Chapter 23 - Dr. Colleen
Dr. Colleen's POV
I heard the outer door open at exactly nine. Voices carried through the wall. My receptionist’s polite murmur followed, then the familiar buzz that released the lock.
Punctuality. That was a form of control, not courtesy.
When the door to my office suite opened, Lily Thompson stepped in first. She wore oversized sunglasses and a dress that didn’t belong in a morning appointment.
A young, good-looking man followed, a steady presence behind her.
His posture was military, his expression unreadable.
He stepped forward first and introduced himself.
Sean Macon, Lily's guard. I made a mental note for her file.
“Miss Thompson,” I said, turning toward her. “I’m Dr. Colleen.”
She didn’t remove the glasses right away. “You’re the court-appointed shrink?”
“I’m a psychiatrist,” I said. “The court sent you to me.”
That earned the faintest smile. “Close enough.”
Her tone was a performance, every syllable testing boundaries. I’ve seen enough of those to know they usually cover exhaustion.
“Come in,” I said, stepping aside.
She looked at Sean before moving. “You’re staying outside in the car?”
“I’ll be in the waiting room,” he replied. His voice was low, steady.
She muttered something that sounded like “babysitter” as she passed me.
Inside, she stood near the window, arms folded. She didn’t look at the chair until silence started pressing on her. When she finally sat, it was with the body language of someone making a point: I choose this.
“I don’t need therapy,” she said.
“Good,” I answered, settling into my chair. “That makes one of us.”
That earned me her first real look, sharp, assessing, curious despite herself.
I placed the thin case file on the table between us and opened it where the paperclip had bent the first page. I did not look up when I began to read.
“Breaking and entering. Destruction of property. Violation of a restraining order. Attempted kidnapping. A few months in the county lockup. A history of stalking allegations that did not result in formal charges, though they generated incident reports.” I turned a page.
“Alcohol use. Self-reported episodes of rage followed by dissociation. Does that sound accurate enough to begin?”
Lily rolled her eyes. “I’m bored.”
I looked at her evenly. “Yes. I can see that.”
Her mouth twitched. “Good. At least you’re observant.”
“Tell me about the boredom,” I said. “Does it come before or after you act out?”
She frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Some people act out because they’re angry. Others because they’re afraid. But boredom,” I said, “boredom can be dangerous. It’s the space where people start making noise just to hear themselves exist.”
She leaned back, crossing one leg over the other. “You think I act out because I’m bored?”
“I think you cause trouble to feel alive,” I said. “That’s not the same thing.”
Her gaze sharpened, but she didn’t look away.
“What do you feel right before you do something that gets you in trouble?”
She hesitated. “Restless.”
“Restless,” I repeated. “And what helps when you feel that?”
“Nothing,” she said. “It’s like I’m in a box. The only way out is to break something.”
“Does it work?”
“For a minute.”
“And then?”
She looked down at her hands. “Then I’m still in the box. It just gets more crowded with the shit I get myself into.”
I nodded once. “You sound familiar with that box.”
Her laugh was low, humorless. “I redecorate it every few weeks.”
“When did you start building it?” I asked, pleased that we were jumping right in.
She glanced up. “You mean the mess?”
“No,” I said. “The box. The part that keeps you from climbing out.”
Her fingers twisted together. “Probably childhood.”
“What was happening then?”
“Nothing dramatic. Just a lot of pretending.”
“Pretending what?”
“That everything was fine.”
I waited. Silence worked better than pressure. She filled it.
“My dad ran a company that chews people up. My mom played hostess to whoever was left, including his mistresses. I learned to smile, keep my posture, and never let anyone know when I was drowning.”
“So you learned early that presentation matters more than peace,” I said.
Her mouth curved. “You make it sound like a diagnosis.”
“It’s an observation.”
“Same thing.”
“Then tell me this,” I said. “When did pretending stop working?”
She hesitated, then said quietly, “When I met him.”
“Who is 'him'?”
She looked at me as if testing whether I already knew. “Matt Taylor.”
Her voice changed when she said his name. Softer. As if guilt and nostalgia were wrestling for the same breath.
I didn’t write his name down, but I was keen on the fact that I was sitting in the presence of the woman who practically referred two of my other patients.
“What changed when you met Matt?”
She leaned back, eyes unfocused. “He noticed me. Not the version I’m supposed to be, the one with the perfect hair and the last name that opens doors. He saw me like I was something raw. Alive.”
“Being seen felt different,” I added.
“It was like air after holding your breath too long. I would classify it more as being seen differently felt real, even though I… wasn’t.”
“And then?” I pressed.
Her jaw flexed. “Then he remembered he had a wife.”
She smiled bitterly. “Saint Sarah. The perfect one. You know the type.”
“Tell me what perfect means to you.”
“She forgave him,” Lily said. “She kept her house, her family, her image. Everyone loves her for surviving him.”
“And you?”
“I’m the villain. The distraction. The woman who set the match.”
“Do you believe that?” I asked more slowly to give her time to react.
She blinked. “That I’m the villain?”
“Yes.” I nodded.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Sometimes I think I just loved him wrong. Is that a crime now?”
“It depends on what you did with that love.”
She looked away. “I made mistakes. I chased him when I should’ve disappeared. I went to their house. I told myself it was closure. It wasn’t.”
“What was it?”
I tilted my head, but I knew she was talking about the breaking and entering. Matt described it as a type of ‘invisible assault.’ It’s interesting that Lily saw it as a form of love.
“A dare,” she said. “To see if he’d still choose me.”
“And when he didn’t?”
Her shoulders lifted slightly, then fell. “I broke. I thought if I could just explain, make him understand, it would fix everything. But the world doesn’t care for explanations.”
