Chatlog: Fear gas + ??? = Therapy?
Kurt and Crane meet in the library to discuss Recent Events.
Disclaimer: No fear gas is actually involved.
* Jonathan is sitting behind the main desk, with a stack of books and a pinpoint.
* Kurt bamfs onto the front steps, not familiar enough with the layout to just appear. (Also that same part of his brain that keeps him from materializing halfway through a wall or chair seems to think it would be a bad idea to break basic librarly rules with noisy, stinky teleporting.) Creeak goes the door and in skitters a Kurt.
* Jonathan is waiting, quietly, but he keeps himself busy. The pinpoint's set off to the side, and he is going through each book, checking it for damage, before setting it down on a cart behind the desk. One book has a few dogeared pages. He doesn't get annoyed, but carefully sets the pages back in order.
* Kurt catches sight of Jonathan and stands up, walking over until he's a few feet away from the desk. "Hi."
* Jonathan smiles at Kurt and shuts the book. "Would you like to come sit down in the office?"
* Kurt looks down and nods. He does not fidget, though his tail twitches and flicks.
* Jonathan stands up, walks around the counter, and then back to the office, which has several comfortable chairs, another desk, and fireplace which is, at the moment, unlit.
* Kurt comes in, closes the door, and waits for Jon's signal before he sits in a chair. Feet on the floor, hands in his lap.
* Jonathan takes a seat opposite Kurt, and waits a moment for them both to settle in, before speaking.
* Kurt sits still. He even wraps his tail around the leg of the chair. Still.
Jonathan: "I really want you to understand, I am not angry."
* Kurt nods. He's still really uncomfortable in a very teenager-who-is-being-talked-to-by-a-grownup sort of way.
Jonathan: "It's difficult for me to put my finger down on Some's... the way he thinks. Humans age in a certain way. -He's- in middle age... and he's twelve. He also isn't human. It makes me uncomfortable to think about it all, but I'm not angry."
* Kurt continues to look at the floor, and frowns. "I don't want him to be middle aged at twelve."
Jonathan: "I don't, either. I want him to be in his fifties. He's acting like a teenager right now."
* Kurt has no idea how to respond to that.
* Jonathan scowls. "I don't think that it was fair of him to present that information to you. I understand that you are frightened."
* Kurt sighs and rubs his face. "No, I went and pestered him about it because I knew he had a crush on someone. And then it was just- ...what happened after that wasn't his fault."
Jonathan: "Well, yes, you pressured him about it, and you should have stopped. You didn't. Perhaps you will in the future."
* Kurt nods and returns to quiet floorstaring.
Jonathan: "Both of you seem quite willing to accept blame for... I don't think it's an issue of blame. You're both friends. Now you're upset, and he's upset. -I'm- upset, but that's hardly any of your concern. I happen to know quite a few things about being afraid."
Kurt: "I know why I'm upset," he mumbles.
Jonathan: "Do you want help?"
* Kurt sighs a fed-up sort of sigh. "I want it to go away. Which short banging my head against the wall and hoping, I can't make happen. So yes."
* Jonathan 's voice is calm. One might pretend that he's sane, but, we all know... "How can I help you?"
Kurt: After a moment's quiet thought, "Help Some understand that getting the memories of my treatment removed is not going to turn me into some vastly different person."
Jonathan: "You want to have... memories removed?"
* Kurt nods. "Yes. There is the reasonable response to things, such as 'thank you but I have a girlfriend and am not interested in guys', and then there is having screaming fits and fighting with myself to not just grab said girlfriend and disappear."
Jonathan: "We don't always act out with what we know to be the most reasonable response. That's why we're human, and not machines."
Kurt: "Well. Look. Some's habits of falling in love with lots of people, I do not know how to help with. He is my best friend, and he and Savvy are the most important people in the world to me, but like you said, he's not human and there is only so much I can understand."
Jonathan: "He isn't human, and he isn't from a species -like- humans, and he's lost a great deal, besides. My point is, you don't have to remove memories in order to find a solution. Experiences aren't like thorns."
Kurt: "...You know, people like to say these things, but yes. They really really are, sometimes. A thorn or a cancer. No one says 'oh, you cannot remove this organ it is part of you!' but a doctor can, and then you get well."
