A Reconciliation

“Are you listening, Alison?”

Even though I knew Ms. Habi was talking to me, I didn’t bother to acknowledge her call. The view from Ms. Habi’s office was something that I was quite fond of; it had an abundance of things surrounding it. The birds were probably what I adored most out of all of the trees and plants flourishing outside because they could fly. Flying was something that I would assume everyone wanted to do at one point; the feeling of wind rushing through your hair, the crispness of evening air, it was boundless. The only thing stopping me from joining them was this room and Ms. Habi. 

Right, Ms. Habi. 

I reluctantly shifted my gaze to Ms. Habi, who was staring at me in what looked to either be contemptment or pity; I couldn’t tell. She held the same old wooden clipboard in her left hand that held a small stack of papers that I couldn’t identify and a thick, metal pen in the other hand. Ms. Habi sat in that same chair day in and day out, asking the same questions every time we met. The only difference between those same questions was the emotion behind them. Every now and then, you could pick up on hints of anger, and other days you could spot sympathy behind her chocolate eyes. 

Either way, I never answered. I didn’t need to, I knew my file said everything she was asking about, so there was no reason for her asking. Plus, her body language said it all— Ms. Habi was leaned back all the way in her chair with furrowed brows, the brows were stitched so closely together you would think she was creating entirely new wrinkles on her face. Other than her visible frustration, you could hear the anger rising in every question she asked me. 

“Alison, we’re getting nowhere. We’ve sat here in front of each other the same exact way in the same exact silence for months; you don’t need to talk about your family or anything you feel uncomfortable with. It could just be about what you’ve been enjoying lately— maybe foods in the cafeteria? Or perhaps a newly solved puzzle. Anything.” Ms. Habi wore either a light gray or black hijab every time I saw her, paired with the same full-body suit and blocky glasses that were the first thing I noticed about her. Elijah is a patient of hers as well, and we always got into arguments about how she “really” was or whatever that meant. 

Elijah always said she had a great reputation around the hospital, that she genuinely cared about her patients’ wellbeing and benefit from their sessions. Still, none of that showed up when we were together. Just last week, I could hear her hollering from the other room to a colleague about me.

“She’s silent, Jorge; I can’t get anywhere in our sessions or this hospital if she doesn’t comply.” Ms. Habi’s exclamations were muffled by a couple of doors and walls. 

A deep voice interjected, “Kaina, calm down; you just have to be patient with her; she’s gone through a lot. This is no way to be talking about one of your patients; you should know that.” They went on and on that evening.

Ms. Habi sighs in front of me, uncrossing her legs and resting her arms on the armrests of her chair. She sat and stared at me for a minute before she said anything. “Alison, your family misses you.” 

“You don’t have to lie to get me to talk.” I propped my elbow up onto the side table, looking outside the window at a flock of birds passing by. “They don’t miss me.”

Ms. Habi’s back straightened, and she planted her feet onto the floor when I muttered my response. Her heart leaped with joy as she quickly jotted down Alison’s response on a nearby clipboard with a blank report paper on it. “Why do you say that?” Ms. Habi hovered her pen over the paper, eagerly waiting for a reply. 

“Why would they miss me? My mom put me here, and my dad could barely spare me a glance last time they saw me. Owen is a lost cause too.” I sighed.

Ms. Habi scribbled down notes as she spoke, “Alison, you know why they feel the way they do, right?” 

“Of course I do. That’s why I know they don’t miss me.” 

The timer began to faintly ring in beside Ms. Habi who hesitantly reached to shut it off. She set her clipboard and pen on a table and rose up to see me out. “It was wonderful to talk to you today, I hope we can have the same conversation on Thursday.” 

