For a second, we lock eyes. Just long enough for a flicker of something to pass between us before he looks away.
It feels like a silent question.
What do you remember, Haven?
“This contradiction creates cognitive dissonance. A psychological state the brain desperately attempts to resolve,” he says, voice dropping low. “End result? Anxiety. Guilt. Shame. And at the furthest end of the spectrum…? Attachment. The victim finds themselves longing for the very hand that hurts them.”
Bastian goes to fetch his coffee from the desk, taking a long, slow sip to let his words sink in. He turns to set the cup back down, catching Kai’s eye.
From my angle, I’m the only other person in the room who sees what Professor Rooke does next.
He licks the rim of his coffee cup, and then languidly runs his tongue along his bottom lip…right where Kai bit him.
It’s an obscene, pornographic taunt directed straight at the green-eyed boy across the desk from Bastian. Kai jerks his sucker out of his mouth, color leaving his face as his chair legs thump down with a loud thud.
An unwelcome pulse of heat flickers between my legs, burrowing deep inside me as I witness their exchange.
Shame engulfs me, burning hot on my face.
I shift, pressing my thighs together, seeking relief even as I grind down into my chair.
What in the goddamn trauma bonding is this?
How the fuck can I be turned on by this? Byhim?
Professor Rooke just gave me all the reasons I need, but logically, I’d have to be fucking crazy to be sitting here like nothing happened.
Maybe I am.
What are the signs?
Blackouts? Mood swings? Depression? Suicidal thoughts? Hallucinations? Risky behavior?
Hi, sex with practically-strangers, drugs, and neon rave parties in the woods wearing nothing but a fucking trash bag. Remember me? It’s Haven fucking Lee!
“—bringing us back to our core question,” Bastian says, walking back to the board to draw a circle around his triangle diagram. “What keeps someone trapped in a toxic relationship? Fear? A touch of psychological conditioning? Or is there something more primal at work?”
He paces slowly across the front of the room, every movement fluid and controlled.
A predator in his natural habitat, surrounded by prey.
“What if…”
He stops talking, stops walking, staring silently at the words scrawled on the blackboard. Then he ambles back to the deskand perches on the corner with one leg, swinging it idly as he crosses his arms over his chest.
“What if we’re hardwired to form attachments even in the face of cruelty, because for our ancestors, being cast out meant certain death. What if this so-called ‘trauma bonding’ is actually an evolutionary adaptation meant to keep us safe, like so many other trauma responses?”
His eyes find mine again. Latch on. Bore deep.
“What if some part of the victim not only responds to the abuser, but recognizes it,” he says, voice carrying effortlessly. “Remember, we all know what cruelty looks like. We all knowhowto be cruel. What if we find comfort in that familiarity. Kinship…”
He strokes the edge of his lower lip, then drags it through his teeth.
“…Like recognizing like.”
To the casual observer, he’s just musing to himself. A brilliant intellectual, simply polishing the filigree eggs in his mind palace.
To me, he’s getting ready to spit inside my cunt again.
