Focusing on making it to her cat and bed, she trudged the final steps and pushed open her door.
Then she almost peed her pants as she let out a piercing scream.
“Surprise!” Lizzie cheered, standing about six inches from the door, a cake in her hands and a huge smile on her face.
“Holy FUCK, Elizabeth. You scared the hell out of me,” Harper said, pressing her hand to her chest.
“Hence the ‘surprise,’ grumpy goose,” Lizzie said, unfazed by the likely permanent damage she’d just done to Harper’s heart.
“What are you doing here?” Harper asked, stepping fully into her apartment and toeing off her shoes.
“I made you a birthday cake!” Lizzie said, leading Harper toward the kitchen.
“My birthday was in September and you made me pie,” Harper said, dragging a hand down her face. She loved her friend, but she desperately, desperately wanted her to leave so she could shower and cry in private. Like a lady.
“Well, it’s not a birthday birthday cake,” Lizzie explained, setting it on the counter. “It’s like a … I don’t know. New-life cake. A happy-residency-visit cake.”
Harper stared at Lizzie.
“It’s hard to be sad when you’re eating cake,” Lizzie said at last, giving Harper a soft smile. “And you’ve been exceptionally sad, so you need an exceptional cake.”
Harper blinked away a few sudden tears. The cake was exceptional. It looked like a work of art: swirls of pastel frosting, accented with opalescent sprinkles.
“Thank you. It’s beautiful,” Harper said, ducking her head as she searched for a knife and plates so Lizzie wouldn’t see the emotion in her eyes. She handed the knife to Lizzie, who cut a generous slice and slid it onto Harper’s plate.
Harper groaned at the first bite, the perfect, fluffy cake seeming to warm a corner of her chest. “It’s incredible.”
They ate in silence for a few moments, both enjoying the masterpiece.
Harper cleared her throat. “How was your—”
“Did you know I was heavily medicated as a child?” Lizzie interrupted.
Harper blinked at Lizzie, confused by the curveball.
“Don’t look so upset, sweets. This isn’t a sad story,” Lizzie said, taking her own bite of cake straight from the platter.
“I … I didn’t know that,” Harper said.
Lizzie nodded. “It’s not something I talk about a lot because … well, the past is the past and there’s no use living there. But I was. My mom would shop me around to psychiatrists, demanding higher and higher dosages to control my ADHD, complaining how I was this unmanageable creature.” Lizzie pulled her chin back to make a goofy face, but Harper didn’t laugh.
Lizzie pressed on. “I hated it. I grew up thinking that psychiatrists were evil. Therapy was a trap. That I was broken. Yada yada yada.”
Lizzie licked frosting off her fingertip. “When I turned eighteen, I stopped all meds. Broke up with my therapists. Peaced the fuck out,” Lizzie said, taking another bite of cake. “And it was a mess, Harper. I can’t even begin to tell you what a walking tornado I was,” she said with a loud laugh, a grin breaking out across her freckled cheeks. “I was moody and shaky and wrecked. But I was gripping at this defiance, this belief that with sheer willpower I could break free of medications and my diagnosis and everything else.”
Lizzie scooped up a bite of cake and nudged it toward Harper, feeding her the bite. “But, even after the withdrawals passed, I still wasn’t … well. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I wasn’t treating my brain the way it needed to be treated. So, I did the thing I always swore I’d never do. I went to a psychiatrist. And it was hard. It took time, and coaxing, and work, and tears, but I eventually realized that the way my mom had handled my brain was to cage it. But that isn’t the point of getting help. The real purpose is to unshackle your brain from the weight of overworking, liberate it with the neurotransmitters it’s been missing. Let it do what it’s supposed to do.”
Lizzie took one more bite of cake, then dropped the fork with a clang, brushing her frosting-covered fingers over her jeans. She grabbed Harper by the shoulders, pulling her into a tight hug. Harper’s stiff muscles slowly softened at the touch, molding closer to her friend’s embrace.
“I’m sorry you went through that, Lizzie.”
“Oh, stop it. It made me who I am,” Lizzie said, pulling back and smiling down at Harper. “But here’s the catch of me telling you. I’m going to leave a slip of paper on your counter. It will have the name and number of the woman that helped me. Still helps me. You don’t have to call the number. You don’t have to go see her. But I want you to know there’s a safe space in this city where you can lay your soul bare and maybe rebuild the pieces along the way.”