Work Text:
ARCHIVIST
We all have domain here, Martin. The place that feeds us.
MARTIN
Oh. [...] What about me?
ARCHIVIST
Would you… like me to -
MARTIN
No, no. Don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.
- MAG 167
[CLICK]
[THE SOUND OF MURMURED CONVERSATIONS AND THE SCUFFLING OF FEET. THE SPACE SOUNDS LARGE WITH THE OCCASIONAL SQUEAK OF A SHOE, AS IN A GYMNASIUM. THERE IS A CLATTERING OF FOLDING CHAIRS, THEN A GRADUAL, EXPECTANT QUIET]
[STATIC RISES]
ARCHIVIST (STATEMENT)
Angela has never liked the idea of group therapy.
To be honest she’s never believed much in therapy in general, but group sounds like a particular sort of torment. Other people, strangers, knowing the private workings of her mind is not going to solve any of her problems. So why bother?
Why is she here?
The group leader is new this week, and though she is certain he introduced himself, Angela fails to catch his name. He’s young, round-faced, smiles warmly like all the group leaders do. He looks nice. Not like last week’s counselor. Maybe this time will be better.
A glance around the circle, though, and Angela realizes with a chill that she does not recognize anyone here. The group is entirely different. None of these people know her story yet, a fact that should bring her some relief–and yet all she feels is the sickening press of dread. These are strangers, blank slates. If only she hadn’t come today, they could all remain that way–but now she is here, and a dozen new people will know more about her than they did before she made the foolish decision to come.
Why did she come?
It’s alright. She doesn’t have to say much. She can just… listen, this time. No need to rush it with a new group. She doesn’t have to speak.
Let’s go around and just give our names, says the new counselor. Young man, wide eyes. A comforting face, the sort of face you could talk to. They go around the circle and say their names; Toby, Rowan, Daksha, David. Two Davids, actually, the second of whom smiles a little sheepishly as he says it.
I’m Angela, says Angela when it’s her turn, I’m forty two. The eyes of the group swivel to her. Why did she tell them her age? She feels small; a great spotlight has alighted upon her. The rest of the group has fallen into shadow, but she knows they are still staring at her. Their eyes are large. Her chest grows tight, she opens her mouth–
And the feeling is gone. To the right, Rebecca tells the group her name as Angela gasps for air.
That wasn’t too bad; that wasn’t much at all. Perhaps that is the end of it. She will sit quietly for the rest of the session, and that will be that. She will go home, and she will never see these people again.
Alright, says the new counselor when they have all given their names, now let’s go around and just… say what we feel like saying! He laughs, and for some reason Angela’s stomach turns over. Rowan, you’re first! What’s your story?
No. No, that’s not right. Aren’t counselors supposed to say something about no pressure? Isn’t sharing supposed to be voluntary?
Take your time, Rowan, says the counselor kindly. Rowan’s face is pale, their skin clammy. The spotlight has fallen on them now. The room is dark save for their small circle and the eyes of their audience. The more you share, the better!
And slowly, haltingly, Rowan begins to speak. Angela watches as their nails dig deeper and deeper into the flesh of their arms, as though to claw the words out. They talk about their impoverished childhood, their father’s drunken rages, the fearful nights they spent cowering beneath their covers. They talk about being kicked out of the house, about being homeless for almost a year before scraping their way back to a halfway regular life. Their hands twist together as they talk about learning that their mother had died sometime in that interim, and they’d had no idea. They shake as they confess how they dream of her, the many mutilations they imagine for lack of any real answers, the seething rage, how they think that one of these days they’d like to track down their father and see how payback looks on him.
Thank you for sharing, says the counselor, patting their shoulder. Rowan sobs brokenly into their hands, tiny flecks of blood beneath the fingernails. Daksha, your turn! I hope you feel comfortable confiding in us.
One by one, the counselor calls upon them for their stories. Angela feels herself begin to sweat. There is no order to the summons, skipping at random around the circle; every time a speaker finishes, the room hangs in breathless panic, wondering who will be next. With each tale, the eyes of her fellow listeners seem to grow wider and brighter. They loom like predators in the dark.
Daksha is suicidally depressed. Evan watched someone get eaten by the ground once. One of the Davids is cheating on his wife. Every speaker squirms, face sliding gradually into terror as they speak, choking as though the words are being ripped out of them, but Angela holds firm even as her palms grow clammy: she will decline. She will remain quiet, and she will leave, and no one will ever be the wiser.
She will not speak. She will not speak. She will not speak.
As Eddie, the man on her left, begins to detail his unfortunate history of fraternity hazings, she feels a strange prickling on the side of her face. When she follows it, she finds that the counselor is smiling at her. His eyes are bright and gentle. His face is soft. The sort of face you talk to.
Eddie finishes his story. His breathing is shallow and far too fast. Angela did not hear most of what he said. Instead, her eyes are locked with the counselor’s. Her own heartbeat is loud and fast in her ears.
She will not speak. She will not speak.
Go ahead, Angela, the counselor says kindly. Tell us everything.
Angela tells them everything.
She tells them about coming out to her mother, the way she professed her acceptance but never stopped needling Angela about how she’d never find a man, dressed like that. About the closeted girl she dated in college, the inevitable heartbreak. She talks about meeting her wife, loving her wife, marrying her wife, about her wife deciding a year ago that actually her family’s money mattered more. Sorry Angie, the will’s been changed, I can still get my cut if I’m married to a man by the time he kicks it. Do you even know how much money my grandfather has? Trust me, it’s for the best.
The eyes of the group are enormous in the shadows of the room, bright circles in the gloom, all fixed unerringly on her. She tells them about her mother’s I-told-you-so’s, about the depressive spiral she’s still in the middle of. She tells them she doesn’t know why she is here. She tells them she doesn’t know why she’s here at all.
Thank you for sharing, says the counselor. Angela chokes as he stares right through her, thorough and placid. The sort of face you tell things to, and she tries, her throat flexes around more words, but there’s nothing left to tell.
And then he turns away.
But something is wrong. The spotlight moves along, but not one pair of eyes moves off of Angela and her shaking shoulders. She is transparent, she is insubstantial, and yet she is far too present in her skin. These people know her now. She’s been seen. She might know a few more things about them too, but it’s not nearly enough to make it even, she’s been read like a book, she’s– she’s–
She cries. And they all watch her as she does.
It could be a day or it could be mere seconds before the last person finishes their story and the circle falls into quiet. There, says the counselor, smiling and content. Isn’t that better? Honesty tends to be freeing, I find.
And Angela finds herself nodding through her tears, finds everyone else in the group nodding along.
The counselor beams. I’m so glad you agree, he says. He claps his hands together. And that’s all the time we have for this session, folks! Thank you so much for sharing. If you’ll all proceed to your next group, your next session will be ready shortly.
And Angela finds herself standing.
[A CLATTERING OF FOLDING CHAIRS.]
Angela finds herself walking.
[THE SQUEAKING OF SHOES. THE HEAVY KA-CHUNK OF AN OPENING DOOR.]
Angela finds herself sitting back down.
[LONG RUSTLING, THEN A GRADUAL EXPECTANT QUIET]
She looks around the circle. The counselor is a young woman, kind-faced and smiling.
She does not recognize anyone here.
[A DEEP BREATH FROM THE ARCHIVIST]
ARCHIVIST
Oh, Martin.
[CLICK]