[TRIGGER WARNING! Mention of abortion and suicide. Discussion of dubious consent wherein r*pe is mentioned.]

"Let's discuss Stacy."

"Do we have to?"

I'm in my final session for the day. In group therapy (which there are two of, a morning group and a night group) I'm treated as a fresh patient. In all of my individual therapies, however, we're picking up right where we left off last time I was here.

I really, really don't want to talk about Stacy right now. I'm emotionally spent from the rest of the sessions I had today. I'm physically spent from my blinding, detox-induced headache, and from not even being able to keep water down.

My therapist/psychiatrist, the one I see for my depression here at the facility, sits before me. He's different from the woman I had last time (apparently she moved). My therapist, the one who I see in Vermont and who was with me in the hospital when I tried to kill myself, is going to phone in once a week and will be in contact with this guy. As such, he has my file pulled up on his computer and he has a notepad ready to use.

He smiles softly at me. "Orion."

I sigh heavily and run my hands through my hair. "Whatdoyawannaknow?"

"Anything. Everything."

I sigh again. "Want me to start from the beginning?"

"Yes, please. For our first few sessions together, I want to get to know you. I want to hear you talk about the things that happened in your own voice." The pleasant smile stayed, and I wanted to smear it off his face with my hand. So I crossed my arms. "Notes are great and everything, but I want to know you."

Now I look at the ceiling. "Stacy was a girl I met through my band mates, Jake and Ben. She was Jake's next door neighbor and best friend. We hit it off immediately, and we started dating. She was the first serious relationship I had in my life. She stole my virginity from me. She was the first person I loved romantically."

My psychiatrist is writing something down, and I can't help but wonder what as I continue.

"In High School we had a pregnancy scare. When it turned out to be a false alarm, we went right back to our physical relationship. Then we had another scare, which turned out not to be a scare--she was actually pregnant. In our infinite wisdom," I say bitingly, "we decided it would be best if she got an abortion. She did, and then killed herself shortly thereafter."

For a moment he didn't reply to me. I don't know if he was expecting me to continue or what, so I didn't say anything, either. After what felt like an hour, he spoke.

"She stole your virginity from you?"

"Did I say that?"

He looks at me evenly. "Yes, you did."

I wave a dismissive hand. "I lost my virginity to her. Whatever. You know what I mean. I was her first and she was my first."

"But that's not what you said."

I don't know where he's going with this, but I don't like it. I pucker my lips and remain silent.

"Could we talk about this?" he pries softly.

I'm trying really hard to not be pissed, but my nerves are shot. So I fold my hands in my lap and glare. "Sure, though I don't know what there is to discuss."

"Could you tell me how losing your virginity to her played out, exactly?"

I can feel myself flush. It takes literally every ounce of willpower I have remaining to not lash out at him. From here on out, I don't think he knows he'll be treading on thin ice. I hope how badly I'm glaring clues him in. "If we must."

"We must."

"Well, I fingered her, and then a few days later she wanted to go all the way, so I obliged."

"You obliged?"

Bye, composure. "What the fuck do you want me to say, dude? Why are we even discussing this? I'm getting pervy vibes from you right now, and I gotta say, I don't fucking like it."

Completely unphased, he folds his hands on his desk and looks at me evenly. "There is a point to this, I assure you. Why is this line of questioning making you angry?"

"Because I feel like you're attacking me!"

"Why do you feel like I'm attacking you?"

I wanted to lunge across the table and strangle him. "Because you're taking this beautiful thing we had, and you're trying to twist it, and I don't know what angle you're playing, but--"

"You're rather defensive. Why is this making you defensive?"

"Because she was my first love and you're trying to tarnish that!" I yell at him.

"Orion," he says patiently, "talking about your first time with Stacy is making you angry and defensive. This is exactly why this needs to be talked about. You also keep using passive terms like 'she stole my virginity' and 'I obliged'."

I fume, drumming my fingers loudly on the leather chair I'm sitting in.

"Orion--did you want to sleep with Stacy when you did?"

Suddenly I feel like crying, although I'm not even exactly sure why. So I take a few moments to compose myself. Even so, when I talk, my voice waivers. "If I didn't want to, I wouldn't have."

He says nothing, simply raises his eyebrows. When I continue to just drum my fingers, he speaks again. "Orion--I really need you to give me details. Not about the act itself--I'm not being a pervert--but about what you did and how it made you feel."

My mouth goes dry. I grab the water bottle I had set on the table next to me, and choke down a few sips. Then I speak.

"Well, her parents weren't home. We started making out, and things progressed, and before I knew it we were naked."

"Before you knew it?" he asked.

"Yeah," I tell him, and the more I speak the quieter my voice becomes. "I mean, everything just happened so fast. I went over there thinking we were going to snuggle up and watch a movie. But instead she wanted to mess around."

I take another, deeper gulp of water.

"S-so, she grabbed some condoms from the bedside table. I didn't even know she had bought them--I didn't know that's what she wanted. I was confused, but--"

I swallow thickly, and if I blink tears are going to spill, so I don't blink.

"But?"

"W-well, I mean, no time like the present, yaknow? So we did. Well, she did."

"She did?"

I can feel myself grow crimson in shame. "Yeah...I...I...I didn't know what I was doing. I mean, neither did she, not really. But I just sort of...laid there."

He doesn't say anything, and it's so hard not to cry, and I still don't know why and I hate it.

"I just laid there, and she was on top of me, sort of--sort of pinning my arms to my sides. And I told her I loved her, and--and that was it, really."

Finally I have to blink, and I quickly wipe away the tear that splashed on my cheek.

"How did all that make you feel?"

I lick my lips and scratch my head. "Embarrassed, honestly. I mean...You know. First times are awkward."

"Anything else?"

I know I shouldn't, but I can't help it. I gnaw on my bottom lip. "S-scared."

"Scared?"

"Y-yeah," I admit quietly. "I felt like puking. I mean, I didn't know what to expect, it was just nerves..."

"May I make an observation?"

I swallow and nod once.

"It sounds like you weren't ready."

I drain the rest of the water down with huge gulps, and the plastic bottle collapses in on itself loudly. I then cap it and put it next to me. "I mean--n-no, I-I wasn't. N-not r-really."

"Did you tell anyone?"

That makes me laugh. "Fuck yeah. When we were back in school I was bragging."

"What did you do that day, after you slept with Stacy?"

And I'm horribly uncomfortable again. "U-um. I went--I went home and showered immediately."

"Did you snuggle like you wanted?"

"N-no. I bolted."

"Orion," he says to me very carefully, leaning forward. "Do you know where I'm going with this?"

Just like that, I'm seething again. I see absolute red, and I'm back to shouting. "Yeah, I do, and I don't fucking like it! How dare you!"

"Orion--"

"No, fuck you! I was not raped." Yet even as those words spring out of my mouth, I start crying. And it's immediately ugly, and I'm hyperventilating, and I think I'm going to be sick, but I don't want to be.

"It wasn't--it wasn't violent," I protest as bile starts to creep up my throat. "We loved each other. W-we were both r-raised Catholic--we-we were g-g-g-gonna get married."

"I'm not saying you were, necessarily. I'm just saying this seems like a situation of dubious consent."

And then suddenly I have to lunge for the trash bin next to his desk, and I get unceremoniously sick in the can. The rest of the session is me puking on and off, apologizing profusely through tears. He's nice enough to rub my back whenever I get sick.