"Tell me about your childhood", Leah said.
*** Melanie and her father, Chris, always went to a pancake house on Sunday mornings. She was only 6, but it was their special little father/daughter routine. Sitting across from him, wearing jeans, a t-shirt and a green unzipped jacket, Melanie was flipping coffee creamers on the table, trying to stack them to impress her father, who sat sipping his coffee and egging her on. When she finally got one on top of the other, they both cheered and gave one another a high five. "Can I get bacon?" Melanie asked. "Sweetheart, you get anything you want, this is your special day," Chris replied. "I want bacon. Lots of bacon," Melanie said, "I wanna only eat bacon for the rest of my life." "Well that's highly unhealthy, but a bit of bacon this morning won't hurt," Chris said, chuckling to himself as he set his coffee cup down and coughed into his elbow. Melanie leaned on the table, posted up on her elbows, and once more began flipping creamers. "Can we go see the dinosaurs?" she asked. "Yeah, definitely," Chris said, "Been a while since we've been to the museum. I loved going to look at the dinosaurs when I was your age." The waitress approached their table and refilled his coffee cup. Chris smiled politely and nodded, thanking her, as another waitress set down their pancake stacks in front of them respectively. Chris and Melanie picked up their forks, but then Chris called after the waitress, bringing her back. "Yeah? What do you need?" she asked. "My daughter would like a plateful of bacon," Chris said, and Melanie grinned. Today would be a great day. *** "Your childhood doesn't sound that bad," Leah said, sitting in her chair as Melanie laid on the couch, her hands folded on her chest, staring up at the ceiling overhead. "It wasn't bad. I had a nice childhood. I'm independent now because I can't return to the kingdom, not without a prince by my side anyhow," Melanie said, "but my childhood was wonderful. The king and I spent all our time together, when possible, and those are the memories I cherish the most. My brother, the prince, he was never as close to the king as I was, and I always felt he was a bit jealous of that. Otherwise we were a fairly happy, royal family." "Well, why are you here then, Melanie?" Leah asked, crossing her legs as Melanie sighed and waited before responding. A few moments passed, and then she spoke. "...i don't really know," she said, "someone suggested i come." "I'm gonna give you some homework," Leah said, "I want you to call your mother. You told me she's been leaving you voicemails, and I think it would help get everything started if you simply called her back. Fairly easy enough, I'd say, right? Maybe you could even work up to going to see her." Melanie nodded, but she knew this wasn't possible. She could never return to the kingdom. *** Melanie was sitting in Frank's kitchen, as he took leftover pie out of his fridge. He sat down across from her and slid some pie on a small plate in front of her, complete with a fork. He smiled at her as she ate, and waited for her to speak. "Not often I get a visit like this," he said, "What's the meaning of this sudden engagement?...did...did the aliens get to you too?" "Frank, you believe you're building the ark because someone told you to, right?" Melanie asked, scooping pie up on her fork and eating it, talking while chewing. "God himself, your highness," Frank said, starting in on his own pie piece. "Do you honestly believe he exists, and that you're not just...you know...crazy?" "I'm not trying to run away from reality, your highness, I embrace it in fact and God himself told me to build this ark for a coming storm," Frank said, swallowing, taking a drink of milk and smiling at her. "But aren't you afraid that, one day, God won't answer you or will stop speaking to you? And you'll find out that everything you ever believed in was ultimately just some sort of...I don't know...mental security mechanism of sorts to keep you from going completely and utterly mad? That everything you ever worshiped or thought will come crashing down around you, and you'll be left with nothing but the shattered remains of what you once thought was true, what you once thought protected you?" "Honestly, your highness, I'm afraid of one thing in this world, and that's being alone," Frank said, wiping his mouth on his arm, "And as long as you're around, I'll never be alone, so I don't think I have too much to fear." Melanie smiled at this, but it didn't ease her questioning. She ate the rest of her pie in silence, and then got up and headed home. As she entered the apartment lobby, she saw Gus standing at the row of mailboxes, gathering his mail. He waved at her as he shoved his mailbox key back into his back pocket. "Where you been?" he asked. "Therapy." "Really?" "Emma suggested I go, so I went," Melanie said, as she headed up the stairs, Gus at her heels. "And you trusted her? You don't...you don't think it's a ruse or something like that? We're just taking her advice now? Seems odd, I mean, maybe it's for the better, considering you're..." She stopped and looked at him. "Considering I'm what?" she asked. "You know...crazy." "You're just like my brother, telling me I'm crazy. I am NOT crazy," Melanie replied, sounding colder than Gus had ever heard her before, "I have things to do, and they don't require your presence." And