Jonathan: 'Experiences, unlike organs, and thorns, form who we are. There are things I would like nothing more than to forget, but, if I forgot them... I wouldn't be myself, at all. I would be a different personality inhabiting this body. -I- wouldn't be cured. -I- would be dead."
Kurt: "Well perhaps I do not like who I am with these memories very much."
Jonathan: "What you -want- is for whatever happened to have -not happened-, and, trust me, you -cannot- change that."
Kurt: "If it happened in a world I have no contact with, if I am the only one around who remembers it, and then I do not remember it, is it not the same?"
Jonathan: "It is not the same. You want to erase your memories out of a desire to heal. You can heal without removing them."
* Kurt softly. "...I don't think I can heal that."
Jonathan: "You've made it this far."
Jonathan: "I have... a great deal of difficulty feeling as if events that happened in my past are, in fact, in the past. It feels as if a part of me stayed there. I am still learning..."
Kurt: "I think that if I did not have the memories I would be like my alternate. Everyone likes him, and he does not have huge meltdowns."
Jonathan: "You don't know everything that your alternate has been through. Everyone has things they'd rather not have experienced."
* Kurt gives Jon a flat look. "Everyone does not get captured by Weapon X."
Jonathan: "No, and there are countless other things in countless other lives that have had just as much or more of an impact on people. Or, do you mean to say that what happened to you was much worse than anything else?"
Kurt: "...I'm curious. What do you think it is, that happened to me?"
Jonathan: "I have no way of knowing. I'm not going to guess."
Kurt: "You are speaking to me of 'countless other things', so there is some base assumption. Here in the nexus we have the Shop that has happened, and we have the islands where you have to die to get out, and those are very terrible. The Shop steals lives and treats them like test subjects. The islands betray life by removing the finality of death. It is like a videogame, you didn't -really- die."
Kurt: "But the Shop treats its subjects well. Yes, even after what they did to me and Ara, that is 'well,' comparatively. And the islands it is impartial, apolitical, and over relatively soon."
Kurt: "I dont' know. I don't want to compare this to other things. It doesn't matter what it is like to other things. It was very very terrible, and it is over now, and it should not have happened."
Jonathan: "No. There is no assumption. Countless other things -have- happened to other people, and I'm not talking about the Nexus." He looks mildly annoyed, but manages to quell that. "We are, however, making a comparison, and one which is useful to us. That comparison is that, like many other people, you can heal."
Kurt: "Well, what? I talk about it until it is somehow 'in perspective'?"
Jonathan: "How exactly it could be addressed would depend entirely on what happened. I can't say that." He sighs. "I won't begin to presume that you will tell me."
* Kurt finally gives in and curls his legs up to his chest. "Well I don't really -like- to talk about it. The US government kidnapped a little German boy, locked him up and played mindgames with him until they got him to kill people for them. He tried to move on and couldn't and now he's in the nexus. The end."
Jonathan: "How old were you when they took you away?"
Kurt: "Eleven. Eleven and a half, pretty much."
Jonathan: "That's very young. I was only a little older when I entered foster care."
* Kurt shrugs, and nods. "I was fourteen when they had us take the X-Men, and then the Brotherhood got us out. Well really, it was Scarlet Witch. She got the bombs out of our heads."
* Jonathan nods, listening. He doesn't understand all of this, but he has the benefit of being from a somewhat similar reality, so suspension of disbelief isn't so difficult. "I'm sorry. You're seventeen, now?"
Kurt: "Sixteen."
Jonathan: "Sixteen, excuse me."
* Kurt shrugs again.
Kurt: "And there was no one who spoke to me until then. I did not know English."
Jonathan: "I would say that removing the memories may be more harmful to your development, because how you -overcome them- will continue to shape the man you are becoming.... No one spoke to you?"
Jonathan: "[Would you rather I spoke German?]"
* Kurt shook his head. "Well, and they, oh. Umh. [Sure. There was also the part where we were Weapon X's weapons. ...Do you...is this therapy time or something?]"
Jonathan: "[If you'd like it to be. I'm not the best with German, and I am sorry. I don't know as many words...? However... I am, actually, trained.]"
Kurt: "...Is this going to involve fear gas?"
Jonathan: "[No, it does not.]"
* Kurt looks apologetic. "[Just checking.]"
* Jonathan bows his head.
