A/N: Okay, here begins the cheese. Out of all the chapters, this is my favorite, and probably the most muddled. Emma's character gets a lot more definition, but, in my head at least, not enough. Again, Work-In-Progress, people. Suggestions loved. Hate it? Like it? Lemme know!

Session Six

I should have been able to predict that she'd be here. I step in, looking like hell, my hair practically standing on end on its own, wearing an old ratty thin t-shirt and a pair of cords. And there sits Emma. Prim and proper in another seat next to my usual one. Red curls are up in a perfect knot and she's dressed casually in a black button down and some khaki capri pants that let her calves peek out. She's wearing a pair of black flip flops. So cool and comfortable. She smiles up at me and I sigh. I had been keeping what I've said in here to myself, not telling Emma, Emma didn't need to know about that side of me. Not yet, at least.

"Hi..." I stutter out after staring at her for a moment.

"Hi." She smiles at me. Dr. Lopez's voice snaps me out of my lull.

"Sit down, Mark and we'll start." I can do nothing but obey. I offer Emma a little grin and raise my eyebrows as if to convey to her I can't wait to see what we're headed into now. She smiles back at me confidently.

"So, Emma." Dr. Lopez begins. "Do you have any idea why you're here?"

"Not really..." Her voice trails off and she looks at me with concern.

"Well..." She continues. "Mark and I discussed yesterday that he doesn't really open up to many people, and he explained that he does a lot of talking to you when he has a problem. I figured that having you tell him some of your concerns will...alert him to them a little more than my saying them."

"So you dragged me in here to point out Mark's faults? How is that going to help him?" Emma: 1. Lopez: 0.

"Because you obviously think that he's got some things that aren't exactly healthy going on, so why not share them? Do you think that it would be fair of you to keep them to yourself?" Emma: 1. Lopez: 1.

"No. But I don't think it's fair that you're asking me to berate him. If he starts doing something that I think is harmful to himself..."

"You think that putting his hand through a window isn't harmful?"

"I'm RIGHT HERE!" I shout. Emma and Dr. Lopez look at me apologetically. "Jesus! I mean...I understand that you're trying to help, but come on! I don't want to sit here and listen to you bicker about what's good for me and what isn't! If I'm fucking up, tell me I'm fucking up and get it over with, give her what she wants!" I look at Emma and she averts her eyes. I stare at Dr. Lopez. "And if she doesn't have anything to say, don't dig on her because she wants me to do this on my own."

"Fine." Emma begins with a wave of her hand. "Fine. I worry, you know I worry about you. I've told you that much, and...I don't know." She lets out a long sigh. "You and Roger are vicious to each other, and I've seen the way that you guys just...tear each other apart. It makes me angry that you let him, though. No matter what you say to him, he doesn't care. He can brush anything off, but you can't. You act like you can, and you pretend like it doesn't bother you, and you push it away and shrug it off and ignore it, but I know it sits and festers and grows into something ugly. And then you and Roger can have a little fight about who didn't go grocery shopping when they were supposed to, you can just..." She brings her hand up in an elegant sweep and snaps her fingers. It's hard to believe that a motion so flawless can be in reference to something to gruesome. "Snap. You can...just...break. I've seen it, I've seen you go nuts." She turns to Dr. Lopez. "Is nuts a bad word?" Dr. Lopez motions for her to continue. "I don't know...it's scary. I mean...I can sort of sense when you're on your last leg of patience. And I try to stay away from you. I don't like having to avoid you..."

I stay silent. Emma clears her throat a little. Dr. Lopez instigates.

"Mark?" Dammit.

"No one says you have to stay away from me, Emma..." I start, annoyed.

"What am I supposed to do? I don't want to be the one to set you off, so..."

"So staying away from me is going to do me a hell of a lot of good. Not being available when you're the only person who listens to me..." Emma cuts me off.

"No. That is not true, I'm not the only one who listens, I'm just the only one you talk to. And I don't know why you feel the need to come to me every time you have a problem."

