In Treatment

Hello?

Sorry. I-I know it's late.

- Are you okay? - Yeah, yeah, I'm okay.

Just this fuckin' dream, yo.

Like, it's winter, and I'm in a field,

holding hands with a... a little girl.

Supposed to be my sister or something.

Starts to snow, I'm excited,

so I catch some on my tongue. All of a sudden,

my throat, it's on fire. It's ash.

A wing from a plane falls to the ground next to us.

I turn, and my sister's face, it's gone.

Jesus, mamita, I-I don't wanna tell you the rest, man.

It's only gonna make you worry.

If I worry, I worry.

You don't need to protect me from my feelings.

- Am I allowed to worry about you? - What do you mean?

I mean,

I didn't expect you to answer so late.

I have no other explanation for being awake other than...

"The agonies.

The mad midnight moments."

"A Grief Observed." C.S. Lewis.

Well, N.W. Clerk, if you really wanna get all technical about it.

Dude was an Anglo-Anglican problem, to say the least.

But he did write some meaningful shit on loss.

Do you cry?

I can't... I can't picture you crying.

I'm the same way.

You remember that girl I told you I dated?

- Mm-hmm. - She had this mode

she could switch into that I fuckin'... I don't know, lack.

We would get into a fight,

and it was like a dam bursting open. She would just sob.

It looked so freeing, like...

she fucking went some place.

One time, she said, "El,

you ever consider that maybe you're just a cold person?"

But I'm not a cold person!

No, honey.

You're not. Far from it.

I told her. I said, "Look, when you cry,

when you become a fuckin' river, that's how I feel."

I wanna point to it because that's...

that's how I feel,

but I just don't know how to get there. I never have.

And, you know, it...

- Hey, shit, sorry. I gotta go. - No, wait.

Real quick. Do some deep breathing before you go to bed.

Um, in for four,

hold for seven, out for eight.

You're the best.

Hi, James.

It's Dr. Brooke Taylor. I got your message

about having to reschedule this afternoon.

I have an opening tomorrow and another next week.

I'm heading into session now but

give me a call and we'll discuss times.

Hey, mamita. Can you give me two seconds?

We just runnin' a little behind over here.

I just have to give Jeremy his seizure meds. Is that okay?

Yes, of course. The time is yours.

Okay, cool, cool.

Aight, we good. Thanks.

No worries at all.

Yo, these motherfuckers really think

they running a Ritz-Carlton up in here.

The kitchen? There's less marble in the fuckin' Vatican.

And the espresso machine? Victoria Arduino.

I'm not familiar.

Yo, it's like a $20,000 machine, bro.

All the medical bills for Jeremy, and they still got

enough left over for some fuckin' copper.

- This shit is nice. - Eladio,

I need to apologize to you.

To me? For what?

I shouldn't have answered the phone last night.

No, I'm glad you did.

Scary dream and all.

In that moment, in another life,

I'd call my mom.

What would've happened if you'd called your mother

instead of me?

Well, it'd be 5:00 AM in Florida.

She'd still be stocking the grocery for another hour.

And when was the last time you spoke to her?

Like four, five months ago.

She got COVID.

Doctor at Tampa General called me

and was like, "Yo, your mom's real sick.

Not like ventilator sick, but sick."

So, uh, I started looking at flights.

The DeMarcos weren't cool about me traveling, but...

Well, anyway,

it-it ended up not happening.

You know, by the time I got my mom on the phone,

she was like, "Oh, don't come. I'll be fine."

- She was. - Must've been hard,

her not wanting your help.

I want a relationship with her, yo.

That's my moms.

But, it's gotta run both ways.

You know, we both gotta want it.

And what's her relationship like with your sister?

You-you hadn't mentioned her before.

Is she older or younger?

Sister?

Oh, from my dream.

Uh, I don't have one.

My mom had a stillbirth before she had me.

She shared that with you?

Not until a few years back.

But, one day,

I was, like, 6,

and I walked into the kitchen, and I asked my mom

where my sister was.

My mom said, "You don't have a sister."

And I was like, "Oh, I remember. She's dead."

- What made you say that? - No fuckin' clue.

You know that... that woo-woo shit

that people are like, you know,

kids are closer to the other side?

Well...

it freaked my mom out,

so she kinda kept her distance ever since then.

- And you think that's the reason. - I mean,

I like to think it was because of something dumb I said,

- rather than she just didn't like me. - What I mean is

when we're children, we don't always understand everything

going on in our parents' worlds.

So if a mother pulls away from her child,

it likely has very little to do with who that child is

or anything he's done.

- Well, what are you gonna do? - Well, listen,

in the future, you can call me off-hours in an emergency,

but let's just...

keep it to that, alright?

Yo, don't do that.

Don't do what?

Slap me on the knuckles or whatever.

Like, you told me to call you if I needed you,

- and I did. - You're right.

I apologize again.

As your therapist, it's on me to delineate

the boundaries that are appropriate,

and I will be better at that in the future.

You know, I think I might just need a referral.

You gotta know a good psychiatrist, right?

Sure.

But why do you think you need a psychiatrist?

This insomnia.

The nightmares, the fuckin'...

I haven't slept in six days, yo.

Six days?

What about last night?

- Did you try the breathing, in for four... - Yeah, yeah, I tried it, okay?

It-it worked, until it didn't.

Okay.

We can try something else.

I just need to be able to function, yo.

Alright, my job's not nothin'.

If I f-forget Jeremy's pills

or I take my eye off the ball when he's out of his chair...

I just feel like medication could help.

I mean, I nap.

You know, couple hours here and there, but it's...

it's like snatching a song out the air. It's snippets.

And you're afraid that that lack of sleep

may affect your job performance.

Look, I can do this job in my sleep.

Aight, I can talk you through this shit over the phone

from a fuckin' internet café in Pakistan on some Morpheus shit.

Wake up, get Jeremy out of bed,

get him into the chair, breakfast,

watch "Rick & Morty" or some shit together

till the PT guy shows, and so on.

I'm not worried about all that.

Not to sound selfish,

I'm worried about me.

I don't feel good.

Well, you may need medication,

but after only two sessions,

I don't feel I have an adequate picture.

- Meaning? - In order to refer you to a psychiatrist,

I need to know more.

There's something at the heart of your sleeplessness.

Lyrical.

I like that.

Say more.

You want lyrical. Okay. Jung said,

"There is no coming into consciousness without pain."

Oh shit.

I like to think of that quote in relation to insomnia.

Maybe...

it's not about the difficulty of falling asleep.

Maybe, we stay awake to avoid the moment

we have to come to in our lives.

Where the dream world falls away...

and reality sets in.

Damn.