Page 162 of Requiem
I think about that because he waits for real answers instead of convenient ones. I’ve learned that with this man.
“When things were bad…” My throat tightens slightly. “I always knew what I needed to do next. Survive. Protect someone. Lie. Run. Whatever.” I stare toward the rain again. “Now I wake up some mornings, and there’s coffee brewing, Emma’s reading on the couch, and the ocean’s outside the windows, and nothing terrible is happening.”
Dr. Mercer stays quiet.
“And that should feelgood,”I say softly. “But sometimes it just makes me anxious.”
“Because?”
My fingers tighten together. “Because I keep waiting for something to destroy it. When I allowed myself to be with her last time, it all fell apart and it almost killed us both.”
The words settle heavily between us.
Dr. Mercer leans back in his chair, studying me with that same calm that’s slowly becoming familiar to me. “You spent years training your nervous system to survive instability,” he says carefully. “Peace feels unfamiliar now. Your brain interprets unfamiliar as dangerous.”
I laugh quietly, but there’s nothing funny in it. “That’s bleak.”
“It’s temporary.”
“I still get episodes of derealization, I guess. I dissociate sometimes,” I admit quietly. “Usually in crowds. Or restaurants.” I rub at my jaw absently. “Sometimes Emma notices before I do.”
“And what does she do?”
The tension in my shoulders loosens a little at the thought of her. “She touches me. Like, just little things. My arm. My neck. She keeps talking until I come back.”
Dr. Mercer nods once slowly. “Sounds grounding. It certainly helps that she, too, is a therapist.”
“Yeah. The lady that she owns her business with has been helping her with a lot of her own trauma.”
“You mentioned on the phone that you’ve been thinking about seeing your family?”
My stomach tightens. “Yeah.”
“And how does that feel?”
“Horrible.”
He waits.
I shove a hand through my hair hard enough to pull slightly at the strands. “They saw everything online before the truth came out. And even after…” I laugh weakly. “How the fuck am I supposed to sit across from my mother after all this? I’ve…killedpeople.”
“You think they’ll see you differently.”
“I know they will.”
“Do you?”
The question hits me harder than I expect. I lean forward again, forearms braced against my thighs. “I…I don’t know who I am when I’m not surviving something,” I admit finally. The confession leaves me feeling strangely hollow.
Dr. Mercer watches me quietly for a moment before answering. “You’re learning, Jude.”
***
By the time I leave the office an hour later, the rain has softened into a mist drifting along the Oregon coast. My motorcycle waits near the curb, black paint still damp from the weather. I bought this pretty much as soon as I could, craving the freedom it gives. When I’m on it, I feel better. Emma is still a little nervous about riding, but I’ll get her on someday.
I slide my helmet on and swing a leg over the bike. Before I bother to turn the key, I stare ahead at the mountains framing the town. I’m a free man now. Truly.
I was acquitted of every charge. Vlad and Henrik were arrested, and Nolan became the dead scapegoat everyone was looking for, taking the blame for most of the murders I actually committed. Vlad’s trafficking empire collapsed, and countless women and girls were pulled out of that nightmare alive.
