Better Off Forgotten
By C.L. Knight
Copyright 2011 C.L. Knight
Smashwords Edition
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Chapter One
I stood in the shower, letting the warm jets rinse away the remnants of the bad dream. Closing my eyes, I placed my face directly under the stream of water, before pressing the heels of my hands over my eyelids. I don’t know how long I stood that way. It could have been a few minutes or a few hours. The whole world slipped away and with it went my sense of time, until I heard the slight creak of the door.
“Are you all right?” His voice was muffled with sleep, but his concern was also evident.
“I’m okay,” I replied, without lifting my head or removing my hands. I heard the rustle of the shower curtain and sensed the slight change in light that occurred with it opening. Slipping my hands from my face, I turned to see him lifting one leg into the bath. Giving him a half-hearted attempt at a smile, I turned back to the water.
“Do you know what the time is?” He asked with a swift sweep of the curtain back across the length of the bath.
“Yes,” I replied, numbly. Well, that wasn’t true. I had no clue what the time was at that moment. I knew what the time had been when I left the bed, though.
“And you’re telling me you’re okay?” He probed, as he placed his arms around my waist and encouraged me to lean back against his broad chest. “People who get out of bed at three in the morning, and feel the sudden urge to take a shower, are not fine,” he whispered, placing his chin on my shoulder.
“Just a bad dream,” I said, entwining my fingers with his where they clung to my waist.
“I guessed that much,” he said softly. “You want to talk about it?”
I shook my head. He always asked and my answer was almost always the same. In the past, my excuse had been that there was nothing new to tell. On this occasion, that wasn’t entirely true. There had been something new, but certainly nothing I was prepared to tell him.
“Are you sure?” he nudged in that unconvinced tone he often used whenever I told him I was fine.
Turning to face him, I took his face in my hands, “I’m all right,” I insisted. “It was just another stupid nightmare and now it’s over.”
He opened his mouth to speak again, but not wishing to discuss it further, I quickly placed my lips to his. Tracing his bottom lip with my tongue, I heard him moan slightly, before opening his mouth. As soon as he did, I thrust my tongue forward running it over his and coaxing it into entwining with mine. Just when I thought I had him sufficiently distracted, however, he pulled back, placing his hands on my shoulders.
“Hey,” he began, a little breathlessly. “Listen, I know you don’t want to talk about it, but it worries me.”
“I know,” I said placing a brief kiss to his lips again. “I love it that you worry,” I added, moving my mouth to his collarbone and sucking on the thin layer of skin there. “I don’t know how I got so lucky,” I whispered, placing a deliberate row of kisses down his sternum and continuing south. “I don’t deserve you,” I concluded, as I reached his lower abdomen and let my tongue dart into his bellybutton. Sinking to my knees, the stream of water flowed over my head, pushing some of my hair into my face, as I came eyelevel to his growing erection. “You’re so good to me,” I said, as I drew my check against the side of his penis. I felt his body quiver slightly at the delicate contact and when my head came back on the return journey, I saw that his shaft had become significantly harder. I gazed at his manhood for a few seconds contemplating my next move.
I had never gone down on him before. We’d been dating for almost a year, but hadn’t become intimate until a few months into the relationship. Initially, I had been hesitate about sex and he’d been both patient and understanding; the perfect gentleman. Subsequently, he’d never asked me to pleasure him orally and I had certainly never offered. Previous experiences of oral sex had been fairly unpleasant affairs. Nervously, flicking my eyes towards his face, I saw that his eyelids had drifted closed and he was letting his head loll back against the wall.
What had started as a mere distraction technique, had suddenly become something much more, as I felt overcome with emotion for the man standing in front of me and realised that the nightmarish images were receding further and further into the distance. Suddenly, I found myself wanting to take him in my mouth. What had always seemed so distasteful, demeaning and objectionable to me, seemed like the most natural thing in the world. “I love you,” I told him, before placing my tongue on his tip and moving it in small circles.
“Faith,” he said huskily, with a voice that was about an octave lower than normal. “Oh, God.”
