2020-05-13 - Through The Window - Brayden and Kira

Brayden Kim walked alone to the clinic. He was wearing his signature brown hoodie and today  pair of black jeans and black runners. This was something he was insisting on trying. His mother was so amazing and supportive but it wasn’t realistic for her to work her work life around him and have to babysit him for the rest of his life. He had to start doing things on his own. She would meet him there after today, and then eventually he would just leave and return on his own. However for his own comfort, he walked with his phone out in his hand with the number pad open in phone mode in case he needed to call for help. He knew it was stupid but it got him to the sidewalk. He used to walk with headphones. He loved his tunes but he had let that go so he could hear all around him, watching in many directions like an animal being hunted. As he went he got less anxious. The street was full of old friends and neighbours. A few people said hi to him, some stared. Clearly word had travelled. He accepted this fate now, after Cory’s party especially. The doors of the clinic were a welcome beacon and he stepped in and walked up to the counter. He was directed to a waiting room chair and within minutes the kind face of Dr. Gushan Singh appeared in his office doorway beckoning him in for their appointment. As usual for work, Gurhsan had on a white shirt and colourful tie, blue turban and black dress pants.The door shut.

Kira Delmonaco was walking from her house towards the center of town.  She’d returned Sajani’s clothes .. without a note .. and gone home to double check her on stores.  She was no back in her usual.  Grey sweatpants, a black tshirt and a hoodie with musial writing all over it.  Plus her trainers, which were very colorful … the only real color on her.  Prioritizing the laundry had dug into her finances, but she thought she could get a couple days of food with the money left from the 10.  As she walked, she noticed someone a good deal ahead of her on the street and turning down Central on the side that didn’t open up into the Forest.  It looked like Breyden .. the hair was telling.  Her curiosity got the better of her and she followed from a good half a block away.  She noticed that some people looked at him .. oddly.  She got strange looks as ell and tried not to pay any more attention to people than she had to for her own security. He turned and walked on the police station side of 2nd street … and straight to the clinic.  After he went in, she could see through the large glass windows Dr Singh wave him into the back of the clinic.  His office when he saw patients there, she knew from experience.  Not breaking her stride, she walked past the clinic towards the water.  There she loitered at the ER doors, which might not look too strange as opposed to hanging out in the clinic parking lot under a window.  Why she waited, she honestly did not know.  Maybe to talk to Breydan once he emerged.

The sessions were always 1 hour long. At 10 minutes to the end of that Michelle Kim walks up to the counter from inside the clinic. She’s wearing a soft purple blouse and a pair of dark grey cotton dress casual pants and balck and whote trainers.. She has a brief conversation with the counter attendant and walks to sit in the waiting area, collecting a magazine from the table to flip through.

Knowing how long the sessions were, Kira straightened and stood, shamelessly, in front of the glass ER doors.  Maybe Brayden would see her and talk to her ..  Butshit twenty minutes in, a couple of EMT’s brought in a boy with a cut hand, so she quickly beat feet to the front of the building, seeing Michelle Kim enter.  Brayden’s mom?  She loitered on the corner in front of the clinic, looking through the window at the midwife .. the woman who shed hope would someday be her mother too.  SIlly teen dreams.

Dr Singh’s door opened part way and he seemed to be looking out for someone and waved at Michelle a little urgently. She jumped up and almost ran to the office. Brayden looked like he was slumped forward and crying into his hoodie. He fell into his mother’s arms and Dr. Singh closed the door again, letting them go overtime on the appointment.

Kira moves out of the way of a couple bustling down the street.  She turns her head and looks in the window again and sees Dr Singh lean out of his door and wave to Mrs Kim, who ran back and into the office.  No she wondered.  Had Brayden had some kind of attack?  She took a cautious step forward, ready to jump out of anyone's way.

A few minutes later the door opens again. Brayden is between his mother and Dr Singh and looking more composed. He shakes the doctor's hand and then Michelle pats Dr Singh on the arm after saying a very obvious “Thank you.” The mother and son move to the door to come out and exit with Michelle giving Brayden’s back a little affectionate rub. They slowly begin to walk.

Kira sees that Brayden is looking a little better … but why had he been so upset .. well, except that Dr Singh was relentless when he wanted something.  But his mother was almost hugging him down the hallway.  The Brayden she knew was touch.  Smart, tough, but sensitive.  Kira moves to the sidewalk outside of the clinic door and … loiters.

