Inner And Outer Demons

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Tris's POV

The sunlight is warm on my skin as it shines in through the window. Past the tall potted plant in the corner, and across the maroon colored couch I sit on. Even as the ray is warm, I feel cold. I have for the past day and a half ever since I yelled at Tobias in the precinct parking lot. I was wrong. I know that, I accept that it was my fault. But it doesn't change the fact that I said what I said, took the jabs at him that I did. Hurt him just because I was. Guilt piles in my stomach like stones and my heart aches thinking of him, and the fact that I may have just screwed up one of the greatest things I had in my life.

"You didn't want to have to come here, did you?"

I look up from my hands that are twisted anxiously together in my lap, and I meet the eyes of the woman I came to talk with. Dr. Julia Scott; the precinct's therapist/counselor.

Releasing a sigh, I respond to her honestly. "No, not really."

"Why is that? Do you think?"

"I think that I thought it would go away. That after a day or two, the nightmares and the thoughts would subside and that I would be fine. I thought that I could get through it on my own, not have to drag others into it."

"And have they? Subsided, I mean."

"No." I answer. "They haven't."

They've gotten worse. The nightmares, they are more sickening now. Not just because every night I know I'll shoot Tobias in my dreams, but because I may have lost him in real life by my actions. So to lose him in both reality and in my dreams, it's too much to bare.

"Have you confided in anyone else about the shooting? Your partner perhaps?"

My eyes burn as I hold back the tears at the mention of him, and looking up at her I take a deep breath. "I haven't, no."

"And why is that?"

I run a shaky hand through my hair as I gaze out the window to my right. "I just can't seem to bring myself to tell him how badly I'm struggling."

"How come?"

"I don't know." I tell her, still not looking her way.

"I think you do know, you're just choosing to avoid the truth because in the long run it's easier."

Shaking my head, I look down at my hands. "It's not that I don't want to tell him, I just can't."

"How come?" She repeats, and as she stays calm I start to bubble over.

"Because I'm scared, alright!" I shout out, looking at her in the eyes now. "I'm scared to tell him."

"I'm scared to tell him about the nightmares I've been having. Scared to tell him that I'm not fine after screaming at him that I am. I'm scared for him to know the truth, okay?" I can feel my voice cracking, but I ignore it.

"Your partner," Julia looks down at her notepad for a short second. "Four Eaton, he isn't just your partner is he?"

Her question takes me by surprise for a moment, but I soon recover. "No, I guess not."

"You both work together in a high stress job and are also intimacy partners?"

I laugh softly, knowing she's asking in the only clinical aspect she knows how. "I wouldn't describe it that way. We're work partners yes, and we're together outside of work as well. At least, I think so."

"Why do you say it like that?"

Because I screamed at him in the parking lot like an idiot, so we may be over.