Done Adulting Vol. 2 Ch. 24

“You can call me Mary.”

“I know,” Ella said as she paced in Mary’s office looking at the diplomas on the wall and the human psychology journals and books on the shelves. “Jamie told me about you,” she added flatly.

“What did Jamie say?”

“That we’ll talk, and I’ll feel better.” Jamie believed that, and Ella did, too, most of the time.

“How do you feel today?”

Ella shrugged her head to the left. “Average.”

“And what is your average?”

“At the moment? Anxious. Not very happy.” Ella’s voice was matter of fact, like she was talking about someone else.

“You don’t seem to mind talking about it.”

“Well, us littles say the darndest things. Isn’t that what you amazons say?”

“Would you like to sit down?” Ella acquiesced to sitting, propping herself in the corner of a little-sized couch facing Mary. “Stacy and I have spoken a couple times, and I have your file from the Department’s psychologist.”

“Yeah? What does the Department have to say about me?”

“The Department or the psychologist?”

“Same difference, right? She works for them. If they decide to just write me off, she’ll back them up to keep her job.”

“She took the same vow to help people that I did.”

“She’ll put her mortgage ahead of her vow. People do it where I’m from, too.” Ella folded her arms over her chest.

“Can I ask how you felt about the Department before they made this mistake?”

“I didn’t think much of them at all. Not lately. I guess before I was grateful, but it’s been a long time since anyone from the Department was part of my life.”

“Now?”

“They screwed up, and for political reasons they might decide it’s best to be rid of me. They could fuck me over in two dimensions if they decide.”

“Is that what you think they’re doing?”

“I know they’re thinking about it. Why else would Ben stop answering Stacy’s questions? He was her friend before all this, before I was even in Itali, and now he won’t give her a straight answer. If he had good things to say, he’d be saying them.”

“They let you talk to their psychologist.”

“And what’s the file say? I haven’t seen it.”

“It says you’re angry.”

“O, it says that, does it,” Ella laughed. “How perceptive of them. Top notch for government work.”

“Are you just angry at them?”

“Honestly, I’m angry at amazons in general right now.”

“Even Stacy?”

“A little bit.”

“Why Stacy?”

Ella shrugged and was quiet for a moment. “I know it’s irrational, but she lied to me. She didn’t mean to, but she did.”

“How did she lie?”

“She told me she would protect me. Turns out she can’t. She’s not really any more powerful in this situation than I am … And I don’t like that she contacted my parents without telling me. I know why she did it; I might have done the same thing, but I’m mad anyway … We irrational littles, ya know.”

“Why do you say it like that?”

“Say what like what?”

“‘We irrational littles.’ And earlier you said, ‘Littles say the darndest things.’”

“That’s how it seems, right? To amazons?”

“Is that how you feel about amazons?”

Ella stared blankly at Mary. “I said it, didn’t I? God, could you just ask what you want to ask and we can get out of here early? I have a life to go endure.”

“Okay. Do you dislike amazons? All amazons?”

“As a species, you’re kinda on my shit list.”

“Why?”

Ella rolled her eyes. “You fucking know why. And then the amazons of Itali say they’re so different. ‘It’s so different here.’ But we’re still not people to you. Not when it gets complicated. The Department fucks up, and instead of making it right, they start thinking of how to fuck me over to save their asses … Judging people by the group is exactly what amazons do to us, and I’m trying not to do it back. I’ve always thought I was pretty good at that, compartmentalizing, recognizing that this big is good and that one is bad, and all of Aidu is bad … It’s hard to compartmentalize when it’s the government doing it, to say it’s just a bunch of bureaucrats and, ya know, the society they work for doing this…

“And it made me think, if we went public, told everyone about this mess, whose side would people take? And why? Would they side with the government, say getting rid of one little is worth it to keep adoptions flowing? Or would they side with me because it’s what I want? Or would they side with me because they don’t think any little should be on their own, or that we’re none of us capable of making our own choices and it would be cruel or negligent to send a human home? Or because siding with me is siding with Stacy, and they’d side with any amazon who wants to keep their little?” Ella stared off into the distance for a minute and sighed.

“Ella, can we talk about your arrival in Itali?”

“I don’t remember it.”

“You remember some of it.”

“I remember … broken glass. When they rescued me. I remember broken glass and …”

“And what?”

“Blood, I think. I’m not sure if that’s a real memory or not. I don’t think it is.”

“You think your mind made it up? Why would it do that?”

“Wishful thinking,” Ella gently scoffed. “A little drama to the story. Revenge.”

“You wish the people who had you in Aidu were hurt.”

“Wouldn’t you?”

“Probably. What did you think of amazons when you got here?”

Ella sighed in frustration. She knew all of this was in her multi-volume file. “I didn’t like or trust any of them for months. I got used to them. Stacy and I made an arrangement – she’d take care of me but otherwise treat me like an amazon unless I was okay with being treated in a different way. Seven more years go by, and now I’m talking to you. There.”

“It was just a question.”

“Then ask better ones.”

“Okay. I was going to work up to this, but let’s just talk about it. They tortured you in Aidu. You didn’t trust anyone in Itali. You had the choice to stay or go. Why did you stay?”

Ella sighed again and sat silently, re-crossing her arms. “Medical care.”

“They have that where you’re from.”

“It’s better here. I don’t think I would be walking again.”

“You could have gotten the care you needed and then left.”

“Safety.”

“From traffickers?”

“Traffickers don’t operate in Itali, at least not successfully.”

“You were afraid of being kidnapped again.”

“Yeah.”

Mary made a note, tapped her stylus against her tablet, and looked back up. “Any other reason?”

“Such as?”

