Held & Pushed (2 book bundle) (27 page)

“Nicole,
when you came here, it was to learn to cope with the stress and the trauma
you’d endured, both during your ordeal and in the months following. It’s only
been thirteen months since you escaped your suffering—”

“Since I escaped from the home of a killer.
You can say it,
Dr. Loyd. You don’t have to beat around the bush about it. I was kidnapped by a
psychopath and held against my will in his basement for the better part of a
year. You don’t have to sugar coat it. I know what happened.”

“Okay
then. It’s only been thirteen months since you escaped that house.
Only two years since you were kidnapped.
The things you had
to see and suffer through while held captive were terrible. No one expects you
to forget, especially not this soon.”

“I
haven’t forgotten. I’ll never forget.”

“And
no one expects you to. However, you’ve only been with us for three months. I’m
not sure that we’ve covered all the ground we need to cover in such a short
amount of time.”

“Dr.
Loyd, I think you forget that I willingly checked myself in to this hospital. I
saw that I couldn’t deal with my problems alone and I sought help. Surely you
agree that if I was aware I had a problem and had enough sense about me to seek
help,
then
by the same token I have enough sense to
know when I’m ready to leave.”

Silence
from the doctor, followed by a slow nod of his shiny, bald head.
“Fair enough.”

I
continued. “And surely you’ve noticed the change in me since my arrival.”

“I
have. Look, Nicole. I’m not saying you haven’t made improvement. I’m just
saying I think maybe you’re not quite ready to return to your life just yet.”

“I
have no life to return to, Dr. Loyd.”

He
leaned forward, resting his forearms on the oversized mahogany desk that stood
between us. He folded his hands together, intertwining his thick fingers. He
was all ears, listening to and scrutinizing my every word.

Knowing
this, I chose my words carefully.

“My
husband and I are separated. Not legally, just…we thought it was best if I
didn’t live there for a while. He has our son. I won’t go back to them until
I’m one hundred percent well. I can’t. I can’t put them through that.”

I
saw the look on the doctor’s face and quickly continued before he could make
any brash judgments.

“I
see that you’re worried about that, but I’m okay with it.
Really.”

His
eyes drew together in doubt and he asked, “You’re okay with being away from
your husband and son?”

“I
am. It certainly isn’t the way it sounds. I mean, it’s not like he left me or I
left him, you know? We did what was best for him and for our son Mason. We
still love each other. I’m just afraid of exposing them—especially Mason—to the
emotional hell that I suffer through. I don’t think they should see it. It’s
something I have to work out on my own.”

“I
see.”

“I’m
doing everything in my power to keep my family together. But if I can’t, if I
can’t come to terms with what happened to me and find a way to get past it,
then I’ll give Wade a divorce and let him move on with his life. He can’t wait
for me forever. He’s already waited longer and had more patience than most men
would have had.”

The
doctor’s eyes never left my face as he listened to what I said.

“I
was out of control before.” I paused before adding, “Honestly, I think I
should’ve come here as soon as I escaped that house. I should’ve just checked
myself in here instead of going home.”

“You
think that would’ve been best?”

“I
do. I needed someone to talk to, to vent to about the awful things I’d seen and
done. I needed someone to listen to me, to understand what I’d been through.
Someone qualified to help me sort out and understand my feelings. Wade tried.
He did what he could do, but he’s not a doctor. He was in over his head trying
to handle me, and I was in over my head trying to go it alone.”

I
stared at the front of the doctor’s elaborately carved desk, temporarily lost
in the memories of Wade and Mason. I missed them madly, but I
masked
my emotions and carried on with the conversation.

“I
was a fool to think I could do it alone. That’s why I came here. You’ve been a
huge help. Plus, I think distancing myself from the outside world helped me to
put everything in perspective.”

“So
you don’t suffer with survivor’s guilt like you did when you first arrived?”

