Work Text:
The voice coming from Ash's therapist is calm in the most aggravating of ways, contrasting so starkly with the ridiculous fucking turmoil Ash feels inside.
"Journaling could be a good way to channel some of these thoughts and feelings that you're having, the nightmares and memories, in a way that doesn't hurt yourself or anyone else," she says. "Catharsis."
"Yeah, well I fucking tried that," Ash snaps. "I can barely even talk about what happened to me most of the time. You think I can write about it?" It's funny, really, in a way. Ash used to be so blunt with discussing his history. What happened to that cocky teenager who could look someone in the eyes and explain horrors most adults couldn't imagine? All straight faced, without breaking a sweat.
Dr. Yeats—or, Holly, since she wants Ash to call her by first name—crosses her legs. Ash winces.
"Sorry," he says quickly. "I know I'm bad at this whole—everything. This therapy thing."
But Holly smiles, and it's gentle. "You're not bad at therapy, Ash. In fact, you're doing very well."
"You know I can't believe that."
"And you know I'm going to tell you anyway, until you do."
Ash pouts, and Holly's smile widens. Rolling his eyes, Ash breathes out a laugh.
"Fine," he says. "But if I'm doing so well, why is even something as simple as journaling so fucking impossible? Like—shouldn't it be easy? God knows I have a million things I could write about."
"You do," Holly agrees. "And that might be exactly what makes it so hard. With so much to say, where do you start?"
"Yeah. Fucking—yeah," Ash mumbles.
Holly hums. "You know, Ash, if you have too much to say, a picture is worth a thousand words. You could try drawing."
"No one wants to see that," Ash says immediately. "I'm not an artist, and—even if I were, no one would want to see the things I would think to draw."
"No one would have to see them. It's just for you. You, and your recovery."
"Right," Ash breathes. Why is that so hard to grasp? The idea of something being just for him, and only him? That he can even do things for himself, without having to constantly think about the fact that every step he takes hurts someone else? "It's just ... hard, sometimes, to think that way."
"And that's what we're working on, right? No one said it would be easy," she teases.
"Yeah, they sure as hell didn't." In fact, no one really told him that it was possible. But he's starting to think that maybe—just maybe—it is.
"Do you want to try drawing something?" Holly gestures over at a bookshelf with loose paper, markers, and crayons alongside the DSM-5.
Ash gives her a dry look.
She smiles again. "What's your protest this time?" Teasing again. She half hides a smile behind her hand.
"That stuff is for kids," Ash grumbles.
"You're barely more than a kid yourself, Ash."
"I'm nineteen!" he protests, trying to make sure his voice doesn't crack at the worst possible moment.
"You're a teenager," she says, but she makes it sound like an agreement. "And you may be nineteen, but were you ever given a chance to be nine?"
Ash chews on his lip. "What's your point?"
"Pick up a crayon."
— — —
why is it all red, red, red?
the too perfect apple, wilting cosmos
bloody elbows, rug-burnt knees
scarlet crayon wax inside my legs.
have my hands been stained forever?
my handprints allow festering rot where i touch
violent, gory, red.
the fire supposed to cleanse me burns
burns too hot to be red
an engulfing white blaze
— Aslan Jade Callenreese
— — —
Reluctantly, Ash holds the red crayon above the paper, letting it hover just an inch from staining the white.
He glances at Holly, who only gives him another goddamn smile and an encouraging nod.
Slowly, cautiously, Ash presses the stupid fucking blood red crayon to the paper.
"Do you want me to look away?" Holly asks.
Ash swallows. "I'm not even sure what I'm going to draw yet."
"Is that a yes or a no?"
"N-no, you're good. You can watch." How is he supposed to get better if he hides shit from his therapist?
So he presses the crayon down.
And down.
And down.
Grinding it into the paper, then scribbling frantically, painting half the fucking page red and pressing harder, harder, harder until the crayon just fucking snaps.
Ash slams it down onto the page and sobs.
"I'm sorry!" he cries. "I'm fucking—sorry. I just—can't do anything right, and—"
"You have nothing to apologize for," Holly says gently, as though Ash isn't in her office breaking her property and ruining everything and—
"Is this what you wanted?" Ash demands. "A sheet of paper with a bloodstain drawn in wax and a broken crayon?"
"I think that this is just a step on your road to recovery. So, yes. This is what I want."
"Well it's not what I fucking want." Getting better isn't worth it if it means I keep making shit worse for everyone else.
"Then we don't have to do things this way!" Holly says brightly.
"We—don't?" Ash asks, a little stunned.
