🧐AUTHORS NOTE: *** Triple stars denotes start and finish of flashback or memory ***
New Year's Eve.
The first one I've ever spent alone, and also the first one during which I've been incarcerated! I hope it's the only one ever. I am choosing to be hopeful, I want to remember, I just don't know how to!
I have found during my sessions with Daisy that I am not in a phychiatric hospital at all, but the hospital wing of a women's prison. That was a shock, why was in in prison?
Daisy couldn't tell me, but did say that what I needed to remember would make all the difference to my current predicament, and I surmise the person they presume I care about and could help by remembering anything is Yanni.
Where is he?! I'm scared for him. I want him here with me so much, I lie awake at night wracking my brain for any tiny detail of that night that might help me recall something useful, something that gets me out of here and back to Yanni. He is the reason I have finally gotten out of bed, behaved like a normal human being, washing, toileting alone and trying so hard to eat at least a little of the 'food' everyday. That's proving very tough!
I've had six intense sessions with Daisy since I agreed to work with her to unlock the depository that is my brain.
We've glossed over my marriage for now, I prefer to try and help Yanni, I need to focus on the now. Exorcising the ghost of Harry will have to wait for another time.
The details that I have been given in an attempt to trigger a memory are minor and seemingly inconsequential. I don't understand how five words are expected to be the key to unlock the treasury of secrets inside my head but I'm prepared to do whatever I can for Yanni.
Moonlight.
Prosecco.
Staircase.
Silk robe.
PAIN!
The five words that are supposed to save me, and probably Yanni too, from a miserably long spell in jail/psych unit!
I try to imagine scenarios where all of these words would sit together comfortably.
The first four sound like a lovely romantic evening. Were Yanni and I having a date? If we were, where does the pain factor in? Perhaps it's not physical pain I'm supposed to remember.... it's possible that he told me something that caused me emotional pain. Him having a girlfriend would cause that. Did he tell me that he has a girlfriend, or worse still, a wife??!
It doesn't feel right, I reject that scenario.
Maybe I had too much prosecco, tried to walk up the stairs in my silk gown, the way lit only by the moonlight, slipped and fell, causing the pain?
*** "stop strugglin, pretendin you don't love it! You're a whore, a dirty fucking slut, you love this, you just need reminding is all. I'm going to remind you reeeeal good..... thats my job today, holy shit...I LOVE MY WORK....mmmmmm... oh fuck yeah...feel how tight that arsehole is..... that's gonna feel amazing, well, for me at least. When my cock slams into you you're gonna to feel like you've been ripped apart.... you're gonna scream, and the louder the better. The harder you scream the more I'll love it , so a little embarrassingly I'll probably come quick, but I guess thats a win win..... you get a break from screaming and I get to come in that filthy little dirtbox as instructed, then after a short break I get to fuck you again, however I want, no restrictions...... as long as I don't kill you. We, sorry.....I..... am going to have the BEST. NIGHT. EVER!! You're going to get the message, and if I do a very good job he might even hear you for himself ***
"The Intruder!!" I whisper
"I remember something!!! The silk robe was the trigger.
I slipped! No.... yes, I slipped and that alerted him...... he caught me as I tried to run.... he hurt me but I didn't scream, I didn't fight... I did nothing at all....."
YES I DID.... I damn well survived! That's something I did! Bastard! I did not give him the fight he wanted, I did not move, I did not scream..... not once! That did nothing to save me from the most degrading abuse I've ever suffered, but probably took the shine off of his pleasure. I would rather die that help this vile and depraved sub-human get his rocks off!
Daisy sits forward slightly in her chair, she's excited but trying not to show it.... I have the same problem when getting a scoop that I wasn't expecting... it's exhilarating! I'm brought back to the room when Daisys soft and calm voice cuts through my musings.
"That's good Sydney, well done. Can you go back there? Are there any sounds? What can you hear? Are you cold? What can you see?" she prys gently.
After gripping Daisys hand tightly, as a child would a security blanket, I take some deep cleansing breaths, slowly inhale through the nose, exhale slowly out through the mouth. When I feel calmer I force myself back there.....
*** I can feel, but there is no sensation. No, that makes no sense, feeling IS a sensation... I mean, I'm aware of his hands, and worse, on and inside my body, and I'm aware of movement, but there is nothing else..... no feeling at all, neither physical or emotional. I can't tell if the ground is cold, or hard, i can't hear anything... wait!!
A WHEEZE!
AN ACCENT!
*** "'E wasn't lyin' when 'e sed you was bangin'! I'm gonna fuckin' enjoy this........ but not as much as you are sweet'art!" ***
"He had an accent, Northern, I'm not good with regional accents but I'd guess maybe Liverpool? Definitely English though! Without doubt.
He said something strange!
He told me that he'd been told.... told? Wait... what?
Someone told him to hurt me?" I'm confused.
The answer is there in my brain, I can feel it, like that elusive itch that you can never scratch, always just one more millimetre away, always just a hairs breadth from that supreme satisfaction, the triumphant relief when your nails connect with the source of your problem, and for me in this case it's....
"I FOUND THE KEY DAISY!!" I cry, the switch to put my brain back online has been tripped.
I remember EVERYTHING! It all comes back in a flood of random, disjointed images, no order to them so I'm having to work hard to decipher the order of events.
"Nausea! I recall feeling dog sick while he..... while he......violated me, and I, err..... I remember wondering if it was the Prosecco I'd drunk on an empty stomach, hunger, or the violent rrrraa..... or the constant and incessant torture of him slamming....
I gasp, the air sucked into my lungs at warp speed as fat tears roll down my cheeks.
"TORTURE! It was torture. He was sent to torture me.... Daisy, he was sent!! He targeted me, he wasn't an opportunistic prowler, he was a message... a warning!"
"How so Sydney? Why do you think that?"
I snap in reply "I don't THINK that, I KNOW that! He told me. I remember his words, what he said. He was a message meant for me Daisy.... a physical D.M!! A direct message from him to me, and now this guy is a real D.M...... a dead man!"
If she's upset, angry or scared, either by my words or of my anger she doesn't show it, instead asking if there is anything or anyone else that I can see or hear.
I can't think about that for a minute, every free brain cell busy processing the fact that I know WHO the intruder was talking about!
Who the message is from, and what it means!
"YANNI!" I croak before bawling like a baby again.