As soon as we get settled at my apartment, I log into my laptop and let Allora start working on all the things she has to do. Some of it is essential—like ordering a replacement driver’s license—but other things are just distractions. And that’s okay. It’s important for her to do whatever she needs to do to get through this. Including ignoring everything for a while.
Not forever.
That will come back to bite her if she doesn’t deal with everything, but these first few days have to be more about regaining her sanity than anything else.
By late in the afternoon, she’s done about all she can do and she closes the laptop with a sigh. I told her to have her new cards and license shipped to Shadow Security headquarters as a precaution so now all we can do is wait. I’ll have to take her to the car dealership to get her new key fob, but we can do that in a few days.
“Are you hungry?” I ask.
She smiles. “Yes. Always.”
“How about we order in tonight and then I’ll have some groceries delivered. Full disclosure—I don’t cook a lot.”
“That’s fine. I can cook. I don’t mind.”
“I don’t expect you to cook for me.”
“Well, we have to eat and ordering in every day gets expensive.”
“Whatever you’re comfortable with.”
She sinks down on the couch next to me and leans back, closing her eyes. “I’m tired.”
“Do you want to take a nap?”
“No… I meant I’m mentally tired. Exhausted, really.”
“The last few days have been a lot,” I say. “Cut yourself some slack.”
“When is it going to hit me?” she whispers.
“I don’t think there’s any way to know. We’re all different.”
“When did it hit you?”
I hesitate.
I don’t talk about the time I was captured very often. Almost never. The military made me meet with a therapist but that wasn’t helpful because I knew what I had to say for them to sign off on me. For the most part, I worked it out myself. Mostly with tequila and my fists. Those probably aren’t good options for her, though.
“I didn’t do things the right way,” I admit. “I bullshit my way through mandatory therapy and then did all the usual crap people do when they’re trying to pretend they’re not hurt. Drank too much. Got in bar fights. Fucked around. Thankfully, I had my sister and Rage to knock some sense into me. Don’t do what I did and pretend you’re fine. Because you’re not. No matter how strong you are, what happened to you was horrible.”
“It was,” she says slowly. “But there’s a part of me that’s like, what the fuck? If I let this destroy me, they win again. And that’s bullshit.”
“I didn’t say you should let it destroy you. Just don’t pretend you’re fine. Talk to a therapist. More than once. Allow yourself to grieve the person you were before while simultaneously working on who you’re going to be going forward.”
“Do I have to be…someone different?” Her blue eyes are shrouded when they meet mine.
“You already are, even if you don’t know it yet. That kind of trauma changes you. Sometimes, it defeats you. Makes you anxious and fearful. Other times, it makes you stronger.”
“It definitely isn’t going to defeat me. At least, I hope not.”
“It won’t.” I shake my head. “There is no doubt in my mind you’re going to persevere.”
“Did what happened to you make you stronger?” she asks after a moment. “Because I’m pretty sure you were already pretty strong, both inside and out.”
“I don’t know about stronger, but it made me tougher, both physically and mentally. Determined to never be in a position like that again, even though that’s not entirely realistic.”
“Do you really think they want to kill me?”
