A solitary tear sailed down her cheek. “But I’ve screwed up everyone’s lives and now you’re all as miserable as I am.”
“We’re not miserable. It’s just an adjustment. And it won’t be forever.”
She huffed, and bitterly spat, “Yeah, because eventually I’ll be too old for Zander to be interested in. The sad part is that I can’t even ugly myself up or scar my skin because he’ll just turn around and fix it until I’m pretty again.”
I saw her eyes fixate on the burn on her right arm, which was still a medium shade of pink. “Is that why you don’t want to continue your laser treatments? Because you want to remain damaged in his eyes? Hope he’ll think you’re not worth the effort?”
She didn’t answer, didn’t even look my way, but more tears fled her eyes.
“Megan,” I said calmly, reaching out to angle her chin my way so I could see her beautiful brown eyes. She sucked in a breath. “If that ass**le comes for you again, it won’t be because of what you look like. It’ll be because he’s f**ked in the head and acting out on it. And even if he’s looking, it doesn’t mean he’ll ever find you again. The police don’t know where we are, so he can’t get your address through their files this time. So please don’t live in fear. Your family and I are going to do everything possible to keep you safe. Even if it means we’ve got to pick up and move to Fiji and build a shack in the middle of some rainforest.”
That got a tiny laugh from her, and I released her chin. “Fiji, huh? I suppose Thea would love it there. I remember her complaining about how the weather here just didn’t understand bikini season.”
I smiled, my fingers making their way to rub circles on her scalp. “Speaking of Thea again, she wants to come stay here this weekend.” Megan looked up to me, not a single emotion implicating the thoughts within her head. “I told her it was okay, but it’s really your decision. Do you want her to come? Because I can take the fall and tell her I changed my mind and that it’s not a good idea.”
She continued to stare mildly at me. She seemed so content, her moist eyes appearing lazier since I began rubbing her head, her lips pressing in as she debated. “No, you don’t need to do that. I think it’d be good to see her. I’d like to see her. Maybe she can…” Megan closed her eyes off to me.
“Maybe she can what?” I led with curiosity.
Her shoulders shrugged, her head shaking as if she didn’t know the answer after all.
“Hey,” I said, tipping her chin again, waiting for her eyes to find the courage to open. “You know you can tell me anything. I’m not the enemy here. I’m on your side no matter the problem.”
It was barely a nod, but it was enough of an answer for me.
At least for now.
3
“Tell me about the dreams.”
A collected breath overfilled my mouth, making my lips puff outward as air slowly pushed through the slightest opening between my lips. My lips felt dry and sticky, but I didn’t bother wetting them. My dreams. She always wanted to talk about those horrible dreams.
As if reality hadn’t been awful enough, now my psychiatrist wanted me to relive it over and over and over again in my mind. To let the dreams play out so I could confront Zander and control the situation. What the hell for, I just didn’t get. Even if I could find a way to beat back the fear in my dream, the real version was still out there to fear, and that wasn’t going to slip away because I became courageous in the dream world.
“I don’t really remember them once I’m awake.”
That was a total lie, but I was getting better at it. Lying, that was.
“I can remember that he’s in them, but there’s just this feeling of fear inside my chest. I don’t remember any of the details.”
More lies. Truth was, the few times I accidentally drifted off to sleep, I did remember the details of my dreams. Or nightmares, I should say. Zander was always there, sometimes even his brother Charles, who imprisoned me in his basement long before Zander ever got a hold of me. Maybe if I hadn’t killed Charles that night when I set the fire, Zander wouldn’t have come for me. Of course even I knew that was stupid deep down. If he hadn’t, Charles probably would have. He was the one who had me stolen the first time because I was the perfect match for the features he requested. If he wanted me that badly, he wasn’t going to just let me escape. Just like Zander didn’t let me escape. He hunted me down and took me all over again.
