Original subtitles

So, how was your week?

Fine.

How was yours?

It was okay.

How are you feeling about your dad?

-April. -What?

I'd rather talk about you.

Surprise, sur-fucking-prise.

I'm just worried that what happened last weekend...

may have changed our relationship.

We have no relationship.

I have dumped people for less than what you did to me.

Are you thinking of dumping me?

I don't know what I'm doing here.

Maybe you wanted to convey your anger toward me in person.

Maybe I just wanted to get out of the hospital for a few hours.

Does anybody know that you've left?

You think I just hopped a fence or something?

Call the doctors if you like.

You're all such good friends now.

I'm doing fine,

so they let me out for a few hours.

I have to check back in tonight.

I had to tell her.

-Why? -She's your mother

and you were delirious.

You could've waited until I came out of it.

And what if you never came out of it?

Then someone would've called her eventually.

You put me down as your emergency contact number.

-So? -So, you empowered me

to make a decision on your behalf

-if anything happened to you. -I had a bad fever.

It wasn't like I was in heart failure--

You had 105.

They were packing ice onto you when I arrived.

I talked to the doctors, Paul. I know what happened.

Really?

I understand that you're angry with me,

but I didn't make this decision lightly.

And if I had to do it again,

I would do exactly the same thing.

Wow.

Has my insurance covered everything?

You don't have to--

you don't have to worry about that.

Well, I'm leaving and I'm not coming back,

so if I owe you anything,

-speak now. -April, please don't go.

How could you? It was the one thing--

The one thing that I asked you not to do!

I didn't think it was right to let you lie there alone

on the brink of death.

You really don't understand, do you?

You don't understand what you were to me.

What did she say...

when you called?

At first, she--

She just-- she just didn't understand.

She-- she didn't even know you were seeing a therapist.

I-- I asked her to meet me at a coffee shop

so we could discuss it in person,

but she-- she refused.

She's paranoid.

I offered to go to her house, she hung up.

And I called her back and I asked her

if she'd meet me at the hospital in an hour.

She showed up?

Are you surprised?

Did you meet her in my room?

No, the lobby.

Well, how did you recognize each other?

She looks just like you.

So, you just walked up to her and said, "Hi, I'm Paul Weston.

Your daughter has stage three non-Hodgkin's lymphoma

and she's dying on the fourth floor."

I explained to her that you'd come to see me

several weeks ago with the diagnosis of lymphoma

and that you'd begun chemotherapy.

What did she say when you said "cancer"?

She seemed...

stunned.

Did she cry?

No.

Was she angry...

at me?

Definitely not. No.

She hates being the last person to find something out.

She did have a hard time

believing you would keep something like this from her.

What did you say to that?

I told her she'd have to speak to you.

-How long was this conversation? -A couple of minutes.

It wasn't me she wanted to see.

She wanted to see you.

I woke up and she was sitting there.

I thought--

I thought for a moment that...

I was at home...

and it had all been a bad dream, like I was still a child,

and I was sick and...

my mom was taking care of me.

I had never grown up and...

I had never gone to school and...

I had never gotten cancer.

I closed my eyes and...

I guess fell asleep.

When I woke up she was still sitting there...

glaring at me

like I had gotten sick deliberately.

You broke my heart.

Worse than Kyle.

I'm sorry.

That was never my intention.

Kyle took me out for coffee last week.

He'd been harassing me, so I finally went

just to shut him up, like,

"I'm still alive. I'm in chemo. Just leave me alone."

And he just seemed so young to me,

like a baby.

I was thinking...

"I don't want a boy like you. I want someone like Paul.

A man."

What was it like to see him again?

I don't want to talk about Kyle. I just brought him up bec--

Fuck it. Never mind.

I thought you were a man.

So, today I'm your betrayer,

but last week you were equally certain

that I was generous and good.

Can you see how dramatically your opinion of me has changed?

-Yes. -And can you make sense

of that for me?

I guess I never really knew you.