“No.
I mean, I still feel guilty, yes. I imagine I always will. I lie in bed most
nights and wonder why I lived. Why did he kill all those other women but not me?
What was it about me?”

“You
can’t begin to try to understand the reasoning of a madman, Nicole. They have
no reasoning.”

“I
know that. But still. I can’t help but think I could’ve done something to help
save those women.”

“We’ve
talked about this. Look how long it took you to save yourself. You are not
responsible for those other women. You did not bring them into that house, into
that basement. You didn’t torture them. You didn’t rape them, Nicole. None of
that was your fault.”

“I
know. I know you’re right, but it still haunts me sometimes.” I watched my
thumbs dance around one another and said, “I can still hear them scream.”

Silence
filled the room and for a moment, I was back in that basement, listening to the
screams of the woman next me as she was brutally tortured by the man that would
soon kill her. I heard the sounds of bones breaking, the sound of an ax
chopping through their bodies and clanking against the cold concrete beneath
them. I could smell the metallic odor of their blood as it spilled from their
battered bodies and made its way across the floor and slid into the drain.

“What
about the nightmares? Have they increased in frequency or intensity?”

Brought
back to the present by the doctor’s questions, I adjusted myself in the chair,
sat up straighter, and said, “I still have them.
Once or
twice a week.
Not as often as before, and they’re not as bad as they
used to be.”

Lies.
All lies. I was plagued by those nightmares, haunted
by them both at night and during the day. They weren’t just figments of my
imagination, but horrific memories of things that had actually happened. If
anything, they had doubled in frequency and tripled in intensity.

But
I wasn’t about to tell the doctor that.

“That’s
good to hear.” He picked up his pen and wrote something in my file, which lay
spread open on his desk. “I assume you’re taking your medication regularly,” he
said without looking up at me.

“Yes.”

“I
think I’ll reduce the dosage of your
Prazosin
then.
If your nightmares have decreased, you don’t need to be taking such a strong
dosage. We’ll work toward getting you off that altogether if we can. But if you
find the nightmares increasing again, let me know immediately and I’ll up your
dosage.” He continued to write in the file, pen scribbling across the page.

“How
are your nerves?”

“What
do you mean?”

“Your stress?
Anxiety?
Have you had
any panic attacks recently?”

“No.
I haven’t had an attack in a while.”

He
looked up to study my face for a few seconds, nodded, and wrote more in my
file. “We’ll keep you on the
Xanax
and the Zoloft for
now. Just in case. But we’ll keep an eye on those.” More notes in the file.

When
the doctor was finished writing, he leaned back in his chair and stared at me,
elbows resting on the arms of the chair, forearms straight up. He held the
silver ink pen loosely at each end and absentmindedly spun it with his meaty,
well-manicured fingers. While he looked at me, I watched the pen spin. Around
and around it went, slowly, reflecting the light from the overheard
fluorescents and from the sunlight streaming through the windows behind him.

For
a full minute, I was transfixed by the shiny silver of the pen. In it, I saw
the blade of an ax. I saw the silver of a spoon. I saw the metallic shine of
handcuffs. I saw chains. I saw everything I never wanted to see again in the
glint of that shiny pen, held in the hands of a man whose job it was to teach
me to live with those very images.

I
was grateful when the doctor finally dropped his hands to his lap, hiding the
pen from my view. Had he not done that, had he not broken the hypnotic hold the
pen had over me, there was no telling how deep I would’ve gone, how lost in
memory I would’ve become.

“What
about Austin?”

Though
every muscle in my body tensed and my stomach knotted, I did my best to appear
as though that name didn’t instill in me a bone-chilling fear that threatened
to curdle my blood and a soul-wrenching sadness that shattered my heart into a
thousand pieces.

“What
about him?”

“How
do you feel about him now?”

“How
should I feel about the child I had with my abductor? Part of me misses him
greatly because he’s my child. Another part of me is glad he’s gone because
he’s a part of him.”

