Page 67 of Little Liar
I should be at home with Olivia. She shouldn’t be at work, and I shouldn’t be here. What the fuck am I doing? Why am I here?
I don’t want to be here.
They’re the only words running through my head while Dr. Preston talks me through our last few speech therapy sessions. He’s been showing me my progress pyramid, and that I’m halfway from the top. Considering I was near the bottom when I first came to him a few weeks ago, I’m making progress, even if it doesn’t always feel like it.
“Okay, so when you first came in, we went through what you struggled most with and set some small targets, and since we haven’t quite reached them, let’s take another approach.We’ve covered shorter sentences and more straightforward pronunciations. Instead of longer sentences, I think we should add in words with more syllables, some trickier words that don’t necessarily roll off the tongue, and work on your confidence. I can hear your nerves. Try not to focus on the fact I’m sitting in front of you.”
The voice in my head wants to tell him to stop telling me what to do—it’s an immature knee-jerk response I won’t let out. He’s helping me and, in turn, helping my relationship with not only Olivia but the outside world.
Dr. Preston is around my dad’s age. His voice is soft, and for some reason, I don’t feel the need to strangle him when I fuck up my words. He doesn’t laugh, doesn’t even seem fazed by my fuck-ups. He takes notes and gets excited when he talks about different approaches we’ll be taking.
Yet he sees me as an experiment.
A bit like Olivia. She encourages me every step of the way, but I know she’s trying different things. Different routines for my meds, and she even wants us to eat at certain times. I still don’t know why she’s become so focused on my mental state.
I’m fine.
I stare at the words on the table in front of me. We’ve been working on five-worded sentences and words with two syllables. He tries to encourage me to read, to try to sound out the words I know will be difficult, but sometimes I overthink and fall over the way they sound. I can hear them in my fucking head so clearly, but I can never actually speak them clearly.
Frustrated doesn’t even describe the way I feel right now.
He types on his laptop then looks at me. Too bad for my short-fused temper and hating the way he stares at me—I kind of need him to fix me. “Can you read the first line?”
My gaze drops to the paper again, and I lick my lips, but I can’t. Something is stopping me. Like my voice box has vanishedand my mouth forms no sound. I look up at the guy, feeling heat crawl up my cheeks. I shouldn’t be embarrassed, but when he hums and types again, I grow anxious.
He’s probably writing about how much of an idiot I am—what twenty-eight-year-old struggles to fucking talk? I know how to. I can read, write, and I can fucking speak, but for some reason, sometimes I can’t.
“You’re more nervous than your last appointment. Has anything changed?”
Yes. Everything. My entire life.
I stare at him—I want to tell him that I fucking won, that I got the girl and she finally chose me, but not only can I not form the damn words, I also don’t fully believe them.
Olivia’s smile is in my head. Then sadness takes over her eyes and snuffs away the happiness—she’s not fully mine. Not yet. I can feel it.
She’s biding her time before she can leave again.
My heart is thrashing, and my fingers cramp up, so I drop the paper on the speech therapist’s desk and lean back in the chair. The need to call Olivia has me very aware of my phone in my pocket, but I need to try to do this myself.
I did well when I first came in this morning, but it lasted all of ten minutes before things got tricky, and everything within me has crawled under the fucking bed and is staying hidden.
“Do you have someone you could read to?” He puts on his glasses and checks his paperwork. “Any children you could read a bedtime story to?”
Frowning, I stare at him unblinking—he knows I don’t have any kids. I shake my head anyway. The poor kid wouldn’t last a week if I was their father.
“A partner?”
Pausing my breaths, I stare at him for a long second more before I slowly nod.
“Great. That must be what has you more perked up. What I’d like you to do at home is sit down with your partner and read. Or you can record yourself reading and listen back. You’ll know which words are harder, and you can work on those too. Look at it as minor homework.”
I nod again and lean my elbow on the arm of the chair, my fist to my temple. He talks me through a few other exercises while printing off sheets of paper, and I sign in response.
“Does your partner sign?” he asks, typing on his laptop again.
For a few beats, I blink, but then I take a deep breath. “Yes,” I say quietly.
“She’s patient with you?”
