Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
-Thalia-
Inside the room, the air feels sterile and stark, clean and unnerving.
I sit across from the therapist, her voice sounding almost muffled, as if we are separated by a distance I can’t traverse.
The words she speaks swirl around me, incoherent sounds that dissolve into a fog I can't penetrate.
I twist my hands in my lap, my nails digging crescent shapes into my palms in an attempt to pull myself back into the moment.
I shouldn’t be here. I don’t belong here. This is not my story.
My knee bounces without my permission. I press my palm down on it, trying to stop the trembling, but the shaking only climbs higher, into my stomach, into my throat, into the buzzing hive beneath my skin.
I stare at the floor because the floor doesn’t look back at me. The floor doesn’t ask questions.
I track the pattern of the carpet as if it were a map that could lead me somewhere else. Somewhere where none of this happened. Where my body is still mine.
You don’t belong here.
The voice isn’t real, just the echo of Damian’s certainty, but it’s enough to hollow me out from the inside.
The therapist shifts slightly in her chair, and the soft movement makes my heart spike. Every part of me braces for impact that isn’t coming.
I wonder what it would be like to be a person who walks into a therapy office and doesn’t feel like they’re confessing to a crime. Someone who says I need help and doesn’t immediately regret the vulnerability.
I don’t know how to be that person.
Yet here I am.
The clock ticks far too loudly. Each click is a tiny accusation counting my failures. My throat feels scraped raw, the air too clean to breathe. The chair’s leather sticks to the back of my legs, anchoring me somewhere I don’t yet want to exist.
When there’s a long stretch of silence, I look up and realize she’s watching expectantly with a soft smile and waiting for me to reply, like she knows I’m deep in my own head.
“Sorry, what did you say?”
“I asked you what brings you in today.”
The question cuts through the haze like a shard of glass, and the world rushes back into focus. I see the bookshelves lined with titles I can’t read, the framed art hanging on the pristine walls, and finally, the therapist’s patient eyes aimed at me, steady and inviting.
Her pen doesn’t move. She isn’t writing notes, just waiting.
The silence presses in until I can hear my pulse echoing in my ears.
I try to swallow, but my throat is too tight.
My pulse drums at the base of my skull, a frantic percussion I can’t turn off.
The room blurs at the edges, colors draining to gray as if someone were slowly lowering the saturation of reality.
The therapist moves a pen on the table. Not toward me. Not threatening. But my muscles lock anyway. I feel the mistake happening in real time, how my body responds to danger even when logic can’t find any.
The fan hums in the corner. A soft breeze brushes my arm. I know the air is cool, but my skin feels fevered, prickling with old memories.
Ground yourself.
But grounding feels like trying to stand still in a stampede.
My hands search for proof that I am here. My nails dig into my thigh until pain blooms, sharp and anchoring. The pain helps.
I stare at the neat row of tissue boxes on the side table, each corner aligned, waiting for someone like me to unravel in front of it.
My hands twitch, unsure whether to fold, clasp, or hide.
The smell of disinfectant mixes with the therapist’s faint perfume, a sterile sweetness that makes my stomach twist. Everything here is too clean, too ordered, as if chaos like mine doesn’t belong here.
I can feel the confession forming before it ever breaks the air. It isn’t just words; it’s teeth and claws and pieces of memory trying to tear their way out of me. Shame burns beneath my skin, a wildfire no one else can see.
Saying it makes it real.
Not saying it keeps me trapped.
There is no version that doesn’t hurt.
The words tumble out, jagged and raw, an emotional avalanche.
“I was raped.”
The moment I say those words, everything shatters. Hot, heavy tears flood my eyes, blurring my vision and suffocating me. I fold in on myself, my chest collapsing inward as sobs wrack my body, ugly, broken, and unstoppable.
The therapist does not interrupt; instead, she leans a fraction closer, her voice calm and unwavering. “You’re safe here, Thalia. You’re not alone. Take your time.”
Her voice becomes a rope I grip blindly. I match each inhale to her calm expression, forcing air past the sobs until my chest stutters instead of caves.
But the words keep cascading out, each one a stone added to a crumbling dam. “He–he held me down. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. And now I can’t stop seeing it, feeling it, like I’m still there.”
