~ Chapter Six
Maybe Steve was a complete head case. It would really explain a lot if Steve was. Like how come Steve was about to break down and cry because he hadn't seen his dead best friend in four days. Or why Steve was thinking in third person.
The ink blots still looked like ink blots no matter how hard he squinted. And what made it worse was that he had an audience. A girl who was a mess of hair with enormous buck teeth jammed into (Steve kids you not) neon pink braces. She had introduced herself, with a very horsy laugh, as Emma-Jean who loves ballet. Steve had shuddered and accepted her hand for a very hardy handshake.
Then he had met Gory. No, not Corey, he had checked. Gory was all of four feet, and black wrapped, pasty faced, with purple eyeliner.
Right now they were both staring intently at Steve while a "trained therapist" (read – the doctor's monkey-boy), held out a blue ink blot.
"An angel."
"Do you think about angels a lot, Steve?" The therapist sounded bored.
The answer there was obvious. All the freaking time since one had pretty much moved into his bedroom. "No not really, it just looks like angel wings here." Steve pointed to the picture. "Kinda soft and flowing." Nah, a guy doesn't feel another guy's wings, man. Come on. Get with the times.
"Ah."
Was that a good ah, or a bad ah? Was he going to spend the rest in a mental institution? Should he just give up right now and announce, all Sixth Sense-like, that he saw dead people? Like his best friend, and Abraham Lincoln.
"Do you think about heaven a lot?"
"Not really. Sometimes." Steve knew the minute the words left his mouth that that was a bad answer. Because now the therapist looked interested.
"Do you think about dying?"
"No." Steve never thought about dying anymore. Not since Marty had come back. Because, even though Marty was dead, he was so much alive that . . . It was overpowering. He somehow made Steve feel alive. It was like he needed Marty just to keep breathing. Marty was the air, and Marty was the feeling that he got first thing in the morning, like he actually wanted to get up and live.
"Never?"
"I used to, back when my friend Marty died. But not anymore." When Marty got back, Steve was going to hold on to him and never, ever let go.
"Well, that's fairly normal following a tragedy. Emma-Jean, why don't you tell me what you see in this ink blot?"
