I hear the smile in her voice, but I don’t understand it. Why is she smiling? What’s there to smile about? So I don’t have any vitamin deficiencies—I have plenty of others that can’t be fixed by pills and sunshine.
“He took care of me. Made sure I had vitamins. Access to a treadmill and some weights. I had to eat healthy, no sugar. He even brought home antibiotics the one time my neck managed to get too infected. I didn’t survive ten years because he neglected me.” When I swallow, I feel the gauze wound around my neck. It’s not too tight, but it feels strange. Foreign. I’m used to something heavy and cold circling my neck, not something light and gentle. It makes me uncomfortable.
“Did he abuse you, Jade?”
Her question hits me hard. So hard I need to shake my head to clear it before I can answer. I’d known this question would come. I spent enough time fantasizing about being rescued that I’d run through what my life would be like after being found. Questions. Morbid curiosity. Everyone telling me they wished me the best but secretly believing I didn’t stand a chance. No one able to look at me without seeing me as a victim. No one able to not wonder what Earl Rae had done to me.
“Are you asking if he raped me?” I don’t flinch. I just blink at the ceiling and wait.
“I’m asking if he abused you.”
“If he raped me.”
Dr. Argent is quiet for a minute. I’m not making this easy on her, but she isn’t making this easy on me either. “There are more abuses than rape, Jade.”
I don’t need her to tell me that. Actually, it upsets me, pisses me off that this person who’s studied books is telling me how abuse works.
“The answer is no. He never touched me like that.” I swallow because my throat is on fire. From the drugs and now the emotions clawing at it. “I was his daughter. He never raped me. I’m fine . . . so you can move on to another patient who needs you.”
I’m Sara, your daughter. I missed you, Dad. I’m so glad you found me. I love you. Those phrases have been so programmed into me I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to forget them. In a way, they’re the words that freed me. Once I finally gave in to playing the role of his daughter, I was allowed out of the closet. I moved from the dark to the light. I went from being a prisoner to a priceless family member.
“He didn’t rape you, but he did kidnap you, held you against your will for ten years, and kept you chained up.” Dr. Argent lets that hang in the air. She isn’t waiting for me to respond; she just wants to make sure that gets good and embedded in my head. Since clearly my head wasn’t messed up enough. “This isn’t something a person can just get over, Jade. It’s not something they can just be ‘fine’ from a day later.”
I wish the drugs would carry me back under again, but my adrenaline’s probably burning through them too quickly. I want to fall asleep and wake up to find that I’m all ready to move on and my scars have faded away.
“Well, I can.” My voice breaks, and I look at the cup of water. I wet my lips again. “I just want to forget it all. I can’t do that if you keep asking me questions, okay?” My fingers tremble. I ignore them. “I just want to forget the past ten years of my life.”
“You know that isn’t possible.” Her harsh words are spoken softly.
“I know I can try.” I shift in the bed, but my body feels limp. Kind of the way it felt for a couple of days after he drugged me the night he took me. “Is he dead?”
My voice is so quiet I’m surprised she hears me.
“Earl Rae Jackson?” She just barely nods. “Yes, he’s dead. He shot himself.”
Something squeezes at my heart, and when I swallow this time, I can’t. Something’s stuck in my throat. “What are they going to do with his body?”
“I don’t know, but I can find out if you’d like.” Dr. Argent uncrosses her legs and crosses them the other direction.
“Will they have a funeral?”
“I’m not sure. Would you like me to ask?”
I shake my head, and it’s only then that I realize I’ve started to cry. They’re silent tears, but they come one right after the other, feeling as though they’re carving canyons down my temples. “No, I don’t care what happens to him.”
I want to wipe the tears away so I can pretend they’d never been there. I want to swipe them away so she can’t see them. I want to stop crying altogether because I learned a long time ago that tears do nothing but make a person feel worse.
Dr. Argent’s quiet for a second. Then she clears her throat. “You know, it’s very common for victims in your situation to form some sort of attachment to their captors.”
I close my eyes, but really, I want to cover my ears. I don’t want to hear any of this.
“It can happen in a matter of days, and with you being under his control for a decade—the only person you had contact with—it would be very normal for you to feel some kind of bond with him.”
The tears don’t stop. They come faster. “He took my whole life away. I hate him.”
Dr. Argent scoots the chair a little closer. “You’re crying.”
I laugh a few notes. They don’t sound like most laughs though. “In case you missed it, it’s been a rough decade for me.”