Collared(13)

He burst into my life and took me without my consent as they did. He confined me to a small space, pumping me full of drugs as they are doing. He punished me when I didn’t do what he wanted as they have. He restrained me when I resisted, taking away my freedom, just as they have.

If this is what being saved means, I want a pass. I want my old life in that small house in the middle of nowhere back because at least there, I’d gotten used to it. I had a schedule. I had fifteen feet of freedom inside a house instead of being strapped to a small hospital bed.

I’ve been told I’m at Seattle Mercy Hospital in Seattle, but I’m not sure how long I’ve been here or really much of anything else. The nurses and doctors whisk out as quickly as they whisk in. With the drugs pulling me under every few minutes, I’ve probably only been here for hours instead of the days it feels like.

I could ask. They probably would answer me. I could ask what happened to Earl Rae. I could ask where I’ve been living for years. I could ask just how many years I’ve been missing. I could ask any one of the million questions I have, but I don’t because I know the answers can be summed up in one phrase—I don’t want to know.

If I want any chance of making whatever kind of life a person like me can have going forward, I have to bury all of the past and pretend it doesn’t exist. The only way to have a future is to murder the past. To cut its throat, let it bleed out, and bury it in an unmarked grave.

The machines surrounding me beep every few seconds. I guess that means I’m alive, but I’ve never felt so dead. Well, other than those first few months after Earl Rae took me. The machine on my left shows my heart’s still beating, but it isn’t. Not really.

The room is dark and quiet. They gave me a private room when I was whisked in, and I’m thankful for that. My life has been so small for so long I’m not sure what would happen if I were thrown into all of the stimulation of the outside world all at once. The light, the noise, the smells, the people . . . I panic just thinking about it.

My head’s melting into my pillow again—the drugs are strong—when the door opens. At first I think it’s a man coming in, but when the person moves closer, I can see it’s a woman. She has short hair, is tall enough to play in the WNBA, and is in slacks and a button-down shirt. She isn’t dressed like the doctors and nurses. She isn’t in a SWAT uniform either. She’s wearing normal clothes—the first person I’ve seen in them.

She moves slowly across the room after closing the door. Her shoes barely make a noise on the tile floor. “Good evening. I’m Dr. Argent. I’m a psychiatrist who works with the hospital in certain instances. Is it okay if I sit down and talk with you for a minute?”

I can only imagine the things she wants to “talk” about. I’m not sure what her clinical term for me would be, but I know what the layman’s term is—a head case. I’ve been kidnapped and held captive, and I actually tried evading rescue when a team of police officers came to “save” me. She’s probably already working on a book deal for this mess of a case.

“Certain instances?” My throat’s dry because of the drugs. In the closet, I spent what felt like a year with severe cottonmouth. It isn’t a feeling I associate with pleasant memories.

“Exactly.” Dr. Argent moves closer, still slowly, and reaches for the pitcher of water on my bedside table. She pours some into a glass.

“Certain instances being a girl who’s been found years after her kidnapping?”

She doesn’t commit to my assumption. Instead she rolls her hand. “Anyone the hospital staff feels could benefit from talking with me.”

She holds the glass out for me, but I don’t lift my head. Cottonmouth’s uncomfortable, but not as much as drinking from a cup being held by a shrink because my hands are restrained.

“I don’t have much of a chance for a normal life, do I? After all of this?” I shake my head when she tips the cup in front of me. “I know the stories of other girls who were taken and held for years. They don’t acclimate back into society very well.”

She shrugs in a suit-yourself kind of way and sets the cup back down. “True, some don’t adjust back into what you call normal life well. But some do. That’s why I’m here and why I’m hoping you’ll be receptive to speaking with me.”

“Some do?” I repeat. “Don’t you mean most don’t?”

“And if some—even one person—have done it, that means it can be done. That means you can do it too.” She pauses like she’s hoping those words will wind their way inside me, but that door, the one receptive to optimism, was sealed shut years ago. “You don’t have to let what happened to you define the rest of your life. You don’t have to tell yourself you have no chance for a normal life, because guess what? There’s no such thing as a normal life. You can make a new life for yourself— however you want to build it.”

My throat itches. I need to scratch it, but I can’t with my wrists restrained. I try twisting my neck around on the pillow, but that’s useless. “I already built the kind of life I wanted. Years ago. I want that life back.”

“And why can’t you have it back?” she asks gently.

I haven’t had a conversation with another person in forever. Even with Earl Rae, we never really conversed. We exchanged words and a sentence here and there, but we never sat down and just talked. I feel out of practice. I don’t recognize the voice or words or edge of bitterness in my tone. I’m the one talking, but it feels like someone else is calling the shots as to what’s said and how it’s said.