Capítulo 204: Let it Go
"You're sure you don't want me to come with you? You don't have to do this alone, you know." Akane rubbed Ranko's back reassuringly through her fluffy white sweater.
The cotton enveloping the whole of the young singer's torso transmitted a gentle stimulation across her sensitive skin that felt like the shirt itself was giving Ranko a hug. She was glad of it, even though the March day was a little too warm for such an outfit. The realities of laundry day had forced her to wear a skirt, but she'd paired it with a set of black leggings so as to still feel somewhat protected against the world. Her hair was still in the braided pigtail that had been a staple of her former life, but she'd clipped a barrette with a yellow bow into the end of it. I'm trying, at least, she thought as she remembered its presence.
"I'll be fine, Akane. Thanks." Ranko held up her backpack. "And I'm not alone."
Akane nodded, cracking a smile and motioning to a sidewalk cafe with her own backpack dangling from her shoulder, shielding her eyes against the mid-afternoon sun. "Okay, then. I'll be right over there studying when you're done, beautiful."
Ranko blushed, recoiling with a bit of a coy expression. While the specter of her biological parents loomed over her every waking moment, she hadn't felt especially feminine, but Akane's constant barrage of endearing words to that effect were still managing to hit home. "It's so weird, hearing you say things like that while I'm… you know, with everything going on and me feeling like this."
"Well." Akane set her bag down on the sidewalk, pulling Ranko into a hug with a toothy grin. "you'd better get used to it, my beautiful, amazing, cute, sweet, silly, sexy little princess."
"Akane…" Ranko buried her face in Akane's shoulder to hide her flushing cheeks, and the tiny smile she felt guilty for allowing to cross them. She had much more to get off of her chest, but the good cry of the night before had helped her regulate her emotions at least somewhat.
"You and your friend had better get a move on, or you're gonna be late." Akane kissed her fiancee on the forehead with a gentle pat on her backside. "I love you. And hey, don't hold back in there."
Ranko nodded as she was released from Akane's embrace. Her eyes scanned the little plaza warily. "I love you too, Akane. Be careful out here. He could show up any time."
With a reassuring smile, Akane shouldered her backpack again. "I'll be just fine. I've beaten him before, remember? Now, you get your pretty little ass in there, Mrs. Tendo."
Shaking her head with a quiet little laugh as she turned toward the office building, Ranko called behind her. "Not yet! You still gotta make an honest woman out of me!" The flicker of mirth in her heart evaporated as soon as her hand made contact with the silver bar handle of the frosted glass door marked Suite 117, however. Taking a deep breath, she summoned the courage to pull it open and step inside the cramped little waiting room.
"Hello," Ranko said to the slender receptionist over the laminate counter that served as his desk, blushing a bit. One of the previous times she'd been in this office, Akane had pointed out that the young man was making eyes at her, and now, seeing him was pretty awkward for Ranko. Especially when she was there alone. She didn't see it in him, but as Akane and Yui were always pointing out to her, when it came to boys, she never did. "Hi. I'm Ranko Tendo? I have an appointment for 1:30?"
The man looked up from his computer screen with a smile, adjusting his black-rimmed glasses. "Yes, I know who you are, Ranko." He motioned to the Rise CD case on the desk next to his Discman, which bore her signature in black marker on the cover art from her last visit.
Blushing again, Ranko rolled her eyes and laughed at herself. "Right. Duh. Sorry." Sometimes I think Yui's right. Maybe I should dye my hair blonde. Thank the gods there's nobody else in here who heard that, she thought as her eyes surveyed the empty waiting room.
The receptionist grinned. "It's okay. We're used to people being a little nervous in here. Go on in, he's ready for ya."
Pulling her backpack back up onto her shoulders despite its minimal weight, Ranko nodded and walked to the second door on the right, turning the doorknob and pulling it open.
"Well, hello there, Ranko! We haven't seen you in a while," came the greeting from the middle-aged man standing in the center of the room. "Come on in."