I’m almost certain, that ‘Oh, God’ was not what he intended to say, but as I placed my lips around his penis and began to suck on as much of it as I could comfortable fit in my mouth, they seemed to be the only words he could find. I slowly moved my head back and forth, stroking the underside of his cock with my tongue, as it slid from the entrance of my mouth to the soft pallet just before my gag-reflex kicked in.
“Faith,” he tried again, before clearing his throat.
Beginning to feel a little bolder, I tried to take more of him. I knew I’d never be able to take it all, he was far too big and I was far too inexperienced in the art of fellatio. But I wanted him to enjoy it, so on each forward motion, I tried to take a tiny bit more. Soon, I felt his bulbous head hit the back of my throat and immediately withdrew slightly, as the reflex to wretch took over. Desperate not to disappoint him, I tried to mask the reaction and continued to suck him as enthusiastically as I could. But I was careful not to take quite so much again.
“I…” he began, bringing his hands up to my head. His fingers brushed the hair, which the water had plastered to my forehead, away from my face and tucked it behind my ears. “I think…” he faltered, as he began taking deep breaths through his mouth.
I felt a moment of panic when his hands took a firmer grip of my face; a flash of concern that he would hold my head there and force himself into my mouth and down my throat. But, the thought did not have long to linger, as he pulled my lips away from him and encouraged me to my feet.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, feeling a little insecure about my efforts to please him. I was certainly no expert, and previous boyfriends had made it clear how unsatisfactory my efforts in that area were. However, as it was a favor I had never willingly given in the past, the fact that I was deemed ‘bad’ at it, hadn’t bothered me. Now, though, was a different matter entirely. I had wanted him to enjoy it. If what I’d been doing was good, or even just okay, why would he stop me? He was a man after all.
He took two deep breaths before speaking, “I think that we should take a step back.”
“Was I doing something wrong?” I asked in a quiet voice, looking at my feet as I spoke.
“What?” he blurted, with the hint of a laugh.
When I still couldn’t raise my eyes to meet his, he took my chin in his finger and thumb and lifted it gently. I peered into his face, but still managed to avoid his eyes.
“Look at me,” he encouraged softly. “You were doing everything very right,” he said solemnly. “But I don’t want us to do this while all that stuff is in your head.” He hesitated briefly over the word ‘stuff’. Although, I had never filled him in on specific details of my dreams, he knew that they were violent, he knew that sometimes I would wake in the night and be physically sick and he also knew, like me, that the dreams had, at least some, basis in fact. “I love you,” he whispered, so quietly that I barely heard him over the sound of the water still running from the shower and over our bodies. “And I can’t bear the thought of…”
“It’s all right,” I assured him, through the lump in my throat. I wanted to say more, but I couldn’t find the words. Instead, I pressed my mouth firmly to his, pushing him flat against the wall. While my tongue forced its way into his mouth and the smooth skin on my face scraped against the slight stubble on his, my hand drifted between our bodies, grasping hold of his somewhat diminishing erection.
His hand darted down to grasp my wrist. “No, Faith,” he insisted with just a hint of anger, twisting his head to avoid the attack of my lips. “No,” he repeated more softly, but no less firmly. “I can’t. I don’t want you to associate us…together, like this, with the sick things in those dreams.”
My hand fell away from his penis, causing him to release my wrist. Panting slightly, I took a small step backwards. Meeting his eyes properly for the first time since he came into the bathroom, I gazed into those dark brown depths and saw such compassion and concern that I almost couldn’t breathe. Was it really possible that this man cared so deeply for me; more deeply than I’d ever cared for myself? “You,” I mumbled, as tears began to form. “Are the most incredible man I have ever known.”
He gave a half smile and shrugged slightly. “Well,” he said, “I try.”
I managed a genuine smile in return. “It really is all right,” I said, taking a step forwards and closing the gap that had opened between us. “That stuff - the nightmares,” I clarified, putting my arms around his waist and burying my head against his shoulder. “They go away when I’m with you.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, skeptically.
