Chapter 14 #2
I doubt this is what the doctors would call appropriate, but it is working. Every moment, kiss, touch, and authoritative word I experienced with my step-father and step-brother is removed, until I feel empty.
“Now, I need you to do one more thing,” he says.
“Think about your step-brother and step-father from when you were a kid. I want you to force those memories to go hazy. Their faces, what they sound like, things that they said to you. If asked, you’ll say you don’t remember much about your childhood, even though you’ll be able to remember other things without any issues.
Even their names will fade with time, but you’ll remember them if your mother asks you about them. ”
There’s power in those words as well, and I want to fight against it. A faint whine slips from my lips, but Riley shushes me. He’s insistent on taking everything from me, and I slump on the couch as the memories fade away. All of it is gone, and there are just pockets of shadow now.
“When I say ‘goodbye’, you’ll wake up and think it’s the first time you’ve woken up.
I’ll tell you the doctors are ready for your next treatment, and you’ll allow me to walk you there,” he says.
“It’s very important that you not fight me or anyone here, Nina.
If they say something confusing to you, let it roll off your back and just nod.
Don’t question them. Do as you’re told so you can get out of the hospital. ”
I make a small noise, and Riley squeezes my feet. There’s a hint of his alpha bark in his voice, and I feel compelled to do what he wants.
“Goodbye, Nina,” he says, and I shudder before I open my eyes.
Riley is sitting at the end of the couch, leaning forward as he gazes at me.
“I hope you slept well,” he says, while I blink at him confused.
“Why am I laying on the couch?” I ask. I don’t typically have comforts like this, and the blanket is soft and warm. I feel disoriented, having expected to wake up on the floor or bound to a chair.
Neither is happening right now.
I didn’t even think they had any blankets like this. I certainly haven’t received any comforts like this. There’s a soft pillow underneath my head, and I think I could cry with how nice it feels.
“Dr. Kind thought you may enjoy it because you’ve been getting better,” he says. “When you do what you’re expected to do, you get nice things.”
“I have?” I ask, shaking my head. I don’t remember doing anything that they’d be happy with.
The staff and doctors usually glare at me because I’m so awful.
“You have,” Riley says. “Do you remember your alphas?”
“What alphas?” I whisper, feeling as if I have a large chunk of my heart missing. “I have alphas?”
“Not anymore,” he says softly. “Come with me, Dr. Kind wants to run some tests.”
Flinching as I remember the pain those tests involve, I want to fight, but my body disobeys me. In fact, I’m trapped in my mind as Riley wraps his hand around my bicep and leads me out of the office and toward a testing room.
Dr. Kind gazes sharply at me before glancing at Riley.
“It’s done,” he says. “No memories, sir.”
“Miss Nina, if you pass this exam, we can work on other parts of your therapy and be closer to your being released,” Dr. Kind says. “Come along.”
My feet move even as I ask myself why when I’ve never done what they’ve wanted me to do. It feels as if I’m watching myself from the outside, silently yelling that I stop.
And yet…I can’t.
“Please sit on the chair,” the doctor says, his eyes heavy on me as I sit down.
“Now, I want to measure how you react to the stimuli I’m going to play on the screen in front of you.
Nurse Naylor is going to put electrodes on your head to measure your brain waves.
If there’s no sign of the recognition pattern I’m looking for, nothing will happen. ”
Nurse Naylor steps into the room with a cart and the items she’ll need for the exercise. She prepares my scalp with a gritty cream and scrubs as I wince but remain still for her. The nurse grunts to herself, but continues working, and the electrodes are soon taped to my scalp .
Honestly, I’d rather her grunt and mutter to herself than call me a graceless and ungrateful whore. This nurse doesn’t like me, and enjoys hurting me.
The dull hum of the machine sounds in the room, and Dr. Kind turns on a projector. I remember the pain connected to this type of “test” and I stiffen slightly as Nurse Naylor’s hands hold me still in the chair.