Or maybe you're so angry at me you're--

you're having a hard time seeing this situation

from my perspective.

Don't lecture me on empathy.

I am not talking about empathy. I'm talking about perspective.

You feel deeply for people whom you believe

are on your team because they are, in your mind,

basically extensions of-- of yourself.

You feel their pain as if it's your own pain,

but you do have a hard time understanding someone

who's approaching from a different perspective.

You were using your perspective to fuck me over.

I thought you were in serious trouble

and your mother deserved to know.

Why? You have no allegiance to her.

-You've never met her. -As a father, myself--

I'll tell you what happened. You got scared.

You didn't want to be my emergency contact.

-April, that-- -You didn't want

-that responsibility. -April--

If I had a patient who asked me not to call her mother,

I would never have called her mother.

You don't have children.

It's so easy to betray you.

It's so easy to let you down.

I make one mistake-- Not even a mistake.

One decision that you don't agree with

and that's it for you.

I'm worthless because I'm weak.

Now that's a quality you can't accept in others,

because you can't accept it in yourself.

But you know that nobody can live up to your standards,

because you can't even live up to them.

This is life, April. There are days that are just...

classless and cruel,

but it is the only life that you've got.

Leah lets me down...

all the time.

How?

Little things.

I mean, she's a flake.

She'll show up an hour late or...

she'll forget we made a plan at all.

-But that doesn't bother you? -No.

And what's special about your relationship with Leah?

I know she loves me.

She's known me since I was six.

Before I had done anything.

So, she loved you when you were a child.

She got inside before you closed the gates.

-That's so depressing. -Is it?

To have one person who really knows who you are?

I used to be really different.

-In what way? -I was a total mess.

This really emotional kid.

I would cry at the drop of a hat.

I used to write my parents hate mail

and leave it on their pillows at night.

"Dear Mom and Dad, these are all the things

you did today that upset me. Please respond."

And did they respond?

My mother would tell me that I had to get tough.

I couldn't let my emotions show on my face.

Yeah.

You know, when I was in--

When I was in grad school, I-- I had a professor...

who said something I still remember.

He used to say that...

for better or for worse, that maturity

in modern American society had become

synonymous with a lack of emotions,

to not feel anything too deeply.

-That's true. -But some people naturally

have more heightened emotional responses than others.

I think that you're one of those people.

So, you've been working hard to change your nature,

which is-- It's probably a futile enterprise.

But the continual effort to do that...

could make you very angry or insecure.

-You think I'm insecure? -Do you?

Well, there's no good way

for me to answer that question.

If I say no, I'm a narcissist and if I say yes, I'm a loser.

Well, the way I see it, if you say no...

you're perfect, if you say yes...

it means you're human.

Why do you think your mother told you to...

keep your feelings to your-- to yourself?

She wanted to keep me from getting hurt.

Is it possible that it had something

to do with-- with Daniel?

What do you mean?

Daniel couldn't control his emotions

and he became-- he became violent when--

when he was upset, yeah?

So, maybe a--

a heightened emotional response from you, even though

it was an appropriate reaction to a given circumstance,

maybe it reminded your mother of Daniel

and in some way it scared her.

The world is a messed up place.

She was just trying to teach me to protect myself.

But maybe she didn't give you time

to get to know yourself first,

to know who it is that you are protecting.

You think I don't know myself?

I think that you've been operating for a long time

in reaction to your mother.

At the hospital, she was so mad she wouldn't even look at me.

She just kept coming in and out of the room,

bossing the doctors around. I just--

I just wanted her to leave.

Maybe she wasn't actually angry.

Maybe she was scared.

-It doesn't matter! -It doesn't?

No, Paul, not when I'm hooked up to three IVs.

The only thing that matters in that moment

is that my mother is there and I can't deal with her.

My dad came by later and...

he was perfect.

I mean, I was freezing so...

he went out and bought me a down blanket.

And now whenever he comes, he brings me something special.

