“Wayne State in Detroit,” I answered.
“And what are you hoping to do after graduation?” he asked with more interest.
“I want to teach literature, like my mother,” I answered proudly. Mentioning my mom made me feel like I had a knot in my throat as I thought about how I’d lied to her. She had no clue where I really was nor who I was with, and she would have been so disappointed in me if she ever learned the truth. But ever since I met Neil, I’d become prone to making more irrational and even insane choices.
“You’re a girl with a good head on her shoulders. That isn’t true ofeveryone your age,” John noted, unaware of the fact that I did not, in fact, have a good head on my shoulders. At least not when it came to love. I spent too much time drifting into fantasies that Neil was doing his best to thwart. This trip to the clinic, in fact, was intended to show me what a monster he was. Instead, I saw it as an incredibly brave act that, honestly, only made me like him more.
I couldn’t ask for a relationship, and I couldn’t tell him that I loved him, but I could continue to think he was something special.
“How long ago did Dr. Lively’s group start?” Neil cut in.
“About a half hour ago. Why?” John answered.
“Because Selene and I are also going to participate,” he answered with an unreadable smile. Dr. Keller didn’t seem to be fully on board. His lips flattened into a doubtful expression, but Neil pressed on. “It’s the whole reason I brought her here,” he said. John turned and looked at me with perhaps a bit of dismay, but he didn’t object, likely because he knew how pigheaded Neil was.
John led us down another hallway on the opposite side of the café, this one apparently leading to the music room.
I didn’t know what the group was about or why Neil suggested that I attend as well, but I was sure that this was all part of an attempt to shock me.
“Are you trying to freak me out?” I asked him pointedly as we followed John down the hall. His proud posture, cynical bearing, and omnipresent grave frown made him look like a divine creature, both beautiful and damned.
“I just want you to watch and listen,” he answered flatly, without so much as a glance in my direction.
“Like you wanted me to watch the blond in the pool house suck you off? Or like you wanted me to watch you and Jennifer on Halloween?” I pressed, feeling unnerved. “You failed those times, and you’ll fail this time, too,” I told him clearly. Neil did things, abnormal things, often in a cynical or ruthless attempt to make me hate him and force me out of his life.
“Don’t be a fucking brat. Now is not the time,” he scolded me, an especially irritating note of condescension in his voice. He always used that tone when he wanted to quickly put me back in my place.
“Is this war of ours ever going to end?” I asked, still trying to find common ground with him, despite the fact that John—who was only a little bit ahead of us—was surely listening in on our entire conversation.
“It’s not a war; it’s just reality,” Neil answered just as we stepped into a large room. In the middle of the room, a group of young people were sitting, talking, and laughing with another man who, to judge by his white coat, was probably the other doctor. He had a notepad and a pen in his hands as he moved amongst the others, looking at them one by one. He looked just like a psychologist, studying and analyzing his patients’ every movement.
Was this the man who had been caring for Neil since he was a child?
“Let’s try to take our seats quietly so we don’t disturb Dr. Lively and the others,” John suggested under his breath. He gestured at a series of chairs next to the wall.
I sat down next to Neil and automatically put my hand on his leg. He looked calm, but he wasn’t actually comfortable. All he could do was give the appearance of being comfortable.
I had gotten a feel for his emotions, and I could sense how awfully tense he was.
“Each one of you is like an actor playing lots of roles.” Dr. Lively took note of our presence, but he ignored us and continued with what he was saying. “You put on what I would consider to be masks to make yourself palatable to others, mostly to avoid their judgment,” he went on. “In this room, though, all you need to do is be yourselves. You need to think of yourselves as insulated by the kind of normalcy that no one out there will give you. And do you know why?” he asked one girl rhetorically. I took a look at her—she had a stuffed animal clasped to her chest like it was a holy relic, and she stared intently at the doctor. “Because I am here to shed some light on the dark parts of you. I am here to give you an opportunity, not just to change your lives but to change your mental habits. I’m here to awaken your subconscious and allow it to be part of a better reality. Because, believe me—a better reality does exist for you,” he said firmly with such engaging enthusiasm that he coaxed a smile from everyone present.
My fingers automatically tightened on Neil’s leg. I wanted him to not just hear those words but really take them in, make them a part of him and use them like a compass as he set off on his path to rebirth. I shot him a brief glance and found him staring seriously at the doctor. His unflappable expression didn’t allow the slightest emotion to peek through, and his golden eyes, cold as metal, took in everything and were surprised by nothing. He was aware of my hand on his leg, and he had not objected, but he hadn’t moved to hold it in his own either.
Disheartened, I turned to look back at Dr. Lively, who was asking a very pretty blond if she’d be willing to do an exercise. I observed her carefully: She wore a short dress, her legs were crossed in a way that showed them to maximum effect, and she had long blond hair that fell past her breasts. I tried to keep my jealousy in check and didn’t even glance at him to see if Neil was looking at her thighs in that hot, hungry way of his. Instead, I kept my gaze fixed on her.
“Brenda, tell me the first word that pops into your head right now,” Dr. Lively instructed. She thought for a moment as she looked at the boy sitting beside her.
It was the same tattooed guy who had slapped my butt in the hallway—Drew.
“Ice cream,” answered the girl.
“Why ice cream specifically?” the doctor pressed, scrutinizing his patient attentively.
“Because my brother and his friends treated me like a sweet thing, free to be taste-tested.” Brenda swallowed hard and stroked a section of her hair nervously. “He told me that I was beautiful and that he was attracted to me. He was jealous and possessive, and at first, I thought that it was…brotherly. Part of his bond with me. Then he snuck into my room one night and took off his pants, and I realized I’d been wrong. He demanded we go all the way, no matter how many times I told him no.” In her eyes and in her voice, I could sense all the pain that Neil surely felt because of Kimberly. My grip on his leg tightened, and he looked at me, narrowing his eyes slightly as though looking for any signs that I was crumbling.
But why?
Did he really think he’d get rid of me that easily?