“I don’t know. Any reason why you didn’t want to go home. Didn’t you miss your family, your friends?” Ella broke eye contact, and Mary noticed, the first sign of Ella’s vulnerability.

“I … How do you get back from what happened to me?”

“You were twenty-six in human years when you were rescued. That’s pretty young. Plenty of time to start over.”

Ella shook her head. “Start over as what? I’d never be who I was. My life wouldn’t have been what it was … I’d never just be a person there. I’d always be what happened to me.”

“And being a person with that past, at home, was worse to you than being an adopted little? Maybe I’m off base, but you don’t seem to like being a little.”

“Littles are littles everywhere, right? Isn’t that what you amazons say? We’re all just bumbling and pretending back there, right?” Ella weakly replied.

“I meant the lifestyle of a little. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe you do like it.”

“I like parts of it.”

“What parts? Or better yet, how are those parts different to you than they’d have been back home?”

“Here … Back there I’d be the nearly crippled victim and pity case. Here I’m just a little who needs some extra care.”

“Do you need that much extra care? It says in your file…”

“Not as much as I used to.”

“What else do you like about here?”

“I didn’t have to figure out how to live. How to … integrate back into society. It’s just spelled out for littles here, what our lives are. It’s pretty simple.”

“What else?”

“Stacy.”

“So you do like some bigs.”

“Some. Stacy. Carrie. Becky, Amanda, Mel. I still see Dawn and Michael sometimes.”

“And what do you like about Stacy?”

“She treats me like a person.”

“People back home would have treated you that way, so how is she different?”

“She’s … I guess the part I like about the little lifestyle is getting to be open with people and getting unconditional love in return.”

“Humans don’t get that from their parents?”

“They’re supposed to. Same here, right? They’re supposed to but they don’t always. Most do, back home just like here, but it’s different when you’re an adult.”

“What about you and your parents?”

“What about them?” Ella was looking across the room, away from Mary.

“Did they love you unconditionally?”

Ella’s lips quivered, and a tear fell from each eye. Mary waited, and just as she was ready to reframe the question, Ella answered, “Yes.” Her voice was suddenly hoarse. Mary slid a box of tissues toward Ella across the coffee table. She didn’t take one. “But it’s different when you’re an adult, I think. I never got to know them as an adult; they never got to know me as an adult.”

“Do you want to stop for today?”

“Just ask your questions,” Ella said as she wiped aways the tears with her hands.

“How come you never contacted your parents?”

“I figured they had moved on. It had been eight years. I figured they had done their mourning and,” Ella shook her head, “I didn’t want to screw that up.”

“You didn’t think they’d be happy to know you were alive?”

“I thought … I thought they must’ve been over it. I mean, as over it as someone can ever be for something like that. Why tell them if I had no intention of going back? They lost me once; why make them lose me all over again? I couldn’t do that to them.”

“What about you? Didn’t you want to see them?”

“Of course I did.”

“But that didn’t factor into your decision? You only thought about them?”

“Your point being …”

“Maybe there was a reason you didn’t want to contact them that had to do with your own feelings. Maybe not; I’m just asking … Like, maybe you were afraid.”

“Maybe.”

“Embarrassed?”

Ella nodded her head.

“Ashamed even?” Ella stared into the middle distance again, pinching her lip with her thumb and forefinger as she thought. “You were the victim. Why should you be ashamed.”

“Because it was my fault,” Ella said flatly.

“How so?”

“I went … I broke the rule. Don’t accept a drink from a stranger. First thing everyone teaches their teenage daughter when they start going to parties. Don’t accept a drink from a stranger … We were at a bar, in public. At least I think … But that doesn’t make a difference. I shouldn’t have.”

“You’re still the victim, Ella. Everything that happened after that drink wasn’t your fault. It was theirs.”

“Tell it to Maggie.”

“Who?”

“Maggie. My friend.” Ella sat back in her chair. “She was with me. She didn’t wanna go. I talked her into it.”

“She was taken, too?”

“I don’t know … I don’t know what happened to her. I remember walking with her on our way to the bar, and then I was in Aidu.”

“Does that have anything to do with why you didn’t contact your parents? Or go home?”

“I didn’t want them to know that it was my fault. I can’t fix it, so … I already ruined their lives once. Telling them the truth would just do that all over again.”

“And that’s all you were concerned about?”

“I didn’t wanna be … what everyone would think of me when they found out. Stupid … The girl whose fault it was … And Maggie’s family. What good would the truth do them? They’d blame me, but they’d blame her, too. Why do that to them?”

“And you didn’t think people there, in general, would see you as the victim? They’d blame you?”

“You’re not as familiar with humans as you think. Yes, they’d blame me. Or a lot of them would. Even if most people saw me as a victim, deep down they’d still think it was my fault because I accepted a drink from a stranger. Not so deep down for a lot of people.”

“Earlier,” Mary began slowly, “You said you had a life to go ‘endure.’ Is that really how you think about it, or were you just saying that?”

“Sometimes. More now than before all this. Feel like I’m living on pause, waiting for all this to work itself out.”

Mary took another note, tapped her tablet with her stylus again, and looked up. “Ella, did you stay here to punish yourself?”

“Maybe … Some.” Ella was looking into the distance again, her eyes unfocused. “But I grew to like it. Now it might get taken away. A few years of happiness, and it might get taken away … And all the other reasons, they’re still true … If I stay, I can … I can see myself being happy again. I don’t, if I go back; I don’t see myself ever being happy again … But …”

“But,” Mary prompted when Ella didn’t finish the sentence.

“But I want to see my family again.”

“You’re gonna get to.”

“I know. And yeah, I’m scared.”