♪ (DRAMATIC MUSIC PLAYS) ♪
Well, I finally did what you said.
I quit.
I never told you to quit your job.
Now you playing games?
This is my life.
I don't think I like the way that you're talking
to me right now.
You told me I needed to change my life.
No I didn't!
Therapists terminate therapy when it becomes apparent
that a patient is being harmed by continued counseling.
I will make sure to find someone who understands you,
who pushes you, and who will take care of you.
That person is you.
I'm failing you.
I'll see you next week.
-(doorbell rings) -(door opens)
(insects, birds chirping)
Here's Johnny.
Come on in.
(light piano music playing)
♪ ♪
(footsteps approach)
(puts down cup)
Thank you.
So, I-I went back to your psychiatrist friend.
-And? -And she's interesting.
She kinda reminds me of an aunt I haven't seen in a while.
There's a stillness about her.
You could very much picture her sitting by a cold window
and listening to the snowfall
and being satisfied with that for hours.
I mean, I wish I was more like that.
And she agrees with you.
And, um...
I think maybe I agree with you, too.
About which part?
Uh, I don't think I'm bipolar.
I mean, I have some other shit,
uh, I-- which I guess
is easier to handle.
Uh, depending on how you look at it.
-Tell me more. -Yeah, I mean,
she just thinks, basically,
I have an obsessive compulsive personality
combined with a general anxiety disorder,
and that I'm prone to bouts of depression.
So, we was talking about maybe treating that
with a front-line SSRI
for the depression, and then some sort of
Ativan or somethin'
for the occasional larger bouts of anxiety.
You know. But, I mean,
you know, not yet, right?
Like, maybe there's some more
talk therapy work to do before we bring the drugs back.
Nah, I-I mean...
I'm scared.
I'm scared for sure,
but I'm also not
because I have you,
and you're the best. And I...
I just think there's more for us to do in here.
Brooke: And I'm sorry I couldn't see that
as clearly at the end of our last session as I can now.
And I'm really grateful
you wouldn't allow our work together to end there.
You are?
(sighs) 'Cause, like, I kinda thought you'd still be mad.
(laughs)
I have a lot of feelings about what went down last week,
but mad is not one of them. Or...
if it is, I'm only mad at myself.
Don't-- Don't beat yourself up.
People try to leave me all the time.
-I'm just gettin' better at not lettin' them. -Mm.
So...
this is a lucky place you find yourself, isn't it, Eladio?
-What do you mean? -Well, it's not often we get signs
marking the crossroads in our lives.
It's usually only when we look back
we realize we chose a path,
but here you are.
You quit the DeMarcos,
your work front has opened up,
your living situation is up in the air,
you've had a major diagnosis reversed.
So,
big picture moment, wouldn't you say?
(sighs)
When you lay it out like that,
that's fuckin' terrifying, yo.
What am I supposed to do with all of that at once?
Does it help to know that you're not alone?
Yeah, yeah. You're here with me.
No.
I mean, in a larger sense.
Wait, hold up.
You trying to sell me some existential nonsense
right now? I-I need
answers, doc. Not more questions.
Yeah, all I'm saying is that the past year has resulted in
every single one of my patients having to take a step back
and look at their lives in very different ways than before.
The pandemic ripped off the blindfolds, you know?
In the early days,
all the usual distractions fell away-- work,
school, social obligations, traffic.
We were forced to take stock,
to prioritize.
To panic over paper products.
To think about what we wanted our lives to look like after.
We?
So that goes for you, too?
What, you think I'm immune?
This year has been ruthless.
(both laugh)
You know, but maybe,
-also a gift. -A flaming bag
of dog shit on your doorstep kind of gift.
(both laugh)
Let's try a thing that I do with patients
who aren't sure about what lies ahead.
I want you to tell me your vision for your life.
-I don't know if I can. -Try.
I don't think I have, like,
that robust of an imagination.
Both you and I know that's not true.
What do you want?
What do you imagine for yourself?
What story would you write for yourself
if you had the power to control every move,
and there is no reason not to believe
-the best possible version lies ahead. -Yo...
I'm not trying to be resistant or, like,
not do what you're asking me to do, but...
I fuckin'...
I don't know what I'm gonna do after this.
I don't... have a plan.
I don't have friends, really.
-I don't fuckin'... -Eladio.
I'm not asking you to inventory your fear.
I'm asking you to hope.
To envision.
Let's start there.
What do you want?
I don't know.
I wanna love someone, I guess.
You can have that.
But, like, in a romantic way.
I understand.
What else?
I don't know, fuck it. I wanna be loved.
I have a feeling
that once you open yourself up to the world,
making that happen will be as easy as drawing in a breath.
I wanna be known.
-Say more. -I mean...
To love is to know, right?