Swiftly leaving her office, I was led by another employee to the cafeteria where I quickly spotted Elijah. “Elijah!” I trotted over to Elijah sitting on a table next to a window quietly eating his dinner. “I just finished up with Ms. Habi, same old same old. She asked the same stupid questions like she does every time.” I sat down, shifting my weight so I could sit more comfortably in front of Elijah. “But this time, she made up some stuff about how my family’s feeling.” I snickered, watching Elijah for a reaction. 

Elijah continued to eat his food for a moment and finally looked up at me. “She said the same thing about my parents, they actually came to see me.” He was more quiet than usual today, usually, we would banter back and forth, sometimes even getting the nearby guards or some worker to quiet us down. But today, he was different. Was it because of his parents’ visit? 

Elijah and I have been here for about two years together and we know pretty much everything about each other. Elijah was sent here by his parents because he said he wasn’t having the best time in school, so he started creating problems. He went into greater detail one time during our designated freetime— Elijah began the story with how he never transferred schools ever, so he would always be stuck with the same group of people since grade school. He said this wasn’t favorable because the kids bullied him, so he was constantly bullied throughout high school. “I just broke one day you know? I lashed out at some guy who was making a spectacle of me, and I got punished for it. They got no repercussions.” He scoffed. “How crazy is that?” 

He didn’t have a good relationship with his parents either, so that didn’t make it any better. Elijah always told me that we were the same, our situations were just flipped. His was at school while mine was at home. We never judged each other, and that was what I liked. 

“Did something happen with your parents?” I tiptoed around the question, hoping not to offend him. 

He looked up at me, tears in his eyes. “I’m sorry Al, but my family wants to discharge me.” Elijah gripped onto my arm, the face was ridden with guilt. 

I laughed,  “Eli, it’s fine, really. This is good isn’t it?” I pushed his hand off me and offered a small smile. “When are you leaving?”

“Tomorrow.” Elijah’s voice chokes out. 

I pat his shoulder, “Don’t feel sorry. Come visit every now and again.” Freetime concluded as Elijah gave a sorrowed wave as we get up and make our way towards our rooms. 

Usually, I meet with Ms. Habi on Tuesday’s and Thursday’s because she’s my primary shrink, but when I woke up on Wednesday, I saw that Ms. Habi had called an emergency meeting. My mind flashed to Elijah.

Was it really my parents?

I couldn’t help but think, what would they do if they came to visit me? My parents and I didn’t have the best communication with each other throughout my childhood, it was always misunderstanding after a misunderstanding.

Ms. Habi invited me into her office and had me sit down on the same seat as yesterday. She started off with the same questions, “How are you” or “Have you had any unusual thoughts lately?” and still, I didn’t answer them. They were empty questions after all.

“Alison, there’s something I want to try out.” Ms. Habi sat at her desk instead of her usual cushioned chair in front of me today. “If you want, we can have a group therapy session with your mom today. It’s all scheduled, we just have to have your permission.” Ms. Habi looked hopefully in my direction. 

“They actually missed me?” I laughed under my breath, quietly talking to myself before I made a decision. The last time I saw her was when I was covered in blood. Now, what will she think? “It can’t hurt to try.” I shrug my shoulders as Ms. Habi excitingly presses a button on her landline phone to call her secretary. 

This was all going too fast. First Elijah, now me? I wasn’t particularly comfortable here, but at least there was peace and a nice viewpoint to birdwatch from. 

The door creaked open to the left of me, slowly revealing the wrinkled face of my mom. She looked different from what I remembered, but maybe I just had begun to forget how the faces I once knew so well around me had looked. She wore an ironed white shirt with her usual khakis and shoulder bag. Nothing changed besides her face.

Her face. It had looked more aged, like a grape basking in the sun for what felt like a day, but I guess it was years. So much had changed in two years. 

“Alison…” Her hoarse voice trailed off as she matched my gaze, and she quickly grabbed a tissue from her bag. She greeted Ms. Habi briefly and stood in the back of the room.

“Ma’am, you can sit in my chair; I can pull up my desk chair.” Ms. Habi politely directed her to her velvet chair, where she took a seat and tightened her grip around her bag. She was tense.

