Page 29 of The Fall Classic

Georgie

Mergence?

Sorry, autocorrect! Tell me about it.

If you don’t mind.

You don’t have to, of course.

I smile at the phone. Georgie asking me to tell her about it and then worrying she was sounding bossy is something I already know is vintage Georgie.

I glance around my apartment, which would be lifeless without my stacks and boxes of books. I’m still in the two-bedroom apartment Lucas and I leased at the beginning of the year. As much as I tell myself it’s easier to keep up the more expensive lease than it is to move to a cheaper one-bedroom place, the truth looks a lot more like my trouble with the knuckleball.

I hold on too tight and release too late.

Dr. Chang wants to go back to brainspotting in our session tomorrow—trying to access that part of my brain that’s hiding my unprocessed trauma from losing my mom.

I want to avoid it completely.

Dr. Chang says avoidance feeds anxiety.

And that just makes me want to avoid my session tomorrow.

Take that, Dr. Chang!

Logan

You focus on something close for a count of three—I use my glove lacing—and then you let your eyes drift out to something far away. Something neutral. It’s supposed to interrupt the anxiety loop without requiring you to think your way out of it.

Georgie

Wow. Brains are awesome.

Logan

I wouldn’t mind my brain being less awesome.

Georgie

Cough *humble brag* cough

Logan

Haha

Georgie

No, seriously. It’s so cool that your brain is so good at protecting you, and it’s so cool that you’re training your mind to work around the overprotectiveness. That’s a really determined, really awesome brain you’ve got there, 49.

Logan

That’s a nice way of looking at anxiety.

Georgie

After my mom passed, I started talking to the school counselor every week.

She helped me see that mourning isn’t a sign of something wrong but a sign that something was ever so perfectly right. The love you used to give has to go somewhere and do something, so it carves a space for itself inside your chest and stays there.