Page 125 of The Sound of Him

“Cynical Adam is my favorite. Go on.”

He rolls his eyes, but his smile makes it fond. “You just like when I’m cynical because it bothers Kellan and you find it amusing.”

“Itisamusing!” I point at him, knowing for a fact he feels the same. “It takes so fucking much to bother that man and you say one pessimistic thing and he’s snapping. Unbelievably entertaining.”

“Yes, well, I’m glad that me provoking a man with antisocial tendencies provides you with a source of entertainment.”

“Oh, like Kellan would ever touch you.”

Something complicated passes over his expression before he locks it down. The moment catches me off guard. Adam has always been good about keeping his expressions locked down. Sometimes too good. He has a hard time turning it off when he’s not with a client, wearing a mask more often than not. It’s rare he slips. It’s even more rare for something that intense to be what slips through, a multi-faceted chaos of emotions.

What the fuck did Kellan do to him?

I lean forward, my heart doing its best to lodge itself in my damn throat. “Did he threaten you? Over what? Is it about me or Keat-”

“Stop. No.” He leans forward too, resting his forearms on his desk, hands cupping the glass of scotch. He stares down into his scotch for a long moment before looking up at me with a wry smile. “Just - that wasn’t anything. Ignore it. My mind is messy.”

Messy.That pulls a smile out of me. I forgot he taught me that. When I was little, that’s what we called it - my mind would get messy.

“You know, we all talk to you and lean on you, but who do you talk to, Adam?”

“I have a therapist, Ace.” He reaches over to squeeze my hand. “Don’t worry about me. I just really need to find the time to video call with her. These past weeks have been too busy.”

I eye him. “We don’t lie?”

“We don’t lie,” he agrees, having adopted the rule from Kellan. He picks his glass up and nudges it against mine where it sits still untouched on the desk. “Your turn.”

“Wait, no, you never got to be cynical.”

“Ah, right. Well, between you and I? The decision to let Travis and Jake stay here is risking lives. If you weren’t here, I would have turned the position down unless Kellan agreed to override them. It is utter bullshit. It’s unhealthy and unethical and way too many survivors left here too early. One is already in the hospital for a suicide attempt. I'm honestly surprised there haven't been more.”

I relax into the leather chair I’m in, taking a sip of my drink as he washes down his admission with a gulp of his own. He leans his head back and closes his eyes. “Sometimes I wish we could hold them. I know that’s fucking awful, Ido, but the shock of a rescue is… it fucks with them. They aren’t thinking straight. Not yet. It’s all fear and survival instinct now. Fight or flight or freeze, and we’re offering to give them wings. If they were at a real hospital, with police working their case and social workers, they would all be on involuntary psych holds easily. There’s areasonfor that.”

“There is,” I agree. “And there’s a reason we don’t enforce the same rules.”

“I'm aware.” He laughs humorlessly. “And now the two survivors they demanded to be here for are leaving anyway and I’m just-” he stops, rubbing a hand over his face. He doesn’t pull it away when he’s finished, just resting it there. “I’m justreally fucking frustrated. Because these two aren’t ready either. It feels like I’ve been slapping bandages onto everyone from this operation and praying for the best, and that is not the kind of doctor I am, Ace.” He drops his hand, his eyes sad as he looks at me. “I don’t like this. Ihatethis.”

I take a sip of my scotch, pretending it’s the only reason why it hurts to swallow.

I want to say that I hate it too, but that won't fix it. Plus, my hate is more complicated than his. I care about Travis and Jake more than he does. He's just their colleague - and sort of a therapist for them, if they ever let him help. It's easy for him to say that things shouldn't have gone down this way. It's harder for me.

A goddamn mess, as Kellan had said. This whole operation has become a goddamn mess.

“One or both of them are going to hurt themselves in the next month,” Adam mutters, almost like he's telling it to himself, trying to come to terms with it. “Carter will likely do it through recklessness. He issodetermined to prove that he’s fine. He wants to prove that he doesn’t need Travis or Maison or me or anyone here. He’s all fight and fury, with no real reason to check himself. He's breaking his own heart with Travis and that hurts is going to form a vicious circle he'll get swept up in.”

“And Casey will do it quietly. He'll slip away from us. Carter is going to be so loud, he'll drown Casey out. I'm not blaming Carter for that. I've just seen this enough times. Casey is living for Carter right now. I don't think he's all that interested in living for himself. If Carter successfully moves on, Casey will feel like a burden. If Carter spins out and hurts himself, Casey will take all of the blame. That kid is going to slip right through the cracks and there's not a damn thing I can do about it. I don't even believe they'll actually come back to see me despite the deal we made. Carter won't want to, he wants nothing to do with thisplace, and Casey won't come alone. It's…” he trails off, shaking his head.

“A goddamn mess,” I offer.

“Yes. A goddamn mess.” He rubs at his eyes before sitting back in his chair again, forcing himself to relax. “Now I'm worried about you.”

I sag in my own chair, bringing my drink with me. My knee is already bouncing.

“Give me three,” he says softly. “And something good.”

It's a game he used to play with me when I was younger He used to tell me that one day it'd be difficult to come up with three whole things bothering me, and that thesomething goodwould be hard to narrow down. I hadn't believed him. Turns out - in a rare occurrence between the two of us - I was actually right.

I wonder if he's realized that. I wonder what he thinks of it, if he has. If he maybe still hopes I'll reach that place some day.