My mind drags me back into the dark like a rip current. The weight on my chest. The scrape of his belt buckle. My vision narrows to just his smile.
Stop thinking. Stop remembering.
But my body remembers without my consent. My wrists ache with phantom bruises. My lungs seize, desperate for air they cannot draw.
“You’re here,” the therapist says, grounding me, her voice slow and calm. “Not there.”
I nod, but inside, everything is still happening.
The therapist waits, allowing me to spill out my pain without judgment. I grapple for the tissues she slides toward me, though they do little against the flood of anguish spilling from my heart. My entire body shakes, hands trembling so violently that I can scarcely hold on.
I hate crying in front of strangers, yet something inside me loosens each time another tear falls. Maybe honesty is what breaking actually feels like.
“I don’t know how to live with it,” I gasp out, choking on the enormity of my words. “It’s like it’s still happening. Every time I close my eyes. Every time I’m alone. I’m so tired. I can’t sleep. I can’t stop it.”
The therapist’s voice cuts through my spiraling panic. “You’ve been carrying something unbearable on your own. But you don’t have to anymore. This is the first step.” Her words feel like a fragile lifeline, implausible yet perhaps true.
For the first time since that night, I feel the weight of it shift, a fraction of the burden lifting from my shoulders.
The tissues pile up in my lap, damp and crumpled, a testament to the storm brewing inside me.
My throat feels raw, as if the words I’ve been holding back are clawing for release.
My chest is a tight knot, constricted under the weight of unspoken fears, but the therapist doesn’t rush me.
She remains patient, her expression calm and inviting, as if she understands that the silence we share is laden with meaning.
When I finally break the stillness, my voice emerges as a low, cracked whisper, barely recognizable even to myself.
“It ruined me. Not just that night. Everything after. The world shrank after that night. Streets I once loved walking became maps of ambushes. Every light felt too bright, every shadow too deep. I started cataloging escape routes instead of memories—how far to the door, how fast I could run, where I could hide if someone raised their voice. It’s exhausting, living like prey in your own skin.
I miss the version of myself who didn’t flinch at footsteps, the girl who believed monsters lived only in stories.
It’s as if he didn’t merely take my body; he stole…
me. And now I’m lost, wandering through my own life, searching for a way to reclaim what’s been taken. ”
Her gentle nod offers me a thread of connection, an understanding that transcends words. For a heartbeat, I almost resent her sympathy. It feels too easy. Then I realize she’s offering me the thing I keep refusing: permission to not be fine.
“You’re still here, Thalia,” she reassures me.
“The part of you that feels lost is not gone. It’s wounded, holding onto pain and memories that are far too heavy to bear alone right now, but we can navigate this path together.
” The word ‘together’ lands heavily. I picture a rope bridge stretched over a canyon, frayed and uncertain, but at least someone’s on the other side, holding it steady.
I grip the tissue in my hand until it tears, a physical manifestation of my inner turmoil.
“I’m terrified I’ll never be able to be touched again.
Not without being flung back into those memories.
” The panic rises in my chest, constricting like a vice as I continue.
“I’m with someone now. Xander. He’s incredible, everything I’ve ever dreamed of.
He respects my boundaries and makes me feel safe.
But every time he touches me—” My voice falters, caught on the edge of despair.
“It’s like I’m transported back to that moment, and I just freeze.
I panic. I feel guilt, like I’m punishing him for something he had no part in.
It feels like I’m broken, and he’s suffering for it. ”
Burning tears spill over, a humiliating reminder of my fragility.
“I just crave normalcy. I want to desire him without fear suffocating me. I want to experience intimacy without shaking uncontrollably and crying afterward. I want to stop sabotaging everything good in my life.”
The therapist leans in closer, her voice unflinching yet infused with compassion.
“What you’re feeling is a very real and common response to trauma.
Your body carries the echoes of what your mind longs to forget.
” The sentence vibrates inside me like struck glass.
The echo isn’t sound; it’s heartbeat, muscle, reflex.
A memory stitched into skin. “It’s not your fault, Thalia.
That doesn’t mean you can’t heal. It means we need to teach your body to feel safe again.
