Page 20 of Keeping My Girl

“I’m never safe,” I tell her simply.

“And why do you think that you’re never safe?”

“Because he always finds me.”

“Who finds you?” she presses.

“Constantine Carbone.”

Saying his name out loud sends a shiver through me. It’s like speaking the name of a demon and being afraid he’ll appear at any given moment. I can see a change in the psychiatrist’s face as well as she jots down some notes. God, I wish I could see what she’s writing. Does she think I’m crazy? Does she think I asked for all of this? Does she blame me for putting her employer on Constantine’s radar?

No, stop thinking that, I chide myself internally.

I’ve been battling horrible inner thoughts my entire life. I always expect the worst in every situation. Always. And it’s only because the worst always seems to happen. I’ve never actually been happy and safe.

Well, except for when I lived here with the Vitales the first time.

My eyes drift to the wall of windows to the left of me. Thinking about my past here, in this house, causes a familiar ache to take center stage inside my chest. For the first time in a long time, I allow myself to remember. The memories I desperately locked away for many years come flooding back to me. I can almost smell the familiar grass and the way it used to feel on my feet as Nico and I would run through the yard, playing tag or kick ball. We were always outside or finding excuses to go outside.

“What are you thinking about?” the psychiatrist asks, bringing my gaze back to her.

“The past,” I tell her simply.

“The past meaning when you were last here?”

I slowly nod. I wonder just how much the Vitale family told her about me. I’m assuming everything up until this point. She most likely knows my history, knows my past. Probably assumes some of the horrors I’ve been through but couldn’t possibly understand them. No one can but me.

“Do your memories from here help you cope with the present and what happened to you when you were being held captive?”

A lump forms in my throat, and I struggle to swallow past it. It’s like she can see right through me. Maybe she can. Maybe I’m as transparent as a ghost. I mean, I do feel like I’ve been dead for years. Never living; merely existing. “Yes,” I whisper. Picking at an imaginary thread on the arm of the chair I’m sitting in, I ask her, “Do you…do you think you could prescribe me something?”

“May I ask what you would want the medicine to accomplish?”

“I…I just want to be numb,” I confess. It’s been difficult facing reality since I realized where I am and who I’m with. I don’t want to see the looks of pity and disgust that I’ll no doubt find sometime soon on Nico’s face.

The psychiatrist glances up at me, her pen finally stopping. “I understand you were on a concoction of drugs when you arrived. Did they ever make you feel better?”

I consider her wording. Did they make me feel better? No, not really. They simply masked everything so that I could ultimately deal with it. I shake my head slowly, answering her honestly.

“I think dealing with past trauma sober would be a much better option than dealing with it while high or incoherent. Wouldn’t you agree?”

I fidget in my chair and glance at the clock on the wall. God, it’s only been thirty minutes. It feels like I’ve been in the hot seat for at least two hours.

“How about this?” she offers. “If you continue to see me and we continue to talk, I might be willing to prescribe you an anti-anxiety drug to help with your panic attacks you told me about. But I haven’t been totally able to assess you on this first visit, Selina, so I don’t feel comfortable just writing out scripts. Do you understand?”

I give her a small nod. I hate to think about trying to cope with all of this sober, but what else can I do? It’s not like I have easy access to drugs like I did before.

“Are we done?” I ask.

“Do you want to be?” she questions.

I nod again.

“Then we can be done,” she says simply. “Same time Wednesday?”

“Okay,” I agree.

I can tell the doctor sees me as a tough nut to crack, and I don’t know if she’ll ever make her way through the hard exterior walls I’ve built up around me over the years. I spent a lot of time fortifying them so that nobody could get in. I don’t even really remember the girl I was before Constantine took me and stole my innocence. Maybe she’s in there somewhere, screaming to get out.

If anyone could find her again, it would be Nico. But I won’t be here long enough for him to break her free. She’s probably lost forever, drowning in an endless pit of sorrow, and I refuse to throw her a life vest. The old Selina is better off dead and gone forever.

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