“I promise,” I assured him. “When you stepped into this bath, those dreams were the furthest thing from my mind.” I paused for a moment before deciding, in the interests of honesty, to amend that statement slightly. “Well,” I began hesitantly. “When we began kissing, the dreams started to become the furthest thing from my mind. When I was on my knees just know, they were pushed completely away.”
“Really?” he asked, pulling away from me slightly, so he could look at my face. “You wouldn’t just say that, would you?”
I silently shook my head. Then, I felt the twitch of his still semi-erect penis pressed against my hip. “So?” I asked, elongating the vowel sound in an attempt to lighten the mood. “Perhaps I should just pick up where….” I trailed off, as I began to slip lower down his body intent on finishing what I had started. However, before I reached my knees, he grasped my elbows gently.
“That can’t be comfortable,” he pointed out, lifting me slowly once again to a standing position. “I’ve got a better idea,” he said with a smile, before spinning me around, so that our places were reversed, and pushing me against the wall.
“I like the way you think,” I told him, before his lips came down to meet mine. I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled his head closer, as his tongue began a very deep and thorough exploration of my mouth.
His hand slipped down my side to my left thigh, lifting my leg until the knee was level with his hip, and he used his other hand to tease my right breast. Leaving my mouth, he traced a path of kisses down my neck. I realized just how much restraint he had displayed earlier to stop things, as his hands, lips and tongue now moved at feverish speed over my skin. The hand that had been at my breast was suddenly gone and I felt him move to my labia, parting the lips and pressing his middle finger to my clitoris, then rubbing in gentle circles.
Whether he realized that I was sufficiently aroused or simply decided he couldn’t wait any longer, I don’t know, but this stimulation hadn’t lasted more than a few seconds when his finger abruptly ceased its action. Immediately, he bent at the knees slightly, to position himself at my entrance, before looking up into my eyes. His mouth quirked into a grin and he slowly brought his lips to mine. As our tongues stroked and wrapped around each other, he pushed himself inside me with a long groan that emanated from the back of his throat and reverberated in my mouth. At the same time, I heard a moan that must have come from me, but I wasn’t conscious of making it.
I wrapped my left leg firmly around his hip and he released my thigh to grasp both of my hands with his. Interlacing our fingers, he lifted my arms and pinned them against the wall above my head, while gradually pulling his shaft from me. When only the tip of his penis remained inside, he stopped, removed his tongue from my mouth and disengaged our lips. He looked at me for a brief second with an expression I couldn’t read, but there was no opportunity to ask him about it, as he slammed his hips against mine with a powerful thrust that knocked the air from my lungs and caused the head of his shaft to bump my cervix.
Resting his check against mine, his ragged breath was coming in gasps at my ear. “Too much?” he asked between pants.
Closing my eyes, I lifted my chin slightly and let my head flop back against the wall. Aware that he had said something that needed a response, I tried to work out what the question was, but my brain refused to cooperate, as his hard chest heaved with his struggle for breath, causing a delicious friction against my nipples. Moreover, the knowledge that his difficulty in breathing was caused by his arousal, rather than any physical exertion, was making me weak in the knees. I eventually managed to make a non-committal humming noise, hoping that, whatever the question, that would be the right answer.
I felt, rather than heard, him chuckle slightly. “Did you hear what I said?” he whispered, bringing his lips to my earlobe, before taking it gently between his teeth.
“Yes,” I gasped, shifting my fingers restlessly beneath his.
“Oh, yeah?” he asked, placing a line of kisses down my neck, across my throat and then back up the other side. “What did I say?” he muttered in the other ear, as he slowly drew back his pelvis once again, leaving about an inch of his cock in me.
The need to touch him was becoming unbearable and I struggled agitatedly against the hands that held mine captive. “What?” I panted, opening my eyes and forcing myself to focus on what he was asking me, but realizing that, at that moment, I’d probably have trouble remembering my own name.