"Oh, sorry to be such a burden, Emma, I didn't know it was such a chore for you!"

"Get off the cross, Mark!" She cuts me off again and I shut my mouth. "You're not some...some lost little boy who can't convey emotions, you're not...I'm not going to feel bad for you for this!"

"Let me guess, because it's my own fault, everything is my fault..."

"Here we go again with the self loathing! That's all I hear from you! How you can't do this, and you can't say that, and you want this and you want that and you aren't doing this, you aren't doing that, and this is all your fault, and why is everything your fault?"

"Emma..." I mutter. I want her to stop talking. Now.

"Everyone's problems don't center from you, Mark. You aren't the cause of the world's troubles. Just your own. You're your own worst enemy, and in turn...you're making everyone else your enemy."

"Emma." Sharper, clearer.

"You've got to fix yourself, figure out what the hell makes you hate yourself so much before you can figure out why other people are staying clear of you."

"Emma!" I shout now. She cringes and quiets herself. Dr. Lopez stares at us.

"Let her continue, Mark."

"No, I don't have anything more to say..." Emma spits. I cringe.

"Liar..." I accuse. Emma stares at me.

"It takes one to know one." And then I feel something break, just like Emma said I do.

"How? How am I a liar, what have I done to lie to you!?"

"Mark, your whole attitude is a lie! Your whole...whole...demeanor is a lie! You put on this happy face for everyone and act like it's really you! And it isn't!" Her hands move in a fluttery wave. "I know what you're really like, you've shown me! You're not always happy, and you're not always willing to listen and you're not always dedicated to the interests of others."

"Oh...stop it! You don't know jack about who I am! I've shown you nothing...nothing! Don't get all high and mighty, like you're the resident Markologist. You're not! No one is!" I'm standing now and Emma stands as well.

"Why do you do this, Mark?" She asks, voice high and shouting. "Why do you open up to people and then...negate it, like it never happened? I don't get it!"

"Because it doesn't mean anything! I say things to you that don't mean anything, I'm a liar, remember?"

"Don't twist my words around!" She slings back. I blink and put my hands up.

"Don't act like you know everything, Emma. Don't act like you can fix me!"

"What needs fixing, Mark!?" She asks me.

"I don't know, Emma! That's all Dr. Lopez ever asks me, do you think that if we knew we'd need you? Do you think that if I knew I'd be here? I wouldn't, I'd be at home, dealing with...whatever this is on my own!" Turning my head, I scramble to pick up my bag.

"Mark, where are you going?" Dr. Lopez asks.

"Away, away from here." I mutter, tugging my backpack on.

"Mark, we have 20 more minutes and you're not running out of here..."

"Watch me." I spit, heading towards the door.

"Mark..." Emma starts.

"No!" I open the door and slam it behind me. But I don't move. I listen. I hear Emma sink back into her chair. I hear Dr. Lopez shift.

"I don't know how to help him, Emma. I don't know what I can do, every time we make any slip of progress he does this. He pulls away and we need to start from square one again..." Dr. Lopez's distinctly authoritative voice is almost desperate. Pleading.

"I know. I know, that's how he is with everything. I--we...we'll share something, he'll tell me something and then act like...it never happened."

I collapse against the door, sitting helplessly on the rug and I just...listen.

"You care about him, Emma. Don't you?"

"Of course I do! Of course I care about him, but it's so hard to have to leave everything up to him. I can't make any decisions about us, because it's bound to inconvenience him. He's got this big master plan--or so it seems--and I don't fit into it and he's thrown off by my presence in his life. He's just...it's...I don't even know what to describe it as anymore..." Emma's voice trails off.

"Emma...what do you want from Mark. In any sense..."

"I want him to stop thinking that one spontaneous action is going to ruin his life. I want him to stop having these deep conversations with me that mean nothing. I want him to stop being scared of change. He doesn't understand that he has to change and adjust to fit things. He thinks that he can go on living his life this way, this...lost, hopeless miserable way! I want him to stop being so indifferent about things..." She pauses and I can hear her leaning against the squeaky leather of the chair. Or maybe she's standing, I can't tell.

