O-oh. Oops?

"We're going to do something a little different this time."

Rebecca smiled warmly as Kid gave her a rather suspicious look. She didn't really blame him; sudden change didn't exactly seem to be the reaper's strong suit. At least not in personal or social situations and those were the two areas she was trying to deal with. She knew that his time spent at the academy dealt with situations outside of that realm, but the less she knew about that the more comfortable the therapist felt.

The monsters that the students at the academy faced were things that the citizens of Death City knew about but never really thought about. Kishins, witches, immortals – Over the past several weeks Rebecca had learned more about them than she care and, as far as she was concerned, the less they talked about them the better.

"Different?" he repeated, nose wrinkling just a bit. She nodded and unclipped a sheet of paper, placing it on the small table before the reaper. Rebecca placed a pen beside it as well and smiled again. "I thought that therapy was all about… talking."

"Some forms of therapy are," she said, nodding in agreement. "But it's not the only form. It's actually not even what I generally do…" And here she trailed off, biting down on the corner of her mouth as she tried to keep from grimacing. Professional boundaries. If only he didn't act so damn adult, but Rebecca knew that was just an excuse and a flimsy one at that. Child or not, she wasn't supposed to be talking to him like he was her friend. "And since we've spent so long just talking with each other I figured that now might be a good time to mix it up a little."

Which was true but not the entire truth. She had noticed that his progress had slowed to a crawl and that the reaper just kept on rehashing the same tired old stories and complaints. Rebecca was certain that it was at least cathartic for him to have a place to go to release all his pent up frustrations – because, of course, doing that with any of his classmates would have just been a sign of his imperfection – so she had let it slide, but eight sessions of nothing more than bitching were eight sessions too many.

And you're not supposed to think things like that either. Her mouth curled into a warm smile to hide her internally frustrations. Bitching? He's opening up.

"I want you to draw me a picture," Rebecca said slowly, gesturing to the tools she had placed before Kid. Before he could question she added: "Of anything. Whatever you want to draw."

Kid looked at her dubiously before picking up the pen. He hesitated, holding it over the paper, before shaking his head. "Where's the other paper?"

"Other paper?"

"Yes. In case I make a mistake."

"There is no other paper."

He blinked, looked down at the sheet before him, and looked back up at her. For a moment Rebecca could see the confusion in his expression, the lack of understanding, before her words sank in. Slowly his eyes widened and he looked back at the paper before glancing at the pen. "Well, then, is there a pencil I can use?"

"No pencil. Just the pen."

Kid's mouth twitched and Rebecca noted the first signs of panic flicker over his expression. His hand tightened around the pen, knuckles turning white, and with what seemed like a herculean amount of effort the reaper slowly lowered his hand down to the paper. Before he could actually touch the tip of the pen to the sheet in front of him he shook his head again and took a deep breath. "This can't possibly be the only piece of paper you have," he said flatly. "You have more on the clipboard."

"Yes, I do," Rebecca said in agreement. "But this is for me to take notes on. And the exercise is for you to use only one piece of paper."

"If you expect me to do that then I'm going to need a pencil," he said, expression starting to turn a bit ugly. "There's no way I could possibly draw anything with this. It… it's not possible. And it's not going to happen."

"Except it is going to happen," Rebecca said gently. "I don't have any pencils that you can use and I'd really like to have something drawn by you. It doesn't have to be anything fancy, just whatever you feel like drawing." She smiled, trying to be as reassuring as possible, as her own pen tapped against the edge of her clipboard. She had expected this to be Kid's reaction, or for him to respond similarly. From their first session she had noted his rather peculiar obsession with symmetry and perfection and knew that he suffered from a rather severe case of obsessive-compulsive disorder. That, at least, was what Lord Death had told her when they had discussed the younger reaper's treatment. Though she had noted a few displays of the odd behavior nothing severe had ever seemed to manifest. Which meant that there was the possibility that the Grim Reaper was simply exaggerating the condition out of concern for his son…

Or that Death the Kid was just learning how to suppress the compulsive tendencies for the hour that they spent together.

Certain things obviously set him off – symmetry, everything revolved around that word, and perfection. Maybe the test was a little cruel but she was curious how he was going to respond. To leave the paper blank would be an admittance of failure – he could he ever say that he couldn't – but if he placed the pen down then suddenly it would no longer be perfect. Even worse than that, it seemed doubtful he would be able to make the image symmetrical, and Rebecca wondered which one would be worse for him.

Kid stared down at the paper, the pen hovering over the surface as he swallowed hard. The teen ran his tongue out along his lips, licking them nervously as he kept on lowering his hand before abruptly pulling it up again. "There… there really is nothing that I want to draw," he mumbled, keeping his gaze low. Rebecca just laughed lightly at that as she leaned back in her chair.

"Are you sure Kid?" Rebecca pulled out another blank piece of paper and placed it on the table, this time in front of herself. "How about we make a trade? I'll draw something for you if you draw something for me."

The thought seemed to offer some sense of relief to the teen and he nodded. Rebecca stared levelly at Kid, meeting his gaze when he dragged his eyes up from the sheet before him, and after a long moment she realized that he expected her to go first. There was a small stretch of awkward silence between before he looked to the side. "Well… are you going to…?"