Noticing my mounting restlessness, his fingers disconnected from mine and his hands began a leisurely trip over my wrists, and down my arms stopping at the sides of my breasts. “I said,” he muttered softly between mouthfuls of my skin, as he allowed his lips to follow the path that his right hand had just taken. “What did I say?”
A jolt of electricity whipped through my entire body when he placed on open mouthed kiss to the outside of my left breast. “Oh, God!” I cried, as my whole body began to tremble. Grasping his head and fisting his short dark hair, I pushed his face closer to my chest, silently begging him not to stop.
But he did stop. Placing his hands on the wall either side of me, he pushed his upper body away from mine and looked directly in my eyes. “What did I say?” he repeated, with a sternness that was betrayed by the slight smile on his face, which told me he was loving the fact that higher brain function was beyond me. In fact, who was I kidding? Lower brain function was pretty far out of reach, too.
I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing intelligible emanated from it. Instead, I produced a guttural sound, as he forced himself back inside me even more vigorously than he had the first time. My back slid several inches up the wall and I grabbed his shoulders for support as the strength of his thrust made me dizzy. “Ben,” I gasped, now finding it difficult to remember how to breathe. “Too much,” I managed to blurt out on an exhalation of air.
His hands slid quickly down to my waist, pulling himself completely from me and letting my leg slip limply from its perch around his hip. “I’m sorry,” he said, speaking quickly and bringing a hand to my face to brush my hair behind my ear. “I’m so sorry,” he repeated, “Did I hurt you?”
A moment of complete bewilderment descended on me. I couldn’t understand the abrupt removal of his body from mine or the apologetic look on his face. The speed with which he had spoken was not helping in my efforts to comprehend the sudden change in our situation. Looking at his face, I felt my eyebrows crease slightly, as the last words I’d spoken came rushing back to me.
“I did, didn’t I?” A growing look of utter mortification rose on his face, as he spoke again. “I hurt you. I am so sorry, Faith-”
Unable to speak, but unwilling to let him continue to batter himself over some imagined harm, I had to play for time. Taking either side of his face in my hands, I pressed my lips to his in a gentle, but persistent kiss. I was careful to add nothing sensual to it, as the aim was to give my brain and body a chance to resume some semblance of normality. After a few seconds, rational and connected thoughts were back, so I assumed language would be returning, too. Allowing my lips to slowly disengage from his, I kept a firm hold of his face. “No,” I said, emphatically, “I’m sorry.”
“But I-”
“No,” I repeated, gripping his face a little tighter. “You didn’t hurt me,” I insisted.
“Faith, you said-”
“No,” I stopped him again. “I mean, yes, I did say ‘too much’, but I didn’t mean that it was too much. I just remembered what you were asking me.” I paused for breath and gave him a smile. “You were asking me if I’d heard what you said,” I continued to explain, as the look of guilt refused to leave his features. “And I was trying to remember, but couldn’t and then it came to me. You asked me if it was too much.” I allowed myself a small pause before feeling the need to continue, “I wasn’t telling you it was too much, I was just repeating what you-” I didn’t get a chance to finish my sentence, as he pushed me firmly against the wall again.
He placed one leg between mine, and nudged my thighs apart with his knee. My hand automatically went to his throbbing erection, which either had not abated at all during the course of our conversation or was back with a very sudden vengeance. I rubbed my fingers up and down the length of him and let my thumb wipe at the fluid weeping from the tip, before quickly lining it up at my entrance. Then, I lifted my leg to stroke his calf with my toes. “Faith,” he growled, “I’m not sure how long I’m going to be able to last.”
“It’s all right,” I whispered, letting the fingers of my free hand stroke the back of his head and the nape of his neck. Looking down, I released the grip I held on his shaft and watched, as it slowly disappeared into my body. When his hips made contact with mine, a small whimper left my lips as his pubic bone pressed against my clitoris. The slight noise seemed to attract his mouth to mine, as his tongue began to tease my bottom lip. I felt him slowly withdraw from me, but he seemed to hesitate slightly. “It’s all right,” I repeated, allowing my hands to slide down his back. By the time I reached the base of his spine, he still hadn’t moved, so my hands continued their exploration. When I reached his buttocks, I gripped one in each hand and pulled him to me; releasing a long, low moan as he filled me again.
