should’ve known better

content warning: sexual assault and suicide attempt

“I should’ve known better.”

“Excuse me?”

“You only ever call me when you fucking need something, and the only time I hang up, you know, now that I’m employed and have a job and can’t obey your every whim any more, you go ahead and do something so reckless and stupid, it makes me regret ever setting a boundary. I should’ve known better than to answer the damned phone.”

“Julie, please, it’s not like that, I swear, I -“

“You’re calling me from the fucking psych ward after drinking an entire bottle of mouthwash because you were home alone and felt life was no longer worth living without your girlfriend around to remind you of your life’s worth. Look, call your fucking parents or use the help those hospitals provide, because I’m done with this shit, okay? Forget my number, I’m not answering again.” The dial tone echoed in Adam’s ear, announcing the necessity of hanging the phone back on its hook. 

Adam hung the phone back on the hook. He should not have called Julie. She was right; Adam had a pattern of doing dumb shit when he felt rejected, but Adam couldn’t turn to his parents in a time like this. Which left the hospital as his best option. Which was a shit option.

Adam collapsed back onto the bed in the hospital room after the failure of a phone call to his now ex-girlfriend. She should have known better. More than that, Adam should have known better. He should have known better than to call a girl he could already tell was falling out of love with him for emotional support, but more than that, he should’ve known better than to put himself in the situation in the first place. The situation, Adam thought about his messed up family dynamics as, because he didn’t have the courage to even think the true words of what had happened to him, what he had participated in. 

I should’ve known better Adam would think to himself, remembering Stephen’s hands, Stephen body blocking him in, blocking the sunlight steaming through the window, and if this was fiction that would be symbolism, Adam remembered thinking to avoiding thinking about where Stephen’s hands were on his body, what happened. 

Adam had no reason to be thinking. He shouldn’t be thinking - he should be dead, but he had failed in that endeavor also. So why was Adam thinking? Sometimes, Adam’s mind took pity on him and removed thought entirely, a behavior the psychologists at the hospital called dissociation. Adam’s existence then consisted only of sensory input, vision and auditory stimuli and buzzing background that was feeling, tactile, no, Adam was alone in a hospital room again. Alone, not at home, not under Stephen, his older brother he should have known better than to spend time with.

“I should’ve known better.” 

“About what? Why’d you do it, Adam?”

“I should’ve known better, but I just - I don’t want to be loved. I don’t want to love him, but I can’t seem to stop. Then things - he does - I want out, I just want to die, why can’t I just be allowed to -“

“Adam, you’re spiraling again. If you don’t want to address the topic, just say that. Wanting to die is never really about death, it’s trying to escape the situation. Being hospitalized is a temporary solution to the problem of whatever it is in your life making you suicidal, but you won’t be able to leave unless you can verbally express yourself.”

“Great, guess I live here now. You can’t help me, so stop trying.”

“I’d be failing my duties as a therapist if I gave up on a patient. Why do you think you can’t be helped?”

“If I leave, I’ll just end up being - he’s going to - I don’t know why I let it be such a big deal. It’s just sex.”

“Sex? Hang on, are we still talking about your brother Stephen?” Adam couldn’t look the therapist in the eye but he shamefacedly nodded. He flapped his hands, the maelstrom of emotions, of letting someone who shouldn’t know learn the horrible reality he lived in, the fear he was betraying his family - but hadn’t they betrayed him first? “Adam, look at me, please.” Adam dared a glance at his therapist’s face, her expression unreadable as any of the emotions Adam had beentaught to expect from revealing the crime he had committed. “That couldn’t have been easy to admit, and I’m proud of you.”

“I didn’t admit it. I should’ve known better, shouldn’t be attempting suicide like some… I don’t even have the words for how pathetic I am!”

“You’re not pathetic, you’re a young man going through something incredibly difficult where your family cannot support you because they caused this. I’m assuming what happened was not consensual?”

“No. Well, yes, your assumption is correct. No, it’s not - I don’t want this. I don’t want to be alive since this is the only - it’s been going on for so long I should’ve known better than to stay at home when he was visiting but I thought maybe he’d outgrown me. I should’ve known better -“

“Adam, I’m taking should out of your vocabulary until you can learn to use it more appropriately.”

“You can’t - fine, I wish I had known better, hadn’t bothered hoping and let myself be caught off guard and surprised and devastated when what I knew could happen did in fact happen. Is that better?”

“Yes. You can’t live your life assuming you’ll be sexually assaulted, but it’s a natural reaction to wish you hadn’t been.”

Adam didn’t know what to say or do now. He was unused to his feelings being validated like this. The only person he had tried obtaining validation from before was Julie, who complained he used her. She was right. Adam was exhausted and unreasonably scared now that he had broken one of the biggest taboos in his life. ”Can I go back to my room now?”

“Of course.” Adam stood. He didn’t want to have to put the energy into moving one foot in front of the other, but that was the only way to get from the therapist’s office back to his hospital room. That felt unfair, that after having admitted the scariest thing in his life ever he still had to do mundane shit like walk around. He wasn’t supposed to even be alive. 

Adam stared at the ceiling, wondering why he had talked. The words sexual assault hung in his brain, not wanting to go away, feeling important even though Adam knew that was what had happened long before this shrink put it into words, into a verb. 

“I should’ve known better.” Adam said aloud, just to prove he still could use the word should, even though the therapist said not to, even though the therapist did probably know better what Adam should do than Adam himself did currently.