Page 67 of Finding Amanda

Amanda tried to smile, ignoring the twisting in her stomach.

"I'm sorry?—"

"No, it's okay," she said. "I was with my best friend and her family, and we were on our way to the beach. Her parents were in the front seat, my friend was on one side of me, and her brother was on the other, the three of us were shoved in the back of a tiny Celica."

Alan tilted his head to the side. "Okay . . . ?"

"A truck lost control. Hit the car. We were pinned between the truck and a guardrail. The car sort of folded up."

"How awful," he said.

"My friend . . . all of them died. I guess because I was in the middle . . ."

His hand enveloped hers. "Amanda, I'm so sorry. I can't imagine."

Shaking off the nightmarish scene that filled her mind, she worked for an even tone. "My mom took me to see Gabriel. He was a psychiatrist in Boston."

Alan's lips were pursed, the hand not holding hers fisted.

"I saw him once a week, and he helped me so much." She squeezed his hand. "Look, this is in the memoir. You don't want to hear it again."

He squeezed her hand. "I do. I want to hear everything, but if it's too hard for you, I understand."

Mark never wanted to talk about it. Whenever the subject came up, he'd shut down as if he had a power switch. And here was this man who, even after reading her story, still wanted to talk about it.

"Gabriel was so considerate and kind. I began to develop feelings for him, and I thought he felt the same way." Atfifteen, she hadn't understood anything. They were in love, and how could love be so wrong?The world needs more love, Gabriel always said. Now, whenever she saw a teenaged girl, she realized how vulnerable she'd been, how sick Gabriel had been to take advantage of her.

When she was writing the memoir, so many stories, so many details surfaced about those first few months she and Gabriel had spent together. She'd put them in the book as a warning to other girls, so they could recognize the signs. But she didn't want to go into that with Alan.

"Anyway," she continued, "you know what happened."

"I just can't believe a psychiatrist would do what he did." His anger seemed to simmer just below the carefully-controlled words.

"Yeah. I guess?—"

"You were fifteen? How old was he?"

"Mid-thirties. And he was married with children. But I was sixteen when the affair began."

"Oh, that makes it okay, then." Sarcasm laced his voice.

"We were together my last two years of high school. He wanted me to go to college in Boston, so we could be together. But I didn't want to. Even though I thought I loved him, I knew I needed a break from him. I went to Plymouth State in New Hampshire, hours away. Before I left that summer, he proposed."

"Even though he was already married?"

"He said he'd be divorced by the time I graduated, and then we could get married. I agreed, thinking I'd have a few years of fun before I settled down with him. It took less than a month away from him to realize what a hold he'd had on me."

"What do you mean?"

"It was like . . . He'd become my whole world. I'd lost my best friend in the accident. My father traveled a lot for work.My brothers had both moved out. Gabriel became everything to me. Up at Plymouth, I made new friends and got involved in my studies, and I realized he'd become almost like . . ." Amanda looked down, stared at their clasped hands.

"It was like he was the leader of a cult, and I was his only follower. Like he was a . . . a god to me or something. I knew I had to get away from him. But I didn't have the courage to try to break it off. He was so good at manipulating me. He would have talked me out of it. So at the end of the semester, I transferred to Johnson & Wales in Providence to study culinary arts, and I didn't tell him. I changed my cell phone number. My parents moved that year to Florida, not that Sheppard would've contacted them. I just kind of . . . disappeared."

"Hmm," he said. "So you're saying that, in the hotel, when you said he found you, that was the first time you'd seen him since . . . when, exactly?"

"That was the first time I'd seen him since I was eighteen. Since the day he proposed."

"Oh. Wow."

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