Page 95 of Back To Our Beginning

“So emotionally you’re okay?” she asked me, as she raised one white eyebrow.

“Absolutely.” I smiled. I took a bite of my sandwich.

“Well, you’d know. In a sense, you are the professional, being a social worker and all.” She broke off a piece of her biscuit and buttered it. “I’m glad to hear there are no residual effects.”

Shit.

I thought about how I wasn’t letting Beau see me naked.

Little Grandma must have seen me hesitate.

“Is there something on your mind?” she asked gently.

“Normally it’s Trenda I’d talk to…”

“But?”

“She feels so guilty because they mistook me for her. I can’t tell her anything about what happened.”

“Honey, can you tell me?” the older woman asked quietly.

I looked around the room, and I realized there were no occupied tables close to us. I slowly nodded.

“It’s really no big deal. I mean, nothing terrible happened to me.”

“You were dragged away from Trenda’s house. You needed emergency surgery. You almost died. Bad things happened to you, Maddie.”

“I mean, they didn’t really abuse me, you know?”

“Define abuse, Sweetpea.”

God, she’s talking to me like I talk to the kids that I deal with in my job.

Shit! I’m sounding like them too!

My eyes went wide.

Little Grandma gave me a wry grin. “Had an epiphany, did you?”

“I was punched and slapped. Not so much different from the stuff that happened if you weren’t quick enough to get out of the way of dear old Dad.”

The smile on Little Grandma’s face was wiped clean. “That man needs to rot in hell.”

“I won’t disagree with you, especially after what he did to Piper.”

“Do you want to talk about what else happened?” she asked in a solemn voice.

I nodded. “I think I need to.” I bit my lower lip. My hands were clenched in my lap. “You know my job, right?”

She nodded.

“So, I’ve seen some really bad things, but I also know that sometimes even small things can mess with you. So, I guess I’m messed up.”

“You never have to apologize for your emotions, Maddie. We’ve discussed this. How you feel is how you feel. You’re entitled to your feelings.”

I let out a breath, and some of the knots in my stomach seemed to ease.

“There were two of us in the house where the two men were. I mean two women,” I explained, looking down at my sandwich. “Only, Lana wasn’t a captive. She was kind of one of the men’s girlfriend.”