with that she stormed up the stairs, leaving Gus to wonder what was really going on. *** Emma was seated in her car in the parking lot of the school, waving at the kids as they passed by with their parents. She turned the car on, pulled back the parking brake and waited to back out when the passenger door opened and Gus climbed in, surprising her. She looked at him, and he glared at her. "You have done a terrible, horrible thing," Gus said. "Which is?" "Melanie? In THERAPY? That's the most dangerous thing you could do to a girl with her sort of mentality," Gus said, sounding genuinely angry with her, "She's not another one of your students, Emma, that you can just send to the school psychologist if they're having behavioral problems. She's a real ass adult with some, apparently, very serious mental and emotional issues!" "Well doesn't that warrant her getting help, then, if you're so readily willing to openly admit that about her?" Emma asked as she pulled out and started driving. "No! Because therapy isn't exactly the best thing for everyone! It works for some people, but Melanie is not one of those people! I know how she thinks, I know how she works, I'm gonna..." Gus went quiet and looked at his shoes as Emma stopped in traffic, waiting to leave the parking lot. He continued, speaking softly. "I'm gonna be the one who helps her," he said, "Not some therapist. Me. Because if I don't do something, and I allow someone else to, and they make it worse, I'll always hold myself responsible for that." Emma smiled a little as she moved forward, getting out onto the street now. "I used to have a little sister, you know," she said, "She got really, really sick when she was about nine years old, and one day she simply didn't come home from school. When we finally tried to get the police to help, become involved, all they did was put out a little missing persons report. They never even organized a proper search party or anything." "What does this have to do with-" Gus said, but she interrupted him. "Just listen, okay? Eventually, she was found, albeit at the bottom of a lake. She'd walked there after school and just jumped off the cliff that overlooked it. They found her backpack there and everything, still on the cliff, still full of homework. She hit her head on a rock and drowned once in the water. Throughout this entire ordeal, I never did anything to help. I never asked her if she was okay, I never tried to look for her myself, and I certainly never put up any flyers of my own or anything. And then, when she was finally recovered, dead at the bottom of a lake, I realized I'd failed my own sister. And that, perhaps, had I just done one single thing, then maybe she'd still be alive today to talk to. I have always regretted never doing anything when I so easily had the opportunity to, and I didn't want Melanie to follow that same path." Gus stared at her briefly, before sitting back in his seat and looking out the windshield. Neither one spoke for a bit, they just listened to the soft classical music on the car radio and drove through town. "I'm sorry," Gus finally said quietly, "I'm sorry that happened." "I know you want to protect her, I know she's your friend, but...she deserves to have more support than just one person," Emma said. Gus suddenly felt bad about every single mean thing he'd ever said about this woman. *** "Tell me about your mother," Leah asked. *** Students walking by in the hall could hear the shouting through the principals door to their office. Nobody stopped to listen, they just continued on their way, but they could hear the shouting clear as day. "This is unacceptable!" Karen yelled, leaning over the principals desk as Melanie, in her dress and princess hat adorned upon her small head, sat in a chair beside her mother, quietly looking at the floor. "No, what is unacceptable, Miss Irres, is that your daughter could theoretically be doing something to stop attracting all this negative unwanted attention she's receiving, and she simply refuses to be cooperative," the principal responded, sounding stern and irritated with this whole mess. "You honestly expect her to?" Karen asked, snapping right back at him, "Let's see how well you deal with what's happened at her age! Could you honestly stand there and tell me you would've reacted any better? And what about the students harassing her? They're just not to blame at all, huh? Typical parental behavior, raising little monsters you then refuse to discipline or take responsibility for the actions thereof, because you wanna be their friend, not their parent!" "This is not about the other students, and it's certainly not about their parents!" the principal replied, his voice growing louder, "This is about Melanie and this goddamned daydream she lives in!" "It's not a daydream to her!" Karen shouted back loudly, before glancing back at Melanie, leaning in closer over the desk and lowering her voice, "this is not a daydream, Mr. Jeeves, this is her reality now, and I am doing my goddamned best to help my child but there's only so much you can do for a sick child who's suffered such trauma." "I know," Mr. Jeeves replied, "I do, and I feel for you both, believe me, but this is a problem that should be dealt with at the home, not brought to the school. This isn't the place for it." Suddenly they heard the door open and when Karen spun around, Melanie was