Kurt: "[I just don't...It seems like a lot of grief over a thing that is not going to get that much better. I want to be able to trust my friends. I want to be able to trust Some. And now it is just going to be...all of that between us. It took me the longest time to just get over the fact that people were...would choose a lifestyle. AND it's a thing that you do yourself so that is maybe a problem.]"
Kurt: "[...The thing being...stuff. Not Some. Who is a nice person."]
Jonathan: "[It's going to get better and it -can- get better. Allowing yourself to accept that, alone, is a very big thing, and very important.]" He thinks about the rest. His knowledge of German doesn't cover every topic. "[I'm not living a lifestyle. I can't....] talk about it in German. I apologize. First of all, Some is only male because there's no analogue of his sex among humans, so the situation is more complicated than that."
* Kurt is just going to die now.
* Jonathan ._.
Kurt: "Ja, you know I sometimes wonder if a girl would not me more accurate given what Iii am maybe not going to talk about Grue genders."
Jonathan: "[I'm not certain. I'm not sure it matters to him as much as it would to us.]" He'll just switch back and forth between languages, here. Don't mind him. "It makes me decidedly uneasy to think about. I was not raised to have an open mind about it.'
* Kurt nods. "[It is hard to remember, sometimes, that so much of what we learn as far as how we should behave is based on gender, and that Some does not have that cultural foundation."]
Jonathan: "[He doesn't, nor do I really understand what being a poppet is, beyond what he's told me. I'm not in love with him because he's....] I'm not gay." This conversation is suddenly so awkward. If it helps...
* Kurt is going to fiddle with his tail now. "[I think it is that...the poppet makes everything work, between all the others. The one who brings everyone together. Which makes sense with his personality, I think. I guess without knowing more about Grues there's no way to know if this is common. ...] I love him too. But there are different kinds of love. I don't know if he is good at separating."
* Jonathan resists picking at his sleeve. "Is that what scares you?"
Kurt: "Well. It makes me worry about /him/." But no, that is not what scares him, per se.
Jonathan: "What about it upsets you?"
* Kurt fiddles some more, sullenly. "It doesn't have to do with him. Well, I guess maybe. He knows what happened and it was really stupid of him to...to think about me that way. AND he already HAS a family and love is supposed to be about putting other people first."
Jonathan: "People don't have control over who they feel attracted to. It isn't a switch. We've also already been over the issue of who's to blame for this information coming out. What -is- his responsibility is how he acts on it. I don't think it would be appropriate for him to act on it."
Jonathan: "Is this a specific something that happened?"
* Kurt shrinks back, and eventually nods.
Jonathan: "Can you tell me what happened?"
Kurt: "Bad things. I don't- ... I wouldn't kill for them."
Jonathan: "You wouldn't, and so they tried to break you?"
Kurt: "They did break me."
* Jonathan 's expression looks pained, for a moment. He forces that down, as well. "What did they do?"
* Kurt just sits there, withdrawn and increasingly tense.
Jonathan: "You don't have to tell me, now. Or ever. I never told anyone anything about what happened, until I was well past your age."
* Kurt softens a bit, but still doesn't say anything.
Jonathan: "I wonder how it would have been different, if I had."
Kurt: "Foster homes are not good."
Jonathan: "I wasn't in any sort of state to make it any better."
Jonathan: "I was very, very angry."
* Kurt nods. "I try not to be so angry. It just makes me sick."
Kurt: "It makes me sick that people like to hurt one another."
Jonathan: "It's a sickness. It perpetuates itself."
Kurt: "Is it so bad that I don't want it in my head, then?"
Jonathan: "How does the body fight illness?"
Kurt: "It gets rid of the thing that is making it sick."
Jonathan: "It develops an immunity. It becomes resistant to the disease through exposure."
Kurt: "...There are more kinds of disease than chickenpox. And exposing people to traumatic events to get them over traumatic events is the stupidest idea ever, I'm sorry. They did not make me afraid of /heights/ or snakes or something."
Jonathan: "No. You were -exposed- to a traumatic event. That -cannot change-. Do you want to grow stronger, or do you want to give up and erase part of your life in order to run away from it?"
Jonathan: "I -gave up-, Kurt. Do I need to elaborate upon what I became to allow myself to forget?"
Kurt: "Well I don't know what 'exposure' is supposed to mean, then."
