Work Text:
Dear Diary,
Oh God it’s terrible. My psychiatrist advised me to do this and it’s such a cliché. He laughed about it himself. Well, maybe not laughed, not openly, but the smug smile on his face said it all. He was so terribly amused and proud of himself. I feel like a joke to him. A sad, tired and miserable joke that I am, no doubt.
Dear fucking diary. Oh, doctor Lecter must have a good laugh now. He probably went home and couldn’t even lock the door behind him properly before he burst into a maniacal laughter. I bet he could barely contain himself during dinner. His wife must be asking him now what’s so funny and he’s indulging her in a hilarious story of a sad man. Whom he recommended to write a diary.
Anyway. I think I got off track. This ‘experiment’ was about me and my feelings, not about my fantastic psychiatrist who… okay. This was supposed to be about me. How do I start writing a diary? Do I write my name and occupation? Basic info about me? I guess I could make a frontal page with all the necessary information. As I did in school with all my books and notebooks. So silly.
My name is Will Graham. I am a teacher in the Academy. Technically, I work for the FBI. I share what I have learnt with the new minds at the Academy and I hope they remember as much as they can. One thing I was taught was that whatever long and exhaustive training will not prepare you for ‘the real thing’. I guess that’s correct. Only once I had to take part in the action in the field and I wish never to do that again.
I’m made like that. I value the mental comfort of my own head. That’s why I
oh god he’s not going to read it, is he? That question didn’t make it worse at all.
Anyway, I would never see a therapist if it wasn’t necessary. I hate people who fumble in my head, trying to know me and pretending they succeeded.
I’ve got one friend who is unlucky enough to be my friend and she was the one who made me go to a psychiatrist. She, her name is Alana, recommended doctor Lecter. He was her mentor when she was still a student.
Why am I writing this again? I know that. I know what’s in my head.
Anyway, I’m currently going through another phase. It’s the one when I get all emotional but still feel empty inside. Do you know that feeling? I’m drowning in self-hate and I mean… What did I even do to deserve this? And more importantly, will I ever be cured?
This isn’t easy. For me or… well, for me. I don’t have anyone who would give a damn about my state or what’s happening to me. Maybe Alana would be brought down if she found out that…
I’m getting off track, again. Speaking of which, I saw a man on a motorcycle today. Actually, he was lying on the ground, his helmet was meters away from him. I was waiting at the traffic lights, watching as the police surrounded the scene and waited for the ambulance to arrive. I could hear the sirens in the distance. I had to drive by him on the crosswords and it was only then that I spotted a red mark under his head. First thought – his brains and blood on the ground. It took me a second to realise it was just a blanket a police officer had put there.
I paid attention to the road, not to cause another accident, but I noticed other people’s reactions. Pedestrians, passers-by, people who stood there and watched, as if it was a form of entertainment. I know we don’t deal with death every day, I mean normal people don’t. But being a witness to an event like that… When I start thinking…
I really should stop thinking. I guess simple people, with normal chores and duties and jobs – they are too busy to stop and realise the many things I have realised some time ago. And it scares me.
**********
Dear diary,
I’m tormented between wanting to die and to never die. Funny, huh?
I feel like I’m developing a schizophrenia. I know the symptoms. I know the symptoms of being bipolar. And I still sometimes believe I suffer from it. It would be a perfect excuse, wouldn’t it? But I guess I could have that tested and diagnosed. If only I wasn’t so… I don’t trust Lecter, not yet. Maybe I never will.
He said he understood and he said he respected people’s boundaries but his behaviour tells me otherwise. He constantly keeps challenging me. His questions puzzle me and I’m not sure if I should give him all the answers. I don’t want him to uncover me.
I don’t need to be saved. I need to save myself.
**********
Dear diary, I need to stop addressing a notebook
I’ve been thinking about reincarnation. Seeing as much death as I have seen, one would try to imagine if there’s something afterwards. I was raised a catholic but the faith vanished with my first steps in the adult world. I’m not saying there is no God, I just don’t buy his story. But I want to believe there is something more to life than only the constant struggle for nothing.
Lecter tells me that God’s terrific. But not in the creepy way that zealot would say. No. Lecter does not pray. He is not a believer, he does not belong to any congregation. But he assumes there is a god, an absolute – be it a catholic god or Buddha or whatever there is that people believe in. There is no real difference, is there?