Ms. Habi smiled and sat down as well. “How about we start off with how you guys are doing?” She whipped out her clipboard and metal pen.

She never broke her gaze towards me. “We’ve been holding up all right at home. Owen started high school, and your dad got another job.” She smiled, waiting for a response.

I contemplated what I should say next. “How was Liam’s funeral?” 

Taken aback by my response, she cleared her throat. “Your aunt was distraught. But everyone made it fine, everyone but you.” Ms. Habi glanced in between us and our growing tension. “Why did you do it, Ali? Why did you kill Liam?”

“If you listened to me back then, you would have known why.”

“Just tell me now, please.” 

“He wasn’t a good guy, Mom. He came in when you guys were gone and prodded me for money. I was defending myself, what’d you want me to do?” Heat began to boil in my stomach.

“But you sat there in his blood, Ali. You looked like you were enjoying it! You were laughing when we got back! What do you want us to do, not send you to get some help?”

“It traumatized me, Mom! It would’ve helped if you were on my side!” I shouted back, adding more fuel to the fire. I knew this conversation wasn’t going to end well. 

Ms. Habi cleared her throat and interjected with, “Let’s settle down, okay? Your mom came here to gain a better understanding of why you did what you did. Maybe she didn’t see you clear enough or understand your point of view, but that is why were are here.” She looked directly at me. “Alison, don’t you think it’s freeing to have someone finally know the truth? To understand you?”

Free? Had a multitude of answers for different people, whether it was physical freedom from something or the freedom to choose what you desire. 

I sighed, already knowing the answer to Ms. Habi’s question. I nodded slowly, looking out the window at the bright blue sky. “You sent me here with a look of disgust on your face, mom. I didn’t even have a chance to explain myself to you. You and Dad and Owen left me with nothing but the fear of what happened that night.”

Before they shipped me away to the mental hospital, my mom always got upset with me because I didn’t always have time to spend time with them. Every year, we would throw a holiday party around Christmas time, where our extended family came to celebrate. Between school and extracurriculars, I found that I didn’t need to come to the party every year, so I opted out. Of course, my parents were angry, and it started our downward spiral into slowly distancing ourselves from one another. 

The lack of communication between us was what really caused this whole situation that has now last for over two years, and still, no one has apologized. Many arguments like that happened leading up to my incident, and we never got to reconcile. 

“I’m sorry, Alison. I was just scared.” Her voice softened, and her posture became less stiff. “We miss you; we just want a chance to understand.” 

Ms. Habi smiled and set her clipboard down in her lap. She had a look of contentment and pride plastered onto her face, along with a soft smile. “I think we made a lot of progress today. We know that Alison’s incident with Liam was a huge source of trauma for the both of you, and I think that naturally coming to a state of understanding amongst yourselves was the best course of action.” She smiled at the both of us and continued on, “I also think this is the best way for Alison to start to go down the path of healing and for you, Ms. Montgomery, the path of forgiveness and understanding. I would like to continue on with these weekly visits between the two of you and hopefully branch out to the rest of your family, including Liam’s mother, your aunt.”

My Mom looked at me with a gleam in her eye, as if silently asking me to agree to Ms. Habi’s suggestions. I nod hesitantly at first but then say, “I think that’s a good idea.” 

The next was nothing special, I continued on with the scheduled routine that Ms. Habi had planned out for me, but the only different thing was that Elijah wasn’t there, and the windows were open, allowing gusts of air into the common room. The air was refreshing, letting everyone in the hospital breathe in the spring breeze.

I stepped outside for a moment, taking in the scenery. The air and the sound were much better than I had imagined from inside the office. The birds chirped, the leaves danced as they fell to the ground, and the grass was long and scratchy. I laid down gently on the grass to look up at a clearing of the trees above me.

A flock of birds passed through my vision, and slowly flew out of sight.

End.