Well! Selma rubbed her suddenly clammy hands against her pants, wishing he’d look down at the paper again. “Maybe... uh, maybe... three times a... week?”
His forehead furrowed, and she managed to feel like a complete pervert before he said, “That won’t do. Make sure you increase it—your body needs the surge in hormones. Do you have a healthy diet?”
Did he really just prescribe orgasms? She managed a weak nod to his question about eating right, as well as answering if she exercised.
“Excellent.” Dr. Hershey snapped the notebook shut and got to his feet, gesturing toward a sofa half-hidden behind his book-laden shelves. “Please, come sit with me.”
A bit apprehensive of why they might need to change their seating arrangements, Selma nevertheless got up and followed him to the sofa.
He sat down first and patted the cushion next to him, rewarding her with a smile when she obeyed.
“Now, Selma, I want to explain the procedure to you first. I know from previous patients that it can be… somewhat uncomfortable to submit to this sort of treatment, which is why we’ve adapted the methods a bit. I want you to know that you can ask for the standard procedure, but given what almost happened to you last night, I strongly urge you to let me make this as pleasant as I can for you, okay?”
Selma frowned, some of her hope dimming. “It’s not… it’s not electroshock, right? I’ve… it doesn’t work on me.”
Dr. Hershey grimaced and put a gentle hand on her arm. “My dear girl, no. I would never subject a patient to something so barbaric, and I’m so sorry that someone did. It’s a sad truth that some doctors will resort to the most archaic and vile treatments when they’re faced with a patient whose illness they can’t cure, almost in some twisted act of revenge for putting their skills and reputation in question. I promise if you put your trust in my hands, you won’t be harmed.”
She shouldn’t have trusted him—he was one of them, after all—but as she looked into his fiery eyes, she knew he meant every word. It went a long way to soothing both her fears and the painful memories of the experimental treatments she’d endured in the past.
Dr. Hershey must have picked up on her acceptance, because he continued, “For the first step, I will give you a pill. It’s nothing but a concentrated dose of progesterone, and it will help your body accept the treatment. Now, have you heard of birth control implants?”
Selma nodded.
“Excellent. The device I’ll be fitting you with works in a somewhat similar fashion. It’s a small metal circle that fastens around your clitoris, where it will be able to constantly monitor your body’s delicate hormonal balance and regulate it as necessary.”
He said it as if there was nothing to be remotely alarmed about, but Selma jerked back from him with a start.
“You’re—on my… Are you serious? No, I don’t want that!”
Apart from the incredibly unsettling idea of having him touch her down there, his suggestion that her delusions could be cured by a piece of metal around her clit, of all places, sounded absurd. Where only a moment ago she’d felt overwhelming trust in him, her initial fear of what he looked like came rushing back on a flood of adrenaline.
“I know it’s a lot to ask that you trust me on this, Selma,” Dr. Hershey said, his face never betraying anything but patience. “And I know you’ve had little reason to believe in my kind before. But this procedure will change your life, and you need to be brave.”
“Your kind?” she asked, eyes darting to his horns.
His smile widened a little. “Doctors. I’m just a man, Selma. One who wants to help you.”
“And… and how would this procedure be done? Would you…?” She fidgeted on the chair, trying to not imagine him between her spread legs.
“Yes, it would be me. Attaching the ring requires some expertise—and a delicate touch. The way I strongly suggest you let me do this is in the privacy of my office. I’ll help you get comfortable on the couch before we coax your body to allow me to place it. I promise it will be pleasant.
“Now, if you are uncomfortable with that, you do have the right to ask for a more formal procedure. That would be… less pleasant. There would be three doctors and a few nurses present, and I would have to put you in an examination chair in one of the procedure rooms. Instead of gentle stimuli, I would be using steel tools, and if I may be blunt—there’s a strong chance you’d be tied down. Patients who’ve opted for this route in the past haven’t been able to keep still, and with the tools, any wrong movement could injure the patient.
“I don’t want that for you, Selma. I don’t think it would help your healing process, especially not after your assault last night. I urge you to choose the gentle way.”
Selma swallowed thickly, gaze darting to the door on instinct, then back to him. The image he painted had her heart thudding unevenly. She didn’t want him to attach anything down there, not even a supposedly medicinal ring that would cure her hallucinations, but she especially didn’t want to be tied down and gawked at by multiple people. She’d been in a straitjacket once, and the memory of being helpless while she was prodded at was nauseating.
“I… Can’t I choose neither? Look, it was a one-time relapse; I’ve been doing fine for the past ten years. Please, I just want to go home.”
Dr. Hershey put a large hand on her knee, and squeezed. “I know, sweetheart. But I can’t let you go home while you’re still seeing these monsters. If you were honest with yourself, you’d know you weren’t doing fine this past decade. It was only a matter of time before your condition would flare up again. I don’t want you to get hurt, so you have to stay with us until we’ve got a handle on this.
“Please, Selma. Please let me help you. I don’t want to hand you back to the hacks who’ll torture you with their electroshock treatments and drug you with pills that will leave you a walking vegetable.”
She stared at him as the images he conjured sank into her mind’s eye. Years of torture. Years of being too drugged to even think. She’d escaped that future when she convinced her previous doctors that she was cured, but now Dr. Hershey knew she’d been lying. There would be no escape from being permanently institutionalized—unless she submitted to this treatment.
If it didn’t work, she could fake it. What was a few uncomfortable moments in the face of a much bleaker lifetime? He may have looked like a monster, but he was her only hope.
“Okay,” she said softly. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
