Page 146 of Lost
“I was at the hospital after a birth and ran into them. They said that they recognized my eyes. I got spooked and started to leave, and in Lars’ panic, he used his alpha bark on me. They tracked me down, and in their singlemindedness to prove their suspicions to me, they weren’t very kind,” I remember.
“What is your reason for coming to see me?” Dr. Alys asks.
“I have three scent matches, three bond bites as of this weekend, but the original isn’t healing. Honestly, neither is Lars’, even though his and Caleb’s are much fresher, there’s no reason for it. When I went to have a doctor look at Tyde’s bond bite, he told me that my body is rejecting it.”
“There’s typically only a few reasons I’ve heard of or seen that cause this to happen,” she says, leaning back to fold her hands in her lap. “They all stem from the omega’s inner self not feeling safe. Even if you feel safe with them, it could be because your inner self is trying to protect you from past alpha trauma that’s not yet healed.”
“That’s what I thought it might be,” I whisper. “I feel defective. I know that my alphas don’t think that, but I have nightmares about a dead alpha. The things he did…”
“So we’ll work through it all so that you can have a brighter future,” she promises. “You may not even need to be too far into sessions before your inner omega feels safe enough to acceptyour bonds. As long as you’re doing the work, you may be able to show yourself that you’re taking care of the most important person in this equation: you. When was the last time you put yourself first?”
“The day I left home, and then kept running. Otherwise? My entire life revolves around caring for others.”
“Empty cups can’t pour into others, Nova. I’m going to begin this session by telling you that whatever you had to do for your own survival wasn’t wrong,” she says. “If it was running, deflecting, finding whatever coping tools you could to keep going, it was all right at the time you did it.”
Tear after tear slides down my cheeks as I nod.
“I tried to kill myself to get away from him,” I wheeze. “I feel so much guilt for doing that. How can I celebrate life for others when I gave up?”
“You found the only out that was presented to you,” she says, swallowing hard as she clenches her fingers together. There are parts that go bloodless and pale from how hard she’s squeezing them. “How can you blame that person for breaking?”
“I wasn’t…strong enough to stay,” I gasp, my voice wrecked. “I took the easy way out because he was hurting me every night.”
“How old were you?” Dr. Alys asks.
“Fifteen or so,” I say, my mind struggling to keep up with the conversation. I doubt that I’d know my name at this point with how hard my mind is trying to disassociate. “I was sixteen when I left home, but he only let up because the bandages were a reminder that he was breaking me.”
“I doubt that there are adults that could have handled any of that,” she says. “Death isn’t an answer, but the attempt gave you the space to escape. I for one am glad you’re still here. Have you ever attempted again?”
“Thinking and attempting are two different things, so no. I had an absolutely terrible heat in December, and I had a seizurebecause I didn’t think I’d need my scent matches. Things were really fucked up at the time.”
“So let’s unfuck it,” Dr. Alys says.
The next two hours are spent unraveling the things I’ve kept hidden from myself, things I’ve forced myself to forget. It’s a really rough session, and I somehow feel both better and worse.
My nerves feel raw, as if I’ve been turned inside out. I use the bathroom in her office to wash my face, and my neck feels really itchy. Whining in annoyance, I pull at the collar of my dress, and find that Tyde’s bite is beginning to scab over.
“Oh my God,” I whisper in awe. As Dr. Alys said, nothing about this process will be easy, but I want my pack to be whole. That means I need to be whole too.
It’s like I shattered my soul into a million pieces through no fault of my own. I am responsible though for putting myself back together. That’s going to take a lot of really hard and scary work. Blowing out a breath, I release my collar and walk out of the bathroom.
As promised, Caleb is sitting in the waiting room along with Lars. The surprise is that Tyde is also sitting with them. He pulls me into his lap, holding me tightly as he buries his face in my neck.
“Hey, Little Queen,” he breathes.
“Hi,” I whisper. I’ve been talking for so long, my voice doesn’t even sound like my own. I’m exhausted emotionally and physically, because I don’t speak for long periods of time like that to anyone.
It’s as if my social battery is drained.
“I didn’t expect you,” I admit.
“My hours are different, which means that I’ve been out of work for about an hour,” he says.
“You didn’t have to wait,” I say. Thinking about my words, I decide to be honest with the both of us. “I’m glad you did though.”
Straightening, I smile at Lars as he offers me a sugar laced treat.
“Your eyes are puffy and you’ve been crying,” he observes. “Sugar is good for helping with the drop after a long cry.”