I wanna attempt to know the entirety of another person,
and have them know me back.
Even though it's impossible,
even though to be human is to be a river,
I wanna fall in love with someone
who's singularly obsessed with growth.
I-I wanna meet my cousins' kids.
(laughs) You know.
It might sound stupid, but...
I want my cousins' kids to have a nickname for me.
I wanna get a job where I work outside, you know. (laughs)
My boy Almo, he always says
that me and his grandfather have so much in common,
which is kind of a weird thing because my man is 92 years old.
But, like, I... I really wanna
get fluent enough in Arabic that when I meet his grandfather
and he tells a joke, I laugh.
I wanna do Christmases with my mom again.
You know...
And I wanna be enough of a fuckin' grownup to stop
waitin' on an apology that's not gonna come
and hatin' her when it doesn't.
It doesn't have to be all that...
Just wrap the fuckin' oil diffuser,
watch her open it, make coffee...
Normal shit.
If I had all that...
Shit, if I had half of that...
it'd be dope.
Brooke: That's beautiful, Eladio.
I think you can have it.
All of it.
Yeah, right. People like me
don't get what they want in life.
People like you?
There are limitations.
Such as?
I'm limited.
-Alright, I got problems. -Do you? Really?
It's an old story, El.
Don't have to tell it to yourself anymore.
Ask me, ask Dr. Ahmadi, ask yourself.
Nah.
But, like, even if I'm not bipolar,
there's still somethin' wrong with me.
In what way?
I'm like a magnet that's always turned the wrong way.
Any time I try to get close to someone,
it's like there's some force between us.
Like something about me just, like,
pushes people away.
Is it okay if I disagree with you right now?
Yo, don't try it, mami. Okay?
-I ain't gonna be convinced. -Can I empathize with you?
Empathize.
Relationships with people.
Close relationships.
I haven't had the easiest time either.
And for so many years,
it was one of the many reasons why I drank.
And for my years of sobriety,
I told myself it was because
I was a recovering alcoholic.
That no matter what, I was broken.
That's rough, yo.
And that limiting belief about myself
had very real effects. I mean (sighs)...
look around. What do you see?
I mean, there's a lot of nice-ass furniture.
Mm. What else?
Tasteful art.
-Lot of books. -Where are the people, Eladio?
It's so funny, the assumptions we make.
When I picture you, like,
between sessions or whatever,
it's like, that fireplace over there is always lit.
You curled up with a book, and some, like,
aristocratic philosopher husband hands you a cup of Darjeeling
and asks you if you're coming to bed soon,
or if he should put another log on the fire.
You have me married to Sir Francis Bacon?
More like a minor Maharajah. (laughs)
Hey, I appreciate you pulling back the curtain this way.
And I know your point is to say that we all go through it.
And it does comfort me.
I'm glad.
So, like,
what do you do when you look around and your life is...
or isn't...
when it isn't what you thought it would be?
You get a good therapist.
-Do you have a good therapist? -I do.
He let me down the other day,
but in his apology, he said something great.
He said, "We therapists fail our patients
in the exact way they need."
-Doesn't sound great. -Yes. (laughs) True.
I only mean that I hadn't heard it before,
and it has helped put what has happened
between me and you into perspective.
Well, how are you defining what happened between us?
You mean the transference shit?
Can I pull the curtain back even more?
Sure. Yeah. Bring it.
In the case of transference,
it is the job of the therapist to, first of all,
-identify it. -And you did that with me.
I remember the morning. Maternal transference,
-and we joked about Freud and shit and-- -Yes, that part I got right.
Then the next step becomes setting
and maintaining impeccable boundaries.
Every time a transference occurs, it's my duty
to steer the conversation towards the emotions
and childhood experiences that triggered the transference.
And then I hold steady in the face of a patient's
often intense feelings about those boundaries.
About not going there with them.
You've done that, too.
Remember? You told me not to call,
and, like, you know.
-Other shit. -Here's the part you can't get in a book, El.
With you, every time I tried
to re-establish the line between us,
the rejection you would feel was palpable.
Your defenses would go up, and you would go straight
to talking about referrals and meds.
No-no, Eladio.
Makes perfect sense that you felt that way.
The rejection you experienced from your mother,
the distance she created between you two as a child,
it was playing itself out on me.
And that is also okay.
That's what therapy can be for.
-Yeah? -Except there was a transference
happening on my end as well.
You...
(sighs)
I have my own...
childhood trauma.
I gave my child...
my son, up for adoption, and...
(sighs) you being the age you are...
You being the "you" you are.
You became a surrogate for him in my mind.
Every time you felt rejected,
it would trigger a fear in me
about how my son must feel,
rejected by me.
And instead of...