gone in a flash. She streaked down the hallway, her hand on her hat to keep it in place, and burst through the front doors of the school, turned, and then took off again across the field. Once she was deep in the nearby woods, she finally stopped at a small pond and fell to her knees. She took her hat off, slowly, and looked at it, then hugged it to her chest, and sobbed. *** "She defended you in everything you ever did, it sounds like," Leah said, chewing on the tip of her pencil, a bad habit she'd been trying to break lately. "The queen was great, and she did her absolute best," Melanie said, wiping her eyes, "I don't think I ever gave her enough credit." "Then why don't you call her up, tell her that now?" "Because I can't rely on her to fix everything, I'm an adult now," Melanie said, sitting up on the couch, tears rolling down her face, "...I'm...I'm not crazy, right?" "Crazy is a word we shouldn't use anymore, quite frankly, but no, Melanie, you're not crazy," Leah said, crossing her legs and smiling warmly at her, "Sometimes there's people who just don't fit into what society deems as 'the norm', so they get labeled different things like unique or special, or crazy, but really what you're doing is living in a reality that suits you far better than the one that doesn't suit you at all. In fact, if I had to say so, I'd say I'm jealous. We'd all be so lucky to be so safe." Melanie chewed her lip and watched as Leah rolled in her chair back to her desk and started writing something down. Finally, Melanie cleared her throat and spoke again. "Are you happy?" she asked. "Uh," Leah responded, looking up, caught off guard as people rarely asked about her in their sessions, "Yeah, I guess? I mean, I have a nice job that allows me to live a comfortable life and help others, and I have a good selection of friends and a happy family. I'd say I'm fairly happy." "...i wanna be happy," Melanie said quietly. "Well we can make that happen," Leah responded, smiling. *** Emma found herself sitting at the kitchen table, flipping through a photo album when Darren came in through the side door. He opened the fridge, pulled out an apple and bit into it, turning to look at her. He came and sat down at the table, flicking through a few of the photos she'd pulled out to inspect. "Did you ever experience anything traumatic when you were a kid?" Emma asked. "Well I don't know if I'd call it traumatic exactly but one time I got one hell of a wedgie," Darren replied, making her laugh; he continued, "Is this about your sister? Is that why the album's out?" "I look at these photos and it just makes me realize how much negativity people cut out of their lives so that when they, or someone else, looks back on it all...they don't see the pain, you know? Photos are made to deceive people, sell you on this false reality, and only show you the good stuff, the stuff people want to remember." "Well, I mean, makes sense doesn't it?" Darren asked, taking another bite of apple, "Remembering the sad stuff just makes you unhappy." "Yeah but sadness is just as important as happiness, it's all a spectrum," Emma said, taking a swig of the beer in front of her, "They're both emotions we have and have to deal with, and if we don't, we just...then we're just bottling things up and that's not very healthy." "Naw, you're lookin' at it from the wrong perspective, Em," Darren said, leaning back, putting his feet up on a nearby chair, "I mean, you're right, don't get me wrong, I'm not arguing semantics with you. Everything you said was completely spot on, but what you're missing is that people don't want to remember the bad stuff. This isn't about whether they should or not, it's about whether they want to or not. If you thought about someone dying all the time, you'd always be miserable, but if you just remember the good times with that same person, you'll feel better. Photos are simply snapshots of time captured to remind us of the good, because life is so much more often filled with the bad. We need these reminders. They're not necessarily lies. They're just a filter." Emma nodded and sat back in her chair, running her hands through her hair. She picked up her beer and took another drink, then set it back down and exhaled loudly. "The whole thing is just aggravating, really. My parents made such a big damn deal out of treating us as equals, but then once she died, they rarely mentioned her again. Down came the childhood artwork, the pictures in the frames changed, and it was like she never existed in the first place." "It's not cool, I agree, but they did what they had to to keep their sanity," Darren said. "Do you think I'd make a good mother?" Emma asked, surprising him. "Uh..." Darren said, trying to think fast, "I guess, I mean, yeah. You're wonderful with your students, you're compassionate and understanding and patient, I think you'd make one hell of a mom quite honestly. Can't say I'd make a very good dad though. I'm more like the cool uncle who gets you out of jail and stuff." "Are you saying you wouldn't ever want children?" Emma asked. "This is one of those conversations that ends badly no matter what my answer is, isn't it?" Darren asked, "I've read about these." "You have?" Emma asked, chuckling. "Hey, when a man is stuck in a bathroom and desperate enough, he'll read a Cosmo magazine," Darren replied, "I don't know if this is the best time