Jonathan: "What I mean is that by removing the memory of this experience, which has already happened, you remove the potential to learn from it and best fight that which perpetuates such things."
Kurt: "Wh- Herr Crane. Jonathan. I do not need to /remember/ what they did to me to know how to fight. I do not need even the slightest detail to know that what happened was extremely wrong."
Jonathan: "You can heal without forgetting."
Kurt: "It's...frustrating." Ahaha understatement time.
Jonathan: "Yes. I hope that you understand that I'm trying to help."
* Kurt nods. "I know. And you have been. Very amazingly helpful."
Jonathan: "I would like to continue to talk to you. Obviously, these things can't be simply talked through, in the course of an afternoon."
Kurt: "I guess...is it okay if I talk to Gabe? He'll probably say the memory thing is a bad idea too," forgive him a childish eyeroll.
Jonathan: "Of course! I would encourage you to talk to whomever you trust to speak with. I'm not... I'm not the best psychologist, but I am trying to learn to use what I know to help."
* Kurt grins, wry. "Well that's encouraging."
* Jonathan doesn't look quite as amused with this. He does smile a little, though.
Kurt: "I am happy to talk to you no matter what. Happy that you /want/ to talk to me."
* Jonathan smiles a little more, looking down at the carpet. "Is there anything else you'd like to talk about, today?"
Kurt: "I'm not sure what to... how /is/ Some?"
* Jonathan 's smile fades. "He's very sad, right now."
* Kurt nods. ._.
Kurt: "I told him in text message that it was okay. I am /not/ mad at him. I'm just...very sorry. I hadn't..."
Jonathan: "I told him to give you time."
Jonathan: "Is there anything else that I should tell him?"
Kurt: "I don't know what to say."
* Jonathan nods. "I'll keep telling him that, then."
Jonathan: "I'll also tell him that we talked, and that I'm pleased with how it went."
Kurt: "Me too." Little smile.
* Jonathan stands up and holds out his hand.
* Kurt uncurls, stands and takes it.
* Jonathan shakes his hand.
Kurt: Shake shake. "Well. Good. I guess I'll...keep you posted?"
Jonathan: "Thank you very much. You know how to find me."
Disclaimer: No fear gas is actually involved.
* Jonathan is sitting behind the main desk, with a stack of books and a pinpoint.
* Kurt bamfs onto the front steps, not familiar enough with the layout to just appear. (Also that same part of his brain that keeps him from materializing halfway through a wall or chair seems to think it would be a bad idea to break basic librarly rules with noisy, stinky teleporting.) Creeak goes the door and in skitters a Kurt.
* Jonathan is waiting, quietly, but he keeps himself busy. The pinpoint's set off to the side, and he is going through each book, checking it for damage, before setting it down on a cart behind the desk. One book has a few dogeared pages. He doesn't get annoyed, but carefully sets the pages back in order.
* Kurt catches sight of Jonathan and stands up, walking over until he's a few feet away from the desk. "Hi."
* Jonathan smiles at Kurt and shuts the book. "Would you like to come sit down in the office?"
* Kurt looks down and nods. He does not fidget, though his tail twitches and flicks.
* Jonathan stands up, walks around the counter, and then back to the office, which has several comfortable chairs, another desk, and fireplace which is, at the moment, unlit.
* Kurt comes in, closes the door, and waits for Jon's signal before he sits in a chair. Feet on the floor, hands in his lap.
* Jonathan takes a seat opposite Kurt, and waits a moment for them both to settle in, before speaking.
* Kurt sits still. He even wraps his tail around the leg of the chair. Still.
Jonathan: "I really want you to understand, I am not angry."
* Kurt nods. He's still really uncomfortable in a very teenager-who-is-being-talked-to-by-a-grownup sort of way.
Jonathan: "It's difficult for me to put my finger down on Some's... the way he thinks. Humans age in a certain way. -He's- in middle age... and he's twelve. He also isn't human. It makes me uncomfortable to think about it all, but I'm not angry."
* Kurt continues to look at the floor, and frowns. "I don't want him to be middle aged at twelve."
Jonathan: "I don't, either. I want him to be in his fifties. He's acting like a teenager right now."
* Kurt has no idea how to respond to that.