"How do you feel about him?"

Oh God.

"I--I don't know. He won't let me feel anything about him, that's the problem."

"But if he would, Emma. What are you capable of feeling about him? What do you see in him that's good, rather than bad."

There's a long, drawn out, excruciating pause.

"I see something that no one else sees. I don't know what it is, but it's there. I just can't reach it, he won't let me get in and pull it out of him. I can't even convince him that it's there. I want this all to stop, God..." I hear footsteps. "I want him to stop closing himself off to me, that's why he's here, right? So he'll start talking? I just...I don't even know if I want talking, I just want him to figure out what the hell he wants so he can tell me and I can accommodate. I want to help him, Dr. Lopez and I don't know why I can't. I feel like there's nothing I can do to fix him because he won't let me see how."

"I know, Emma...I know how hard it is to tear words out of someone whose mouth is sewn shut like Mark's."

"No, it's not his mouth! It's his head, his heart, his thoughts, his feelings. They're behind something, some big wall of...something!" Her voice shakes. I hear rustling of something.

"Keep going, this is helping both of us. And it'll help Mark in the long run." Dr. Lopez's pearls of fucking wisdom.

"I---I--I don't know! It's just hard. I love him. Okay? I've said it, I love him and that's too big for him. I wish he'd just...I don't know! I've tried to tell him that I loved him. He senses it, he senses that the words are going to come out of my mouth and he changes the subject, or he leaves, or he goes off on a tangent so I forget. But I don't forget. God, I just want to be like...four or five again when if you had a problem, you fixed it with some cookies and it was over." She pauses again, paces. "I've tried, I mean...to fix him. But he just...holds so much in. I didn't know one person was capable of repressing so much. So he just...keeps it all locked up and it runs out in little spurts. He takes it out on me, Roger, the fucking weather. Or a window. All the things that don't matter in the scheme of it all. He just needs to breathe, step back and look at the big picture. He needs to stop being hooked on the small and meaningless and just look at it all. Assess things that way. If he doesn't do that then...then he won't get over the bigger things that are slowly...tearing him inside out."

"I understand."

"I don't know if I can do this much longer."

"Do what?" Dr. Lopez's voice gets a little quieter.

"Love him and get nothing back."

The words hit me like a steady blow to the chest. I lean back and curl my knees up a little, ears still perked to their conversation. But all I'm getting now is silence. I can imagine they way they're looking at each other in there. Emma, confused and in need of answers. Dr. Lopez having the same problem. Neither of them have answers.

"I need you to fix him, Dr. Lopez. Maybe not fix him. Just...show him it's not a bad thing if he's upset. That it's not a bad thing to be sensitive..."

"We'll keep in touch, Emma. This has been very...informing to say the least."

I scramble to stand. My legs carry me towards the elevator, but not fast enough. The ominous click of the door tells me that this is it. I take this head on now or never.

"Mark..." Her voice is faint. I turn and she's stalking towards the elevator like a woman with a mission. I stand there, the button to indicate that I want out...not yet pressed.

"Yeah..." I mutter as she nears me.

"I thought you left." Red-handed.

"No. I stayed. Listened. I was just sick of yelling." Which is true. I didn't need that. I couldn't yell at her anymore. I couldn't listen to her yell at me.

"You heard all of that?" She asks me with an innocent, doe-eyed look.

"Of course I did."

"Well?"

"Well what?"

I expect a tirade. I expect her to snap again. But no, she just looks at me with this helpless, defeated gaze.

"Never mind." Her finger leans in and presses the button for the doors to open. That was my panic button. Dammit, she was supposed to scream and rant and rave and I'm supposed to take that and run with it.

"You told her you loved me." I point out.

"I know."

"Why didn't you tell me that?" She turns as the elevator doors slide open. Her lips part and she speaks very softly.

"Because I don't think I could handle it if you didn't say it back." She steps in the machine. The doors slide shut. And I'm left alone in an unfamiliar corridor.