Book - Part Deux

Well if it isn't perfect timing- Mummy has quite the migraine today and would rather be lying in bed in the fetal position than doing anything the resembles going through a normal day. As promised, another entry from the book. For the first entry click here.

Anyone else smell ammonia?

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In her mind, though Casey began to think back. Hit me? No. Rob had never hit me. Sure, there was that time that he twisted her arm a bit. When he would forcibly make her do things but that was not hitting. Besides, she was small and he was so big. He did not know his own strength. He always said he was sorry afterwards too. That she was weak and she was so small she needed to toughen up and he was just helping her. It was true. She was small and weak. She wanted to be tough. That was not hitting though. That was not what Candi was asking, was it? Was it?

Casey finished relaying this story to Elaine and then just stopped. She had no idea what to say next. She looked at Elaine. The silence in the room was palpable. Elaine uncrossed her legs, smoothed her skirt and looked at Casey for a minute before she spoke.

“Well, I was wondering when we were going to come to this.” She said. “We’ve only been dancing around it for the last year and a half in these sessions.” She said it easily and in a measured tone. She looked like she was gauging Casey.
“What?” Casey asked. She began to feel like she could not breathe. Her chest was tightening and the room narrowed just a bit. She dug her nails into the couch and looked into her lap. “What do you mean? You know why I come here. My problem is that I am having trouble with being away from home and my friends. I am concerned about my friends. I just like this outlet to talk about it. It is not any real problem. Do you think I'm just having a hard time dealing with the break up from Rob? I don’t…” She stopped. Her face grew sad. She knew. In just this instance, it was clear to her finally.

All those years with Rob. All those times he was “toughening her up”. They were not the typical easy-going, normal moments teen-age girls have with their high school boyfriends. It was more than that. Elaine was right. This was why she came to these sessions. It was not that she was homesick. It was that for the last five years of her life she had a secret so deep inside her that she herself had been blind to it. She never saw it for anything more than what Rob told her it was. She began to cry. Sobs quickly consumed and racked her body. She shuddered and grasped at the tissues Elaine offered her. She began to scream. Normally quite shy and reserved Casey no longer cared that someone was watching her howl like a wounded animal. She did not care who heard her. At last she was finally being heard.



Until next time...