This seemed to be all the encouragement he needed, as any pretence of a slow unhurried approach was completely abandoned. Stopping twice during the height of arousal had clearly taken its toll on his patience. His body was now screaming for release. “You feel so good, Faith,” he panted in my ear, as our bodies came together with a hard wet slap. His hands moved to my hips and held them in a viselike grip, as he prepared to thrust into me again. “I’m close,” he said, as his penis forced its way deeper still, demanding to be accommodated by my body.
I knew that he was now way ahead of me, the raggedness of his breath and the spasms in his buttocks telling me more than his words, just how close he was to orgasm. But I couldn’t find it within myself to feel angry or even disappointed about being left behind. After all, I had been the cause of his mounting frustration, so I was only too happy to provide the relief he so desperately craved.
Releasing my grip on his bottom, I moved my hands up to the back of his head and drew his mouth down to mine. Sliding my tongue, between his slightly parted lips, I began to mimic the action and rhythm of his body as it frantically pulled back and drove into mine again and again. When he plunged into me, I ground my hips against his, trying desperately to fuel my own orgasm, but the contact didn’t last long enough; before I knew it, he had withdrawn.
As he stepped up the speed of his motion, he only allowed himself time to remove around half of his shaft, before forcing himself back into me with a grunt. And then it was over, as the whole of his penis was buried deep inside me, I felt his upper body stiffen and his fingers spasm, as he clamped down harder on my hips, followed quickly by the a breathless gasp of my name and the spurts of semen, which spilled out of his body and flowed into mine.
He continued to kiss me or, more accurately, our tongues continued to wrestle with one another, while the last of his come flowed into me and he made a few final lazy movements with his lower body. Then, he removed his mouth from my lips and tilted his head back, gasping for breath. Shifting his hips, he slid flaccidly out of me, before resting his forehead against mine. “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “That was selfish of me.”
“It’s okay,” I whispered. “I love you, Ben.”
“I love you,” he responded, putting his arms around me and pulling me tightly against his chest.
We stood that way for several minutes, allowing the warm water to wash over us. Eventually, however, he noted the wrinkled skin on my hands and told me that I was beginning to resemble a shriveled old prune. Turning off the water, he suggested that we go back to bed. The thought of returning to sleep and the potential for further nightmares was too terrifying to contemplate, but rather than explain that, I lied, and told him that I wasn’t tired.
“Who said anything about going to sleep?” he quipped, with what, for Ben, passed as a smirk.
I grinned at him, as I pulled the shower curtain aside and reached for a towel. “You’ve got more in you?” I asked, arching an eyebrow and tossing the towel in his direction before turning my back on him to grab another.
“Well,” he sighed, as he pulled the towel around his waist and tucked it in on itself. “I’m not sure about that, but there are other ways to ensure you’re satisfied.”
With that, he gripped the towel in my hands and tugged it out of my grasp. He began to gently rub it across my chest, breasts, arms and stomach. Then he moved down to my legs, before turning me around to dry my back. I stood there, passively enjoying his affection and surprising myself by just how much a simple action like that turned me on. When he was sure that every last inch of me was dry, he stepped out of the bath and draped the damp towel over the edge of the tub.
Placing one hand on his muscular shoulder, I lifted my right then left leg out of the bath and stood beside him. “Don’t you want me to do you?” I asked gesturing to the water that was still dripping down his neck and chest.
With a self-deprecating smile, he replied, “You’ve already done me. It’s your turn.” His smile broadened, as he reached up to rub his thumb along my cheek bone. “Come on,” he said taking my hand and leading me from the bathroom, pulling on the light cord as he crossed the threshold.
