He walks away, the echo of his boots dull against the warped tile. The door slams, and for a few seconds, I just stare at the wall, blank and silent. Then everything catches up at once, the shaking, the taste of copper, the urge to disappear.
I drag myself upright. My knees won’t hold, so I crawl. The floor burns my palms. The flickering light hums overhead, steady and cruel.
In the corner, a small mirror hangs cracked above the sink. When I see my reflection, I stop breathing. My face is swollen with bruises around my eyes, which are too wide, my lip is split open, and my cheekbone is bleeding. My skin is unnaturally pale, with blood on my neck. I reach for the tap, turn it, and rinse until the water turns pink, then clears.
Outside, an engine idles steadily, patient and certain. I know without looking that he’s still there, waiting for me to walk out exactly as he planned.
I wrap a sheet around myself and stumble through the door. The hallway stinks of cigarettes and dust. The exit sign buzzes overhead. Every step feels like walking through water.
The desert air hits like a slap when I step outside. The car is parked where he said it would be, with the keys in the ignition and the driver's side door open. There’s a note on the seat in his neat handwriting:
Tell them I’m coming.
I close my eyes. The wind shifts, carrying the smell of exhaust and fear. And in that moment, I understand exactly what the reason is.
"You're another stray he'll abandon," he said. "Just another broken thing Tiny picks up and discards when he gets bored."
“He was wrong,” Dr. Chen says gently, and the steadiness in her voice makes something in my chest shift, even though I don’t trust it. "Tiny came for you."
"They all did," I whisper. "The whole club. They tore that place apart looking for me."
"Because you matter to them."
"Because I'm," I stop, swallow the poison I've been carrying. "Because I'm theirs to protect."
"Is that what you believe? That you're just a responsibility?" The question hangs there, sharp and uncomfortable.
"I don't know what I believe anymore," I admit. "Josiah taught me that I was nothing. Lattimer taught me that I was a tool. The club treats me like family, but." My hands shake. "What if they're wrong? What if Josiah was right and I'm just…"
"Stop," Dr. Chen interrupts gently but firmly. "What Josiah did to you, what Lattimer did to you, none of that defines your worth. You are not what was done to you. You are how you survived it."
I want to believe her. God, I want to.
"I'm still so angry," I whisper. "I'm angry that it happened. Angry that I couldn't stop it. Angry that Nadia and Exleigh had to suffer too. Angry that Josiah is dead and I can't." I break off.
"Can't what?"
"Can't make him hurt the way he hurt us." The admission sits between us like a live wire.
"That's a normal response to trauma," Dr. Chen says carefully. "Anger is part of grief. And you are grieving. For the safety you lost, for the innocence, for the version of yourself that existed before."
"I don't even remember who that person was."
"Then maybe," she says softly, "it's time to meet who you are now."
The words sit between us like a challenge I'm not ready to accept.
"What if I don't like her?" I whisper.
Dr. Chen leans forward, elbows on her knees, and for once she looks less like a therapist and more like a woman who's also survived something she won't talk about.
"What if you do?" she counters. "What if the woman who survived Josiah and Lattimer, who teaches dance to traumatized girls, who paints beauty out of pain. What if she's stronger than the girl who got taken? What if meeting her is the best thing you've ever done?"
I want to believe her. God, I want to. "What if she's still too broken to love?" The question comes out smaller than I meant it to.
"Then you let someone love the broken parts until you can." Dr. Chen sits back. "Syvannah, being loved isn't a prize you earn by healing. It's the thing that makes healing possible."
When I step out of her office, the sun is too bright. Everything feels too loud, too sharp, too much.