to have this discussion. I'm a little buzzed, you've been drinking, I don't know that I can be trusted to be totally honest and-" "Oh please," Emma said, interrupting him, "People are only honest when they're drunk, it's when they're sober that they lie. Why do you think people lie about being alcoholics? Because they're sober when they're asked." "I don't...I don't know that I want children, yeah," Darren said, standing up and tossing his apple core in the open trashcan, "And if that's something you might want, maybe we should reconsider things. I'm...I'm sorry." With that, Darren turned and exited back out the side door, leaving Emma alone with her photos. *** "Tell me about your brother," Leah asked. *** How many days had a 13 year old Melanie been chased after school, pelted with rocks? Far too many, she figured. As she bobbed and weaved, left and right, covering her head for some sort of safety net, she could hear their jeers and taunts right behind her. Suddenly she tripped on a sprinkler on a lawn and fell on her face as the kids surrounded her, pelting her with little stones and pebbles. As Melanie cowered in the grass, taking it all, a car pulled up and a young man only a few years older than her got out. "Hey! Get the hell away from her!" he shouted, and the kids took off, scattering in all directions; he approached Melanie and leaned down, touching her gently, "Mel? You okay?" Melanie looked up at him, her lower lip bleeding, her face caked with dirt, her hair a tangled mess, and he sighed. He helped her up and took her to the car, then got back in and started driving. For a bit, neither one said a word, but finally Shane sighed and spoke. "Are you okay?" "I'll have them executed tomorrow," Melanie responded, making him smirk. "Melanie, this is ridiculous. From now on, wait with a teacher and I'll pick up at the school," Shane said, "That way this whole thing can be avoided. You know mom worries when she comes home and you're all hurt. We need to get you cleaned up now before she gets off work." "I don't know why people have a problem with me. I don't have a problem with me," Melanie said, making Shane nod, grinning. "That's a good answer," he said. *** Melanie, sitting on the couch, sobbing into her hands, didn't want to look up at Leah. Leah was jotting something down and then set her clipboard on the desk and stood up, walked over to the couch and sat beside her, rubbing her back. "The kingdom just...fell apart," Melanie said, "and my only option, when I turned 18, was to run as far away as I could." "I still think you should call your mother," Leah said, "or your brother, or even see your father. Let's make another appointment for this coming week, and we'll see how you're feeling then. Does that sound good?" Melanie nodded as Leah got back up and headed to her desk to schedule it in. Maybe she was right. Maybe all Melanie needed to do was see her dad. *** Gus answered his door after the first few knocks, only to find Melanie standing there, in rather civilian clothing much to his surprise, looking worn down. He opened the door a little bit wider and looked at her cautiously. "You're not gonna yell at me again, are you?" he asked. "I need you to come with me," she said, "Will you drive me somewhere?" "...sure, let me get my keys and my coat," Gus said. Neither one spoke in the car. Well, Gus did ask where they were going, but she wouldn't answer, so he just kept on driving, following her directions. Finally they pulled up, a bit ways out of the city, to the front of a cemetery. Gus pulled his jacket on and followed Melanie out of the car, and in through the front gates. He zipped his jacket up and shoved his hands in his pockets as he tried to keep pace with her. "Graveyards creep me out," he said, the cold air in front of him clearly showing him his breath, "I don't like being human, cause only humans know they're going to die. Dogs don't have that kind of mental capacity for critical thinking, not on that same level of existentialism anyway. One day they're chewin' a bone or chasin' their tail, the next day they're dead. They don't know what's coming." "Mortality is a completely natural thing to be afraid of," Melanie said. "Oh, it's not mortality I'm afraid of," Gus said, "I like knowing that I CAN die, I just don't like knowing that I WILL die." And then he bumped into her. He backed up and fixed his glasses, then looked at her again, as she knelt on the ground in front of them. "Mel?" "Gus," Melanie said, shining a flashlight on a headstone, "This is my dad. Dad, this is Gus." "Uh, nice to meet you sir, nice place you've got here," Gus replied, awkwardly. The headstone simply read, "R.I.P. Chris Irres, Father, Husband, Wonderful Man" and his birthdate to his enddate. Gus heard Melanie start to cry, and he put his hand on her shoulder, then knelt down beside her. Without warning, she pushed herself into his chest and squeezed him tightly, sobbing away. Gus just sat there, in the dark, for lord knows how long, letting her cry. He wasn't going to let her be alone. Not anymore. He was her court jester, after all, and it was his duty to make her happy.
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Royally Screwed follows 24 year old Melanie Irres, an average young woman...who legitimately believes she's a princess. Archives
July 2023
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