(sighs) filing away those impulses,
to work on with my supervisor, I would move to protect you.
Us.
From those feelings.
I would...
pick up the phone at 2:00 AM.
I would give you extra time.
-I would-- -Hey, doc.
I-I-I can't help but to notice that...
this whole time you've been talking about stuff between us
has been in the past tense.
I have?
That's because it's time for us
to move on from that dynamic, Eladio.
To leave that in the past.
And after our session last week,
I became singularly focused on helping you
to realize your worth doesn't come from outside yourself.
From a mother figure like me, from your mother herself.
It can only come from within.
(sighs)
See?
I knew we were perfect for each other.
-I'm not sure that that's what I was saying-- -We are.
You got your shit, I got mine,
and... it matches up.
Okay.
I think I've gone and done
a lot of talking this hour.
Could I hear from you?
-Hear from me how? -I want to know how you see our relationship.
How you experience it.
You always seem to
find a silver lining.
Gratitude is powerful, dawg. (laughs)
And how would you describe our relationship to someone else?
A friend? Soyoung, perhaps.
-What would you say? -I don't...
-Not too good at role play. -Try.
Say I'm Soyoung,
and I ask you, ahem,
"How are things going with that therapist you've been seeing?"
-Well, she's helped me a lot. -How so?
Well, she helped me see...
-She got me to quit my job. -She got you to quit your job?
Well, she made me see that I wasn't being treated
how I deserved to be treated.
Yeah, but you lost your job.
Eladio: I didn't lose my job.
I-I quit.
I emancipated myself from a bad situation.
Brooke: Hm. So, where are you working now?
Nowhere. I got a few feelers out.
I mean, it's only been a week.
Brooke: You have savings though.
Nah.
Hm. So, your therapist
who works-- Where does she work again?
I mean, outta her house.
-I mean, I think it's just 'cause of the pandemic. -What neighborhood?
-Baldwin Hills. -So your rich therapist
who lives and works in the Black Beverly Hills...
And you pay her how much an hour?
-275. -275? Jesus Christ!
But it's worth every fuckin' penny.
Alright, she-she's kind. She's kind and she cares.
She paid for me to see one of her colleagues who's incredib--
-She paid? What do you mean? -It means
that all this class shit
that you talking about is actually kinda unfair
because she literally paid for me to see a psychiatrist
that I otherwise couldn't afford
'cause that's how much she cares.
Brooke: And isn't that,
-I don't know, a little weird? -Weird how?
And how did your very last session with her go?
This isn't fair.
Does that sound like a person
who's been a positive force in your life?
But I love you.
Wait, whoa, look. No, I... I get your point.
It hasn't been all peaches and cream, but what relationship is?
Right, I'm just saying that
I don't mind that you're complicated.
I-I don't expect another human being to be a blank slate.
Eladio, can you excuse me a moment? I just...
Just one minute.
(opens door)
(shuts door)
(birds chirping outside)
(wind chimes ringing)
♪ ♪
(sighs)
Jeremy won't text me back.
And I feel really fuckin' stupid because...
I thought it'd be the other way around.
My critique of the class structure in the DeMarcos' house
was that Mrs. DeMarco was always...
telling Jeremy that we...
his aides are his friends.
And I always felt really bad for him because I was like,
"Why would you tell him that
if it's not true?"
It-it feels cruel.
But I also did think we were friends.
I didn't think just because
I wasn't working for him anymore...
I mean, he ghosted me.
I'll never forget that moment you called me haunted.
It was the truest thing anyone ever said about me.
I got ghosts everywhere.
Jeremy, Sikander, my mom.
My first girlfriend.
She taught me to fuck in her blue Honda Civic.
She made me mix-tapes.
Gang Starr, Biggie, UGK.
And then one November, she just stopped coming to work.
I'm not stupid, you know.
I know you're still there.
Giving me a chance to leave and not be left.
I mean, you saw me come in here last week,
seven feet tall. I had-- I had left the DeMarcos,
and I was damn near singing praise songs.
I-I know you want that for me.
Hell, I want that for me.
I see it, okay?
Everything you've been saying.
I fight it, but I do.
You can't show up for me.
Not in the way that I deserve.
-(door opens) -(sighs)
(sighs)
You can do this.
You have everything that it takes.
(sighs)
(sniffs)
Eladio. Wait.
What's this?
It's the referral I tried to give you last week.
Call the clinic, ask for Evelyn Perchet.
I think she'd be a great fit for you. She's wonderful.
Your cash from last week is in there, too.
Might buy a little time to decide on the path ahead, yeah?
So you planned this all along?
You knew we'd end up here.
You can never plan in therapy, but...
you can hope.
"And then, she never saw him again."
♪ ♪
(light exhale)
(inhales)
(door shuts)
♪ ♪