Dr. Good and Mr. Lucky — Epiphany
Victor? he thought. Victor who? He didn't number even one Victor among his acquaintance, let alone one they might have in common. And then, he remembered. "You know Victor's not a person, right? It's just a short-hand way of talking about one aspect of my personality."
"Yes, yes, we've established that," she said, impatiently. "What I want to know is: when does he make an appearance in the story?"
"Now's as good a time as any, I guess. So… after I went to live with Pops, I started, very gradually, to recover. Pops was a tough guy in some ways, but he was always fair, and, best of all, he was predictable. You always knew where you stood with him. He laid down the rules, and as long as you toed the line, he had no beef with you. I was able to relax for the first time in years, and slowly I regained enough confidence in myself to look to the future with hope and even guarded optimism.
"At the same time, I couldn't completely forget Tim. I'd been him for a long time after all, and I was terrified that, somehow, I'd slip up and become that pathetic wimp again. It was that fear that made me flip the script. I mean," he said, anticipating trouble, "I did a 180." Not an improvement. "I went from one extreme to the other." That was clear, finally. "I made a conscious decision to 'fake it until I could make it.' If, before, I was dependent, from then on, I would stand on my own two feet and ask nothing of anyone. If I'd been submissive, now I would take charge, I would be firmly in command, both of myself and of any situation I found myself in. I would lead, not follow, go after the good things in life instead of waiting for them to be doled out to me on someone else's timetable. I was never going to be on the losing side again."
For a brief time, the only sound to be heard was the creaking of the chains as the swings moved in shallow arcs, back and forth. She was the one to speak first. "I know what it's like to feel powerless, to be at someone else's mercy." She said the words softly, as if the effort cost her.
He went very still, waiting for her to continue. When she didn't, he ventured, "You mean, when you were in foster care?"
"Then, too, I suppose, but, no, that's not what I mean. I was in El Salvador, more than a decade ago, working to identify the remains of a young girl who'd been shot in the head, and dumped in a well. A cop came into the tent, and told me to stop, and when I wouldn't, he kidnapped me with the help of two other men. They held me in a windowless cell for three days, and on each of those days, he threatened me with the same fate that girl had suffered. I determined, then and there, if I survived, I would never be such an easy victim again."
"That's what decided you to take up martial arts training?"
She nodded. "Like you, I learned to defend myself. I wasn't going to be bullied ever again, if I could help it."
"I don't remember ever hearing that story, Bones." A shrug was his only answer. He pushed his swing toward hers, and slipping his arm into the space between her body and the chain, linked their swings together. "I'm sorry that happened to you. Really sorry."
"Don't be. It taught me a valuable lesson. It pushed me to improve my stamina, strength and physical skills so I had at least some chance of protecting myself in a fight."
"And thus was the badass Brennan born." That drew a smile, if only a wry one. He loosed his hold on her swing, and drifted off to the side. "I can see where you'd think our situations were parallel, but there's really a huge difference."
"How so?"
"In your case, you were preparing yourself to face outside attack, assault from other people. Yours was a completely rational response — no surprise there — with potential positive outcomes. But in my case, I was building a defense against myself, Victor fighting off Tim, if you will. That's your classic no-win situation."
"I see your point. It's similar to playing chess against yourself: even when you win, you lose."
He couldn't contain his shock and horror. "People play chess against themselves?"
"Of course. It's a very effective way to study standard strategies and tactics, such as opening gambits and possible end games." She waved her hand dismissively. "Bad example, on my part. I forgot who I was talking to."
"I don't have to know how to move the pieces, or what to call that little castle thingy to appreciate your analogy. It's a good illustration of a hollow victory. Victor was not the whole me; he was Tim's opposite number, a function of how much I hated Tim and wanted to hide him away. Regardless of the success I achieved — the merit badges, promotions, commendations, citations for valor — it was never enough to silence Tim completely. His voice was always in my head, whispering it was all a fluke, a lucky break, unearned, undeserved. Soon, it wasn't enough to be on the football team, I had to be captain. It wasn't enough to be strong, I had to be stoic. A pretty good sharpshooter? Hell, no, I had to be rated first. I was driven to be the best: top dog, king of the hill every time. That was the only way I could shut Tim up, and even then, the reprieve only lasted a while."
He was amazed that the words poured out of him so freely. As a rule, he was not given to making speeches. A co-ed he'd dated for a while had called him 'laconic' (he'd had to look the word up, and so it'd stuck with him), and she'd hit the nail on the head. Even as an instructor, he didn't usually lecture, preferring to teach by example and communicate in short, targeted bursts. He supposed, in this instance, he wasn't so much talking as telling a story, a long, convoluted story about two guys and their love / hate relationship. That was probably the reason he felt relatively easy.
"What I'm hearing," she said, sounding disturbingly like Dr. Cameron in both language and tone, "is that you knew, intellectually, that you were succeeding in your endeavors, but you didn't feel it, not emotionally. Is that right?"
Knowing her genius, he ought not to have been impressed, but he was. "100%, Bones."
"So, from that and other things you've said, I deduce that Tim represents what is traditionally viewed as feminine — emotion, weakness, irrationality, subservience — while all the stereotypical masculine traits — intellect, strength, reason, command — belong to Victor."
At some point in the last few minutes, the sunshine had ceased to be entirely pleasant; the skin across his cheeks and brow felt hot and tight; maybe he was burning after all. "Sun screen," he muttered, sitting up and giving his face a good rub. "Never leave home without it. And water. Water and sun screen."
She slid her swing toward him, and bumped his shoulder with her own. "I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable. That was not my intention."
"Yeah? Well, just so you know, men don't like hearing they have a 'feminine side.' It's… it's ooky."
She regarded him blankly. "I don't know what that means."
He didn't really know himself. The word had just popped into his head. "It… ah… means a general feeling that something's not right. Something's creepy, weird."
She pinned him with a look. "Am I likely to find this adjective in the Merriam-Webster standard dictionary?"
"In the dictionary? Sure… I mean, probably. Or… ah… maybe not. Yet."
"Ooky," she repeated, biting back a grin.
"Yeah, so… where were we?" he said, anxious to move along. "Masculine and feminine. More convenient terms, right? Ends of the spectrum, structure for organizing thought…"
"Right," she said, half-smiling still but willing, apparently, to let him off the hook. "It's a conceptual pairing, a starting point for reflection and investigation. In alchemy, for example, the duality is expressed as king versus queen. The Greeks opposed the sun god, Apollo to the moon goddess, Diana. It's a very basic, and effective, way of ordering phenomena. The designations are not all that critical. We can substitute yin / yang, if you'd rather …"
"Or, Tim / Victor."
"Yes, or… Oh! Oh!" She straightened suddenly, and, with a little bounce, turned to him with rounded eyes.
"What? What?" he said, as she continued to stare at him, jaw slack. "Are you hurt? Were you stung?"
"No, no." Her lips curved into a high-wattage smile, reassuring him. "I just… I had an epiphany!"
"An epiphany, hunh?" He didn't like the look of that gleam in her eye. It usually spelled trouble.
She was nodding emphatically. "It came to me, just now: the reason you don't want to be called Seeley!"