“Can
you not say his name?”

“Whose name?”

“Your abductor.”
As an afterthought, the doctor said, “Or
your son.”

“I
have no problem saying either of their names.”

“Then
say it.”

“Austin.”

“Now
say the other name, the name of the man who kidnapped you from a mall parking
lot.
The man who raped you.
The man
who made you watch as he murdered a string of women.
The
man who tortured you, Nicole.
Say his name.”

I
wanted to say his name so the doctor would see that I was well enough to leave,
but my mouth had gone dry, making it virtually impossible to speak.

“There’s
liberation in speaking the truth, Nicole.”

It
was increasingly difficult to keep an unreadable poker face, to keep my
nostrils from flaring, my lips from pursing, and my stomach from retching.
Difficult, but not impossible.

“Ron.
His name is Ron.” The words left a bad taste in my mouth. It was the taste of
blood and rotten dog food, both things that would forever remind me of the
monster who’d ruined my life.

“So
you’re okay with Austin not being a part of your life? You’re okay with what
you did concerning him?”

“As
okay as I can be, I suppose. It’d be a lie if I sat here and told you that I
feel good about what I did. I don’t feel good about it at all.”

“Exactly
how do you feel about it?”

“I
feel like a horrible person and a bad mother. I feel that I failed him.” My
lower lip began to tremble so I bit it, hoping to take my mind off the hurt
that always accompanied thoughts of Austin.

“Do
you want him back?”

This
was a loaded question. I weighed my answer before giving it.

“Under different circumstances, yes.
But
as things are right now, no.”

“What
do you mean by that?”

“My
life is a mess right now. I’m not in any position to try to be a mother to
anyone. That’s why Wade and Mason are gone.” It pained me to say those words,
but I had to pretend indifference in front of the doctor. “When I leave here
tomorrow, I’ll have to find my place in the world again. Plus I don’t know if…I
just think he’s better off where he is now than with me.”

“What
were you going to say?”

I
sighed. “I was going to say that I don’t know if I could handle him living in
my house. I don’t know if I could stand to look at him every day, to look at
his face and see his father. To have a constant reminder of what I went through
and how he came to be. I just don’t know if I could do it. Not yet.”

It
was true. Seeing Austin’s face every day, a smaller version of
Ron,
was a torturous memento. It had driven me to the brink
of sanity and nearly pushed me over the edge. Seeing his face was a constant
reminder of who he was and from where he came. From the color of his hair and
eyes to the shape of his nose and chin, he was the spit and image of his
father.
A rapist.
A murderer.
A maniac.

“After
all, Dr. Loyd, living with the child of my abductor is a huge part of the
reason I ended up in here.”

“Are
you blaming the child?”

“No.
Absolutely not.
It’s not his fault. He didn’t ask to
be here. And if I were a stronger person—a better person—I could’ve overlooked
everything and just accepted him as my child. But unfortunately I’m not a
strong person.”

“Nicole,
that’s not true. We’ve gone over this before. What you went through, what you
survived, proves that you’re a strong person. You’re without a doubt one of the
strongest people I’ve ever treated.”

I
shook my head slightly and let my eyes fall to my hands, which were folded in
my lap.

“Then
why do I feel so weak?”

Dr.
Loyd tilted his head and thought about my question. He picked a piece of lint
off the sleeve of his green wool sweater before replying.

“The
human mind is full of self-doubt. For example, say an apartment complex housing
a hundred people catches on fire. A firefighter risks his life by running into
the burning building over and over, saving the lives of ninety-nine people. Yet
he still feels that he could’ve done something more to save the one person who
died. He doubts himself, his actions, and he carries guilt with him all of his
days, even knowing that he did all he could.
Knowing that if
not for him, ninety-nine other lives would’ve been lost.
Self-doubt.
It’s what we do. It’s a perfectly normal
reaction, Nicole.”