"All right Kid," Rebecca murmured, and she looked down at her own blank paper. Now what the hell am I going to draw? She pressed her pen to the paper and jerked it across, creating a rather shaky slash. Hmm. She curved it around before drawing a bulb-like shape below it. It was a poor attempt at a vase and the therapist had to bite her lower lip to keep from laughing at how poorly done it was. "I never said I was an artist," she remarked as she looked up at Kid.

He was staring intently at the drawing, hands pulling at the fabric of his pants as watched. Curious, Rebecca drew another jagged line, a poor attempt at the stem of a flower, and his grip tightened. Kid looked almost pained as he watched her continued to scratch out her drawing. She added a second line before started to haphazardly sketch out the petals and with that he actually reached out, grabbing her hand to stop her.

"You… you're not…" Kid drew his hand back slowly, though he kept on jerking it forward as if to grab her again. "You're not doing it right."

"I'm not?" she asked, forcing herself to sound perplexed. "I'm just drawing a picture. I'm not a very good artist though."

"Not a good artist?" the reaper repeated, sounding incredulous. "You're terrible! That thing is an abomination! You've absolutely ruined that paper. The only way you could have possibly done any worse would be if you tried to draw this with your eyes closed." Rebecca narrowed her eyes, feeling just a touch insulted at what Kid was saying. He looked back at the drawing and snorted. "No, I change my mind. If you had kept your eyes shut you probably would have done better."

"I'm flattered," she said flatly. Rebecca knew she shouldn't have been taking what Kid said personally – it was the OCD talking, not the reaper – but she still felt a surge of irritation at his words. "I would love to see your attempt to do better." And without saying anything else the teen snatched the paper from her and started to try to furiously fix it.

For about five seconds.

Kid drew one line in an attempt to cover up the shaky scratch mark that Rebecca had made for the stem before pulling himself back. He started at the paper in horror before leaning over and scribbling, etching line over line as he tried to hide his previous mistakes. His attempts were in vain and only ended up making the picture look incredibly uneven; one half of the flower was drawn with heavier and thicker lines, making it look as if the flower was tilting over. The teen shook his head and tried to replicate the effect on the other side. "No, no…"

Rebecca's irritation vanished as she noticed the panicked look that was flickering over Kid's face. "Kid?" she said hesitantly, and when the teen failed to respond she reached out to place a hand over his. "Kid, I think you've-"

"NO!" He jerked back and there was a sickening tear as Kid ripped the pen through the paper. His eyes opened wide and his mouth widened in a look of horror. There was an awful stretch of silence between them before he drew back, lips pulling over his teeth, and the reaper grabbed the paper to finish tearing it in half. "I can't believe I worked on that! What a horrible disgusting piece of garbage!"

"Kid," Rebecca found herself saying again, and now she found herself completely worried. The reaper just shook his head as he continued to tear the paper, folding it carefully before ripping it into tiny equal-sized pieces.

"Absolute garbage! And I'm garbage for working on it! Absolutely worthless garbage for lowering myself to work on such a useless abomination!"

"Kid, really, it-"

"How could I ever possibly take over for my father if I can't even do something as simple as this," he hissed, dropping the paper shreds onto the table. "I'm worthless. I'm worthless for being here. Only someone ridiculously weak would lower themselves to coming to a place like this."

Rebecca's eyes narrowed. "Kid," she said again, her voice taking on a slight growl. It's not personal. He's not meaning these things to be personal. This is just a symptom of his illness. This is not personal! "Kid, you need to calm down. Your picture wasn't bad," she said, trying to make her voice sound calming. "You were trying to fix something that was already unsalvageable. I'm a therapist, not an artist." And she cracked a smile at that, trying to ease the mood.

"Really?" he snapped back, eyes narrowing as he glared at her. "Your skills at both seem to be on par. Frankly I'm amazed you manage to even feed yourself-"

The rest of his statement was cut off by a loud smack. Rebecca's eyes widened and she found herself staring at him while breathing hard. Her hand hurt and he was staring back in confusion as an angry red mark started to form on his cheek. It took shape slowly, four finger-shaped bruises curling back to his ear, and her anger and frustration was replaced with confusion. What? What happened?

Oh. She knew what had happened.

She had slapped him.

There was nothing she could say that would possibly make what had just happened right. Kid was having a break down and Rebecca's response had been to physical harm him. His panic attack – because that really was what it had been – didn't matter; she had hit him. She had hit a patient. The therapist swallowed hard and opened her mouth to speak, though nothing came out.

"… I… think I should go." Kid blinked and nodded stiffly as he pushed himself to his feet. She nodded, forcing herself to meet his gaze. It was the least that she owed him and she refused to let herself look away.

"Yes, that might be best," Rebecca said quietly. The sound of the slap was still ringing through her ears and she doubted she would ever forget it. How could I have done that? How could I have-

"I'll see you next week." Kid nodded stiffly and walked himself from the room as she blinked, brow knitting together in confusion.

You'll… you'll see me again next week.

… what?