While You Were Creeping - Poppy Rhys

ONE

“Are you still creeping your ex?”

My therapist was blunt if nothing else. I loved and hated her for it.

Busted.

I tore my eyes away from my palm-sized glass comm and slid it into my back pocket. Instead, I stood by the large window and fixed my gaze on the snow-covered road three stories below.

Christmas decorated buildings of every size lined the main strip of town leading up to the square where—even if I couldn’t see it right now—an enormous, perfectly trimmed balsam fir tree stood, surrounded by snowy hedges, dusted benches, and iron-curled street lamps.

I hated it.

Tinsel—the real name of this place—was a Dor Nye tourist trap modeled after charming Earth towns, and it was known for its winter solstice celebrations.

Namely, Christmas.

Which was a big thing since most of old Earth’s religious holidays were only observed by niche groups as a fun blast-from-the-past event.

Anyway. Maybe I’d been creeping on my ex, maybe I hadn’t been. Maybe I’d been looking at his newest holiday photo with his sparkly fiancée and their matching sweaters and their so-adorable-it’s-painful newborn.

Maybe I hadn’t.

“How many times per day have you checked his social threads this week? More than five times, or less?” Dr. Molina asked in her frustratingly calm voice.

It annoyed me. The decorations annoyed me. The bundled-up humans and aliens crowding the sidewalks on the cozy street below as they did their gift shopping annoyed me.

When did I become such a Scrooge?

I knew the answer to that as well as I knew my own freckles.

Today was December first. The worst day of the year, besides December twenty-fifth. It meant the official start of the winter solstice festivities.

Christmas.

Ugh.

“A little more,” I hedged, finally answering her question. How embarrassing. What had I become? It’d been three years since George, my ex-boyfriend, left me for another woman—the sparkly fiancée—and I just couldn’t get it out of my head.

Pathetic, really. I knew I had a problem—well, more like many problems—but I couldn’t stop it. It was like watching a train wreck—you just can’t look away—only I was the train. Fuck the rails, I was forging my own path right through a neighborhood, bulldozing whatever was in my way.

“And the other thing?”

The other thing.

My face flushed red, I could feel it. My skin betrayed me every time. It was probably redder than my hair right now. If stalking my ex’s social threads was embarrassing, then my newly formed compulsion to flush toilets made me want to climb into a foxhole and die.

Yeah, you heard that right.

Any time I’m near a commode, I can’t leave the room until it’s been flushed. It doesn’t matter that they’re sensor laden and flush on their own. Even if I’m just in there to straighten my hair or wash my hands...

I have to flush the fucking toilet.

I was doing good for a while a couple years ago. Six months after George left, I’d only checked his social threads about twice a day—in the morning and just before bed—but then he went and announced he was engaged. To her.

That’s when the toilet flushing began. Innocent at first. An extra flush here and there, but then it got worse. Sometimes I went into the restroom just to trigger the sensor and listen to the tank empty.

It’s a problem. A real fucking issue.

And here I am, talking to my therapist about it. It must really suck to be her. She probably laughs about all this at night. I wouldn’t blame her. I laugh at myself. And sometimes cry.

I’m a damn mess.

“The other thing is still a problem,” I declare with a sigh. The colorful Christmas lights twinkle against the buildings across the street as the darkness creeps up. It gets dark so much earlier than I’d like this time of year.

I can’t look at it any longer. Turning, I round the comfortable beige couch and plop down. It blends into the décor of this office. Everything is a shade of brown—boring and neutral. Probably that way on purpose.

Eventually, I rest my gaze on Dr. Molina. If I thought my eyes were a pretty green, hers blow mine outta the water. Vibrant and crystal clear. Hypnotizing and stark against her pale skin and black hair.

“Have you tried the method we talked about?”

“Yes. Counting doesn’t help.”

“It doesn’t help, or you don’t want it to help?”

Why the hell wouldn’t I want it to help? Who the hell wants to compulsively flush toilets?

I try not to grind my teeth. I don’t need another problem on top of the ones I already have. “It doesn’t