“You seem restless today, June. What’s wrong?” June’s therapist, Leanne, asked her the next day.
Her therapist’s office was small and clean. June was sitting on a comfy white couch that had a plush, brown rug beneath it. There was a tissue on the side table next to the couch (which had been used several times by June), and a shelf with pleasant, inoffense books lining it.
June scratched her skin a little. “I don’t know. My Dad wants me to go to college.”
Leanne watched as June tapped her feet restlessly and trembled a little. She asked without reservation, “June, are you taking some kind of drug?”
June was shocked her therapist noticed, but not too shocked; it was her job to notice. June was defensive for a moment. “Why would you ask that?”
Her therapist, knowing how to get the most out of her, was silent. Either June would tell her more or she wouldn't, but Leanne wouldn't judge her either way.
June broke down in tears. “I’m sorry…”
“How many times have you taken the drug?” Her therapist asked.
“Three times. Please don’t tell anyone… don’t be angry.” June begged.
Her therapist looked very thoughtful, and then she took a deep breath and said, “June, it's not my place to tell unless your addiction becomes life-threatening, but I do think you should consider telling your parents and perhaps checking yourself back into therapy.”
Although her therapist was looking at her compassionately, June was paranoid--paranoid that her therapist was judging her and secretely telling all her friends about June--the stupid girl who couldn't control her addictions.
Her heart also began beating visciously at the memory of almost dying from a seizure when she used to drink alcohol. “I’m sorry. I’ll try not to do it again.”
Her therapist told her kindly, deciding not to push the issue, “It’s alright. Now, tell me more about college.”
“My dad wants me to go, but I really don’t want to.” June breathed easily, relieved to get it off her chest.
Her therapist leaned forward and let what June said sink in for a moment. “Because of what happened in high school or something else?”
June had never told Leanne in great detail why she dropped out of high school, but she made it known it was a scarring experience for her. June crossed her legs and looked down silently.
“June, are you ready to tell me more about high school?” Her therapist asked gently.
June looked her therapist in the eye, with unshed tears in her own. “Justin told everyone I was a cheap slut when I wouldn’t sleep with him. He ruined my reputation. I had to listen to other people whisper behind my back for a whole year. Trisha didn’t want to be my friend anymore; she promised she’d never abandon me, but she did. Anyway, Justin told me he’d stop telling everyone I was a slut and he’d tell them I was one of the cool kids again if I slept with him. So I did….”
Her therapist knew there was more, and she waited patiently for June to continue.
Tears were now falling from June’s eyes—her fists were balled up, shaking. “I hated it! But it felt like he really loved me… to everyone else, it seemed like I was his girlfriend; but in reality, I was just his whore...”
Leanne passed June a tissue box and let her sob for a moment.
“Nobody decent will ever want me again—I'm ruined!” June couldn’t stop crying. Her cheeks were red with terrorizing memories, and she felt hot and defensive.
“Your body is worthless because you made a bad decision?” Leanne questioned June's belief.
June looked at her therapist. She hadn’t told anyone about Mercury since she’d met him. He was a special secret she liked to keep to herself. She was afraid that if she told anyone, her memories of him would no longer be enchanting or a source of comfort. She was afraid they would become normal, wretched memories that plagued her mind with empty emotion like the rest of her memories--they would no longer take her to a holy, euphoric place that only she occupied where no one could judge her.
“There was this boy—a boy I truly loved—he had these two different colored eyes. He was a complete and total mystery, and I was free to imagine him any way I wanted to; I liked to imagine that he loved me unconditionally when nobody else did--that he was a prince from another world, come to rescue me from this placid, humdrum, unenchanting life. And... when I actually met him, I could feel it was true, even if it wasn't, really. When Justin blackmailed me for sex, Mercury told me not to do it. He told me I had to live in my body for the rest of my life, and that I should respect it.
"I took it to heart. From that moment on, my body was sacred. And I liked that it was sacred. But… But then Justin just kept chipping away at my reputation until I had no friends. I wanted to be loved—I needed to be loved—and so I let a man who thought of me as nothing more than a toy have me. Justin thought of my body as an empty shell to be used. He dug his nails into my wrists until they bled. I can still feel the pain!”
June’s therapist let her cry for a moment, and then she asked June, “How can you measure a body’s worth?
“I can only measure it by how much I valued it, which wasn’t much.” June replied.
Leanne spent the rest of the session continuing to challenge that thought, until June believed, at least at that moment, that her body was not worthless or vile.
At the end of the session, her therapist asked, “This boy… the one you loved? Are you still in love with him?”
June nodded. "He’s my poison.”
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