16

PTSD

----------------------------------------

Helen took a while to find where Janet had hidden herself, since while many sections of the Kl'Deesius remained locked off to non-essential personnel or visitors, the corridors themselves were not. It meant that Janet could continue wandering them alone without impediment. While the crew of the ship were under orders not to interfere with humans, this meant that she would essentially be left to her own devices.

Helen eventually spotted her, walking energetically around a junction, clearly flustered. She tried to catch up, and while she was normally fit and healthy and tried to keep that way, this pregnancy was slowing her down and making her feel more drained than was useful right now. Eventually, she had no choice but to slow down her pace, with no other option but to call out.

"Hey," she tried to shout loud enough to be heard, but the jog had winded her, as she held herself up against a bulkhead in an attempt to catch her breath.

Janet turned back, a frown on her scarred face, which soon cleared to a look of concern when she saw Helen almost doubled over. "Hey, what the hell's wrong with you?" she asked bluntly.

"Nothing," Helen told her, attempting to inject some levity into the situation. "Baby doesn't like... when I run around... Wanted me... to know it!"

"Come on!" Janet told Helen, taking one arm and throwing it over her shoulder, putting her arm with the still-injured wrist around Helen's waist. "How far's your medical again?"

It took a few minutes, and Helen slowly eased back into normalcy as they casually walked back to the medical bay, but eventually, they were back inside, and the doors closed.

"Seal the doors from external access and set a D.N.D until further notice," Helen ordered in the Tau Cetian language. A tone sounded, and Helen now knew that no-one was getting into this room unless overridden by Miradima herself. "I wanted to come see how you were doing," she then asked Janet.

Now that the immediate concern for her fellow human was taken care of, Janet started to pace again, her face a mask of distress and a sense of shame. This worried Helen greatly.

"Hey," Helen tried again, much more gently. "Talk to me."

"I don't know what to do," Janet wailed, barely holding on to her composure. "Why is this happening?"

"What is happening?" Helen gently insisted, lowering herself to the medical bunk. It was a psychological tactic, which Helen hoped would encourage Janet to sit as well.

"So I went with Stephen to that room you had set up for us," she began, her breath shaky. "I clung to him like a... Whatever... Anyway, we talked about what happened. I told him I was scared and angry about him getting hurt. He admitted he might feel the same way..."

Helen was not surprised by this. Stephen was fiercely protective of his friends. His long-standing friendship with John was testament to that. "Yeah, I suppose he would."

"Yeah, so then..." Janet stopped, her face going white, and she swallowed heavily. This kind of violent reaction to whatever went on concerned Helen greatly. She was suddenly alert, and was about to press further, when Janet continued. "I don't know why, but I got it into my head that I wanted to kiss him. So I did..." She stopped again, her breathing becoming dangerously shallow and rapid.

"Janet," Helen immediately took control of the situation, taking a firm yet soft tone in an attempt to reassure her. "You're having a panic attack. I need you to listen carefully to me, OK?" Helen then stood up and approached her, looking directly at her face. "You can look at me, or close your eyes, but listen to what I'm telling you now. You're in a safe place, and won't be hurt here. Now..."

Helen had her go through the mechanical process of breathing slowly. It was something she often had other patients follow whenever they exhibited symptoms of PTSD, and was frequently used whenever any military veterans she had attended started to have panic attacks. After a few moments, Janet's face had some of her usual color back in it, and her breathing was more regular.

"Alright," Helen exhaled slowly herself. "What happened next?"

Janet's face turned red. "Well... So we were kissing, and then his hands started to roam around... You know?"

Helen had to ask. The violent reaction she had exhibited earlier had to be explored, even if she didn't believe the answer to her question would be an affirmative. "Janet, this is important. Did Stephen assault you?"

The reaction was surprising. Janet's face was a picture of incredulity, and then anger. "What?! You know him better than-"

"Yeah, I'm sorry," Helen immediately assured her. "I know, I know, and I'm sorry, but I had to ask."

Janet was somewhat mollified. "Why?" she still asked, wanting to know, which Helen supposed was fair.

"Alright," Helen began to explain. "What you just showed signs of was severe Post Traumatic Stress Disorder."

"What the fuck is that?!" Janet asked, clearly having no patience.

"It's what happens when people go through trauma in their lives. Sometimes the mind gets into a state where sometimes things are triggers. A memory might cause a panic. Someone saying something. A word. A sound. A smell. Anything. When that happens, you go into panic as though you were in real danger, even though you're not."

