The feel of paper on fingertips is exquisite, isn't it? It's something we often forget in this ever-advancing world of ours. A screen may be more efficient, but it's certainly not as tactile. It's something I learnt to appreciate the hard way, three years in a place where the most advanced piece of technology is a rotary phone tends to bring things into perspective. Perspective. Funny thing that, it's just what I needed last night and Fun delivered in spades. That and more protein than a steakhouse.
It's why my office was currently snowed under in papers, reports, notes, and several doorstoppers that could only be called 'books' if your idea of a great read was 'The Myth of Sanity: Divided Consciousness and the Promise of Awareness'. Some of it was from my peers, requested before Twilight's first session. Others had been bought on a whim or were essential during my training. Yes, I may have laughed at her parents' assessment, but let it never be said Calmy Storm wasn't prepared.
I had to be, I was all she had after all.
Fun really solidified it. Whilst there was no way to be truly open with my sister regarding the 'finer' details, she had a way of getting to the core of a problem that I honestly envied at times. Dissociative identity disorder isn't something you just casually treat, it's an incredibly complex mental health disorder with more layers than an onion. Whilst the basics had been covered in a few extended modules I'd taken for extra credits, the general consensus was always 'If you want to treat this, you'll be specialising only in this' and that just didn't jive with my goals at the time. So when a new patient turns up, scared, confused, alone, and wrapped up in the arcane...well who else could she turn to?
That brought the 'Snake' once more to the fore, he had fun. A lot of it in fact. I think one big fear everyone in my profession has is damaging someone, we're here to help not harm at the end of the day. Fun set us both straight though. When in doubt, knuckle it out. So with all the perseverance of my sister at a rack of weights, I hit the books.
Calling myself a 'professional' in DiD right now would be rather hasty, but progress had definitely been made.
“Boss?” a familiar voice tentatively enquired from the open threshold.
Drawn from my labyrinth of ink and paper, I couldn't help but smile at Sonata. Bless the kid she'd brought me some food!
“C'mon in,” I say, a quick gesture of invitation bringing the girl closer. Despite being so young she had a rather old-fashioned sense of etiquette when it came to entering my office or the therapy room. Made me feel a little uncomfortable at times, to be frank, like I was in some kind of movie from the fifties or dealing with a vampire.
Which was crazy really, everyone knew they'd gone extinct in the sixteen hundreds.
“You've been working super hard all morning, so I thought a pick-me-up might help. Then I remembered you're kinda anti coffee...and tea....and beer...” she rambled, a box of chilled crimson berries in her hands, “But then I remembered you said these perked you up last time!”
“Beer is a pick me up to you?” I take the proffered fruit, an eyebrow raised at my sixteen-year-old secretary.
“Oh no, no! Not for me,” she replied, looking all the more like the guilty kid she should be, rather than a young carer forced into work. “Just...uh...well...Dagi and Aria, they both get kinda stressed out and don't deal with stuff well.”
There's an awkward silence as the berries are swiftly depleted. A kind of pregnant expectation almost. She probably expects a lecture, some kind of after-school special thing about the horrors of teen drinking. I'd be a raging hypocrite if I didn't say anything, but I'm not an idiot. These three are struggling more than anyone their age should be. I've just got to word it carefully...
“Don't ever drink alcohol-based hand sanitiser, the proofing is wrong and you'll end up in hospital.”
Great job Calmy. You're really good at connecting with the youth of today, aren't you?
“So what are you reading boss?” she asked, gesturing to the ocean of white on my desk whilst thankfully changing the topic.
When it came to Sonata I'd learnt long ago to be careful in indulging her. Ignoring client/patient confidentiality for a second, there was the simple fact that she...well...wasn't the brightest. I never expected a great deal from a sixteen-year-old, especially one abandoning their education for financial reasons, but she was a little below even those not-so-lofty heights. Sweet as sugar (sometimes to an irritating extent) and far more competent at her job than I'd initially assumed, yes. However, at times she could be shockingly dim. Take her general knowledge, complete and utter car crash. You'd think she'd never been to a middle school! This led to many of her queries evolving into mini-lectures, with myself as the dope having to explain the basics before we circled back to the start again.
So I leant on old faithful.
“It's related to a client, so-” I began, a passable imitation of sad indignation on my face
“-you can't tell me any more, s'ok boss. I get it.” she finished, quick as a whip with an even faster smile on her face.
Shards of guilt stabbed at my heart as she turned to leave though. The kid probably had a non-existent social circle between work and her mother. Even something as simple as a conversation could be integral in staving off the grinding pressures of life. No, I totally wasn't projecting.
“Hey, uh Sonata?” she froze mid-step, oddly tense. “... how's your family doing?”