* Jonathan scowls. "I don't think that it was fair of him to present that information to you. I understand that you are frightened."
* Kurt sighs and rubs his face. "No, I went and pestered him about it because I knew he had a crush on someone. And then it was just- ...what happened after that wasn't his fault."
Jonathan: "Well, yes, you pressured him about it, and you should have stopped. You didn't. Perhaps you will in the future."
* Kurt nods and returns to quiet floorstaring.
Jonathan: "Both of you seem quite willing to accept blame for... I don't think it's an issue of blame. You're both friends. Now you're upset, and he's upset. -I'm- upset, but that's hardly any of your concern. I happen to know quite a few things about being afraid."
Kurt: "I know why I'm upset," he mumbles.
Jonathan: "Do you want help?"
* Kurt sighs a fed-up sort of sigh. "I want it to go away. Which short banging my head against the wall and hoping, I can't make happen. So yes."
* Jonathan 's voice is calm. One might pretend that he's sane, but, we all know... "How can I help you?"
Kurt: After a moment's quiet thought, "Help Some understand that getting the memories of my treatment removed is not going to turn me into some vastly different person."
Jonathan: "You want to have... memories removed?"
* Kurt nods. "Yes. There is the reasonable response to things, such as 'thank you but I have a girlfriend and am not interested in guys', and then there is having screaming fits and fighting with myself to not just grab said girlfriend and disappear."
Jonathan: "We don't always act out with what we know to be the most reasonable response. That's why we're human, and not machines."
Kurt: "Well. Look. Some's habits of falling in love with lots of people, I do not know how to help with. He is my best friend, and he and Savvy are the most important people in the world to me, but like you said, he's not human and there is only so much I can understand."
Jonathan: "He isn't human, and he isn't from a species -like- humans, and he's lost a great deal, besides. My point is, you don't have to remove memories in order to find a solution. Experiences aren't like thorns."
Kurt: "...You know, people like to say these things, but yes. They really really are, sometimes. A thorn or a cancer. No one says 'oh, you cannot remove this organ it is part of you!' but a doctor can, and then you get well."
Jonathan: 'Experiences, unlike organs, and thorns, form who we are. There are things I would like nothing more than to forget, but, if I forgot them... I wouldn't be myself, at all. I would be a different personality inhabiting this body. -I- wouldn't be cured. -I- would be dead."
Kurt: "Well perhaps I do not like who I am with these memories very much."
Jonathan: "What you -want- is for whatever happened to have -not happened-, and, trust me, you -cannot- change that."
Kurt: "If it happened in a world I have no contact with, if I am the only one around who remembers it, and then I do not remember it, is it not the same?"
Jonathan: "It is not the same. You want to erase your memories out of a desire to heal. You can heal without removing them."
* Kurt softly. "...I don't think I can heal that."
Jonathan: "You've made it this far."
Jonathan: "I have... a great deal of difficulty feeling as if events that happened in my past are, in fact, in the past. It feels as if a part of me stayed there. I am still learning..."
Kurt: "I think that if I did not have the memories I would be like my alternate. Everyone likes him, and he does not have huge meltdowns."
Jonathan: "You don't know everything that your alternate has been through. Everyone has things they'd rather not have experienced."
* Kurt gives Jon a flat look. "Everyone does not get captured by Weapon X."
Jonathan: "No, and there are countless other things in countless other lives that have had just as much or more of an impact on people. Or, do you mean to say that what happened to you was much worse than anything else?"
Kurt: "...I'm curious. What do you think it is, that happened to me?"
Jonathan: "I have no way of knowing. I'm not going to guess."
Kurt: "You are speaking to me of 'countless other things', so there is some base assumption. Here in the nexus we have the Shop that has happened, and we have the islands where you have to die to get out, and those are very terrible. The Shop steals lives and treats them like test subjects. The islands betray life by removing the finality of death. It is like a videogame, you didn't -really- die."
Kurt: "But the Shop treats its subjects well. Yes, even after what they did to me and Ara, that is 'well,' comparatively. And the islands it is impartial, apolitical, and over relatively soon."
Kurt: "I dont' know. I don't want to compare this to other things. It doesn't matter what it is like to other things. It was very very terrible, and it is over now, and it should not have happened."
