Losing Control : His Madness, His Cure Chapter 268

I glance at the clock, ten minutes left.

There’s something else I need to say, something big enough that it’s been circling my head nonstop, but now that I’m here, I don’t even know how to start. I open my mouth, shut it again.

My fingers twist together. My gaze drops to the floor. I can feel her watching me in that quiet, patient way she does, the one that tells me she already knows there’s something I’m not saying.

“Go ahead,” she urges gently.

I clear my throat. Run a shaky hand through my hair. My chest feels tight, but I force myself to look up at her.

“Do you think...” I start, and my voice comes out rough. I swallow. Try again.

“Xander wants all of it, everything that comes with being in a relationship. Kids and all that.”

I exhale hard.

“I assured him I do too. But I’m just—”

My hands fist in my lap.

“I’m scared that when the time actually comes, it’ll be like now. I’ll get right up to it and chicken out. I don’t want to do that to him.”

She smiles...soft, warm, but also impressed in a way that knocks something loose inside my chest.

“Before I say anything,” she says, “I want to acknowledge something important. You’re talking about the future without wanting to flee the room. That’s progress, Jax. Real progress.”

I huff out a breath that’s almost a laugh, if it didn’t feel so damn bleak.

“Now,” she continues, “the most important question is, is it something you want? Truly. Not for Xander, not because you feel you should, but because you want it for your own life. These decisions take time. They take honest conversations. They’re not something you choose impulsively.”

I swallow hard, then I think about it for a while before speaking.

“Growing up... all my life, honestly....I never pictured myself having a family,” I admit. “It didn’t make sense to me. Didn’t feel like something I could ever reach. I never even thought about it.”

“And now?” she asks gently. “What’s changed?”

“Xander,” I say, the word leaving me like it’s the whole explanation. “He makes me feel like anything’s possible. Like I can want things and actually get them.”

It feels strange, like I'm confessing things to her that I'm yet to confess to myself.

“I like having things to look forward to. I like feeling hopeful. I just...I’m scared this wall I have, this barrier that shows up anytime something good’s within reach, will always be there. That I’ll ruin it without meaning to.”

She takes that in with a slow nod, her expression warm but serious.

“Fear doesn't mean you're incapable,” she says quietly, “It means you care. People who don’t care aren’t afraid of losing good things. You are.”

I sit with that.

“That wall you’re talking about? It’s real. I’m not going to pretend it isn’t. But walls aren’t permanent. They’re protective. And you built yours for reasons that made sense at the time. What you’re doing now, talking about these things, confronting them, letting yourself want more, that’s how walls come down.”

She leans in, kind but firm.

“And when the time comes, you won’t be facing that fear alone. You’ll talk it through with Xander. You’ll make decisions together. That’s what a future with someone looks like. You’re not required to show up perfect. Just honest.”

Her voice softens further.

“And the fact that you’re even worried about disappointing him tells me something important, you’re already trying. You’re already moving. And that’s what makes these things possible.”

I let her words work their way through the places I usually keep locked up. And the more I let myself think, really think, the more something unfamiliar starts to spread through my chest.

Something lighter, because it could be good. Scary good.

I could be....God, I almost don’t want to even think the word...normal. Not perfect, not magically healed, not some version of myself I’ll never be, just normal enough to have a real life. Something solid. Something mine.

Maybe I could have mornings that don’t start with panic. A home that feels like an actual home. I could have Xander in it....

The kind of future I used to treat like something other people got to have, not me. And the terrible, wonderful truth is, I want it. I want that life, I want him.

And I want every damn thing that branches out from wanting him.

I just need to figure out how to handle the part of me that still flinches from good things, that still thinks wanting makes me foolish, that still doesn’t know how to believe I can actually hold on to something that isn’t pain.

I clear my throat, but the words don’t line up. They never do when they matter.

“Do you think I’d even be capable of that?” I ask.

She tilts her head, eyes narrowing slightly. “Capable of what, Jax?”

“All of it.” The words scrape out of me. “Everything Xander wants us to have.”

She gives me this steady look, the kind people use when they’re trying to coax an animal out of hiding.

“You can say it,” she murmurs. “Whatever the word is that scares you. Say it out loud. Nothing bad happens if you name what you want.” She folds her hands in her lap. “You need to teach your brain that speaking your hopes isn’t dangerous.”

I breathe out, shaky. Every instinct tells me to shut up, to change the subject, but I force myself to sit in it. To gather whatever courage I’ve been scraping together these past weeks and just.... try.

And then, bare and terrified, I ask, “Do you think I could actually be someone's dad? Do you think, when it comes down to it, I’d be able to do something like that without completely fucking it up?”

She doesn’t flinch, doesn’t look startled or doubtful. She just smiles like she’s already made up her mind.

“People who worry about being bad parents usually end up being the exact opposite. The fact that you’re asking this, that you’re scared of hurting someone you haven’t even met yet, that tells me you already care. And that matters more than anything.”

She closes her notebook and places it aside.

“You’ve survived more than most. You’ve learned, painfully, how not to treat people. You’ve worked hard to grow. And you love Xander with every part of you, that alone tells me you’d show up. You’d try. You’d learn. Parenting isn’t about perfection. It’s about commitment. When the time comes, if you do decide it's something you'd want, it would mostly be about your presence and effort.”

Her smile deepens.

“And yes. I believe you’d be capable of it. More than capable.”