Brayden smiles tiredly at his mother and then looks forward right at Kira and stops. He stares and then says her name with a pained look “Kira?

Michelle stops too at this odd looking girl her son is calling Kira. She remembers his old high school girlfriend and looks again. Holy shit. She stays close but doesn’t interfere. What had happened to this poor girl? Come to think of it she had seen her around, in town, at the party for Cory. But she blew it off as Brayden being overwhelmed.

Kira looks at Brayden for a long time, aware of his mother, but ignoring her.  In reply ot him, she nods, in the affirmative.

Brayden exhales and nods back at her “Ok...you're you. You’re not talking to me...are you sick or something? No voice?” He’s eager to talk but also really weirded out. This was not the Kira he remembered with such melancholy love. The Kira who he thought loved him back and then abandoned him. What the hell?

Michelle stepped back a bit, trying to give them some space. It was weird but it was Brayden’s weird and it didn’t seem harmful.

Kira begins shaking her head almost immediately.  “N … no…”  she whispers.  “Not ….  Sick.”  she looks at him.  He has no idea that she’s spoken more words to him than even to Sajani.  She bites her lip and tries to explain.  “S… scared…”  the last word is a whisper and on the street he may not hear it at all.

Brayden hears her struggling to speak and  frowns a little, stepping in a bit closer. Close enough that he makes out the word scared. She looks scared alright and he knows all too well what scared feels like. He licks his lips and his shoulder shifts forward like he’s thinking of reaching out to her but he holds back right now. He’s still stuck in his own traume too. “What are you scared of?” He asks her quietly. He can see his mother in his peripheral vision. She’s walked off out of earshot now.

Kira hears his question and she can’t just nod or shake her head.  This was Brayden.  Maybe she could tell him.  Once she could tell him anything.  But opening her mouth, she realized it was hard.  And all she could come up with for that moment was.  “Him.”  she swallows and tries again.  “He  ….i … couldn’t …  I … he…”  she breathes a little faster.  “He … hurt …”  she blew out a breath and looked around, as is expecting to see ‘him’ soop down and hurt her again.

Brayden swallowed hard and his eyes filled up with tears. He didn’t know what he she meant but she was triggering his “he” feelings big time. Now he reached out hand towards her like he wanted to take her hand. He hadn’t reached out to another human who wasn’t his mom in a long long time.

Kira sees his hand.  She’s touched Sajani .. she had been her best friend.  Brayden had been … so much more.  She reaches for his hand.  Hers is shaking, but she touches his fingers and then she is holding his hand.  “I … didn’t …  want … to …”  she pauses and doesn’t know which apology to give him first.  “Leave you.”  she settles on, and drops her head, ashamed … because she’d done more.  Been forced to do more.  “He .. made … me.”  and suddenly she sobs.

Brayden gently holds her hand rubbing his thumb on top of the back of it. His tears slide down his face when she explains and then he sniffs and shivers “Who...who made you?”

Kira begins shaking, even though his touch calmed her … she could only imagine her state if he wasn’t.  “J…  J …  Jack …  Jack Rose…”  she blinks and, for the first time in a long time, tears begin to fall.  She's never said his name aloud before.  And it terrifies her.

Brayden doesn’t let go of her hand but he stagger back and looks like he’s been punched in the gut. His free hand goes to his hair as he holds onto a chunk of it like he’s literally trying to keep his head on straight. Jack Rose. It comes together so quickly in his head he just says it out loud...both parts “Jack Rose raped you….and then Jack Rose raped me.” He looks her in the eyes with a reflection of her shared pain.

Michelle can see the heightened emotion between her son and Kira. Maybe this was a year’s later post breakup fallout. She didn’t love the timing of that given his state. As much as she wanted to give autonomy the mother bear in her propelled her to talk closer and she froze when she got close enough and heard Brayden state that Jack Rose had raped them both. But what Kira said next rooted her to her spot.

She holds onto his hand as he staggers back.  He was going to reject her.  Well, of course he was .. like her parents.  Because she couldn’t have happiness anymore.  That was how her life was now.  But then he just says it .. what he knows what happened to her.  And then …  “You?”  she sounds disbelieving and she almost literally hears a snap in her head.  “I’ll … kill … him….”  and she realizes that this should have been her plan all along.