Jonathan: "No. There is no assumption. Countless other things -have- happened to other people, and I'm not talking about the Nexus." He looks mildly annoyed, but manages to quell that. "We are, however, making a comparison, and one which is useful to us. That comparison is that, like many other people, you can heal."
Kurt: "Well, what? I talk about it until it is somehow 'in perspective'?"
Jonathan: "How exactly it could be addressed would depend entirely on what happened. I can't say that." He sighs. "I won't begin to presume that you will tell me."
* Kurt finally gives in and curls his legs up to his chest. "Well I don't really -like- to talk about it. The US government kidnapped a little German boy, locked him up and played mindgames with him until they got him to kill people for them. He tried to move on and couldn't and now he's in the nexus. The end."
Jonathan: "How old were you when they took you away?"
Kurt: "Eleven. Eleven and a half, pretty much."
Jonathan: "That's very young. I was only a little older when I entered foster care."
* Kurt shrugs, and nods. "I was fourteen when they had us take the X-Men, and then the Brotherhood got us out. Well really, it was Scarlet Witch. She got the bombs out of our heads."
* Jonathan nods, listening. He doesn't understand all of this, but he has the benefit of being from a somewhat similar reality, so suspension of disbelief isn't so difficult. "I'm sorry. You're seventeen, now?"
Kurt: "Sixteen."
Jonathan: "Sixteen, excuse me."
* Kurt shrugs again.
Kurt: "And there was no one who spoke to me until then. I did not know English."
Jonathan: "I would say that removing the memories may be more harmful to your development, because how you -overcome them- will continue to shape the man you are becoming.... No one spoke to you?"
Jonathan: "[Would you rather I spoke German?]"
* Kurt shook his head. "Well, and they, oh. Umh. [Sure. There was also the part where we were Weapon X's weapons. ...Do you...is this therapy time or something?]"
Jonathan: "[If you'd like it to be. I'm not the best with German, and I am sorry. I don't know as many words...? However... I am, actually, trained.]"
Kurt: "...Is this going to involve fear gas?"
Jonathan: "[No, it does not.]"
* Kurt looks apologetic. "[Just checking.]"
* Jonathan bows his head.
Kurt: "[I just don't...It seems like a lot of grief over a thing that is not going to get that much better. I want to be able to trust my friends. I want to be able to trust Some. And now it is just going to be...all of that between us. It took me the longest time to just get over the fact that people were...would choose a lifestyle. AND it's a thing that you do yourself so that is maybe a problem.]"
Kurt: "[...The thing being...stuff. Not Some. Who is a nice person."]
Jonathan: "[It's going to get better and it -can- get better. Allowing yourself to accept that, alone, is a very big thing, and very important.]" He thinks about the rest. His knowledge of German doesn't cover every topic. "[I'm not living a lifestyle. I can't....] talk about it in German. I apologize. First of all, Some is only male because there's no analogue of his sex among humans, so the situation is more complicated than that."
* Kurt is just going to die now.
* Jonathan ._.
Kurt: "Ja, you know I sometimes wonder if a girl would not me more accurate given what Iii am maybe not going to talk about Grue genders."
Jonathan: "[I'm not certain. I'm not sure it matters to him as much as it would to us.]" He'll just switch back and forth between languages, here. Don't mind him. "It makes me decidedly uneasy to think about. I was not raised to have an open mind about it.'
* Kurt nods. "[It is hard to remember, sometimes, that so much of what we learn as far as how we should behave is based on gender, and that Some does not have that cultural foundation."]
Jonathan: "[He doesn't, nor do I really understand what being a poppet is, beyond what he's told me. I'm not in love with him because he's....] I'm not gay." This conversation is suddenly so awkward. If it helps...
* Kurt is going to fiddle with his tail now. "[I think it is that...the poppet makes everything work, between all the others. The one who brings everyone together. Which makes sense with his personality, I think. I guess without knowing more about Grues there's no way to know if this is common. ...] I love him too. But there are different kinds of love. I don't know if he is good at separating."
* Jonathan resists picking at his sleeve. "Is that what scares you?"
Kurt: "Well. It makes me worry about /him/." But no, that is not what scares him, per se.
Jonathan: "What about it upsets you?"
* Kurt fiddles some more, sullenly. "It doesn't have to do with him. Well, I guess maybe. He knows what happened and it was really stupid of him to...to think about me that way. AND he already HAS a family and love is supposed to be about putting other people first."
