Chapter 4 #3
“He was wrong,” Dr. Chen says gently, and the steadiness in her voice makes something in my chest shift, even though I don’t trust it. "Tiny came for you."
"They all did," I whisper. "The whole club. They tore that place apart looking for me."
"Because you matter to them."
"Because I'm," I stop, swallow the poison I've been carrying. "Because I'm theirs to protect."
"Is that what you believe? That you're just a responsibility?" The question hangs there, sharp and uncomfortable.
"I don't know what I believe anymore," I admit. "Josiah taught me that I was nothing. Lattimer taught me that I was a tool. The club treats me like family, but." My hands shake. "What if they're wrong? What if Josiah was right and I'm just…"
"Stop," Dr. Chen interrupts gently but firmly. "What Josiah did to you, what Lattimer did to you, none of that defines your worth. You are not what was done to you. You are how you survived it."
I want to believe her. God, I want to.
"I'm still so angry," I whisper. "I'm angry that it happened. Angry that I couldn't stop it. Angry that Nadia and Exleigh had to suffer too. Angry that Josiah is dead and I can't." I break off.
"Can't what?"
"Can't make him hurt the way he hurt us." The admission sits between us like a live wire.
"That's a normal response to trauma," Dr. Chen says carefully. "Anger is part of grief. And you are grieving. For the safety you lost, for the innocence, for the version of yourself that existed before."
"I don't even remember who that person was."
"Then maybe," she says softly, "it's time to meet who you are now."
The words sit between us like a challenge I'm not ready to accept.
"What if I don't like her?" I whisper.
Dr. Chen leans forward, elbows on her knees, and for once she looks less like a therapist and more like a woman who's also survived something she won't talk about.
"What if you do?" she counters. "What if the woman who survived Josiah and Lattimer, who teaches dance to traumatized girls, who paints beauty out of pain. What if she's stronger than the girl who got taken? What if meeting her is the best thing you've ever done?"
I want to believe her. God, I want to. "What if she's still too broken to love?" The question comes out smaller than I meant it to.
"Then you let someone love the broken parts until you can." Dr. Chen sits back. "Syvannah, being loved isn't a prize you earn by healing. It's the thing that makes healing possible."
When I step out of her office, the sun is too bright. Everything feels too loud, too sharp, too much.
Nadia’s leaning against her car at the curb, sunglasses on, coffee in hand, like she’s been there forever. She straightens when she sees me. She doesn’t say anything right away. She just opens the passenger door and waits.
I climb in, shut the door, and wait. I sit here for a long moment, hands folded in my lap, trying to remember how to breathe without hurting. Nadia turns the engine on but doesn’t pull away.
“You want quiet,” she says, “or distraction?”
“Quiet,” I manage.
She nods silently, accompanied only by the engine's low hum and the steady presence of someone who stays still, with no music or questions.
We sit here longer than necessary. When I finally nod, Nadia pulls into traffic, driving like she knows sudden movements might break me.
The ride back blurs at the edges. My thoughts tangle, unravel, and tangle again. At a red light, Nadia reaches over and presses the coffee cup into my hands.
“Hold this,” she says. “It’s hot.” The weight of it grounds me. Heat presses against my palms. Proof I’m still here.
Back at the compound, Nadia parks and turns to me. “Text me if it gets loud again,” she says. “Or don’t. I’ll check on you anyway.”
I huff out something that might be a laugh.
Once I make it into my room, the quiet finally settles. The journal Nadia gave me sits on the desk, exactly where I left it. Patient. Unforgiving.
I sit slowly, like rushing might undo what little calm I’ve managed to stitch together. I open to a blank page and start writing:
Journal Entry - Month 7 After Lattimer
Therapy today ripped everything open again. Dr. Chen asked me about Josiah, about the motel room, about the moment Tiny cut the chains. I told her the parts I could stand to say out loud. The kidnapping. The fear. The way we learned to disappear inside ourselves just to survive.
I didn't tell her about the smell. How mildew and fear have a specific scent that I can still taste when I close my eyes. I didn't tell her about the sound of Exleigh crying through the wall, or how Nadia whispered strategies for staying alive while we huddled in the dark.
I didn't tell her that sometimes, late at night, I still hear Josiah's footsteps on the floorboards.
Dr. Chen says anger is normal. That wanting revenge is part of the grieving process.
But she doesn't understand. It's not just anger.
It's a black hole inside my chest that swallows everything good and spits out poison.
When Josiah died, I felt nothing. Just a hollow ache where relief should have been.
Because his death didn't undo what he did.
Didn't give us back the weeks we lost. Didn't erase the scars, and Lattimer is still out there.
Still breathing. Still plotting. That's the part that keeps me up at night.
Tiny asked me once why I paint. I told him it helps me process. That's only half true.
I paint because when I hold a brush, my hands remember they can create rather than just survive. When I mix colors, I'm in control of something, even if it's only the shade of blue.
I set down the pen, leaving the journal open on the desk.
Later, Tiny knocks softly on my door and asks if I’m okay. I let him in.
He doesn’t say much at first. He just sits beside me as the room settles around us, his presence filling the quiet without demanding anything of it. When he notices the journal open on the desk, he asks if he can read it, and I nod before I talk myself out of it.
He takes his time, his thumb brushing the edge of the page as he moves down each line. When he finally looks up at me, there’s something unguarded in his eyes that makes my throat tighten.
“You’re the bravest person I know,” he says, not dramatic, not loud, just steady.
I don’t argue.
I let the words sit between us, warm, fragile, and unfamiliar. And for tonight, I allow myself to believe them.