Remember This

By Kayley Barratt

Molly has never felt safe. For four years she has lived in constant fear that the serial killer that murdered her family is coming for her. She has been moved around the country continuously, dropped off with a new foster family every couple of months that are too out of their depth to deal with her. When she is relocated back to California at seventeen, Molly has nothing left to live for. Believing that suicide is her only option, Molly makes the brave decision to end it all one fateful night. She had the perfect plan; nothing was supposed to go wrong. Her new foster family have merely known her a couple of months and she was certain that they’d never miss her. Just one choice, one jump, and she’d be with her family again.

Charlie has never had to consider his own empathy towards strangers. He’s arrogant, selfish and becomes unbearably irritated with other people’s problems. But when he sees Molly standing on the edge of the bridge and ignores every part of himself that wants to walk away, something awakens inside of him that he never realized was there.

Saving her was just the beginning. The two are thrown together in a world-wind friendship of hope, healing and passion as they endure the temptation of love and the danger of a sadistic killer that isn't willing to let Molly go.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: May 28, 2021
• ISBN: 9781008911680

Book preview

Forty-Four

Prologue

The night that Molly’s family were murdered, there was a crowd of four hundred people watching her. Heads were rolling, eyes were blinking, feet were tapping, teeth were clattering.

The night that Molly’s family were murdered, there was a billion stars in the sky. She remembered this, for many nights it was too cloudy to see them and it angered her.

The night that Molly’s family were murdered, her parents had whispered those amazing five words into her ear: We are proud of you.

The night that Molly’s family were murdered, the night her parents were shot, the night her sister was brutally raped and stabbed; there was a sudden silence in the auditorium. It was as if they knew, but how could they know?

Molly delivered her lines, she beamed her eyes up at that bright light at the back of the theatre and she watched as the sound drowned out. She could feel something. Something uncertain. Panic? No, not panic. She couldn’t find her family among the hundreds of faces and she had been trying since the beginning of the performance. Close to panic. Anxious.

Molly could no longer speak her lines. She turned her head to the curtain at the side of the stage and she saw two strangers speaking to her drama teacher. She still tried to speak her words, not taking her eyes from the interaction just feet from her.

Her drama teacher, Mrs Lowe, suddenly looked at her.

My family wouldn’t miss this, Molly told herself. Not for anything.

Molly didn’t need Mrs Lowe to walk out and dismiss the play, Molly was slowly walking toward her, leaving her friends and the audience to watch in silence and confusion. When Molly reached Mrs Lowe and the two strangers, one man and one woman dressed in professional attire, she allowed them to escort her into a private dressing room at the back of the stage.

Molly was told to sit. She sat. She was offered water before an explanation had been given. When the explanation was given, Molly had drifted to another place.

Do you understand, Molly? a voice asked her. She was unsure who.

Molly didn’t respond.

We understand this is going to be a very severe shock. My colleague, she is going to take you to your grandparents. She will take very good care of you.

She’s only thirteen, she can’t handle something like this, Mrs Lowe said. Is your colleague trained in this?

Yes. My colleague, Sophie, is a social worker within the force. Molly will be in very good hands.

Molly felt Mrs Lowe’s hand pat against hers. How odd it was that Mrs Lowe, a drama teacher that Molly could hardly stand, was now her only source of comfort. Molly wanted to go home, she wanted to have that car ride with her family where they told her how much they enjoyed the play and there was laughter and reassuring notions. Molly’s father would probably have driven, for her mother didn’t like driving that much and when they got home they all would have gotten ready for bed while shouting to each other about nonsense.

On the night that Molly’s family were murdered, none of that happened. Instead, Molly was taken by a stranger to her grandparents’ house. She would walk in on them crying and screaming while Molly just stood in the doorway; lost.

She remained lost indefinitely. Not even the distractions of school months later could take away the misplacement of her family. One year after her family were murdered, Molly reluctantly stayed over at a friend’s house. During the night, two strangers knocked on that house.

I’m very sorry but there was a fire tonight at the house you have been staying at. Unfortunately, the two people inside didn’t survive.

Her grandparents. The only connection she had left to her mother and her sister. The only two people in the damn world that she could call family. Molly had heard the phrase ‘lighting doesn’t strike twice’ being spoken before but she could not fathom who would torture her with those odds. Because lighting did strike twice. It struck and it destroyed and it obliterated the last string of humanity she had left. It was almost like a sick joke to her, she had yet again avoided death, avoided disaster, avoided freedom.

She sat on that couch and she listened. Oh, she listened until there was nothing left to hear. But what was left, what was born after, that was silent.

Chapter One

Today

And just in case you missed it there will never be a more perfect time to declare your presence to the world than the moment it demands it. For we are all called upon when it is our time to shine and not a moment before.

To live forever-

To live forever as we will have our moment forever. Molly closes the book and holds it tightly to her chest. The end.

I love that story, Daisy whispers.

I know, Molly says. You make me read it to you twice a week.

Daisy smiles and rests her head back onto her pillow. I almost know it completely. When you leave here, could I have it?

Molly’s grip tightens around the book and she reaches across to turn off Daisy’s lampshade on her nightstand. Goodnight, Daisy.

Goodnight, Molly.

Molly leaves Daisy’s room, the book with her. Daisy is the biological daughter of Molly’s new foster parents and since Molly’s arrival a few months ago Daisy has managed to break a shell that no one has ever come close to knocking through. Maybe it’s because she’s a child that Molly is different with her. She doesn’t know Molly’s past and she doesn’t ask about it. Molly likes that.

Molly’s foster mother, Pam, is brushing her teeth in the bathroom as Molly walks past it. Their eyes meet for a second before Molly becomes panicked and picks up the pace to her bedroom.