Jonathan: "People don't have control over who they feel attracted to. It isn't a switch. We've also already been over the issue of who's to blame for this information coming out. What -is- his responsibility is how he acts on it. I don't think it would be appropriate for him to act on it."
Jonathan: "Is this a specific something that happened?"
* Kurt shrinks back, and eventually nods.
Jonathan: "Can you tell me what happened?"
Kurt: "Bad things. I don't- ... I wouldn't kill for them."
Jonathan: "You wouldn't, and so they tried to break you?"
Kurt: "They did break me."
* Jonathan 's expression looks pained, for a moment. He forces that down, as well. "What did they do?"
* Kurt just sits there, withdrawn and increasingly tense.
Jonathan: "You don't have to tell me, now. Or ever. I never told anyone anything about what happened, until I was well past your age."
* Kurt softens a bit, but still doesn't say anything.
Jonathan: "I wonder how it would have been different, if I had."
Kurt: "Foster homes are not good."
Jonathan: "I wasn't in any sort of state to make it any better."
Jonathan: "I was very, very angry."
* Kurt nods. "I try not to be so angry. It just makes me sick."
Kurt: "It makes me sick that people like to hurt one another."
Jonathan: "It's a sickness. It perpetuates itself."
Kurt: "Is it so bad that I don't want it in my head, then?"
Jonathan: "How does the body fight illness?"
Kurt: "It gets rid of the thing that is making it sick."
Jonathan: "It develops an immunity. It becomes resistant to the disease through exposure."
Kurt: "...There are more kinds of disease than chickenpox. And exposing people to traumatic events to get them over traumatic events is the stupidest idea ever, I'm sorry. They did not make me afraid of /heights/ or snakes or something."
Jonathan: "No. You were -exposed- to a traumatic event. That -cannot change-. Do you want to grow stronger, or do you want to give up and erase part of your life in order to run away from it?"
Jonathan: "I -gave up-, Kurt. Do I need to elaborate upon what I became to allow myself to forget?"
Kurt: "Well I don't know what 'exposure' is supposed to mean, then."
Jonathan: "What I mean is that by removing the memory of this experience, which has already happened, you remove the potential to learn from it and best fight that which perpetuates such things."
Kurt: "Wh- Herr Crane. Jonathan. I do not need to /remember/ what they did to me to know how to fight. I do not need even the slightest detail to know that what happened was extremely wrong."
Jonathan: "You can heal without forgetting."
Kurt: "It's...frustrating." Ahaha understatement time.
Jonathan: "Yes. I hope that you understand that I'm trying to help."
* Kurt nods. "I know. And you have been. Very amazingly helpful."
Jonathan: "I would like to continue to talk to you. Obviously, these things can't be simply talked through, in the course of an afternoon."
Kurt: "I guess...is it okay if I talk to Gabe? He'll probably say the memory thing is a bad idea too," forgive him a childish eyeroll.
Jonathan: "Of course! I would encourage you to talk to whomever you trust to speak with. I'm not... I'm not the best psychologist, but I am trying to learn to use what I know to help."
* Kurt grins, wry. "Well that's encouraging."
* Jonathan doesn't look quite as amused with this. He does smile a little, though.
Kurt: "I am happy to talk to you no matter what. Happy that you /want/ to talk to me."
* Jonathan smiles a little more, looking down at the carpet. "Is there anything else you'd like to talk about, today?"
Kurt: "I'm not sure what to... how /is/ Some?"
* Jonathan 's smile fades. "He's very sad, right now."
* Kurt nods. ._.
Kurt: "I told him in text message that it was okay. I am /not/ mad at him. I'm just...very sorry. I hadn't..."
Jonathan: "I told him to give you time."
Jonathan: "Is there anything else that I should tell him?"
Kurt: "I don't know what to say."
* Jonathan nods. "I'll keep telling him that, then."
Jonathan: "I'll also tell him that we talked, and that I'm pleased with how it went."
Kurt: "Me too." Little smile.
* Jonathan stands up and holds out his hand.
* Kurt uncurls, stands and takes it.
* Jonathan shakes his hand.
Kurt: Shake shake. "Well. Good. I guess I'll...keep you posted?"
Jonathan: "Thank you very much. You know how to find me."