Janet frowned as she thought about it. "Is that what you were doing with the breathing exercises just now? Trying to take my mind off of it?"

"Partly," Helen told her. "Partly because it stops you from fainting. If someone hyperventilates for too long-"

"If someone does what?" Janet asked. Helen should have realized that Janet's medical understanding would be rudimentary at best.

"Breathes rapidly and too shallow. I'll explain later," Helen told her. "Anyway, I wanted to get you calm so we could talk, and that was the best way to get you there."

After a moment's consideration, Janet nodded.

"So you know what triggered it this time?"

The sigh that Janet gave this time was shaky, and her breath hitched. Then for a few moments, she seemed to stop breathing, as her head fell into her hand, and her shoulders shook. Helen decided to wait it out. "We were kissing... His hands started to reach lower... And I panicked and pushed him back on the bunk. Stood up feeling like I needed to get out of there."

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

Not wanting to derail her retelling of the story, Helen waited.

Janet continued, her face blotchy with tears. "The look on his face... I thought he'd run off and leave... So I did it for him."

Helen frowned at this. She wasn't sure what Janet was talking about, so she pressed for more. "Do you remember why you panicked?"

"Yeah, I started to see flashes of what happened to me back in Phoenix."

"Just now?"

Janet frowned. "No, back in the room. I... I hate it when it happens!"

Helen supposed she was right. "What about this time? What caused it a few moments ago?"

"It wasn't a trigger or anything," Janet whispered. "I just... I realized that Stephen's going to be disgusted by me now. He's going to want to stay as far away from me as he can and-"

"No, he's not!" Helen snapped, immediately regretting her loss of professionalism. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to snap at you."

Wiping her face, Janet could not help the shake to her lips or hands. She clearly felt distressed that Stephen had been at the receiving end of a panic reaction, and Helen wanted to reassure her on that point. Janet didn't give her a chance just then. "It's not fair! You love a guy and try to do anything you can for him, and then when you get scared they start to look at you like you're broken and not... Now he's not going to want to come near me again!"

"Hold on a minute," Helen backtracked. "What did you mean, you love a guy?"

"You know, when you want to be with someone and you..." Janet was lost for words on that subject.

"Do you mean 'When you are attracted to someone and want to have sex'?"

"No, I do not mean 'When you are attracted to someone...' Dammit! I mean when you love a guy, as in when you bond with them to the point that you want more than just sex or whatever."

Helen supposed that Janet had a right to be incensed. She had just insulted the girl's understanding of adult feelings without meaning to. "Sorry, that was stupid of me. But listen to me when I tell you that I know Stephen better than you do at the moment, and I know he understands a lot more than you do about panic attacks and what causes them. He's going to know what happened is neither your fault nor his." Janet still didn't seem convinced. "Tell me, what makes you think Stephen won't understand?"

"Because Simon didn't!" Janet half-barked, half-wailed. She managed to get a better grip on her response a moment later as she continued. "After a few weeks together, Simon and I started to experiment a bit. It was OK for a while, until..." She sighed heavily. "One day, while we were... I'll spare you the details. Anyway, I suddenly had a freak-out, pushed Simon off of me, and stepped back. He looked confused, and tried to start back up again. I told him no, I didn't want to any more, and he asked what he did wrong. I tried to tell him nothing was wrong, but he refused to take it, and stormed off. Since then, he barely looked at me any more. We... We might have broken up eventually, but we were too busy fighting for our lives and the issue never really came up. That night was one of the last times Simon and I touched each other, and he stopped pursuing me after that."

Helen refrained from commenting. To her, it sounded like Simon had a very messed up view on how to deal with trauma sufferers and sexual relationships in general. It sounded to Helen, in fact, that Simon might have been somewhat immature on the subject, something that Stephen was unlikely to have any similar view on, and that's without knowing him that intimately. Still, she needed to get this squared away so they could all move forward.

"Janet, this question's important, so please answer honestly," Helen began slowly. "Are you asexual?"

Janet frowned. "What does that mean?"

Helen should have seen that coming miles away. Sex education in a post-apocalyptic environment was bound to be virtually non-existent. "It means that the idea of having sex doesn't make you want to do it, doesn't make your insides flutter, doesn't make you-"

"Right, right," Janet interrupted. "No, definitely not. Just busy at the time. Now? When I'm alone and I think of Stephen-"

"Say no more," Helen immediately cut her off. "I don't need to know the details, but thanks for clearing that up for me."

