All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues, tag;; Mitchell

At this point, Julian had no idea how he had been convinced to rehab. He was fairly certain that his friends had gotten him drunk, stoned or something in order for him to end up here. All he knew now was that he wanted out, even if it had only been three days. He had always heard that withdrawal was supposed to be just about the worst thing one could ever experience in the world, however with whatever pills they were giving him here, it actually wasn't too bad. He hadn't really been paying attention to what they told him when they first gave him whatever it was. But supposedly it was supposed to stop his cravings and keep him from being in as much pain as he had heard he would be in. Amazing what drugs could do these days.

Of course it wasn't all shits and giggles here. They wouldn't allow him any scotch or anything remotely similar to it to help him through the agony of sobriety and what emotions it had reawakened in him. He wasn't even allowed to smoke here. No it was all sitting around talking about feelings and meditating, exactly the kind of stuff that made him want to be on drugs. Anything so he didn't have to sit through and remember another hours with some guy wanting to teach him new breathing techniques. He had been breathing just fine for over twenty years. And even worse than that, he had a bed time. He hadn't been told when to go to bed since he was eight and his mom was murdered. Then they made him get up a six fucking thirty. No one should be up at that time. And to think he was stuck here for another twenty seven days at least.

The next best thing that they surprised him with were mandatory visits with a shrink. Not really something that Julian looked forward to, it wasn't like he was crazy. All he wanted was to be able to have some fun, drinking, getting laid, really anything at this point. He wasn't enjoying feeling things again, about his brother and about his life. The last couple years were a complete haze to him, where he didn't feel, where everything had been numbed. He felt as though he had spent t he past two years with an emotional switch turned off and now suddenly it had been switched back on and all he could feel was pain. And unfortunately not the kind of pain that the drugs they gave him were supposed to help.

Now it was time to spend an hour with Dr. Caylan who seemed intent on wanting him to share his feelings. Which was basically what every other person in this place seemed to want him to do. No matter how many times he told them that he'd be happy to share if they'd get him a drink. "Whats up, doc?" he said as he pushed open the door to the office without bothering to knock. If he had another patient, well it was time for them to get going. Seeing no other patients in there, Julian strolled into the office and plopped down onto the couch, propping his feet up on the arm rest. The one nice thing about this place was that he got to keep his own clothes, so he sat there in a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt with his long and disheveled hair pushed away from his face. He couldn't even remember the last time he had cut his hair, it had been long enough ago that his hair was now shoulder length. "Now what do I have to say to get out of here?" he said looking up at the ceiling rather than at the doctor.

It had been a long day for Mitchell. In fact, most every day these past couple months seemed to be longer than normal. It was as though his career had gotten the jolt of adrenaline it needed--that, or people were slowly getting crazier. Whatever it was, Mitchell was starting to get all sorts of complicated, high-profile cases--a popstar suffocating under the weight of her own fame, the daughter of an American politician who had been flown in just by virtue of Dr. Caylan's good name, and, of course, the drug-addled Santiago boy who Mitchell was patiently waiting for now, turning a quarter over and over in his knuckles.

Julian Santiago was a good case. Not only was the boy clearly in need of help (fast cars, loose women, and copious amounts of drugs and alcohol were hard habits to kick), but it was a case that could secure his spot in the Santiago family. It would give him that sense of security that seemed so fleetingly illusive in this time and age, and as a man with his own crooked past and hollowed out demons, the idea of a soft blanket of security in the strong arms of the Santiago family felt good. Still, despite the fact that the Santiago boy's file was sitting open on the desk in front of him, his mind was drifting. Something about that woman who had just left--the American girl, the politician's daughter. Something about her shy smile, her innocent eyes, the way she wrung her fingers together to keep them from picking at her scalp which was already missing over half of her hair...

His thoughts were interrupted by a swift and immediate presence. Julian Santiago. There was no question in Mitchell's mind that this was his boy--the arrogant poise, the devil-may-care attitude, the way he threw himself on Mitchell's couch as though he owned it (which, of course, he might as well have--he was a Santiago, he owned everything under the Santiago sun). He looked worn, hollowed out, that washed up look of a drug addict trying too hard to wrestle with control. Mitchell simply watched on as the boy flung himself down and announced, "Now what do I have to say to get out of here?"