I was wondering if there was something particular in his life, an event or a person that made him that way.
I’m not sure if this is appropriate but our conversations went in various directions and broached many important subjects. We don’t talk about me anymore. He does not ask me down-to-earth questions but rather those of a higher purpose. It would appear as if he was researching a case.
He’s very perceptive and he seems curious about my perspective. I’ve never met someone who would act so… friendly. I know I’m paying him and he’s a professional but this feels different.
**********
I need to stop thinking and writing about doctor Lecter.
Tonight I had a dream and the only suitable word to describe it is ‘strange’.
Maybe it was a movie I saw or a book I read but I had a dream about the knights of King Arthur. I was one of them. And so was Lecter. Our names matched the ones of the legendary warriors and I can’t stop thinking about that. I can’t remove the image from my head. Knowing myself enough, I will research more on the topic and it may bring an end to my sanity.
Should I tell him about my dream during our next session?
As if he wasn’t laughing at me already.
**********
This is not funny anymore.
Lecter said this was normal. That my dream was my method of dealing with things. That I need clarity but the dream would give me a different perspective.
Perhaps I’m afraid. Perhaps I’m relaxed when I’m someone else in the dream.
Tristan, I mean Lecter (Tristan is his name in my dreams; oh yeah because I’ve had more than one already), Tristan is braver than me but he’s reckless. He saved me once and I’m grateful for that and Lecter thinks that maybe this is my projection and hope for the things to turn out.
Meaning I would like him to save me? This is nuts.
**********
All this talking and thinking and imagining… Lecter told me he had a similar dream to mine. He said this might be a result of our discussion about reincarnation and religion. And I agree with that. We talked too much, revealed too much and this is the strange effect.
Only now I cannot dream of anything else. He’s in all of my dreams.
During our last session I caught myself comparing him to Tristan. I watched him – his moves, his body language, his face. This is becoming a mild obsession and I can’t stand it. I observed him as if he was a sculpture. And to be painfully honest, he may as well be one.
The legs that flow on the floor and reach his waist. The eyes that pierce through me and make it difficult to catch a breath.
Alana asked me how was my therapy and I couldn’t decide what to tell her: ‘couldn’t be worse’ or ‘I think I’m developing a strange obsession over my therapist’. I ended up telling her it was fine and she commented that I’ve changed but that it’s not a change she expected. So what, I’m even worse now? I mean… I only started seeing Lecter to keep my hands busy not to strangle myself. And now I don’t want to anymore. He’s got me curious and… I don’t feel self-destructive anymore. Does that mean the therapy is working?
**********
We spent the last session on talking about various legends and stories. Doctor Lecter prepared some books and we read a few interesting articles. I was his last patient and we were caught up in what we were doing, so when I looked at the clock it was rather late. Lecter apologised for keeping me so long and offered some sort of compensation but I refused and went home and continued reading online about various religions where people could be reborn. It’s fascinating. I don’t believe in that, but… I mean, maybe I would like to believe in that.
It would be more than just consolation. It would be more than reassurance that there is something after death. Rebirth would mean infinite, endless, suffering and joy. It would mean that in another life I was someone else. Maybe I succeeded in one. Or maybe I’m an infinite failure.
**********
This is madness. Doctor Lecter called me Galahad. He said it was just a slip of the tongue, nothing more than a simple mistake but I think there was more to that. He looked at me in this peculiar way, as if he was checking something. His eyes were piercing me and the whole situation looked as if we met on the street, two old friends and he was waiting for me to recognise him. I got the impression that he was mocking me.
**********
We had collected the pieces and then placed them all together like jigsaw. Lecter’s dreams seem to complete mine – either I have the beginning and he has the ending or the other way around. Anyway, I’m done. I need to quit pretending like I’m not interested because I am. Hannibal invited me for dinner; he said it would create a more natural, relaxed environment where we would be able to talk casually. He acts as if he really cared about my well-being but I don’t trust anyone. I don’t believe when someone says they’re worried about me. If anyone really was, then I wouldn’t find myself in Lecter’s office, pontificating about my dreams and sick associations my mind makes every step of the way.
**********
I definitely did not expected THAT. My head is still spinning and my hands are still shaking.
It was a nice evening altogether. The dinner was delicious, the atmosphere was relaxed and Lecter was friendly, as always. He often smiled at me and participated in the conversation with me with so much vigour and enthusiasm, as he always does.