"Why did you ask, anyway?"

"Because you and Stephen are going to have to have an honest conversation about this. You're going to have to lay everything out for him, and let him know what you expect, what you feel safe with, and how best to let you handle things if you ever feel trapped again. Your enjoyment of sex is going to clash with your trauma, and that’s something you both need to find a way to cope with for a while."

Janet frowned for several moments, as she puzzled over what Helen had told her. "Why would I ever feel-"

Helen cut her off. "There is no why. That's one of the problems with PTSD. It can happen to you at any time, and you may not always know what set it off, but I promise you this, it's not something that you can just switch off. It will happen again, and you just need to learn how to deal with it when it does, so that both of you feel safe and well in the shortest time possible. How do you feel about doing a bit of reading?"

Janet shrugged. "I can deal with it," she replied. "I guess I should talk to Stephen and see how he is, but I assume you have some stuff I can look over?"

"A pretty comprehensive guide to how to deal with a healthy sex life," Helen told her. "I'll apologize in advance, it's geared toward adolescents, but it should get the point across. I'll also include a few more advanced essays on the subject so you can make use of the knowledge they contain as well. Some of it will be very useful to PTSD sufferers who want to have a close intimate relationship with their partner."

It took a few minutes for Helen to transfer the data to a data tablet that Janet could read at her leisure later, but eventually, she sent her patient off to rest and to read up. As soon as she did that, she contacted Stephen and let him know that she had seen Janet, and to expect to see her coming back shortly.

----------------------------------------

Janet walked back to the bunk room she had previously fled from. Unlike last time, she did not pace wildly, but instead took a slow stroll, reading the tablet device she had been given, skimming most of the primer stuff that she already understood. As she approached the door, she switched the device off, took a deep breath to control her nerves, belatedly wiped her face, and waved her hand over the entry panel.

Surprisingly, the door immediately opened, and she stepped inside.

Stephen was sat on the bed, looking like a little lost dog. It was enough to break her heart all over, and she almost lost it there and then. Steeling herself against any behavior that might cause a misunderstanding, she stepped into the room and waited for the door to close, then tossed the data tablet onto the nearby desk and approached Stephen, who looked at her sheepishly, as though he had done something wrong and needed to apologize.

"Stop looking at me like you've shit the bed," Janet snapped, then giggled at his expression, before bizarrely dissolving into tears again. "This is fuckin' ridiculous," she wailed, railing at the fact that three times in the space of a single day, she had dissolved into floods of tears and gotten herself in a distressed mental state at least twice. She didn't even feel particularly sad or distressed right now, she was relieved, for fuck sake, so why was she losing it?

Stephen did not disappoint her, though. He wrapped her up in a hug that felt oddly close and protective, as though he wanted to do more than hold on to her. She stopped trying to control her reaction, instead basking in his acceptance of her. It felt even more relieving to be able to relax completely in his arms, and within moments, she felt her equilibrium return, enough that she stopped fucking crying like a kid who had her food stolen by the thugs at the shelter.

"Feel better?" He asked, his tone gentle and comforting.

She didn't immediately answer with words, instead, she maneuvered herself so she could put both arms around him and kiss the side of his face, which she did firmly and for several moments. "Did Helen contact you while I was on my way here?"

Stephen nodded, and Janet pulled back so she could look him in the eyes. "She told me you had something to tell me?"

"Yeah," she said quietly, sighing, but she held his gaze and refused to look away. "I'm not sure how I'm going to get this out, and it might not all be today, but I want us to... I want to make sure we..."

"What?" Stephen prompted when Janet couldn't find a way to say what she wanted.

This was ludicrous, she railed at herself. Just fucking say it already! 

She didn't know exactly when it happened, and she didn't know when exactly she realized that she had, but there was no mistaking how she felt now. After everything that happened today, Janet had never been more sure of anything in her life. Not even Simon could earn her trust or her heart in the way that Stephen had, and his reaction just now gave her the push she needed to stop kidding herself and finally admit it out loud.

"Fuck it," she said indelicately. "Stephen, I'm just going to tell you straight," she sighed, kissing him on the lips again, this time far more gently than the last time she did. She could feel the reaction it caused within him, but decided not to comment on it so as not to ruin the moment. "I love you."