Nodding and trepidatiously biting her lip, Ranko made her way to the black vinyl couch at the back of the room and sat down, setting her backpack on the floor at her feet. She cringed slightly as it made a creaking sound not unlike a fart. "Sorry, Fred."
Ranko's therapist shook his head with a disarming smile. "Don't worry about it." He grabbed one of the padded wooden chairs in front of his desk, turning it backward and straddling it facing her. "So, what's up? When Akane called and made the appointment, she said it was something of an emergency."
"Yeah, it's…" Ranko took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. "Sorry. It's a lot."
Fred motioned to the black plush pig on the other end of the couch from her. "If you need somebody to hug while you talk, Hugo's there."
Blushing brightly, Ranko reached down to her backpack and began to unzip it. Yeah, don't think I'm gonna be snuggling something that reminds me of Ryoga, but, thanks. "I, um…" She reached into her bulging pack, withdrawing a white plush unicorn from it. "I… brought my own friend, if that's okay."
Fred grinned. "Of course it's okay! She's adorable! What's her name?"
Ranko hid her face behind the fluffy plush creature. How does he manage to make me feel even more like a girl than Akane does sometimes? Freaking psychologist mind powers, or something, she thought to herself. "Her name is Starlight."
Fred smiled broadly, giving a wave to the stuffed equine in Ranko's lap. "Well! It's a pleasure to meet you, Starlight! Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to come support Ranko!"
Bowing her head to avoid his eyes, Ranko took one of the unicorn's front legs in her fingers, moving it up and down to make the toy wave to him. If this embarrasses me so much, why do I do it? Is it weird that it helps sometimes? Maybe he knows it helps and that's why he encourages it? Or, maybe he's just weird. Maybe I'm just weird. I don't know anymore. Maybe I just need to stop worrying about what's weird, and just do what feels right to do?
The young doctor leaned forward on the back of the chair he was straddling. "So, what's got you so stressed, Ranko?"
"Well…" The songstress curled her knees up on the couch, pulling her unicorn closer on her lap. "I told you about my pop, how he… wanted me to be a boy, and how I had to run away, all that stuff, right? And, like, how my mom basically wants to kill me and him both because I'm a girl?"
Fred nodded. "We've talked about it, sure." Not entirely sure I believed all of it, but…
"Well… they're coming. My mother is looking for me, and she's gotten her hooks into my pop. So, like, the only way he can save his skin is if he comes and gets me, and…" She trailed off, squeezing Starlight against her chest.
"How do you feel about seeing them again?" Fred rubbed his chin thoughtfully, giving her time to formulate a response.
"Terrified. I have no idea what my mom will think of… well, who I am. But I doubt it'll be good. And Pop… if I ever see him again, it'll be too soon. He just… every time my mom comes looking for me, he's dragged me out of my whole world and made me start over. And Fred, I've… I've worked too damned hard for this. For my singing, my friends, my school, my family, Akane… all of it. It…" She looked to Fred to save her by picking up the conversation, but her therapist waited quietly, leaving the silence looming for her to fill.
Ranko buried her face in Starlight's back, pulling her knees up into her chest. "It's my life, and I earned it, and I want it!"
"Tell me, Ranko." Fred stood, walking back around his desk and grabbing a peppermint from the candy dish on his credenza. "Who made you a singer?"
"Mei did. We've talked about this." Ranko looked up from Starlight's back. Does this dude not keep notes?
"Mei recognized that you were a singer. But who made you a singer? Who writes all those songs? Who does the choreography? Who makes the performances happen every night?"
"I do."
The therapist nodded. "Who taught the lowest-ranked cheerleading squad in the city enough gymnastics skills to win their first championship in your lifetime?"
Ranko shook her head. "I did."
"Right." Fred popped another candy in his mouth, continuing to speak as he sucked on it. "And, your family. When they took you in, did they know anything about your parents? Or was it just because of who you were?"
