Page 1 of Twisted Salvation
Chapter One
Myra
What do you dowhen you have nowhere to run from your thoughts? My mind is a constant buzz of noise and worry. I replay conversations over and over, thinking about all the things I could have said differently: random words, phrases, song lyrics, and a constant feeling of impending doom. I get overwhelmed by my own anxiety, and then the wave of anger hits. I can’t manifest that anger outwardly, so I keep it in. I pack all my problems away in a little glass bottle. When I’m alone, I shatter the bottle and use the shards of glass to cut myself, both metaphorically and literally.
I have been self-harming since I was eleven years old. It’s the only time I feel in control of my pain. It’s the only time I can get my brain to quiet down for long enough that all the anger, worry, sadness, and hatred I feel towards myself can slip away. It doesn’t last long, though. Once the bleeding has stopped and it’s bandaged, the feelings slam back down on me—shoved into a new glass bottle to be released on another day.
Sometimes, the bottles pile up. Sometimes, I break them all open, and it’s too much to handle. Obviously, I’ve never completed suicide before, but I’ve tried—I’ve thought about it foryears. Hell, I’d blow the reaper just for him to drag me to hell. Maybe it’s more peaceful there. Once, I got as far as sitting on the edge of a bridge, but a homeless man with a heart of gold talked me down. There was one time I drank my dad’s last bottle of whiskey and took an entire bottle of pain meds, but I just woke up hours later to my father fucking me. All he said was that he doesn’t like me when I’m limp because I don’t fight him. Father of the year, am I right?
I am standing at the bathroom sink in the restroom of my work with a razor blade in my hand. I am trying to calm myself down before I make the cut, or I’ll end up going far deeper than I intend to. Last night I had another nightmare, only to be woken by Leon. He was screaming at me because my crying woke him up thirty minutes before our alarm. I was still crying when I woke, and he made it so much worse.
His favorite thing to tell me is that the world would be a better place if I killed myself, just like my whore of a mother did. He knows she is a sore spot for me because she is the only one who tried to protect me from Dad. I found her with her wrists slit in the bathtub when I was nine. I only went in there because I was bleeding pretty badly after Dad came to my room for “father-daughter bonding time.” She had been dead for a while, which means Dad knew she was dead and came to my room to rape me before calling the police.
The only thing that Leon hasn’t taken from me is therapy, and that is only because I hardly talk about it. He always tells people that it's where I go to bitch about my dead mother, so that he doesn’t have to listen to it. Also, he doesn’t know my psychiatrist is a man.I’ve been seeing him since I was eighteen. He had just gotten his own practice, and I was one of his first patients. Six years, and I’ve managed to hide his identity from Leon the entire time. Although I started therapy six months before I met Leon.
Leon was my psychology professor, but he was fired because of our relationship. Now, he has his own practice. He primarily sees people for drug abuse counseling. He blames me for losing his job because I melted down after we got into a fight on campus. I spiraled and told someone I was afraid of losing him. I knew I had fucked up the moment it came out of my mouth, but I was distraught. That was my senior year, and Leon talked me out of pursuing my master’s degree because he was fired and made me feel guilty for wanting to stay.
Dominic Mercer has got to be the hottest doctor I have ever met, but he’s my best friend. Maybe I shouldn’t call my shrink my friend, but he’s all I’ve got. He might get paid by my insurance, but I know without a doubt that if I got into a bad enough place, he’d come to me. He’s told me time and time again that day or night, he will come to me if I need him. I am supposed to see him today, which means I need to leave soon.
I take a deep breath and press the razor into my arm before slowly dragging it through my flesh. Blood pours out and drips into the sink. Relief washes over me when the pain bites deep. Deep enough to quiet the noise. Deep enough to bury the memories. My heart rate is accelerated, and my breathing is quickened. I tip my head back and close my eyes to focus on the pain. This is the most blissful feeling, but I hate that I can only find it like this. I’mdisgusted by the scars. I hide them away from me and the rest of the world. I don’t want anyone to see the physical manifestation of my suffering. I just want my mind to slow down. I want to feel calm and at peace. Do I even know what peace feels like?