There's this dark chocolate that I love.

It weighs a ton and I never get it for myself.

He brought me some.

Then he sat by my bed and held my hand and...

just said, "April,

you're a strong girl. You'll beat this."

That's all I need.

She's my mother. Why doesn't she know that?

He sounds very calm, your dad.

He can be, under certain circumstances.

Like hospitals?

What are you saying?

Well, that's what he does for a living.

It might be easier for your father to give you

what you need at the moment because he's had some practice.

But your mother...

-was out of her element. -I don't understand.

Are you for this woman or against her?

April, everything doesn't have to be black and white.

You are so over me.

-Sorry? -You're so tired of this.

You just want this to be done.

You want to figure me out, fix my head

and so you can check me off your ledger.

What-- what about my behavior gave you that idea?

-You turned on me. -How?

By calling my mother.

Oh, we're back to that again.

So, what I did still doesn't make sense to you?

What are you talking about?

For five sessions, all I've talked about

is why I can't call my mother.

I was walking down Flatbush Avenue

burning with fever with a nonexistent immune system

trying to hail a cab to take me to the emergency room

and I still didn't call her.

You pulled rank on me, Paul.

You were like "I've humored this chick for too long.

I'm the adult. I'm gonna call the other adults

so we can figure out how to--

how to just fuck up the world together."

You don't think of yourself as an adult?

I guess I am.

But do you want to be?

Not really.

Maybe that's because you barely had time to be a child.

Your work here is done.

No, our work here is only beginning.

Well, you're wrong.

You can check me off now.

I mean, I'm in chemo, my mother knows.

-Whatever. -You keep using the term

"check me off." Does that mean anything to you?

My mother...

used to write a check on the back of my hand

whenever I did a good deed or aced a test or something.

She said I loved it when I was little.

But something changed as you got older.

I just--

It felt like she was...

you know, checking me off like...

"April's fine. She's got a check.

Don't need to worry about April."

I got so tired of those goddamn checks,

-I stopped telling her things. -Like what?

I don't know. I...

I'd raise money for autism research

-by running a 10K. -But you wouldn't tell her?

No, she'd find out later

from a teacher or school newspaper.

Can you give me another example?

When Leah's mom was dying,

Leah couldn't handle it, neither could her dad, so...

I was over at their house three times a week helping out

just buying groceries, making dinner.

But again your mother didn't know anything about this.

Well, she found out at the funeral.

Leah's dad came up to her.

It seems like you wanted your mother to know these things

but you didn't want to tell her.

Maybe.

And what would happen if she found out?

I was her little hero,

-her saving grace. -Her perfect child.

April, is it possible

that I've become part of that pattern?

-What? -You got cancer.

You decided to fight it alone, just as you've always done.

You didn't tell your mother, but you came to see me.

You told me...

because maybe you knew on some level

that I would eventually tell your mother...

and you would become her hero...

again.

-That is so fucked up. -I don't think it is, April.

I think you saved yourself the only way you know how.

I thought the cancer would clean me out

of all this bullshit.

I thought I would finally stop

obsessing over how to be the best at everything

and all the reasons I should hate myself and everyone else.

I thought I would...

finally start to think about the big picture but...

it's just gotten darker inside my head.

I don't believe in anything anymore.

I don't believe in love or...

my mother...

or my body...

or you.

Because of all this stupid therapy,

I don't even believe in myself anymore.

I literally have no idea

why I should get out of bed in the morning.

That's not a bad place...

to begin, April.

Do you remember the dream that we talked about last week?

The one where I was dying?

Yeah. Except that I think that dream

could actually have been about...

rebirth, about saying goodbye to the--

to the old self to make room for the new.

I could just be dying.

When will you get the results of the blood test?

I told you, end of the week.

Then you'll know for sure if the chemo's working?

Yup.

Will you let me know the results as soon as you get them?

Sure.

Thank you.

Are we done here?

If you want to keep on talking.

Not really.

Can you help me up?

Sure.