Zero · Chat

You sit in the consultation room, the white mist from the humidifier drifting up rhythmically. The door is pushed open and then slammed shut. You don't look up, your pen scratching twice on the logbook, writing down the date, writing down his name—ZERO; you always write the letters a bit lighter than the rest. He sits on the sofa, curled into a large heap. A man of 186cm, with shoulders broad enough to fill out that old hoodie, yet he insists on arching his back, burying his chin in his collar, revealing only half his face. The stray hairs on his forehead cover his eyebrows, his skin sickly pale; you can see the fine veins beneath his temples. The sound of the humidifier fills the silence. "Don't feel like talking today?" you ask. He doesn't move. You uncap your pen, then cap it again. Uncap, cap. You repeat this three times before hearing a slight movement from the sofa—he buries his face a little deeper into his collar. You stand up, the chair wheels rolling across the floor. You walk over and sit beside him, leaving a fist's width of space. This is the safe distance you've spent six months figuring out, exactly the limit of what he can endure. "Let me see your hands." He pulls his hands back into his pockets. "Zero." You call his name, your voice kept very soft. You've never asked yourself why you use this voice with him. Are you like this with other patients? You don't know. You don't want to know. He pulls his hand out of his pocket and opens it. The bruise on the inside of his wrist is deeper than yesterday, printed on his deathly pale skin like something filthy. You don't touch him. You never touch him directly. You just look, looking at that bruise, looking at the red marks on his fingers from pinching himself, looking at the lines on his knuckles turned white from clenching his fists too long. "Pinched yourself again?" He nods. "Last night." "Because of what?" He doesn't speak. You wait. The thing you've learned most in the past six months is waiting for him. Waiting for him to finish smashing things, waiting for him to finish kicking the wall, waiting for him to hold back his red eyes, waiting for him to finally be willing to speak. You've seen him at his most pathetic—curled on the floor shaking, face buried in his knees, like a dog abandoned too many times that no longer knows how to bark. But he has never cried in front of you. Not even when his eyes are completely red. You look at his downcast eyes. His lashes are very long, making him look particularly aggrieved when they droop. You remember the first time you saw him, pushed in by two adults, full of hostility, looking at you like an enemy. Those eyes were wet then too, but not with grievance—with hatred. Now those eyes are wet, but they are willing to look at you. "ZERO," you call him again. He raises his eyes to look at you. The corners of his eyes are still slightly red. You smile, without even realizing it. Then you pull a small object from your pocket—a squeeze toy, bear-shaped, which you saw passing by a boutique last week. You stood before the shelf for a long time then, wondering if he'd find it childish, if he'd throw it back, if he'd—but you bought it anyway. You push it toward him. "Next time you feel bad, squeeze this, okay?" He stares at the bear. Three seconds. Five seconds. Then he turns his head to look out the window. "...Don't want it." "Then I'll leave it here, take it if you want it." You place it on his corner of the table, straightening it, even giving it a light pat. It's plush; he shouldn't be able to break it by squeezing. His profile is reflected in the window glass. You look at that thin reflection, seeing his eyelashes tremble in the light. Then he speaks. "Why are you so good to me?" The voice is muffled in his collar, as if drifting from a great distance. But you hear it clearly. Your hand stops in mid-air. "Because you're my patient." You've said it. That sentence. It comes out of your mouth, drifts into the air, and lands in his ears. Your patient. Yes. He is just your patient. You've given yourself this answer many times, so many times that you've already believed it. He suddenly turns his head, staring at you. That gaze is a bit fierce, and a bit of something else. The corners of his eyes are redder, as if burned by something. "Just a patient?" You don't speak. You look at his hands clenching and unclenching, look at his white knuckles, look at him pinching himself red. Irritability is surging within him, you know. You've become too familiar with this irritability over the past six months. The next second he might smash something, might kick a wall, might curl into a ball and say nothing. But he just stands up. "I'm leaving."