“You’ve built this wall around you and your life. People want to get in, Marissa. It would be a good idea if you let them.” Janet Lillyhood twirled the pink ribbon from her lined journal around her index finger.
I shifted nervously in the soft leather chair. “I don’t think I’m shutting people out. I’m fine.”
Janet cocked her head to the side. “Marissa, are you familiar with the term post-traumatic stress syndrome?”
“You mean like that thing people get when they come back from fighting in a war or something?” I wouldn’t compare what I’d been through to a war.
“Well that is what’s most commonly attached to the syndrome, yes, but it actually applies to many situations.” She kept her eyes on me, and I felt like I wanted to burst into a puff of smoke and reappear inside my bedroom.
“What kind of situations?” I was curious.
She uncrossed and recrossed her legs. “Well, when something extremely intense and shocking happens to a person, they can go into a state of denial about it. It’s a way of coping. They avoid what happened. They find ways around talking about it. They tend to keep everything about their lives that hurt them all to themselves.” She appeared to be blinking excessively.
“I don’t think I’m doing that.”
“Marissa, it’s important to try to be aware of your actions. This is something I think we should focus on for you. You need to take small steps each day to help you overcome this barrier you’ve surrounded yourself with. The only way to finally free yourself of the pain you’re feeling is to experience it. From that, you’ll be able to heal.”
She leaned in closer to me, and the concern in her eyes was more than I could bear. I grabbed my purse and thanked her for the session. As the girl at the front desk called out for me to make my next appointment, I kept walking. That was my last therapy session.
****
It was almost five o’clock when I got home. I knew I should eat something before I went back to the hospital, but my stomach felt like a punching bag that a prizefighter had been practicing on all day. In an effort to not starve myself, I opened the refrigerator, scanning for something that I might be able to keep down. Eggs, milk, grapes, carrots, and assorted condiments were all I had to choose from. Mondays were the day Gram usually went grocery shopping. Dissatisfied, I closed the fridge door and grabbed a box of multi-grain crackers from the cabinet. Like a ragdoll, my body plopped down on one of the kitchen chairs, and I began eating my meal. Crackers. The ticking of the kitchen clock was starting to make me batty. Click, click, click. It was like Poe’s The Tell-Tale Heart — constant, and it got louder and louder. Like with each tick of that clock, my grandmother was closer to death, and I was closer to being all alone. I’d be completely alone without her. Frantic, I sprung from the chair and dashed to my room. I grabbed my workout clothes from the top of my laundry basket. So what if they weren’t clean? In that moment, I didn’t care. I just needed to run. Run. Away.
There was still plenty of daylight, and the heat from earlier had died down and left a perfect sixty-five degrees to run in. I checked my watch that told me my pace, heart rate, and mileage, and it said my heart rate was at one-seventy, which was much higher than my normal one-forty range. Elation coursed through me, I was running an eight-minute mile; the fastest I had run before was a nine-point-five. I could feel a pain in my right shin, and I didn’t care. All I wanted to do was run. There was nothing here to stop me. No family, no friends, no boyfriends, no teachers, no coaches, no diseases, nothing. Just me and my body. That was about to give out if I kept up this speed, which was now down to a seven-point-five pace.
The scent of the lilacs raised my heart rate even higher. My legs and my heart needed a break. With little thought, I ran up the front steps of Mr. Brockwell’s house and pounded on the door.
I was bent in half trying to catch my breath when he opened the door. “Marissa? Marissa, are you all right?”
Tears were falling off my face and hitting the ground below. “Gram’s in the hospital!” I spat out, and then I felt my body disintegrate as Mr. Brockwell stood me upright and wrapped his arms around me.
The back of my hand was streaked with black mascara marks from where I had rubbed my tears away. I was sitting at Mr. Brockwell’s kitchen table. His house smelled like a weird mix of patchouli and lemon-scented furniture polish. He set a cup of tea down in front of me and took the chair to my left.
I took a sip of the warm, rich, tea, and the heat infused my body. Mr. Brockwell’s eyes were on me, but I kept my gaze on the table.
“So, when are you going to see her again?” he asked.
“Tonight.” I wrapped my hands around the mug.
“Are you sure you’re okay to drive?” His tone was soothing. I remembered it well.
Unease crept through my body, I shouldn’t be here. “Yes. I’ll be fine.” I couldn’t escape the parade of nerves that were starting to work their way through me. “I should go.” Abruptly, I stood up and headed for the door.
“Marissa, wait,” Mr. Brockwell called after me.
I stood stiffly in his doorway. “Let me drive you to the hospital,” he said. “I’d feel a lot better knowing that you’re safe. I just don’t think you should be behind the wheel of a car right now.” He laid