Hurricane Dusk hit with more sound than fury. Also a lot of motion. A hell of a lot of motion! I'd never really noticed how animated she was before, yet in the space of three minutes she'd gone through sitting, standing, pacing, crouching and every vantage point surrounding me possible. It was easier to follow that than her conversation amazingly. If I didn't know better I'd say my secretary didn't need oxygen.
“-butAdagioohdontgetmestartedonAdagiowe're alltryingourbestwellIknowIamandAriakindaisbutshe'sbeenreallymopeylatelywellmorethenusualyouknowbutAdagioohIcouldslapherallshedoesismoochandarguei'mtryingmybestouthereyouknowanditsnoteasyshewontstoptreatingmelikesomedumbkidoraslavewellwho'sthedumbkidnowhuhAdagiothat'swho!”
Finally pausing for breath, the teen seemed different to me, a rawness on display that was rarely shown. She was a bubbly airhead popped, weighed down by responsibilities her peers could barely fathom. It was different...more 'real' almost. I almost missed the staccato beat rising from the desk, a tangled nest of thoughts being led on by the drumming of fingers, my fingers.
Maybe she could handle the truth?
Midnights first 'visit' had highlighted my failures, but I was still reluctant. I'd like to say it was wariness, concern for dragging someone so young into this world of spooks and sorcery. What it really boiled down to though was trust. My name was already etched onto a lot of people's shit lists for leaving Saddle Arabia with 'The True Reflection'. Knowledge was sacred and a westerner hadn't exactly been welcomed with open arms to begin with. Could I trust this teen to keep quiet?
“Do you know what my job title means Sonata?” I say, heart in mouth as the die was cast.
“You help people with mental health problems boss,” she responds, with significantly less snark than expected for someone her age, especially when given such an easy target.
“Good,” the swivel chair squeaks torturously, used bearings moving long after their expiration date “That's the 'psychotherapy' part. Let's focus on the 'para' part though. What do you think that is, what it means?”
Sure I'm being cryptic, who doesn't love being the Obi-Wan though?
A whole minute passes as the girl desperately looks for an answer in the room's décor surreptitiously. It fails miserably. Only the blind would miss her eyes batting around like a ping pong ball, left-right-left-right. Despite my attempts at 'wise mentor' though, a chuckle slips out. I'm only human after all.
A strained and cautious “Parachutes?” eventually escapes from Sonata, hope beaming eternal from her eager face.
Normally my blood pressure would rise slightly, but when you set a trap you can't be annoyed that something gets caught. Most clients usually ignored the title and the few who questioned it eventually rationalised themselves an answer, often something of the 'woo woo' variety. Sure I work with magic, but herbs and crystals? Come on!
“No Sonata, not parachutes.” I respond, desperately trying to remember what was said to Cloud Kicker the last time 'the talk' came up. “The word 'para' has several definitions, one is 'alongside' which fits to a degree, but I prefer 'abnormal'.” She seems to be paying attention, always a good thing when dealing with teens. “Now, this will probably sound insane to you, it certainly did to me when I was told and I was a lot older than you when I learnt the truth.”
“Which is...?”
Ah, there's the snark. Better late than never. Time to cut to the chase.
“Magic is real.” I breathe in the stale air permeating the room “Or to be more exact magic is real and we deal non-exclusively with clientele who have had...bad interactions with it.” Unfettered visions slash at me. Pause. Push the memories away. Lock them in the box for later. “Sometimes baggage isn't the only thing our clients bring in, you understand?” Silence and doubt start to pick at my confidence. Was this going south?
“I can....I can show you, here!” the desk creaks under my weight as a report on DiD in the elderly frantically becomes a makeshift canvas, sharpie-drawn runes appearing on the paper with undue haste. They weren't neat and the materials hadn't been prepared, so the spells longevity was suspect at best. Maybe a few minutes if I was right? It was now or never though.
As the sheet was proffered to Sonata, my nerves began fraying. Had that spell been a poor choice? Sure it was simple, there's a reason it's the first thing we learnt after all. Yet it could also be recreated with modern technology and a bit of snooping if you were smart enough. You just needed to know their favourite son-
“Mother?”
Eyes screwed shut, my secretary swayed to an unheard tune, the runic paper held like a drowning man's lifeline. It was comforting to see, as odd as that sounded. Magic had more often been a negative force in my life than a positive, so seeing it bring joy was always encouraging. Perhaps all those years hadn't been wasted? Then again, I knew quite a few people who'd say the same about my college education. That Calmy Storm would never amount to anything. A poor son, a terrible partner, failed sorcerer, useless therapist.
As always, you just needed to trust yourself.