All Four Of Me

Chapter 17

KENZIE

It has been just over three months since I first met my current foster family.

The past two months have been a whirlwind of counselling sessions, school assignments, cooking lessons and the occasional weekend outing with one or more of the men that I live with. There have also been several days of pure chaos which has led me to being grounded twice, sent to three separate detentions at school and multiple dissociative episodes, some of which lasted for more than a day.

About a week after cooking at Ben's house for the first time, Will and Chris were still having difficulties processing the severity of my diagnosis and the impact it would have on their and my own wellbeing going into the future. It came to the point where I was having an anxiety attack almost every night due to my inability to cope with their overbearing behaviour towards me, until James decided that enough was enough and called a "family meeting" to discuss the issue at hand.

Thankfully, we were able to resolve the worst of the problems and within days of our conversation Chris had eased off on his helicoptering habits and Will began treating me less like a problem he had to solve and more like a person again. It has been hard for all of us to adjust, but now that everybody has a better idea of what is causing my random behavioural issues and reluctance to form connections we have all managed to find a relatively workable routine to follow.

Ben has been coming over to the house a lot more since we have started cooking together and the guys, especially Mitchell and James get along really well with him. In all honesty, sometimes it feels like Ben is just another member of the household and in a way he fits in better with the guys than I do. Even Nathan, who had been dead set against the idea of me forming any sort of friendship with a person of the opposite gender was eventually won over by Ben's charms. However, that hasn't stopped Ben from taking every opportunity to stir him up and sometimes even I join in on his antics.

I have noticed that the more time I spend with Ben, the more curious I have become about my biological family. It has even reached the point where I have started to do my own research on the side whenever I have been granted access to one of the guy's laptops to complete my homework. I haven't had a great deal of success considering the amount of information I have on my parents is minimal, however the constant set backs have done nothing to dampen my interest.

Asking my three legal guardians for information has proven to be less fruitful than I had anticipated. Every time I ask one of them anything about my biological family they either deflect the question by finding something to distract me or they answer the questions in a way that doesn't really answer the question at all. It is completely frustrating for me, however none of my previous foster parents or case workers would answer my questions either so I can't get pissed off at them.

I can tell that there is something important they are withholding from me, but I don't try to push them on the topic. If they are keeping secrets from me about my parents and my past then they must be doing it for a good reason. I may not trust them enough to let them into my personal bubble, but I do trust them when they say that they would put my health and safety above all else. My past is riddled with hidden booby traps and the last thing they want to do is lead me into the labyrinth blind.

All I can do is either wait for my memories to reveal themselves in their own time, or give up trying to solve the mystery of my childhood altogether. As much as I wish I could let it go, I don't think I can ever truly move on if I don't have the closure I deserve. There are people in my memories who I keep seeing but don't remember and I feel as if I owe it to them to find out the truth.

I think about all of these things as I stare up at the white coated ceiling, unable to sleep from the haunting nightmares that have plagued my mind, but unwilling to alert James of the problems I am facing.