I let that hang a moment before asking, “And Sarah?”
Lily’s expression shifted, defensive, then something close to admiration. “She didn’t scream... or cry. She just looked at me like I was already gone. Like she’d known all along, I was going to do something stupid. Going after their kids wasn’t the smartest thing I’ve ever done.”
“Sarah’s look stayed with you,” I said. I’d already learned that the more matter-of-fact you were with Lily, the more you got out of her.
“She pitied me,” Lily whispered. “That’s worse than hate.”
“You wanted to matter more than she did.”
“Yes,” she said, barely audible. “I wanted to be the woman he couldn’t forget.”
“And are you?”
Her throat worked before she answered. “I think so. But not in the way I wanted.”
I studied her. “And what way does he remember you, now?”
“As the woman that ruins people,” she said. “Including me.”
“Loving him cost you something.”
“It cost me myself. It's why I went to jail. Why I'm here. Why I'll never be free of my father's hold again.”
Lily’s eyes stayed on her hands. “My dad called me a vow thief. The truth is, so is he. He married my mother, and they had me. Then he just threw it all away for woman after woman. I watched my mother turn into a hopeless shell of herself. I promised myself I would never let a man treat me that way.” She looked up, defiant but trembling.
“It’s true, you know. That I’m a vow thief.
The only vow I’ve ever respected was the vow of silence I took while I stole men from their relationships and broke them up. I can’t stop.”
I leaned forward slightly. “Lily, I want you to think about what you just said.”
She gave a short, nervous laugh. “Which part?”
“The part where you said you can’t stop.” I let the silence stretch. “Now I want you to say what you said again, but in reverse.”
Her brow furrowed. “Reverse?”
“Yes,” I said. “Instead of ‘I can’t stop,’ start with why you started. What came before the need to take what wasn’t yours?”
She hesitated. “You mean… because I saw my father break his vow to my mother? To me?”
I nodded. “That’s closer. When we grow up watching someone betray love, we often try to rewrite that story. You learned early that love is something taken, not given. So you become the one who takes, to make sure no one can take from you first.”
Lily blinked slowly, her voice thin. “So you think I’m just copying him?”
“I think you’re repeating him,” I nodded. “But unlike your father, you still feel the guilt afterward. That’s the part that makes you dangerous to yourself. He built a life out of infidelity. No guilt. No consequence. You built an identity out of it. Full of guilt and obvious consequences.”
She swallowed hard, the edge softening. “You talk like you know what that feels like.”
“I know what it looks like,” I said gently. “Children of betrayal often inherit the shape of it. They tell themselves they’re in control while playing the same game that hurt them.”
She let out a shaky breath. “And what does that make me?”
“It makes you someone who’s still trying to prove that vows mean something,” I said. “Even if you have to destroy them to find out.”
For the first time, Lily didn’t speak. She looked toward the window, then back at me, her voice quieter now. “He said I was a vow thief, but maybe I’m just trying to see if anyone keeps their word.”
“That’s an important difference,” I said. “A thief takes because she believes she’s been denied. A survivor takes because she’s still waiting for proof that promises exist.”
She nodded once, almost imperceptibly. “And if they don’t?”
“Then you learn to make your own,” I said. “Not out of revenge. Out of choice.”
Lily leaned back, her composure thinning. “That sounds hard.”
“It’s supposed to be,” I said. “You’ve already done the easy thing. Now let’s see what happens when you stop breaking what’s already broken.”That’s where we start,” I said. “Not with Matt. Not with Sarah. With what’s left of you.”
She looked at me for a long time, the performance gone, just quiet.
“Is that even still there?” she asked.
“It is,” I said. “You’re sitting in front of me, asking the question. That’s what’s left.”
Her eyes glistened, but she didn’t cry. She pressed her palms flat against her knees, grounding herself.
I closed the file. “Tell me one thing you still want.”
She thought about it. “To stop feeling like a ghost in my own life.”
“Then we’ll work on that,” I said. “Session by session.”
After Lily left, I wrote my session notes:
Progress Note — Dr. Colleen: Patient Lily Thompson
Date: Tuesday, 9:00 AM
Session 1
Lily Thompson presented on time. Her demeanor was defensive, theatrical, and controlled. Affect: variable; oscillates between performative confidence and genuine fatigue. Initial resistance to treatment softened once she was allowed to narrate on her own terms.
Primary presenting theme: control through destruction.
She identifies as “a vow thief,” linking this self-concept to her father’s repeated infidelities. There is an emergent pattern of repetition rather than rebellion: she imitates betrayal in an effort to master it. The behavior is compulsive, not impulsive.
When guided to reverse her own statement (“I can’t stop”), she articulated the underlying motive clearly: she breaks others’ vows to test whether any promise can survive her proximity. This is not cruelty, but confirmation bias born of early exposure to relational collapse.
Emotional insight surfaced near the end of the session. She verbalized a wish“to stop feeling like a ghost in my own life.”
Noted capacity for self-reflection when language is slowed and stripped of judgment.
Counter-transference: brief moments of empathy followed by irritation, a sign of the patient’s ability to project and control emotional atmosphere. Recommend conscious neutrality during future sessions.
Plan:
Continue three sessions weekly for two weeks.
Introduce cognitive reframing around inherited betrayal patterns.
Assign journaling task: “Write one vow you would keep for yourself.”
Monitor for alcohol use and avoidance behaviors following emotional exposure.
Prognosis — guarded, but promising.
Lily Thompson shows capacity for insight and a nascent curiosity about change. She responds not to sympathy but to precision. Beneath the performance, there is pain that wants to be witnessed rather than managed.
End of Session 1.