Kold Karats

TWO: DARREN KOLD

Gray. Brown. Blue.

The colors of an office that now seemed like life, all swirled together in a soothing dance. It was as if the very air itself held a sense of calm, a balm for the soul. Or perhaps it was the simple knowledge that this was a place of safety and understanding, a place where I could speak freely without fear. Either way, the feeling was undeniable, and it all began five years ago — when I first stepped through this door.

Dr. Morgan's office door.

At the time I was twenty-seven, even after that much time with barely any renovation work, I was struck by it all, still. The aura alone was the reason after five years, I hadn't stopped coming here to repeat myself and listen to repeated messages from her. Protocol demanded it. My mental state demanded it. She demanded it; that if I stopped, the medications alone may not be of great benefit.

The soft warm light that bathed the room seemed to emanate from the walls themselves, casting a lenient flush over the brown, plush sofa and armchairs arranged in a cozy circle in the center of the room.

Walls painted a soothing shade of blue enclosed us with tasteful artwork and photographs adorning the space, each one carefully chosen to inspire relaxation and contemplation.

Taking graceful steps further in, eyes on the woman directly in front of me, I could make out the soft music wafting through the room like a gentle breeze. The melody caressed my soul and lifted my spirits; something that had died a few hours ago. It was one of my all time favorite playlists, and she had made it specifically for me.

As I sank into the plush cushions of the sofa, I was unable to fend off the sense of comfort and safety that washed over me.

"You're quite on time," Morgan said, sounding too jovial today. "That's new."

Her dark hair framed her face in soft waves, and her brown eyes shone with an inner light that radiated kindness. Seated in that office chair, she seemed to embody calm, like a refuge from the storms of life. Unarguably, Morgan knew the depths of my soul and could call out to whatever was down there without intimacy.

Dr. Morgan was older by a decade. If age forty promised me this much sweetness, I hoped to die a year before that. I wasn't judging her for it. Matter of factly, she was helping me by being this person. I was only having a hard time picturing myself as who she'd been trying to shape me into.

"How are you feeling today, Darhh—" She stopped, noticing my sharp gaze, and then corrected herself. "How are you feeling, Kold."

"I'm..."

How was I feeling, for real?

Morgan's office was a space of healing and growth, where I could work towards my aspirations with the guidance and support of a skilled and compassionate therapist. It was a place where I could feel seen, heard, and understood, and where I knew I was in good hands.

I could tell her everything.

Couldn't I?

She had never judged me. She wouldn't start today.

My nervousness was as a result of the encounter I'd had with Valentina yesterday, and it's why I was so early to Morgan's office today. What better time for a fix if not before facing any of my employees?

Tapping my foot on the hard ground, I avoided eye contact with Morgan. This scenario was all too familiar to me. I had been here every Thursday at 9-10am for the past five years, even if not religiously, so there was no reason for me to be so silent anymore.

"Darren," Morgan said stridently, bringing my attention right back to where it never should've left. I hated her calling me Darren, or any woman at all addressing me as that, because shaking the sound of my mother's voice after it would almost be impossible. However, Morgan always knew when to bark out Darren to shove my fears right in front of me. "Let's talk about what happened last week. You mentioned you were late for work again."

I sighed. Morgan knew it all. Some I'd tell her, and others she'd figure out with her years of experience. "Yes, I know. I just...I don't know, I lost track of time."

"That's okay, it happens. But I think we should try to understand why it keeps happening."

She was too sweet a person. If I were paid eight hundred dollars for two hours to listen and advise a delusional man, I'd smash his head against the edge of this oak table and cease his problems, yet here she was — trying to help me understand why I was different, difficult, sick in the head.

I couldn't blame ADHD for everything. Yes the condition was a manipulator, it wasn't an excuse for everything that plagued me.

"Darren Roderick," she mentioned with purpose and my stomach churned. Darren Roderick, two words that caused me more pain than my sickness. Dr. Morgan sounded so much like my mother, damnably. Every syllable, every letter, every lilt. Sometimes I desperately wanted her to shut the f**k up. "I know you are angry at your past, but your future is not assured if you don't confront the past."

Sighing again, I looked down at my hands, unable to meet Morgan's gaze as embarrassment colored me. A jilter of nerves stormed through my wrists. I had known what she was going to say, still I wasn't ready to face the truth. "It's just...I don't know why it keeps happening," I said, my voice barely above a whisper. "One minute I know I should be somewhere important, the next minute I'm distracted by something not so important."

Dr. Morgan waited patiently, giving me time to gather my thoughts. Finally, she said, "That's okay. We can take this slowly. Why don't you start at the beginning? Tell me what you were doing before you realized you were late."

My eyes met the thick book on psychology that sat at lip of her desk before I took another deep breath and closed my eyes. Slow, steady, go. "I was working on a project." That was true. "A very important project." That I wasn't sure of.

Most times, I liked to go online and retake demo exams that I had failed before, even one as insignificant as a grade twelve exam. If it had been failed by me, chances were I'd gone back to ace it. That was always a project for me, rewriting and expecting to do better. Morgan knew this so well.

"It was due the next day," I continued, "and I was trying to finish it up. I guess I just got caught up in it and lost track of time."

