Snatch 9

Thing on the cheek. Been there forever. What the hell? What is it?

One of those things you finally pay attention to, knowing somehow it's been there all along but has never drawn your awareness enough to take into account. Now that it has, it's front and center, so much so its mystery obsesses him to the exclusion of all else. Blocks context, immediate memory including whatever outlook held sway.

Conclusions leap to and fro. A tear. No. Would have dried long ago. And what emotion might have caused it that wouldn't outlast something so mundane as a tear? Water? From where? And only one drop? Nonsense. It's imaginary by now, whatever its cause. More than memory. Sparked into permanence by the stark effect of its appearance, its utter contrast with the context it supplanted.

What could do this? Something primal, had to be. Wriggled down through an evolutionary strata to a once vital nerve center, an ancient survival algorithm so smothered by centuries of social priorities its signals are all but ignored outside the most clamant demands. Relief, maybe, from some unacknowledged primal torment? No again. Relief is fleeting. This continues to disturb, if only by implication, with its essence: the livid power of a single drop. It could be blood.

Union (Snatch 2)

Many of the shrinks' questions had a déjà vu feel to them: Do you know why you're here, Jack? Do you like being here, Jack? If you could be anywhere else, Jack, where might that be?

He looked at their faces only to establish he wasn't afraid to look, to make eye contact long enough to certify his “self-confidence” but not enough to convey challenge. He did this at the start and end of each session. During the sessions he kept his gaze steady, focusing on the hand that held the pen that wrote on the yellow pad, and every now and then darting up to the face for a quick reminder he was “paying attention.”

There were little fights.

“Please do not address me as 'Doc'.”

“Why?

“I'm your psychiatrist. There should be a formal distance.”

“What's wrong with 'Doc'?”

“It's too familiar.”

“You call me 'Jack'.”

“What would you prefer I call you?”

“Jack's fine. You want me to be comfortable, right?” Asshole smiles coldly, nods. (All the shrinks are assholes.)

“You can be comfortable without being familiar.”

“Why?”

“It's the preferred way.”

“Preferred by whom?”

“Professional standards.” Asshole clears throat, writes something on yellow pad.

“You can't be flexible?”

“Of course, but within professional boundaries.”

“Am I making you nervous?”

“Of course not, but I can't help you if you won't cooperate.”

“Who said I need help?”

“Everyone needs help.”

“Do you?”

“That's all for today.” Asshole leaves.

Exchanges like this came intermittently, initially as each shrink strove to test the dynamic, “establish a relationship.” Later incursions were intended to surprise, discomfit. Always obvious, occasionally evoking overt laughter.

This was all pre-Aggie. She was there, he knew now, but not on his radar. Once she was, the session evolved. After his radar had found her, he felt more potent. Deleted the snark from the “Doc.” (Embarrassed to seem so predictable.) The vigilance remained, of course, but leavened with insouciance.

But...but whenever Aggie was not immediately present, so he could witness her, he forgot what she looked like.