Page 42 of Bound by Affliction
“Nothing.” It’s as real as I can get withher.
She nods like she understands what I’m saying, and I’m glad she does because I have no fuckingclue.
“You don’t see yourselfanywhere?”
“I guess alive. I don’t know,” I say on ashrug.
“That’s astep.”
Thoughts run rampant. “I’m not going to killmyself.”
“I didn’t saythat.”
“But you implied it.” The air in the room gets a chill that crawls down my spine, and I don’t like it onebit.
She shifts in her seat and rests her elbow on her knees, full attention on me. “I may have said that to see what you would say. Now that I know, I feel better about that. But since you know you will have a future, where do you want to go? What do you want to accomplish? Do you want to go back to school? Do you want to get a job? What are you going to do to be a productive member ofsociety?”
A productive member of society? Hell, all I’ve done since I got out of the hospital is… well, nothing. I cooked a couple of times for Green, but he mostly cooked for me. I haven’t cleaned the apartment, but Green has. I haven’t done anything. At all, but sit and think about what those men did tome.
It brings to mind a girl from high school who had a ‘woe is me’ mentality. Everything she did, she turned it around so everyone felt sorry for her. She turned into this person who no one liked to be around because everything was always abouther.
I don’t want people to feel sorry for me. I don’t want to feel sorry for myself. It happened. I was brutally attacked and came close to dying. But I lived. I lived to see many days with Green at my side. I’ve been able to watch the sun go up and then go down. I’ve been able to feel the sun on my skin and eat. I’ve talked on the phone and enjoyed it, just like oldtimes.
My grandmother, Mom’s mom who passed away six years ago, always saidHappiness is what you make of it. Bad things happen to good people sometimes. It’s a true sign of their character—how they handle it and overcome it. The key here is ‘you mustovercome.’
A twinge hits my heart thinking about my grandma. It’s been a long time since we lost her, but she was a damn smart woman and I’m lucky to remember this. Because I need it now more thanever.
She’s right and it won’t be easy, but I’ve never been one to shy away from work. That is still me. A lot of the old me is still me, I just haven’t seen it in a while. And I miss it. Miss the me I was and dammit, I’m finding heragain.
“I don’t know, but I’m going to figure itout.”
She eyes me cautiously but saysnothing.
Standing again, I take a stroll around the room. “Where does this door goto?”
“My office where I dopaperwork.”
An idea springs tomind.
“Is there another door that leads out past the waiting room and into thehallway?”
An alarmed look crosses her face as she answers cautiously, “Yes.”
Green is out in the waiting room, and I need to step out of this building on my own two feet. No one at my side. Just me, by myself in a community that I’m used to and have been in since I was born. I know this town like the back of my hand and here in the center are lots of shops. I need to see if I can handle it on my own out there. That I have that independence from Green. That I’m not using him as acrutch.
He can’t know until I’m gone because he won’t leave me to it. He’ll be right by my side, exactly where I’d like him to be, but I need to do this on myown.
Yes, I haven’t been out like this in months. Yes, I’m scared. Yes, I’m terrified. Yes, I’m going to do this. I’m going to put myself out there and see that nothing happens to me. That I can walk into a store and buy something without someone pulling a knife out on me. The people around me will look at me; I do know this mostly because of the one scar on my cheek that bubbled over. But I can do this. No, I will dothis.
“I want to go out that way, but I don’t want you to tell Green right away. I want you to wait about fifteen minutes before going out into the waiting room and telling him that I’veleft.”
She shakes her head, disagreeing, “I’m not sure this is a great idea, Leah. You haven’t been out byyourself.”
“Then I should see about that. See what the world has forme.”
Anne rises, coming to me. “And you’re not the least bit scared aboutthis?”
“Oh, I’m terrified, but if I don’t do it, I’ll never know that I can do things on my own without Green. I’ll never know that I can walk outside of these doors and feel like I’m not going to be attacked without Green’sprotection.”
