 'cause I don't have to change my behaviour then." She smirks.

"Yeah, being babbly and clingy must be genetic."

"I take it that everything is okay again?"

"Not yet, I think I need to go out for a while." Otherwise the roof will collapse above my head.

"Ryan?"

"I won't run away, I'll go with Seth. He'll probably have a lot of inappropriate comments about this upon his sleeve."

"This might be true."