Chapter 4: Slow Motion Sickness

Another uneventful day passes, but for once I'm grateful for the peace and quiet. Things happen as they usually do. Carina stares at me blankly when I leave her in her school's parking lot, and in the afternoon Vilana magically appears in my living room (I'm not even sure if I called her) with a fresh supply of narcotics ready to be sold and purchased. As we complete the transaction I worry for a minute that she'll say something about Hannah Shepard (because even she must have heard the news by now) just to fuck with me. Thankfully, she's her usual bored self, and barely says a word during her brief visit.

I hope things will go back to being this way and that the last two days were just a temporary mishap in my new, 'normal' life. If the alternative is seeing dead people and antique firearms appearing at my doorstep, then I'm perfectly fine with being a dissatisfied spectator in Sam's suburban dream life.

I need to get better at remembering that Sam's the only reason I'm even here. If she had been anyone else I would have left long ago. But I haven't, so somewhere I must still believe that our relationship can go back to the way it used to be.

For the most part, things go decently well. I keep my mind occupied by creeper and hallex and stay inside the house as much as possible. But then Sam reminds me at dinner that I'm seeing my therapist tomorrow, and my mood significantly worsens.

Before I know it it's 09:57 the next morning and I'm sitting in one of the chairs in the waiting room outside her office. This is the first time I've ever been on time to one of our sessions. My hands are shaking and the water in the plastic cup I'm holding ripples. There are so few things in the world that I'm scared of; this shouldn't be one of them. It never was until now. I've never even taken our sessions seriously, but I'm not sure if I have the energy to be a sarcastic bitch right now, because I know exactly what she's going to ask me, and I have no idea what I'm going to answer.

Her office door opens at precisely ten o'clock. I walk through the doorway and she smiles at me in a way I think is meant to be welcoming, but the way the rims of her lipstick covered lips push apart her cheeks and split open a thousand lines and wrinkles in her face just freaks me out. It's like if a husk tried to smile at you.

I drop down into one of the armchairs and begin to stare her down. That's the approach I'm going to have to take today, if I can't deflect her questions then I'm going to have to face them head on, and by that I mean doing nothing. She says hello and I don't respond. A brief, uncomfortable silence follows and then she speaks again.

"I heard about your mother. I'm sorry."

Her voice is somber and sympathetic, but on the inside she's undoubtedly ecstatic. I picture her sitting in her living room, fireworks going off inside her head as she and the fat, bald husband she probably has sit watch the news vids about my mother's death. I can't begin to imagine how much she must have been looking forward to this moment. Confronting the most famous woman in the galaxy about her recently deceased mother, it's like something out of a psychiatrist's wet dream.

Another thick layer of silence falls over the room, this one lasts much longer than its predecessor. At one point I catch the corner of my therapists mouth turns downwards for half a second in a flash of irritation, but then she returns to her state of fake compassion.

"How do you feel about it? Has it affected you in any way?"

I look her straight in her eyes. "No."

She's unable to stop a heavy sigh from slipping out her throat. The silence returns. After a while my eyes slide down to my omni-tool's interface to check the time. 10:11 AM. 49 minutes left of this shit. I go back to glaring at my therapist. She's not getting shit out of me.

She moves her fingers and, excruciatingly slowly, jots something down on her notepad. Then she says:

"What kind of relationship did you and your mother have?"

"When did you last see her?"

"Would you rather not talk about this?"

I say nothing. Not a single of my facial muscles move and my eyes are fixed in a disdainful state. I know I'm behaving like a child, I know it's beneath me, but this is over. I decide, in this very moment, that this, all of this, is over. I watch my therapists eyes narrow. My own glance down at a name tag just above her breast pocket that I've never noticed before. It says: Dr. Schumacher. Apparently that's her name.

"Do you miss her?"

At her words, my eyes shoot back to Dr. Schumacher's face. But Dr. Schumacher isn't there anymore. Instead, Hannah Shepard is.

"Do you miss me?"

My mother leans forward. I lean backwards, away from her, and my shoulder blades dig into the plush leather seat behind me. Expressions flash over my mother's face, happiness, sadness and broad, evil grins. None of them are expressions I've ever seen her carry.

I'm not sure what I look like as my mother rises from her seat, puts both hands on the small table that separates us and looks at my face, but the way every inch of my face stretches and hurts makes me think I don't look to good. My mother is still wearing my therapists cream-colored pantsuit and the nametag that reads Dr. Schumacher is still there on its lapel.

"What kind of relationship did you and I have?"

"When did you last see me?"

