Page 54 of Reaper

“Eight, nine, oscar, victor, one, four. Got it. What color again? White Ford Aerostar. Got it. Let me know when.”

“It can be anything?”

He nods.

So I put in the numbers eight, nine, then the letters o and v before ending with the numbers one four. Then I look up at him.

He quirks an eyebrow.

“What is that?” he asks.

“A license plate number, I think. I don’t know why, but it popped into my head. William said it was for a white Ford Aerostar.”

Trigger stiffens. “You’re sure?”

I nod. “Is that helpful?”

“Very. I’ll look into that later. You’ll need two more characters and one of them has to be special, like an exclamation point.”

I nod, adding two of them at the end. He snorts but leans over to click save. Then it opens to the main screen.

“Alright, so I’ve already hooked this to our internet so you don’t have to worry about that. If you take it outside of this building and over to one of the others, we will have to set up the internet there, but I figured we would start here. I put the link to the online therapy right here on the main screen.” He clicks it, showing it opening to the main page. “You put in your name and appointment time and it will connect you. Since we are trying to keep your location a secret right now, I put you under an alias. Natalie Portman. Your birthday is the same, but I made you a year older. No one should question it.”

I nod. “Thank you.”

“Of course. I’ve disabled social media and email on here. Right now, all you can do is the therapy, but if you want to be able to do something specific, just let me know. It’s as secure as a laptop can be so unless someone hacks your therapist, we are good.”

“I understand. I don’t really know what I would do on it anyway. I don’t have social media or anything.”

He gives me a sad look. “It will get better. Your appointment is at eight thirty. I’ll leave you to it. Come find me if you have any questions.”

“I will.”

I stand to follow him to the door, shutting it and locking it behind him.

Then I go back to the computer and sit to wait for my appointment.

What will I even talk about? Do I just dive in and admit that I was abused? Do I start off slow? I know I can’t say much about the MC. I’m sure there’s some patient-doctor confidentiality thing in place, but I don’t want to chance it.

Finally, I log onto the system, waiting for the therapist to log on. When she does, I feel weird. I’m staring at a screen, yet I’m sitting alone in a room.

“Hello. I’m Dr. Lenora. Please confirm your name and date of birth for my records. This will be the only time you will have to do this.”

“Natalie Portman March fifteenth, two thousand and two.”

“Very good. Since this is our first session, I want you to feel as comfortable as possible, so we will take this at your pace.”

I nod. “Okay. I’m not really sure where to start or how to do this.”

She gives me a sympathetic smile. “It’s not some process you check off different boxes until complete. Therapy is about whatever you need. It can be simply sitting here in silence, or it could be screaming at the top of your lungs. We can talk about deep stuff, or you can keep it light. This is your session, so we talk about whatever you want.”

“Okay. Maybe could you ask me questions? I think that would help.”

“Of course. How about we start with what brought you here?”

“My friends thought it would be best that I speak with someone.”

“That’s good. It sounds like they care about your wellbeing. Would you agree with that assessment?”

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