When I felt the carpet of the bedroom at my feet, I immediately felt uncomfortable. And when I glanced toward the bed with the rumpled sheet tangled at the foot of it, a feeling of dread came over me. For the last two months, the nightmares had been getting progressively worse; more vivid, more frequent and more violent. Tonight’s had been the worst one yet, not because it had been more brutal, but because there had been something else. It probably couldn’t be described as anything other than a feeling. One I didn’t understand and one I could never explain to Ben.
Unaware of the thoughts running through my mind and the growing sense of trepidation with every step closer to the bed, he continued to lead me into the room. When he reached the edge of bed, he turned to look at me, “You know, you are so beautiful,” he said, lazily outlining my face with the back of his index finger. “I really am sorry about earlier,” he continued, looking down with the hint of a blush to his cheeks.
“It’s really no big deal,” I told him, trying to keep my eyes focused on his face, preventing them from drifting to the bed behind him.
“It is a big deal,” he whispered, before lifting his eyes and leaning in to press his lips gently to mine. “It’s a big deal to me,” he mumbled, barely removing his mouth from mine. As he kissed me, he released the hand he’d been holding and wrapped both arms around me.
Suddenly, images from the nightmare were back. The blurred face that shouted something incoherent, before swinging a fist, which struck my cheekbone. I flinched and took a sudden step away from Ben, noting the confused look on his face. “I just realized how late it is,” I fumbled awkwardly, knowing that he wasn’t about to buy the excuse I was giving. “You have to go to work in the morning.”
“So do you,” he pointed out with a smile, reaching out a hand to me.
I glanced down at his hand, knowing that it was an invitation to return to his embrace. Part of me was desperate to fling myself into his arms, but the other part knew where that would lead. He would want me to lie down on the bed with him and I just couldn’t do that. I also couldn’t tell him the truth, because he would assume I’d been lying to him in the bathroom. Would he understand that it was just the bedroom that was my source of anxiety? Knowing him like I did, I guessed he would, but I couldn’t afford to take the chance. If he believed, or even just had a hunch, that I had seduced him in the shower and lied to him, just to avoid talking to him, he’d never forgive me. And even if our relationship survived, our physical intimacy would always be tainted. No, I had far too much to lose.
“Faith,” he said, the smile rapidly draining from his face. “Is everything all right?”
I plastered a grin, that even I knew would look phony, on my face. “Yes,” I said, breezily. “Everything’s absolutely fine.” I turned away from him, unable to lie to his face, and moved to the chest of drawers that stood against the wall. “But you have to get some rest and I don’t think you’re going to get any sleep this way.” Opening the top drawer, I rifled through the garments, until I found the over-sized T-shirt I was looking for.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m letting you sleep,” I said, tossing the T-shirt over my head and shoving my arms quickly through the sleeves. Bumping the drawer with my hip to close it, I turned to the door without looking at Ben.
“Faith,” he said plaintively. “If you’re upset about what happened in the shower, then we can talk about it.”
I paused with my fingers wrapped around the door handle. “I’m not upset,” I told him, still unwilling to face him, which I was aware would do nothing to reassure him. Sighing slightly, I turned to look at him. “I promise,” I began, “I’m not upset about what happened in the bathroom.” I took a shaky breath while I tried to work out what to say next. “I…” I stuttered, “I just…” As my eyes drifted away from his, they wandered back to the bed and the face from my dreams instantly returned. “You need your sleep,” I finished pathetically, before pulling on the handle that was still gripped in my fist, slipping out into the hallway and listening to the soft click, as the door closed behind me.
Chapter Two
“And what was it that happened in this particular dream?”
I looked at my shoes, then at the Monet print on the wall, before allowing my eyes to return to Doctor Rutter. She had been my psychiatrist for three years; ever since I was discharged from the hospital. A tall, blonde woman, I guessed she was no more than five years older than me. She wore glasses, which she seemed to enjoy playing with when she was waiting for an answer. As she removed them from the bridge of her perfect nose, she gripped the left arm in her right hand and twirled the spectacles around in a large circle.
“Faith, I can’t help you-” she began.