“Every time we see a recognition pattern that we don’t want to see, there will be a negative response applied,” Dr. Kind says, showing me what appears to be a pen.
However, I know there has to be pain involved if he’s holding it so nonchalantly.
“Hold out your arm,” he commands.
He’s not an alpha. There’s nothing he can do to force me to do as he says, but I do as he says, offering him my inner arm.
“Very good,” he purrs, flicking a button on the pen and pressing it to my skin.
The pain is immediate and my body jolts as I scream. I’m vaguely aware of Riley stepping into the room and the door shutting. He doesn’t say anything though, and my body feels as if it’s on fire. Such a small fucking thing to hurt so much.
“There we go,” Dr. Kind says in a creepy sing-song voice. Pocketing the pen, he picks up the projector’s remote as if he didn’t just fry my nerve endings.
Dropping my arm into my lap, I breathe through the pain. Fuck, the other stun wand shit they’ve used on me didn’t hurt as much as that pen did. I refuse to touch the spot that’s red and angry on my inner arm, I simply force myself to gaze at the projector screen.
I’ve never wanted to get something correct so badly in my entire life. I’m tired of being hurt day in and day out, and for some reason, I’m docile as I wait for the next step.
“Here are rainbow colors,” Dr. Kind says.
I stare at it without anything coming to mind, and the nurse grunts. That must have been enough for the doctor, because he nods and clicks to the next image.
A classroom fills the screen, and I sigh because I miss school. The nurse grunts again, and the doctor clicks the remote again.
I sit until my ass goes numb and my tailbone tingles with pins and needles without complaint as he has me watch his version of a slideshow, without a single zap from his pen.
“Good, good,” he murmurs with a nod. “Let’s move on then.”
A part of me feels as if I shouldn’t have passed this with flying colors, not when they typically torture the fuck out of me. Everything feels wrong as the nurse peels off the tape from the electrodes and scrubs at my scalp.
It continues to feel as if I’m living in an alternate universe day after day at Weeping Willow as I suffer through their tests and therapy, until my mother comes to visit me in the garden outside.
I know what I look like. I’m bald, too thin, and my pants and shirt issued hospital clothing hang from my body.
My mother’s lips thin as she sits across from me, gazing at my appearance with her baby blue eyes, cold and calculating.
“Who is Cooper Thornefield to you, Nina?” she asks.
Why is she asking me that? I haven’t heard that name in years.
There’s a dull sense of deja vu, but I shake my head in confusion.
“My ex step-father,” I murmur, my mind spiralling at such a random question. “Why are you asking me about him? Did you run into him or something?”
“No,” she says coolly. “Did you know that he’s living in Minneapolis?”
“I didn’t,” I say. “Why does that matter to me?”
“I suppose it doesn’t, I’m just making conversation,” she says, shrugging. “I suppose you’ve been here so long that you don’t remember how to do that. We’re going to have to work on it, and you’ll need to attend etiquette classes so you don’t embarrass me.”
“Where will I be that anyone will see me, Mom?” I ask. My skin feels too tight as I sit across from her, my feet in the first pair of shoes in months, even though they’re slippers.
Everything feels surreal, especially the warmth of the sun as it warms my face, despite the shade of the tree over me. I’m waiting for my mother to make a big deal about it, since she hates when I’m in the sun.
“You’re so very pale,” she murmurs absently. “Maybe we’ll need to look at a modest spray tan, and a really good wig for your poor bald head.”
I stare at her as I wait for her to get to her point, allowing myself to enjoy the sounds of nature around me, especially the birds. It’s very sterile within the walls of Weeping Willow, and the only sounds are those of my screams.
Although, it’s been a week exactly since that’s happened, and I’ve been allowed to sleep in a bed. The change is so sudden, I’m waiting for someone to tell me that it’s all a lie as they drop me in the freezing pool to tread water for hours.