Now intimacy can belong to you, not to him. ”
Her words wrap around my heart, but thoughts of safety make my throat ache anew. “I don’t want him—Damian—to win,” I whisper, the weight of my past heavy on my chest. “I refuse to let the rest of my life be overshadowed by his actions.”
My therapist smiles softly. “And he won’t.
Just by being here today, voicing your truth, you’re already taking steps toward reclaiming your life.
Together, we’ll work on grounding techniques, on learning how to discern the present from the past so that you can begin to recover those lost parts of yourself. ”
The possibility of healing doesn’t feel utterly unattainable. It’s still terrifying, still raw, but perhaps, just perhaps, achievable.
“Thalia, what you’re describing—the panic during moments of intimacy, the sensation of being yanked back into the past—isn’t a sign of weakness. It’s your body’s way of remembering. Trauma manifests in the nervous system. The good news? We can retrain it.”
“How do we do that?”
“First, we focus on grounding. Using simple tools to remind your body that you’re in the present.
These will act as lifelines and anchors when panic begins to rise.
” She lays them out gently for me, like steppingstones across a turbulent river.
Breathing exercises to center myself, grounding through my five senses, and employing physical grounding techniques.
She hands me a smooth river stone. Cool, solid, weighty.
“Describe it,” she instructs.
“Cold,” I whisper. “Hard. Real.” Unlike memories.
“They tell your body, ‘I’m here, I’m safe, and this isn’t happening again’.
” I nod, swallowing hard, trying to envision how these could truly help me.
“Now, with intimacy, the key lies in control. You need to know you have choices. Your ‘no’ must be respected unequivocally, and you must feel empowered to stop at any point without fear of reprisal.”
A lump rises in my throat at the thought. “Xander already does that. He always asks, always checks in with me. But I still panic.”
“That’s because your body doesn’t trust you yet,” she responds gently.
The phrase stings. I never thought of my body as something separate from me, but she’s right.
It reacts before I can think, jumping, freezing, and curling in on itself like a wounded animal.
I keep apologizing to Xander for it, as if my instincts are bad manners I should unlearn.
Maybe trust isn’t about forgiving him; maybe it’s about forgiving myself for surviving the only way I knew how.
“This isn’t about him failing to do something right; it’s about your nervous system continuing to exist in a state of survival.
Our work together will focus on rebuilding that trust with your own body. ”
I blink rapidly, tears lurking once more. “What will that look like?”
“Start small,” she advises. “Intimacy doesn’t have to equate to sex.
It can mean sitting closely together, holding hands, or simply cuddling.
Even just lying next to each other fully clothed can offer a safe space to practice touch.
” Images of Xander’s arm around me at night surface, his thumb tracing tender circles into my palm when I spiral into panic—such moments already feel like a beacon of hope.
“When you’re ready, you and Xander can explore sensate focus,” she explains.
“It’s a gradual process, an exploration of touch without the pressure to perform.
Set a timer for these special minutes where you simply explore each other’s skin, no expectations weighing you down.
It’s about curiosity, not performance. About finding pleasure without fear. ”
I never realized how much intimacy was about control until I lost all of mine.
With Xander, every moment is a choice.
My choice.
My face flushes, not from shame but from a blossoming sense of hope.
“And remember,” she adds, “you control the pace. You can stop whenever you need to. Celebrate those small victories. Feeling safe during a kiss or while holding hands is genuine progress. Every step matters.”
I lean back, allowing her words to sink deeply into my soul. It still feels overwhelming, yet it appears less insurmountable than before. Perhaps sex doesn’t have to be a never-ending battlefield. Maybe it’s possible to want it again, to enjoy it without the shadows of fear chasing me.
“Thalia, you’re not broken. Hope hurts. It pricks like a needle waking a limb that’s gone numb. You’ve endured hurt, but your body, your intimacy, and your joy still belong to you. You can reclaim them.”
Belief feels dangerous, fragile, like a thin sheet of ice that might splinter under my weight. I wrap my arms around myself, trying to hold something broken together.
Healing isn’t loud; it’s quiet and slow. Grain by grain instead of all at once.
Xander believes I’m strong. My therapist believes I can heal.
I just want to believe I’m not damaged beyond repair.