"Just the truth." Mitchell offered an easy smile as he wove his fingers together, watching the boy. "Though, technically, you could tell me one elaborate lie after the other and I would still let you out in sixty minutes. How you want to spend you time here is entirely up to you." Honesty, in Mitchell's book, was always the proper method. Well. 99% of the time. There was that stray 1% when your wife asked you what you did at work today and you had to say anything but "I coerced a barely legal young lad to wrap his lips around my cock, what did you do today, dearie?" Still, when dealing with a patient (and, frankly, dealing with everyone in the world who wasn't his now-ex-wife-of-ten-years), Mitchell had overtime come to the comfortable little realization that the more open you were with your clients, the more they had a tendency to open up in kind. This young man was clearly not interested in beating around the bush and Mitchell could respect that. He shared the similar sentiments.

"You've been sober for three days. Why don't you start by telling me how that feels?" It was an easy enough question, casual, and to the point. If Julian headed Mitchell's advice and answered honestly, they could delve in deeper from there. Of course, what Julian wasn't aware of was that whether he was honest with Mitchell or not, they were still playing Mitchell's game. Mitchell knew well enough that honesty was always relative and the fictions people occasionally chose to tell sometimes held more truth in them than the reality of the situation.

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Note: Just for reference, takes place about six years ago, if I read Julian's app right!

Truth be told, Julian had considered skipping this little session. He didn't need a shrink, however, he figured that if he skipped it they'd make him stay in the god forsaken clinic even longer. Probably even get one of their huge orderlies to "escort" him to the doctors office. From what Julian had seen of other patients encounters with a few of them, well it didn't exactly look like an enjoyable experience. And so Julian had walked himself through the hallways to the doctors office. The other employees had seemed to think highly of the doctor. Personally, Julian didn't understand the big deal. Didn't all psychiatrists just sit in a chair and listen to people talk? How much skill was really involved in that. And even though this was the type of doc that could write him a prescription, Julian wasn't expecting anything. People didn't seem to want to give a drug addict any more pills.

At least one thing could be said for this place, the food was much better than the rehab clinic in Argentina where he did his first stint in rehab. And the employee's were much more attractive. In Argentina, most of them had been old women, really not Julian's type. Here though, quite a few were his type, though at this point Julian hadn't been too picky. It was too bad that none of them seemed to be the least bit affected by his charms. It was quite depressing to be honest.

As the doctor spoke, Julian turned his head to look at him. He was an older man, not exactly what he had been expecting when people described Dr. Caylan to him. Not that he really knew exactly what to expect, but the man sitting across from him wasn't exactly it. He had been hoping for some young, hot doctor that he could screw for a month, get a good review from and get the hell out. At least that would have made the sessions fun. The man across from him wasn't even close to Julian's type and even if he was, Julian had a feeling that the good doctor would probably end up breaking a hip or having a heart attack. Okay maybe the guy wasn't that much older than him but still Julian could see it happening.

Julian smirked slightly as he responded to the doctor, "I'd prefer to spend my time with a bottle scotch and a joint." Probably not exactly what Dr. Caylan meant by what he said but sometimes Julian just liked to be a dick. "Don't suppose you have any of that hidden away in a drawer. Maybe some confiscated contraband from another patient. It doesn't even have to be good scotch at this point. Hell it doesn't even need to be scotch, at this point I'd even go for a cheap beer." He turned his head back up to look at the ceiling tiles, his fingers drumming lightly on his stomach.

A laugh erupted from Julian's lips as Dr. Caylan asked him how it felt to be sober for three days now. Odd, Julian couldn't even remember the last time that he had laughed. He was sure that this proved that all the shrinks ever asked was about how something made you feel, if he really wanted to Julian was sure he could do this job too. "Oh its absolutely fantastic," he started, his voice laced with sarcasm. "I mean, I don't know whatever possessed me to start drugs in the first place when I could feel like this all the time. I've never felt better. Though I'm sure this is someone my fathers fault or my mothers, Can't remember which one you people always like to pin it on." This seriously was a complete waste of time, he could believe this actually helped people.

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I think it should be more like two years ago. Julian was in rehab once before when he was in his early twenties, which would have been about six years ago.