"Would you rather not talk about meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-"

Her voice starts fading out into white noise. Her lips are still moving, but I can't hear a word she's saying. I just see a young, spry Hannah Shepard (who looks just like me), her face inches away from mine.

Finally, I manage to reach out an arm and push her back into her chair. Without looking at her I scramble out of my seat and run straight for the door. I exit the building, my brain feeling as if it's on fire.

The drive home is a long, horrible Technicolor blur of stoplights, headlights and streetlights. Just lights, lights everywhere, too many fucking lights. They make the headache even worse. I try to speed up, but the car is already going as fast as it possibly can, which is not fast enough. I need to get away, far, far away from her.

The moment I step inside the house I start marching straight to the liquor cabinet. If that's the kind of shit my brain makes me see when it's sober, then I'm sure as hell going to get it drunk. "OPEN!" I roar when I'm close enough to it. It slides open with a familiar hum. I like the sound, it makes me thirsty.

Inside it are rows upon rows of alcoholic beverages. Half-drunken flasks of wine, stylishly shaped vials of Scandinavian vodka and left-over champagne bottlesfrom the wedding, still unopened almost a year later.

I pick a vial at random and take a long, thorough swig. The cool, soothing taste of whiskey flows down through my throat. The liquid runs out much faster than it has any right to, so I open another, and another, and another.

Slowly but surely, the headache my mother starts being replaced by one of drunken numbness. I go into the bedroom, draw the curtains and lay down on the bed while I continue emptying bottle after bottle.

I suck on the tip of the neck of a vial of vodka, beer, or whatever it is, and stare up at the ceiling. Above me, at an indistinguishable distance, Hannah Shepard hangs. I try to look away from her. I twist my head in all possible directions and shut my eyes, but she's everywhere. I suckle on the cold and comforting neck of the empty glass bottle in my hand as the burning pain growing in my head starts making it impossible to think.

I'm having a dream where a young man in an Alliance uniform leads me down a long, sterile hallway. I'm young too, my hair is very short and I've never in my life worn make-up. It's early in the morning but I am wide awake. The man is not saying anything to me, but I already know where he's taking me.

He's one of my mother's men, and like all of the people she has under her, he's been instructed to have as little contact with me as humanly possible. He makes a turn to the left, then one to the right, then another to the left. The silent promenade through the white, metallic tubes seems to have no end, but I know what the end looks like. The end is me and the soldier standing in front of a shuttle. Just like on the chest of his uniform, the blue Alliance logo is printed in massive scale on the shuttle's door, which lifts with a defeaning roar, disrupting the until now unbroken silence.

I look at him. My entire life I've been taught not to expect anything from her, but even now, at 17 years, about to leave for my first official Alliance posting, I'm still hoping for something. That she'll turn up, that she's given my escort a message to give me, anything.

But it's too late, I've already stepped aboard the shuttle. With another monstrous bellow, the door slams shut behind me. Then everything goes dark.

I wake up to the following: a dry throat, another burning headache and an overwhelming need to piss. I'm lying on the bed. My vision is slightly blurred, but I can still clearly make out what the brownish, greenish pool on the floor next to the bed is.

"You fucking idiot." I mumble to myself, feeling the sour taste of vomit on the tip my tongue. I did not think this through.

I guess I should be happy. After all, I succeeded in my mission to get smashed, but mostly I just wish I had choked on my puke instead. I just hope I can clean this up before Sam comes home.

I'm just about to check what time it is when I hear footsteps from the hallway.

Fuck.

Sam emerges into the room, carrying a plastic bucket undoubtedly filled with cleaning equipment. She kneels on the floor next to the puddle. I look at her and try to think of something to say. The word that comes out of my mouth is: "Hey."

"Hey." Sam replies, continuing to mop up my puke.

"Sorry about this."

"It's okay."

"Is it?"

"No, but I'm not really surprised."

I don't know what to say to that. When she's done, Sam stands up and puts the bucket next to where I'm lying on the couch.

"Are you going to throw up again?" she asks me.

"No."

She leaves the bucket there anyway. She looks at me for another moment or two. I look back up at her. Her face is blank and tired. Her hair is down and she looks beautiful.

"Why are you like this?" she asks. Then she leaves.

The next day I drive Carina to school, wait for Sam to come home, keep my mouth shut and try not to think about anything whatsoever.

A/N: Writing two other fics right now, so this one's going a little bit slower again. One of my new fics is an Assassin's Creed fic, so yeah, if you like AC then please check it out. It's a pretty straight forward romance story told in past tense from a 3d person pov, SO much easier to write than this.

Anyway, thanks for reading. And an extra big thanks if you reviewed, it's super appreciated.