I’ll never take the beauty of the world for granted again. Not ever. I feel as if I’ve been in a war for my sanity, and I’m not certain I’m coming out the other side intact.
In fact, the emptiness I’ve been feeling inside of me for days tells me that I’m missing something, I just don’t know what.
My mother doesn’t seem to know what to do with my silence, and her fingers press together as she looks up at the sky. She’d never be indelicate enough to wring her hands, my mother is entirely too well bred for that, but I can tell she’s at a loss for words.
Still, I won’t be the one to break the silence, because it’s not mine to break. She’d find something wrong with how I did it, and the last thing I want is to be punished for rules I don’t understand.
“Dr. Kind and Dr. Brunes seem to think you’re ready to be discharged,” she says, still not looking at me. I suppose my change in appearance is shocking, though I had nothing to do with it. “Georgia is sweltering with heat during the summer, but it’ll give you time to get ready to be courted.”
I allow the words to fall around me like tiny pebbles, measuring what they mean to me. I recall a fight we had before I was brought here, but not who was there. Ah, yes. She was upset that I ran away to go to college, and believes I should be content to find a pack instead.
That’s what this is about: becoming an obedient omega. I’ve certainly listened to enough of Emilia Richardson’s lectures to know what one should act like. I suppose I should follow those to the letter.
Weeping Willow’s teachings and rehabilitation aren’t for the weak or faint of heart, and I for one have had my fill.
“Yes, Mom,” I murmur, my voice cracking due to the strain from the past months.
“Oh, your voice,” she gasps in horror, glancing at me.
“We’re going to add voice lessons to the list, I suppose.
You should have honeyed, dulcet tones in your voice soon.
There will be no discussion of returning to school, because that life is not for you.
Your alphas will not respect you if you’re too smart.
Thank God Martin understands how important this time is for you, and is being very understanding. ”
Her husband. I can’t even really call him my step-father because I rarely see him. He’s just another revolving alpha in my mother’s life.
“That’s nice,” I murmur, trying to control the terrible condition of my voice and failing.
“Isn’t it?” she asks, beaming.
Since she doesn’t need an actual response, I press my lips together in a reminder to myself to not say a word. It’s slight, just for me, and I know she won’t notice it. While my mother thinks she knows me inside and out, she doesn’t.
“Yes, well,” she says awkwardly. “I’ll be back to collect you in a couple of days. Dr. Brunes says he wants to ensure you won’t back slide in any of your lessons, ah therapy. Yes, that’s it!”
A whisper of disappointment fills me, because I thought I was done. The assumption is mine alone, but knowing I’ll be subjected to more of their “lessons” before I’m released takes my breath away.
I watch as she clasps her hands happily, even as she plans to abandon me to these people.
“I have it all planned out,” she sighs happily. “You’re going to have the best life, and everyone will praise me for being the best mother to you. Be good, listen to your doctors, and I’ll be back. I know I don’t have to tell you of the consequences if you aren’t.”
I can feel the presence of the alpha behind me before he speaks. I don’t know what his schedule is for working here, since there aren’t any windows where I can see them here. Even my bedroom here doesn’t have any.
“I can reassure you that your daughter is doing wonderfully,” Riley says confidently. “She’s recovering nicely.”
I don’t know why I needed to recover from being a normal teenager with plans for her life that didn’t align with her mother’s, but again, I press my lips slightly together.
It helps me keep my voice under lock and key. My thoughts need to remain inside my mind at all times. No mistakes.
“Good,” my mother says, nodding as she stands. “I’ll let you get back to it. Remember what I said, Nina.”
I incline my head as she walks away, refusing to say goodbye. There’s nothing “good” about it, except for her being gone.
I wait for Riley to tell me it’s time to go back inside, but he doesn’t. Instead, I get to bask in the beauty of the world for as long as I can until it’s time to return inside.
Where the lights burn too warm, and everything tastes metallic.