Which was why I was having the nightmares to begin with. Zander already came for me once. He flat out told me before I was rescued that he would do it again, that I was his. I’ll bring you back to me. The more time ticked by, the more I realized my freedom was dissipating. It was making my nightmares intensify. I could feel his body as it pressed over me, my lower muscles aching as he rocked in rhythm, could even smell the faint scent of his spicy body wash on his skin. And I was just frozen. I wanted him off me, but I had no strength in my arms, no voice to speak of. Worse…I couldn’t even roll my head to the side to avoid his leer, because Nick was always right there too, sitting ten feet away watching it all go down. He couldn’t – or wouldn’t – help me.
I think he was there to punish me, because I was supposed to be fighting. It was what Dr. Vitriz had been trying to get me to do from day one. Take control of the nightmares and fight my way through them. To fight off Zander.
But I hadn’t. I couldn’t. I didn’t know why, I just couldn’t.
And Nick always just stared at me as I allowed Zander to do whatever he wanted. I wasn’t going to lie. Those dreams made it hard to look at Nick in the real world, to even let him reach out and touch me sometimes.
I crossed my arms and sighed, looking up at Dr. Vitriz. She was watching me curiously. How long had I been silent? Did she ask me something I didn’t even hear?
“Megan,” she said, leaning over, resting her forearms over the yellow pad on her lap. “Your dreams are the one place you can have absolute control over everything that happens. All those emotions and events that weigh us down in life that we don’t know how to properly deal with? Our dreams put them front and center so we can deal with them. Because it’ll never let go until we do. We’ll continue to feel the weight of the world on our shoulders. You have to control what happens between you and Zander in your dreams. You’ll never heal yourself in reality until you do so. So please try. They’re dreams. Your dreams. Nothing is real. Nothing can hurt you there unless you allow it. Even if you feel you can’t fight him in real life, you can fight him from terrifying you there. It’s your world. Your sanctuary. Don’t let him take that too.”
I just sat there numbly. Remorseful. Ashamed. I didn’t like being this weak. I just didn’t know how to fight like that.
“Tell me,” she said, moving on as she leaned back in her chair again and glanced down at her notes. “How are the self-defense classes going?”
“Okay,” I said lamely. “It’s more learning how to be observant and keeping your head up and appearing strong just to keep people from wanting to choose you as their victim. Not so much on actually learning to defend yourself outside a few moves.”
“You say that like you’d prefer the latter.”
My mouth frowned on one side and I looked to her with a bored expression. “I was pretty careful the first time around. It didn’t keep him from pointing a gun in my face and threatening to kill Nick if I didn’t go with him. How am I supposed to fight that?”
She was silent for a moment, her expression soft as we held a gaze. “I don’t know,” she admitted.
“But the classes are meant to help you gain back some of the power you feel has been stripped away from you. There are other monsters in this world, many of whom won’t use a gun, so I’m sure what they’re teaching you will help you deal with them. Just keep going and learning. I truly feel this will be a confidence booster for you in the end.”
Whatever. The only reason I was still going anymore was because of Maggie. She offered me a sense of normality in a seriously messed up world. She was the one person who didn’t know the details of my struggles or greatest fears and the one person who didn’t bother to find out. Because she knew without asking. Which was why I suspected she wasn’t that unlike me. We knew but didn’t inquire, because we both sought the same thing – a little tranquility in our daily lives, even if it was just thirty minutes to share a cup of coffee.
“Well, our time is about up. Is there anything you’d like to bring up for discussion before we call it a day?”
There was, for the past several sessions, in fact. But I had been complete chicken shit to bring it up. And I wanted to, I really did. And as humiliating as it was for me to ask, it was something I had been wanting to push for Nick.
Nick. Who’d been so sweet to me since he came back into my life. Who took a shot to the chest for me. Who’d held me when I asked and didn’t resent me when I pushed away or emotionally broke down. My reactions had been all over the place that I sometimes wondered if I had become bipolar through it all. Sometimes I just didn’t know what the hell was going on inside me, or why I reacted the way I did. In an instant something could remind me of Zander – a simple touch, smell, simple wording. And I’d snap faster than an overstretched rubber band.
