I threw my hands up with frustration. “What the fuck did I think I was going to achieve? Six weeks of some Bible studying, a happy marriage for a year or two, and then I’d be done. How bad could it fucking be? Nothing worse than Los Siete, right? Easy.Easy.” My knee bounced as I breathed through the anger rising in my chest. “Fucking stupid girl.”
My molars ground together as I shook my head. I was back there, hiding in the manager’s office of the grocer’s as I called Agent Nguyen. The sweat was pooling under my arms as I stared at the door, terrified that someone would walk in and catch me on the phone, that I’d have to endure a punishment. Took me nine months to finally get the courage to use the landline to callher. I needed a light at the end of the tunnel. Needed to know that something good was coming.
“I told her I didn’t feel safe… and she just left me there. She knew I was trapped, and she didn’t fucking get me out until I was useful, until I was worth something to her. Like my sanity didn’t fucking matter. I was a means to an end.”
My jaw ached with the force at which I swallowed my rage.Fuck Agent Nguyen. Fuck her.
“I’m sorry, I’m not quite following here, Emory.”
“Those fucking words. You’re not being sincere, Miss Olivia. You’re not truly remorseful, Miss Olivia. You’re not being humble, Miss Olivia. Repent, Olivia. Take responsibility, Olivia. Accept your punishment, Olivia.Fuck those words. Fuck. Those. Words.”
“Why don’t we take a break, hmm?” Sarah stood from her chair, walking to the water cooler on the other side of her desk. She returned with a small plastic cup in tow, holding it out for me to take.
It was only then that I realized what I’d done to myself. As I reached for the cup and saw the blood beneath my fingernails.
I glanced at my bicep to find the bloody gouges I’d left behind.
Great. Just fucking great.
Apparently cutting them down two nights ago did nothing to dull their effectiveness when I actually tried.
I gulped the cup of water before setting it down on the coffee table between us. I barely registered the sting of the cuts on my arm, my pulse still strumming with racing thoughts. We sat in silence for several long, painful minutes and I contemplated just getting up and walking out.
Finally, Sarah released a deep breath and cleared her throat.
“How are you feeling?”
I clenched my teeth, taking a measured breath before I said something I didn’t mean.
“Angry, tired. Mostly angry.”
Sarah nodded and I turned my attention back to my bloodied fingernails.
Four fucking days. I couldn’t last four fucking days. And I hated myself because I knew it wasn’t the last time I was going to do it. I was already staring at my bag, ready to get the hell out of here and get the release I craved.
“How about we try something?”
I flicked my eyes back up to Sarah’s hopeful smile and shrugged.
“Alright. Were gonna start at our toes–” I blinked, slowly, in a ‘you’ve got to be fucking kidding me’way, and Sarah shushed me. “We start at our toes, and I want you to concentrate on tensing the muscles there. Curl your toes in as hard as you can, hold it, and then relax completely. Now your feet, press them into the floor as hard as you can and hold it. And release. Good,” she said with a smile.
I rolled my eyes to myself.
We continued like that, working our way all the way up to the muscles in my face. If I was kinder, I would’ve told her that it was actually sort of doing something. It certainly wasn’t making me angrier. Honestly, it made me want to take a fucking nap. She made me take a few deep breaths and then we sat in silence for another minute.
“How are you feeling now?”
“Tired,” I shrugged.
She nodded like that was a good thing. “Now, about that pain. Is that your usual method of coping when you’re upset?”
Enoch’s voice rang in my ears, telling me to be honest. Telling me that the more people I had in my corner the easier it would be to actually stop.
I nodded.
“Do you use anything else to cause pain?”
I closed my eyes, the shame bubbling up, making my face hot.