"That's understandable," she spoke with a tone that conveyed a subtle yet unmistakable sense of reassurance. "Sometimes we get so focused on a task that we lose track of everything else. But let's dig a little deeper. Were you worried about finishing the project on time? Was there a lot of pressure?"

I squirmed in my seat, feeling uneasy that this question had come up again. Maybe she liked to compare my answers to the same question in different sessions to see if I was making progress. Despite my discomfort, I decided to answer the question anyway. "Yeah, I guess so. I was worried that if I didn't finish it on time, I'd fail again."

"What's wrong with failing, Darren?"

My heart thumped at the word. Heaven help me not to scrape my skin at the mention of it again.

For a moment, I was lost in thought about my childhood and recollected a specific memory from that time. My father always pushing me to be the best at everything, he wasn't to blame for it all. Actually, I had appreciated his high expectations for me, even though I'd always felt like I was never quite good enough.

How could I forget the crushing disappointment on his face when I had brought home a B on a test, or when I'd lost a soccer game?

In some way, my anxiety around perfectionism was related to my tendency to procrastinate and get overwhelmed. And why I was procrastinating was as a result of my dread for failure. It was an endless cycle of strain and frustration and fear.

I looked up at Dr. Morgan, who was watching me intently, waiting for my umpteenth response to that question. Failure. "I guess I've always struggled with feeling like I have to be perfect. It's like there's this voice in my head that's always telling me I'm not good enough. And that makes it hard to get started on things, because I'm afraid of failing. And then I end up procrastinating, which just makes the problem worse." I trailed off, feeling a little embarrassed at how much he was sharing, not that it mattered.

"It sounds like you're carrying around a lot of pressure and anxiety. And I think it's really brave of you to talk about this stuff. Can I ask you something?" Dr. Morgan's eyes when she sought me again was full of uncertainty. I nodded and she smiled warmly at me. "So, this pattern of self-criticism is something that has been a part of your life for a long time. Can you think of a specific thing that made you start feeling this way?"

I could. I knew it right at the back of my mind, but that was the one thing I wasn't ready to tell Dr. Morgan yet. She knew it all. How I never skipped up to ten classes in high school plus college, how my As had to be linear, how I couldn't rewear a shirt, or engage in silly relationships with women because they were a distraction from my goals. She knew technically everything about my childhood, when these insecurities started, but she didn't know what exactly had conjured a gust of fears and anxiety, and swept it upon me. That was my burden to bear.

"When I think back, I only see darkness."

"Oh, Darren." I could tell that her heart shattered for me, but what I didn't like was her pity. I deserved nobody's sympathy, as it sounded rather convenient for them to simply serve it to me. What about how I felt about all of this? Did it not matter, what I wanted?

The session had only started twenty minutes ago and was nowhere near over. f**k, I wanted no more of her voice, her care and drill. I simply needed silence, as silent as the place already was.

Morgan reclined in her seat and swiveled from left to right. "You see..."

"Stop. Talking. Morgan."

A daze of shock distorted her expression and she clicked her tongue. "Okay."

The session would still end with the both of us feeling a sense of understanding and relief, even if tension was ripping the peace apart, that was the connection I'd spoken about. I knew that I wasn't allowed to leave until ten o'clock, so I just laid back in my seat and started to die a little inside. The wait was excruciating.

"Do you think it's wise to send for Valentina?" I myself broke the silence after a wave of thoughts flooded my head about my sister. She was in Germany, practicing criminal law and had been picking a fight with me over her return home. "I sent her away because I wanted to be alone in the first place, but apparently her absence is straining our relationship...if she keeps making it an issue."

Morgan's gaze was pointed and hard in a deciphering way. "You can't be alone forever, Darren." She didn't know that. "Sometimes you need all the love you can get." I was self-sufficient. Self-assured. Or at least I was trying to be. "At some point, none of this would make sense and you'd long for—"

"Is it wise to send for her? Yes or no?"

"Yes. Yes. Yes. You should," she rushed through her words and rolled her chair to the floor-to-ceiling shelf in order distract herself from me. I knew that gesture; whenever I was being too impulsive and demanding.

"Okay." I said gently, "Thank you." I had made up my mind to listen to Dr. Morgan. I knew that I could trust her judgment because every time she had given me advice, it had turned out to be beneficial. For instance, when she had told me to cut ties with Belladonna.

Belladonna had been one of the shareholders in Kold Karats, my company. We went to college together, and she'd been a part of the team that helped build the company from scratch. Unfortunately, our relationship became too complicated—Dr. Morgan would say toxic—and the strain was setting me back mentally. At some point, Dr. Morgan said if I didn't look beyond the length of time spent and focus on the knocking misery, I'd destroy myself with my own hands.

Once I took the bold step to get her out of the way, Bella left the city and I...well, I pretty much recovered a great deal. I had become less aggressive at least, and more focused on other things that didn't involve her. My attention was hell well divided as always, but protecting her was no longer a nagging distraction.

Grey. Brown. Blue.

Forgetting my miserable existence was as easy as that. I'd lose myself at the thought of those mundane colors and just like that, I'd reroute myself back to sanity. Thanks to Dr. Morgan, I might've still been the guy who feared his shadows, dreaded his nightmares, hated his mother, and died a thousand times at the thought of failure.

Kold was a better man, maybe not the best, but at least self-sufficient. Self-assured. And he trying so hard to lead a normal life.