Spirited Away Fan Fiction ❯ Courage of the spirit ❯ The price of memories ( Chapter 2 )

Next Chappie, Thanks to all who have read me I hope you have enjoyed it so far. More to come, much more.  

The price of memories

After moving into the new house Chihiro had been quiet and reserved, very unlike herself. Her mother grew more and more worried and after 2 weeks she sat Chihiro down for a talk.

"Whatever has happened you can tell me." She had pleaded "Something is really bothering you and your father and I can't help you if you don't tell us."

"You wouldn't believe me," she had muttered.

"Of course I would, you don't lie Chihiro, you never have" Chihiro remembered her chin wobbling.

"It's just that I miss them"

"Who?" Asked her mother "Your old friends?"

"No my new ones Kamajii, Rin, Haku, No face and granny Zeneba."

"Chihiro" said her mother gently "Who are these people? What are you talking about?" Chihiro then told her the whole story.

The next day the doctor came to the house and demanded that she told the truth. Chihiro remembered being so frightened that she gave even more detail to the doctor than she had to her mother.

            Over the next few days her parents kept asking her to tell the truth but she was telling it, they had been pigs and she had spent three days in the spirit world and she had saved them. How did they explain the car? A practical joke they said. But why do that? Why not let down the tires or scratch the paint? Neither could answer to her satisfaction. How come the movers had finished and gone when they arrived back at the new house? Her father mumbled something about an efficient service but seemed to be thinking hard. It made no difference, for the next four years she was in therapy.

            She had her first therapist for a year. He was not very good but he was a kind man with white hair and a moustache. He would just let her talk and talk and talk. He never wrote anything down or made any assessments or recommendations he just seemed to like the story. She had liked him he never said she was lying.

            Exasperated her parents had taken her to another therapist in the city, a woman, goodness knows what she had charged.  Chihiro had not liked the woman therapist; she could not even remember her name now. She had written allot and questioned every sentence of her story. She had black hair with a sharp face and the leathery skin of someone who had had too much sun.

             Chihiro had come out of those sessions in a cold sweat. This went on for some time. She stopped talking about anything except school to her parents, which they saw as an improvement and not for what it was, a loss of trust. She had problems at school too. Her grades were well above average but somehow her classmates found out she was in therapy. No one knew what for, but after that her presence was barely tolerated. She was not bullied as such just ignored.

            Every 6 months Chihiro's parents were called to the therapist's office after her session. At the age of 13 she was starting to get very angry with everyone for thinking she was mad. So one day with her parents waiting out side she snapped.

"Chihiro" said the therapist for the hundredth time "surely you know how this sounds, isn't it time you grew up and stopped playing these games. Your parents are worried sick." It was all she could stand. She got up and stormed out of the office. The therapist ran after her, catching hold of her arm.

"Let go of me!" she yelled and pulled her arm away. Her parents were behind her, she knew that but what did she care about them now?

"No!" she shouted in the therapists face "NO, NO, NO!" She shrieked "your wrong, your all wrong. I saw these things happen I met these people they are real."

"But Chihiro" Said her mother

"No!" she shouted, "I'm not listening to any of you any more. I know what happened I was there. I touched it I smelt it, it was not a dream or something I made up and none of you believe me" Her lip trembled, angry with herself she shouted. "I don't want to be here anymore! I want to go home and home is not in this world anymore. I hate you all!"

            Her mother started crying and her farther just looked at her blankly, shocked.

"I want to go home!" she screamed at the top of her lungs "Back to my friends, back…back where things make sense and I don't feel like a freak." She sank into one of the waiting room chairs exhausted.

"Haku please come and get me," she whispered "please"

            Seeing her calm again the therapist called her parents into her office. And closed the door. Chihiro was through playing by the rules and tip toed up to the door and put her ear to it.

"What is wrong with my daughter?" wailed her mother "why is she like this?"

"She is getting worse isn't she" Said her father in a dead voice.

"Yes and no" said the therapist "it is clear that the delusion is deep seated and Chihiro clearly believes it all. However, the very fact she has just attacked us all is a good sign."

"How" croaked her mother "how can her hating us be good"

"Our constant stand on not accepting this delusion is having an effect, we have placed doubt in her mind, that outburst was her trying to convince herself that this doubt is wrong. She is trying to re affirm the delusion."

"So what do we do now?" asked her father.

"I'd like to start her on some medication…" Chihiro jumped away from the door. Drugs? They thought she needed drugs? She was shocked and scared. Two days later when the prescription was picked up and her mother watched her take the two yellow pills. She made a decision.

"No more" she whispered to herself in the dark that night "They are wrong it did happen but I have to live in this world so I have to try and forget. Haku said I'd see him again but I think he only said that to make me leave. He probably thought it was the best thing for me." She began to cry again "But it wasn't I hate it here it's like I've left part of me behind. I have to stop this."  Then she said what she came to know as the magic words.

"It never existed it was all in my head."

"It never existed it was all in my head."

"It never existed it was all in my head."

"It never existed it was all in my head."