OH GOODY, WE GET TO TALK ABOUT MY FEELINGS! - Todd & Ray
This is the only therapy storyline that has ever been written for Todd so far. Besides a little bit of group therapy later that he had when he got out of jail at the hospital. It was very illuminating at the time. We got to know more about Peter Manning and how he viewed women. Giving Todd another dimension and humanizing him a bit more, by understanding what his father was like and how he treated his son. At first Todd is his usual cynical self, saying in essence, yeah I had a rotten childhood, so what? Bit by bit, Ray draws him out, and Todd reveals a little more of his background to us.
TODD: (guard is taking off his chains) What’s going on here?
RAY: You knew we had an appointment this morning, Todd.
TODD: Yeah, for another bogus group therapy session. Where are the rest of the guys?
RAY: You’re all there is.
TODD: Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!
RAY: You have a problem talking to me alone? (sits)
TODD: Look, I only do this group thing because I have to, Ray, now what is it?
RAY: I think this might be a big step for you, Todd. What do you say? You want to give it a try? (Todd gives a denial smirk and shakes his head in disgust)
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TODD: I need personal attention? (Ray stands)
RAY: Well, I’ve worked with other guys one on one and it helped.
TODD: Yeah, well it’s not going to help me. Check your files. (playing with him) You see I’m pure evil. I’m the devil. (arches eyebrow)
RAY: Is that how you feel?
TODD: How I feel?? (deeply sarcastic with smile) Oh, goody! We get to talk about my feelings. (turning away) What a bunch of garbage!
RAY: So you don’t want to talk about anything that happened to you. (sits)
TODD: Why? It’s not going to change anything, is it?
RAY: It could.
TODD: (sarcastic) Could? Pigs could fly.
RAY: Would it be too much for me to ask you to trust me on this?
TODD: Why don’t you check your files again, okay? You see I went to college. (cross sits opposite Ray) I took intro to Psych just like everyone else.
RAY: What did they teach you in Intro Psych?
TODD: That everything’s my parents fault. (deeply sarcastic) That I didn’t get enough warm fuzzy’s as a child. And that my Dad’s a jerk. You see all of that, all of that and a quarter won’t buy me a gumball, Dr. Ray. (seriously) I did what I did. And everybody’s got to deal with their junk. Why should I be any different than anyone else?
RAY: So you think that you had a pretty normal time of it as a kid? You had good parents?
TODD: (leans back in his chair, fidgeting) I had (hesitates) a good mother. I had a jerk for a father. So what?
RAY: So even jerk fathers’ don’t usually go so far as to visit their sons’ in prison to tell them that they’re being disowned. (the small smug smile on Todd’s face is wiped off) Do they?
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RAY: (Todd is pacing) So, how did it make you feel when your father came to see you here?
TODD: (stands by chair, taps it, then matter of factly) Like it always does. Like I was nothing.
RAY: What if he said he wanted to help. What would you have done?
TODD: I would’ve looked for the price tag. There’s always a price tag.
RAY: Okay. (he tries a different tactic) Imagine that CJ and Sarah were given to your father for him to raise. (you can see Todd’s wheels turning) What do you think would have happened to them.
TODD: (quickly, on top of it) Nothing.
RAY: Nothing? I mean it’s all right with you, no big deal?
TODD: (very serious) Nothing because I never would let my father anywhere near those kids. I would do anything I had to, to stop that.
RAY: You survived your father. Why wouldn’t the kids?
TODD: (quickly) Those kids are nothing like me.
RAY: How are they different?
TODD: They're innocent. They're way....way too trusting. (small laugh) I mean, look who they looked after? Me! (looks away) Not, my father, he would’ve.....(cannot finish)
RAY: Your father would’ve what?
TODD: (bites his lip) He would have crushed them. (looks at Ray, pointedly) Especially Sarah.
RAY: Why?
TODD: (matter of fact) He hates women. And his son. Women and his son. That’s who my father hates. Hates his son because.....(he looks upward, cannot finish)
RAY: Keep going, Todd. Why does your father hate you?
TODD: (camera angle shooting up at him, he is contemplative) Because I remind him of.......(softly) her.
RAY: Your mother.
TODD: (same camera angle shooting up, he turns away from Ray, quietly, softly with much feeling through out this) Yeah. He hated us both. I would....I would of given anything, you know, to get my father to love me. And when I saw how much he hated me, I tried to change...I tried to be just like him. So I’d push people around, and I’d bad mouth everybody like they didn’t mean anything, like they didn’t matter. And I busted my hump to be the best football player I could be, because....because I thought, if nothing else, if I could win a football game on Saturday then maybe on Monday, you know he....he could go to work or something and talk to the guys about that. Give him something to be proud of. And he could say that....that I was okay. And just for like a week maybe, it would be enough. (Ray looks down in sympathy) Just once for him to tell me that I was enough, that I was good enough to be....his son. Oh, I wanted that. (he swallows hard) Never happened. (Rays stands in back of Todd and puts hand on his shoulder in comfort, Todd reacts to his touch than shuts down)
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TODD: (gets up quick and uncomfortable)I think I wanna go back to my cell. (his back to him)
RAY: (nods) Sure. How about we do this again though, huh?
TODD: (turns back to him coldly staring will not commit to an answer) I think I want to go back to my cell.
RAY: I’ll call the guard. (gets papers) You want some time before I have him bring you back?
TODD: (fast) No.
RAY: Okay. I’m glad we talked Todd.
TODD: (eyes look away) Nothing’s changed.
RAY: Maybe. (Todd’s eye’s shift to him) But what if it has? And what if that helps? You think about it. (Ray leaves, Todd thinks a second then mouths ‘think about it’ to himself mockingly)
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