Knowing exactly where the sentence was leading, I stopped her before she got into her stride. “It wasn’t so much what happened in the dream,” I explained quickly. “It was what I felt.”
“Okay,” she said, elongated the ‘o’ and replacing her glasses. “So, what did you feel?”
“I don’t know,” I replied with a shrug, before turning my attention to a small crack in the corner of the ceiling.
“Well, you must have some idea, otherwise this dream wouldn’t have disturbed you more than any of the others.” She allowed a few seconds for that undisputable piece of logic to settle, before opening her mouth to speak again. “So, what did you feel?” she repeated.
I exhaled loudly and allowed my chin to sink slowly back down, so I could look at her. “I think…” I began slowly. “I think…I mean, I felt as though…”
Dr. Rutter picked up her pen and began to write something. “It’s all right,” she said while scribbling. “Take your time.”
“The man in the dream…”
“The blur?” she asked.
“Yes,” I replied. “He is still just a blur, but some features are becoming clearer. Like, err, I know he’s got blue eyes.” Those blue eyes had come to me for the first time two nights previously. Nothing else about the man was clear in my head, but, for some reason, his eyes were extremely vivid.
“That’s good,” she said in a way I found thoroughly patronizing. “What about this man?”
I took another deep breath and shook my head slightly. How could I explain something that I didn’t understand. “I’ve always felt such hatred for him,” I said quietly, thinking that perhaps, if I took a different route, the destination would make more sense.
“That’s perfectly understandable, Faith,” she commented, not bothering to look up and continuing to write.
“Yes, it is,” I confirmed. “Last night, though…” I paused, terrified to say the words out loud. I seemed to have a childlike belief that, if I said it aloud, it would somehow make it all the more true. “Last night was different. I didn’t hate him,” I blurted out suddenly.
“Uh huh,” was her ambivalent reply.
“I think I felt…I don’t know,” I fumbled. “I liked him.”
“What do you mean, you ‘liked him’?” she asked, looking over the rim of her glasses at me.
It was the eyes that had done it. Ever since that small part of his face had come into focus, my feelings for him had begun to change. “I mean, I felt something for him,” I attempted to elaborate and failed miserably. “I think…I think…I loved him.” I finished, raising my hands in a gesture of surrender and slumping back into my chair. Love probably wasn’t the right word, but it was the only one that came close to describing the strong emotion I seemed to have towards the figure in my dream.
Rutter stopped writing, removed her glasses and looked at me. “Firstly, Faith, it was just a dream,” she began softly. “And secondly, even if those dreams are memories of emotions you felt at the time, it doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you.”
“Oh, really?” I asked sarcastically, bringing my index finger to my temple and rubbing in small circles. As far as I was concerned, there was something very wrong with having romantic feelings for a man who had kidnapped me and held me captive.
“Yes, really.” she confirmed, keeping her voice even. “Have you ever heard of Stockholm Syndrome?”
I nodded, I had read extensively on the subject for an article I’d written last year. “But there’s more to it than that,” I pointed out, refusing to accept her simplistic explanation of what I knew to be much more complex and infinitely more disturbing.
“All right, what makes you think that?” she asked, pushing her glasses back up her nose and resuming her writing pose.
I rested my elbows on my knees and allowed my face to sink into my hands. Without lifting my head, I spoke, knowing that it would be difficult for her to hear me. “I’m fairly certain that I wanted him to…”
She obviously had better hearing than I gave her credit for, because she immediately replied. “You wanted him to what?”
“To do what he did,” I said, stubbornly refusing to remove my face from my hands. “I wanted him to hit me, to kick me…”
“To beat you within an inch of your life?” she asked, simply.
“Yes,” I replied, finally looking up to see her scribbling feverishly in her pad.
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” I snapped. “You’re the fucking psychiatrist, you tell me.”
Her eyes darted up at the expletive, but she said nothing. A confused look crossed her face, possibly because, although she had seen me at my most impatient, my most angry and my most moody, in the three years I had been seeing her, she had never heard me use that kind of language.