Ranko looked down at her hands. "Just me." I think.
"Who did Akane fall in love with? Who is she going to marry?" Fred grinned as Ranko's face glowed, and she hid behind Starlight again.
"She's gonna marry me."
"Okay." Fred walked over to the couch with the candy dish in his hand, offering it to Ranko. As she popped a peppermint in her mouth, Fred continued. "So I think it's safe to say that this is in fact your life, and not your parents'. So, what makes you think they have any right to come and disrupt it?"
Ranko sighed, putting Starlight down on the couch and turning to put her feet back on the floor. "It's not that, Fred. They just… there's things people don't know about me. Things I've told you, and you didn't believe, but they're true. Like how I…" She swallowed hard. "... used to be a boy. And if that gets out to my family, or to my fans, or my school… it'll ruin everything for me. One sentence, one thermos of hot water, and I'm done for. I'm watching around every corner waiting for him to show up and once he does, I don't know what happens, but my life doesn't look the same on the other side of it. I want to run, but at the same time, I want to dig my heels in and tell him that he can't ruin what I've made for myself."
"I think both courses of action have merit. But think about this. If you run, you'd leave everything behind, right? That's what you're afraid of?" Fred crunched down on the peppermint that had nearly finished dissolving on his tongue.
"Yeah…" Ranko scooped Starlight up again. I feel so silly, but he was right. Having her here does help.
"Well, that's what you're afraid of happening if he does all of this stuff. So at least if you stand your ground, you have a chance of keeping the things that are important to you. Right?"
"Yeah, but…" Ranko sighed sadly. "At least they wouldn't think less of me. They'd just… miss me." She sighed, flopping her hands to her sides, and Starlight slid off the couch onto the floor.
"What if you told them these things yourself? In your time, in your way? Haven't they earned your honesty by now'?" Fred sat in the black leather chair behind his mahogany desk, popping his neck with his hands.
"I can't. It's like, I want them to know. At least, I think I do. I mean, I don't want them to ask me about it all the time. Part of me wants them to understand, and wants to be honest with them, but a bigger part of me just wants as much of my world as possible to be places where nobody thinks I'm weird or asks questions or treats me different because they know what I used to be. But if I told them now, they'd probably just be mad at me for lying to them all this time. By the time I knew I could trust them with the truth, it was too late for me to tell them and not feel like I'd be hurting them because I didn't trust them with it until now." She pulled her knees back up into her chest and lay across the sofa, rolling over on the couch until she was facing into its back with her back turned to Fred. "I screwed that all up, too, I guess."
"Hey now, we don't blame ourselves in here, remember?" Fred stood and walked over to the couch, tapping her on the shoulder. When she looked up from the back of the couch, he handed the stuffed unicorn he'd picked up from the floor down to her. "Tell her, Starlight."
Ranko took her plush from him, but did not roll over; rather, she just curled up around the unicorn tightly. "I just… I don't know what to do and I'm so angry and scared, and I don't want to be around any of the people I care about right now. I don't want him to hurt them, and I don't want them to hear the things he's going to say to me. I… I can't bear to have them watch him break me down like that. If they ever find out the truth, I want it to come from me, not from him. Not like that. And I don't want to be seen as the freak again. I've worked so fucking hard not to be the freak anymore, man! So I ran them all off, and once they were all as far away as I can push them, I'm just sitting here lonely and scared, and I feel like I gotta do it all by myself. And, like, I don't know what to do with these feelings except yell and scream at the people I love and wait for the hammer to fall. And I don't wanna be that girl, either. I don't want to be shitty to the people I love, but I can't stand letting this hurt them or change what they think about me."
She rolled over onto her back on the couch, looking up at her kindly advisor. "What do I do with it all, Fred?"
The therapist nodded. "That's an excellent question to be asking, Ranko. I wonder, what do songwriters usually do with feelings they need to find a way to get off their chests?"
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