I exhale in annoyance and return to reality. It’s way deeper than I wanted, so it’s going to take some time to stop bleeding. I don’t think it needs stitches, but I won’t get them either way. It will just be another nasty scar to join my many others. The rips in my flesh are a reminder that I am alive, even if I don’t always want to be. It’s gotten worse lately, so I know I need to talk to Dominic soon. He doesn’t know how bad it has gotten. I’m afraid he will lock me away and call me crazy. He knows all my deep, dark secrets and every bit of my trauma, but he doesn’t know that Leon is nearly as bad as my dad.
Leon has never hit me like Dad did. He has slapped me plenty of times, but Dad left bruises and cuts behind to show his anger. All my broken bones are attributed to him and his drunken rage. He broke my arm when I was ten and told the doctors I fell while riding my bike. They believed him because I knew what would happen if I told the truth. The truth was far darker than a bike accident. He was making me take him orally, and my teeth touched him. He shoved me away from him as he sat on the couch, and I went through the coffee table. My left arm took the brunt of it, and the hospital never even blinked an eye.
I lay gauze over my cut and tightly wrap it before pulling the sleeve of my shirt down. What a terrible day to wear white, but it should hold fine. When I walk out of the restroom, I go to Leon’s office.His last patient should have left ten minutes ago, so I need to tell him I’m leaving before I go, or he will be pissed.
As soon as I open the door, I freeze. Leon is sitting in one of the armchairs while his client is on her knees in front of him. He has a tight grip on her hair as he forces her down on his cock. She’s not fighting, but she is gagging while she sucks his dick. Leon has his head tipped back, but snaps it in my direction when I clear my throat.
“What?” he says with a warning in his voice. He doesn’t stop pushing her head down on his dick, and now I can see the girl is getting herself off, too.
“I’m leaving for therapy,” I say quietly, dropping my head.
“Fine. I’m going out tonight. Don’t wait up,” he says, closing his eyes and tipping his head back again. “Shut the door.”
Tears well up in my eyes, and I rush out of the room. I know he cheats a lot, but it’s fucking heartbreaking to see it in person. He reminds me all the time that I am not good enough for him and that he needs a real woman to get the job done. That doesn’t stop him from forcing me to suck his dick or from holding me down when he’s drunk and fucking me so hard that I sometimes bleed. Considering he is drunk every night, you’d think my body would be used to what he does. Even the very first time we had sex in his office, it was only because he said I was failing and letting him fuck me was the only way to pass. After that, what he did seemed to be better than what Dad would do, so I just dealt with it. He talked me into moving in with him after only a month of dating.
Now, I know he groomed me for this. He showered me with affection and love-bombed the fuck out of me. The moment I moved in, it all changed, and I was stuck. I’m still stuck, unless I want to move back in with Dad. I could probably only get by with a week or two without him raping me, though.
I step out of the office and into the early spring weather. Dominic’s office is only a few blocks away, so I don’t need to catch the bus. I am nearly sobbing the entire way, and I know he will make me tell him what’s wrong. I know I can’t hide Leon’s abuse forever. Let’s face it, though; he likely already knows and just hasn’t made me talk yet.
I manage to stop crying by the time I step into the building, but he is standing up front waiting for me, just as he always does. Something about the rage that flashes in his eyes instantly makes me start crying again. I know his rage isn’t directed toward me, so I’m not afraid or triggered, but it tells me he knows how awful Leon is. He knows I work for him and that I leave work every Friday to come here.
“Come on,” Dominic says softly, waving me down the hall. I nod and sniff back tears before following him to his office. I go and sit on the couch as he shuts the door, preparing for him to make me talk. Instead, he grabs a box of tissues from his desk and sits next to me. He never sits close to me unless he thinks I’m about to have a meltdown.
“I’m sorry,” I whimper.
“For what?” he asks, turning on the couch to face me. I do the same and take a tissue from the box to wipe away the snot and tears.
“I don’t know,” I say through broken cries. I am slowly losing myself to these emotions, which makes me start to panic. The moment it begins to surface, he takes my hand and squeezes.
“Three things, Myra. What are they?” he asks. When he senses a meltdown, he distracts me by having me name three sounds, three sights, and take three deep breaths.
“Uhm… The clock… your breathing, and… shit, I don’t know. Me?” I say, almost like a question.
“Good, Myra. Breathe with me, okay?” he encourages. I nod and close my eyes. We’ve done this countless times, and it’s still as helpful now as it was the first time. We take three long, deep breaths in and slowly exhale. On the third, I open my eyes.
“I’m sorry,” I say again, only calmer.
