Voices In The Theater [SAMPLE]

Chapter 5 - The Little Theater

        Monday morning I learned that many therapists use cognitive behavioral techniques to help their clients. To put it simply: once they helped their clients change their thoughts, they could more easily help them change their behaviors.

        I wondered if Cognitive Behavioral Techniques could work on my dad. But then again, I guess any kind of therapy would only work if the person himself wanted to change. And that wasn't my dad at all.

        When I'd called him Saturday night around 10 PM—worried that something bad had happened to him or was about to happen to him, but not really knowing what I was supposed to say—he simply barked at me and told me to never bother him again, because he had too many important things to do and I was just wasting his time.

        You'd think I'd be used to it by now—his detachment, his hate—but I still found my eyes tearing up when I cut off our call. I wanted so much to throw my phone across the room and smash it against the wall... but then I knew it would only mean I'd have to ask mom to ask dad to give me a new phone. And I wouldn't want to hear anything he had to say to me then.

        So in a sick moment, I wished those horrible voices would get him. If he were dead he wouldn't be able to hurt me so much anymore.

        "Samantha Davidson,” said Sir Julius' voice.

        I looked up with a guilty start; was he calling me or just thinking about calling me?

        "Lana Chan,” he continued, reading off of a sheet of paper.

        He looked up from the paper to look at me, and then at Lana. "You'll be presenting your report on Gestalt Psychology next week."

        "Oh,” I said, at almost the same time Lana said "Okay!" in a cheery voice.

        Apparently, General Psych class had already ended.

        When Lana was just about done dividing the topics of our report between us and we were the only ones left in the room, I decided to ask her where the Little Theater was.

        "Why?" she asked, her pixie face looking a little concerned. "You're not checking it out by yourself, are you?"

        "You make it sound like it's a bad thing," I said.

        "Well of course it isn't bad." With her messenger bag slung over her left shoulder and three thick textbooks cradled in her right arm, she walked in step with me towards the general direction of the cafeteria, where everyone else seemed to be heading. "It's just... I don't know, creepy, especially after we heard Eartha's story."

        I knew she was right. And I did not want to have anything to do with those voices anymore. But my moment of weakness last Saturday made me feel guilty enough to persist. If I couldn't keep my dad from dying, then the least I could do was to find out what was really going on. Maybe I could even find a way to help him without having anything to do with him.

        "What if you go with me?" I asked her.

        Lana looked at me sternly with those almond-shaped eyes. It was pretty impressive, how formidable she looked, considering she was two inches shorter than I was. "You still haven't answered my question. Why do you want to go?"

        I decided to tell her the parts of the truth that she would understand. "Because I'm meeting Karen and the research team later, and I want to be more helpful. The least I could do is actually know which part of the campus we're researching, right?"