It didn't take a psychiatrist to tell that Julian did not want to be here. The boy was lounging haphazardly off the sofa, exuding rays of indulgent teenage superiority, and taunting Mitchell like a cat batting at a small toy mouse, hunting for a good, satisfying squeak. No doubt searching for some sort of repulsed reaction on Mitchell's face, some slap on the wrist, some look of soft pity. The types of responses a man of Julian Santiago's caliber were no don't accustomed to receiving--it was all love and hate with these high profile types. Either they were on top of the world or they were scrounging for pennies with the rats--there was no gray space, no acceptable in-between. The gossip magazines would call it a fall from grace, and example of a bad role model. Very few would actually diagnose it for what it was: a cry for help. Or a cry to be left the hell alone. You could only prod a caged tiger for so long before it either gave up for dead or lashed out and took a small child's arm with it.

Any number of people could have thrown Julian into the rehab against his will. Parents were usually the first to blame, especially if they were of the Santiago ilk. A wayward son wasn't exactly the type of good parenting the children of London really wanted to see from the Santiago family. Or it could have been a concerned sibling or two, but from what Julian knew about the family, there was plenty of backbone to go around, but not enough concern to warrant any real intervention. The best Mitchell could assume was that the boy had been picked up by the doctors and throw in rehab as a medical issue, though he could very well be wrong about that. Julian's file sat open in front of him, but he didn't do much more than glance at it. The real important bits about Julian would be what came from the horse's mouth--not from some nurse's assumptions of his mental state.

"We like to go with the father," Mitchell said, a wry smile thinning out his lips. "Daddy issues are often prevalent in young men who behave without any real sense of discipline. But if you could give me some good Mummy issues, I'd take that, it's been a while since I've had a good Oedipus complex walk through my room."

Not to mention, Mitchell was getting far too good at spotting the clients with Daddy issues. They were usually the ones that fell most easily to their knees in front of him. Not that he would try anything on the Santiago boy--for one, he was a little too old for his type and for two, Mitchell didn't fancy having his head hammered above the Santiago fireplace any time soon. Instead, he pressed on--

"It's obvious you don't want to be here, so I'll speak candidly. I don't like working with clients who don't want to be here. If you don't want to change, you won't change. And there's nothing I can do to prevent that. If you don't think you have a problem, it's not my place to say otherwise. If you think you're completely healthy, happy, and functioning while under the influence, I'd be more than happy to let you walk out the door and drink yourself under the table every night." Mitchell knit his eyebrows, watching the boy. "That is what you want, isn't it?"

A quick glance at the clock told Julian that not nearly enough time had passed that he could get away with storming out of here. More than likely they'd just get some orderly to bring him back, or even worse, they'd lock him up in a room with no one but Dr. Caylan to talk to. Either way, it was probably best that Julian just got this over with, while be as uncooperative as he possibly could be. His friends had trick him into coming here, it wasn't as if he wanted to be a model patient. At least he wasn't the guy that thought he saw butterflies everywhere.

He wasn't really paying attention to what the good doctor was saying until he heard something about an Oedipus complex. He had spent enough time in boarding school to know exactly what the doctor was implying. Unlike most the junkies here, Julian was very well read. "My mother's dead," he snapped in what was perhaps the most serious moment that he had since entering the office. His father had killed his mother, or he was at least responsible even if he hadn't done it himself. No Gabriel had gotten someone else to do his dirty work for him. Like always. Julian had never been able to figure out who it was and no one even bothered to investigate. His father was remarried now, Julian still wondered if she knew what he had done.

"Still, glad to know we're on the same page," his voice was returning to its previous tone. "So does this mean we can agree that my father is a dick and we can move on. I don't think there really is all that much more to know about him." He paused and looked up at the ceiling in thought, "No, that pretty much covers it." So if this was day three according to the doctor, that would mean he had another twenty seven days to go. He just hoped that he didn't have to spend every day talking to a shrink.

His gaze shifted from the ceiling to the doctor slowly as he listened to him talk. Was Dr. Caylan really saying what he thought he was saying? As Julian watched the doctor, his brow furrowed in thought. He really could just get up and leave? That didn't seem like a very rehab like thing to do. Plus didn't everyone want to be the one to say that they finally rehabilitated the loser Santiago son? "This feels like a trick or at least a joke," he responded slowly, sitting up to meet the doctor at eye level. So his friends thought he was bad enough to be in here, but the doctor was saying that he could just leave and be fine? Or close enough to fine to function outside. This really didn't make sense.