He had prepared some notes from the books about reincarnation and we explored the idea further. It’s nice when someone understands what you mean, isn’t it? It’s so nice to be finally seen. Maybe Hannibal would be the one who would come to my funeral. It’s not pity that makes him so invested.
Well, I know that NOW.
Those glances and accidental brushes of fingers or knees by the table. His irregular, slightly louder breathing when he was close enough for me to hear and feel it. And the one deliberate touch when I saw the illustration in one of the books, of Galahad the Pure. His hand on my knee and his smile when I started comparing the man in the illustration with myself.
I think I escaped too quickly and he must have realised it was panic that took over. I was simply not ready to… Well, what might he have in mind? Did he aim for a kiss? Or maybe it’s my wild imagination and he was simply pleased to see me so engaged. How am I going to show up at the next session when I feel like I made a fool of myself?
**********
I read him well.
Hannibal apologised for his behaviour at dinner and confessed that he was confused. He asked me if I wished to change therapist but I explained that he was doing his job perfectly fine. I didn’t pluck the courage, though, to tell him he was wrong in thinking I had run because I wasn’t interested.
So where does that leave us?
**********
I found the answer in a dream. Tristan was dead and Galahad, meaning me, was mourning. I could feel the pain so deep in my chest, I thought I would not be able to breathe again. It was like a pressure so great that it could shatter my bones and lungs and there would be nothing to collect afterwards.
When I woke up, I knew I had to tell him. I had to tell him it feels nice to have him as a therapist and that he means more than that to me. He is like a friend and the fact that he acts involved in whatever I’m talking about is reassuring on a level I never knew possible. I had to tell him he is the part of a week that I am waiting for, impatiently, and that whenever I feel the need to… hurt myself, I think of him and the need goes away.
So I told him all that. In a hug.
After our meeting, before I walked through the door, I walked towards him and embraced him.
His arms circled me, too, with a great force, as if he was afraid he would lose me. As if this was our last meeting.
Our chests were pressed close together and I could smell him. I had never thought I could be so attached to a man’s scent. But Hannibal smelt like forest and like the earth after a storm. There was a moment I wished we would never be separated. I didn’t look at the clock, nor did I count the seconds we continued just standing there, holding each other.
It felt as if all my doubts and regrets fell off my chest and disappeared in the midst of his scent. I closed my eyes and felt his hair on my forehead. It brushed me gently and then his hand on my back, that moved slowly up, to rest between my shoulder blades.
I could breathe again.
I can.
**********
He asked me what I think about us. But by ‘us’ he meant Galahad and Tristan. Obviously, I don’t believe in any of that. I mean, perhaps the stories about the knights of the round table are true, perhaps there were soldiers who were devoted to the case and who were devoted to one another. But the idea that they could be reborn? And that it would be me and Hannibal whose shapes they would occupy?
This is nonsense. I know it is. It only feels so nice to think about such a concept – of an eternal brotherhood or… of an eternal love, carried from one generation to another, in different or even the same shape.
But this is not us, right? I mean, I’m not… in love. Am I?
Or is this what I feel when I go to sleep and wonder what he’s doing at the moment? Or when I recall our hug and all of his gentle touches and smiles? Or is that what you call the confusion I feel when I look at him?
Yes, I suppose it’s easier when you know the name for the thing growing inside you; when you can address your fears and blame every stupid word that leaves your mouth on the unknown force. It’s a good excuse.
**********
I asked him whether or not he had given a name for the thing he feels for me. The answer offered me both a relief and fear.
I have never been in love. I never considered it. I was always too busy and too surrounded by my mental walls to let that thought in. When Hannibal uttered the word ‘love’, I almost fell. My legs became weak beneath me and my head had difficulties processing the fact.
He said he would not act on his feelings if I didn’t want him to, but I didn’t tell him that I would want to. So I guess I’m sitting on dynamite. Any second now it can all blow up in my face.
I only believe that we are not allowed to be intimate when I am officially his patient. It would be unethical. But I don’t want to terminate our arrangement. He’s a good psychiatrist and he is helpful. For the first time since forever I don’t wish to seek the end.
At the beginning I was afraid he treated his every patient with such kindness and care, but now, when he openly confessed he was falling in love with me, I cannot deny that I feel strongly about him, too. I just need to make sure it isn’t my projecting. That I’m not attached to him because he cares. And that it’s not pity that draws him to me.
**********