Believe me, I didn’t want to be this way. Haunted. Damaged. And I certainly didn’t want Nick to continue suffering because of it. He wasn’t the enemy, but at times, my reactions had treated him thus. I wanted to be able to curl up in his arms again, to be able to lie na**d with the man I loved and feel the warmth of his skin pressed against me. I wanted to be healthy for him. Of sound mind. Even-tempered. I wanted to be able to combat the things that made me think of Zander and not let it affect my relationship with Nick anymore.
But apparently, I wasn’t getting there on my own. I needed help. So despite the humiliation I felt spreading from my core outward, I took a full breath and said, “Is there anything you can give me, you know…” I was on the verge of rolling my eyes from the embarrassment. This was so freaking awkward. “…to help me want sex?”
Like always, she kept her thoughts hidden well, which made my heart continue to pound, wondering what she was silently thinking. “Do you think you’re ready for sex?”
“It’s been three months, since…” I didn’t even like to think it let alone say it. And here in her office it was all I was allowed to think or say. I loved Nick and I felt like I was punishing him by denying this. I wanted to have sex with him. I wanted…
“I want it to not bother me to.”
“But it does,” she was quick to say.
Looking down, I sucked my lower lip into my mouth. I numbly nodded my head. “But I don’t want it to.” I felt the tears beginning to build, making me blink double-time to keep them back. Of all the horrible things we typically discussed in these sessions, this was what was going to bring on the tears. “It makes me feel guilty. He’s done nothing wrong and everything right. He… He knows when it’s okay to touch me and how much I can take.”
“Then he understands you’re not ready yet, and that your lack of sexual desire has nothing to do with the feelings you have for him. And I’m sorry Megan, but there aren’t any pills that’ll make you ready for that. Even though you’ve recovered physically from your ordeal, you have yet to conquer the emotional hurdles. And it’s not something you can force ahead of schedule.”
I sighed my disappointment. Truly, I figured she say something like that, but I felt I had to try. “I just thought some pills would help stimulate me into trying, because I feel like I’ve shut that part of me down so hard that it’s never going to fire back up again. And I don’t want to be this way for him.”
“Like what way?” she asked, her brows curving with confusion.
“Broken. Scared. There, but not really. He doesn’t deserve that.”
With sympathy in her voice, she replied, “No more than you deserve to be the way you are right now. If you truly want to try and become physical with Nick again, why don’t you try baby steps with him?”
“Baby steps,” I mocked. Awesome.
“Come on, it’s not that bad. Set aside some time each night and try to rebuild your physical relationship. Begin wherever you’re comfortable. I’m sure I speak for Nick when I say that he’d be happy with whatever you can afford to share.”
4
My hand swiped across the mirror, streaking the foggy substance in an arc pattern. I had let the steam go for a long time before coming out tonight, so much that the air that once felt soothing inside my lungs now felt suffocating. Now I was hot and dizzy and exhausted. I opened the door to the bedroom and slid down the wall beside it, letting the cool air drift in and equalize the temperature, my headache slowly beginning to retreat to the deeper recesses of my mind, leaving me the weaker version that had been plaguing me day and night ever since I decided lack of sleep was the way to go. I was tired all the time, but I’d learn to function and pretend otherwise.
Nick wasn’t here. He’d gone to pick up Thea at the airport so he could drive her home and feel comfortable that they weren’t followed. Thea had never been here, so asking her to constantly double-back when she’d probably get lost on the back roads probably wasn’t the best idea anyway.
She was going to be here for two days. Why didn’t that stir any kind of emotion inside me? Not happy, not sad, overwhelmed…nothing. I couldn’t shake the feeling that my lack of reaction or affection wasn’t right. I should want to see my family, hear their voices all mixed together in the next room having a good time. But instead I just wanted peace and quiet and to be left alone. Truthfully, I felt a little dead inside.