"Of course not. If this isn't working for you, then we do something else, right? The whole goal is to find what works for you."
"And what if nothing does?" Pleading.
"Then I eat my doctorate diploma, but I've managed to avoid having to make good on that side of the bargain so far."
Ash breathes out a laugh, somehow. Damn, she's good at this. "So what do we do, then? If I'm too broken to even draw with crayons."
"Can we reframe that?" Holly is all about reframing things, taking broken glass pieces of Ash and putting them into a light where they shine and sparkle.
"How?" Ash asks, a little desperately.
"Can you think of a way?"
Shaking his head, Ash laughs, bitterly this time. "No."
"Try it. There's no wrong answer, remember?"
But everything Ash has ever done is wrong answers. Shit, no, he—fuck.
Count your breaths, he tells himself. In—2, 3, 4. Hold—2, 3, 4. Out—2, 3, 4.
"You're using the square breathing technique," Holly observes.
Shit. He's been caught. "I, uh—yeah. Is that okay?"
"It's wonderful. I'm so proud of you. You show so much progress with every session we have together. Can you try the reframing technique for me too?"
"Yeah," Ash breathes. "I, uh—I'm too ... too ..." No, he's not too anything. Not too broken, not too much. He's just ... "I'm struggling to find this whole drawing thing effective due to my experiences?"
"So next up, we find something else. If journaling and drawing aren't working, there are lots of other forms of catharsis. Have you considered writing fiction?"
Ash tilts his head back. "I don't know if this creative stuff is going to work. My brother was the poet, not me. And he's—he's gone." But then an idea hits Ash, and he sits up straight, looking at Holly. "Actually—my brother was a poet."
Holly just smiles that signature smile of hers.
"What if I write poetry?"
— — —
For the night sky glows with brilliant stars,
The nearby ocean is alight with gems.
My outreached hands delicately hold Mars,
Brought to Earth to bury it in grass stems.
The Lion, my brother, knows the stories,
Orion, Lyra, Castor and Pollux.
I hope to rejoin him, rich with glories,
Lion, I know my return remains in flux.
Still, I fight, I'll keep you safe in this war,
When I return, we'll stargaze on the shore.
— Griffin Callenreese
— — —
Ash rifles through the documents he and Eiji recovered from Cape Cod after everything settled down—his birth certificate, happy photos of matching baseball uniforms that bring a lurch to his stomach, and there, nestled in with everything else, with tiny fingerprints from the hands of a dirty seven year old stained around the edges, are Griffin's poems.
Ash spends a few minutes miserably sobbing, blurring ink that's already over a decade old with even more tears than before. This isn't going to work. Nothing ever fucking works. He's trying, he really is, but even his most desperate attempts to make progress end like this—with him collapsed on the floor. On his knees, just like he's spent most of his goddamn life. Crying his fucking eyes out.
Eiji approaches him, almost ... cautiously. Carefully, like Ash is—
No. Not like Ash is a wild beast. More like Ash is ...
A friend. A lover. Someone who's hurting.
And oh, how Ash is hurting.
"Eiji?" he pleads. "It's okay. You can touch me."
And Eiji does—like no one ever has. He places a gentle hand on Ash's shoulder. "Love ... Oh, sweetheart ..."
"I loved him," Ash blurts, voice hoarse from tears but not from anything else for once. "Griffin, he—he was my brother, you know? Like, Jim wasn't really my father, but Griff was really my brother."
"I know," Eiji whispers. He crouches down to be at Ash's level, and Ash throws himself at him. Eiji hesitates a moment, then gently takes Ash into his arms.
Every time Ash sobs like this, really letting go, the words You look younger when you cry ring through his head. It was meant to be a compliment—a way to say you're still beautiful.
But Eiji doesn't treat him like that. Eiji ... Eiji ...
"You don't have to push yourself," Eiji says gently. "If it hurts too much, you don't have to—"
"I'm going to," Ash insists. He sniffles, rubbing his eyes with the back of his sleeve. "I ... I actually think I know what I want to write about."
Because—oh, how Ash could write a thousand poems, with Eiji as his muse. With his past as the paper and his future as the ink, and this beautiful muse in front of him ...
Ash can do just about anything.
— — —
you don't think i'm beautiful
you hesitate to touch my hand
gentle, a bit wary
i lid my eyes purposefully
and you only ask if i'm sleepy
my back is bare when you hold me
the back of my head and my shoulder
are where your hand and chin reside
you don't think i'm beautiful
you think i'm lovely
i love you all the more for it
— Aslan Jade Callenreese