She places the book on her night stand. It was her sister’s. She remembers the first time her sister, Savannah, shared it with her and just like Daisy, Molly asked her if she could have it too. Savannah laughed.

Maybe one day, she said. This book helps people discover what their lives could become. Once I’ve figured it out it will be your turn.

It is now her turn. But Molly has no desire to take the words literally. Her moment has gone, it is spread among the wind. If Molly should have had her ‘forever moment’ then destiny would have redirected it. All that’s left is the sound of her sister’s laugh when she reads it and the painful acknowledgement that she will never hear it again.

Molly lays in her bed in the dark watching the moon’s light spray beams through her window. She has been in the foster system now for three years. In those three years she has laid in beds like this one across twenty different homes. Some houses, some apartments, some cottages, even one mansion. Twenty buildings. Twenty strangers. Twenty reasons for her heart to break a little more.

This is the first foster home she has stayed in for more than four months. She doesn’t understand what that means. Did the rest want rid of her but Pam and her husband Daniel don’t? Have her social workers finally become tired of having to relocate her across the country?

So many questions pound her head at night. When will she have to move again? Where will she move to? What will happen once she turns eighteen? Will she be discarded, thrown out onto the street? She will receive her inheritance money when that happens but what is the point of buying a house that she can never be happy in?

Remember this, Savannah said. We cannot take money with us when we die. We cannot take things or possessions or certificates. The only thing we take with us is our memory. So make the brightest memories, the most wonderful memories, because they’ll be all we have to live with forever.

Molly’s tears once again dampen another pillow. Her heart once again beats quickly against another mattress. Her silent screams cling to the fabric that she touches. It leaves behind her imprint of sorrow. A sorrow the world has never known.

Savannah would have been strong enough for this. But not her, not Molly. Molly will never be strong enough; and that is what she tells herself as she falls asleep.

Chapter Two

Molly creeps down the staircase discreetly, trying to leave the house unnoticed. It is morning and she would rather walk to school today than have to endure another loud and boisterous car ride with the kids.

Pam and Daniel have two other foster children living with them. Henley who is four and Lily who is twelve. Molly doesn’t know the ins and outs of why the children are in care but for all her years in the system she has come to know that sharing past experiences is a very unpredictable scenario. It is better not to ask, or to know. She knows enough about Henley’s past though, mainly due to overhearing Pam and Daniel discussing it. And the moment she heard it, she wished she hadn’t.

Good morning. Molly turns abruptly from the front door to see Pam staring at her from the end of the hallway to the kitchen. Where are you going?

School, Molly replies.

School doesn’t start for another hour. Come eat some breakfast with us. I made-

No, thank you, Molly says. I’m not hungry.

Okay, do you still have the money I gave you for lunch?

Molly nods, her hand twisting against the unlocked doorknob. Yes. I’ll see you later.

Have a good day.

Molly opens the door and leaves the house, locking it behind her. She places her strap-bag around her shoulder and takes to the street of her new neighbourhood. This neighbourhood looks a lot like her original one. Palm trees, clean and tidied pavements, boys riding their bicycles as they make their early paper rounds, private driveways with expensive cars. It is her second time in California and she hasn’t missed it. She preferred Georgia. Her foster family there lived on a secluded ranch with dozens of horses and there was a lot to distract her.

As new as she is to neighbourhoods she is also cursed with being the new girl at multiple schools. Every school faculty knew of her past to an extent and that made it harder for Molly to blend in. Her family’s murder was plastered on so many news channels that it was difficult for Molly to meet anyone at school that hadn’t familiarized with it. However, over the last few months things began to change, Molly just didn’t care anymore.

Head down, eyes low and mind on her studies; Molly makes it through day after day without much distractions. Her classmates think of her as weird and Molly has never corrected them.

She reaches the grounds of the high school and she seats herself on a bench as far from the parking lot as she can. Even though there’s another thirty minutes until classes start, dozens of students begin to arrive in their friendship groups.

Many pass Molly, giving glances and smirks. She had friends once. Lots of friends. She was the popular one, the one that all the other girls wanted to be friends with. She was confident once. She would stroll through the hallways of junior high with her head to the sky and her back straight. She still remembers how it felt, like she was invincible; like nothing in the world could touch her. Like, nothing could turn her life upside down.

She watches as smaller groups meet bigger groups. She watches as a handsome guy’s arm folds around a pretty girl’s shoulder. She watches the life she could have had play out in front of her eyes. She watches for so long that she doesn’t hear the bell at first. And then she moves across the grounds towards the entrance, taking her troubles with her.

Her last class before lunch is science and there’s one girl that seems relentless to make Molly’s life hell today.

Have you ever done this before?

Molly looks up from the frog that she’s attempting to dissect and becomes startled by her partner’s question. The girl didn’t want to be put with Molly, she had no choice as her usual partner is sick.

You’re doing it wrong, the girl says, not bothering to wait for a reply. She snatches the forceps from Molly’s fingers aggressively. You have to remove the skin here to make the incision.

Oh, Molly whispers.

Seriously, just leave it to me. Just sit and paint your nails or something.

Paint my nails? Molly repeats. Why would I do that?

The girl snaps her crystal, blue eyes up and narrows them. Are you retarded or something?

No.

I was being sarcastic. Damn, Raya really picked a day to be sick. The girl rolls her eyes and makes the incision with the scalpel. Molly just observes, unsure of what else to do. Are you just going to stare at me? the girl demands. It’s creeping me out.

At her remark a few classmates from the tables around them laugh out. The blonde, tanned popular girl then looks at them and laughs along. Molly did hear the teacher call her name but she forgets what it was. She is bad with names.

What do you want me to do? Molly asks her.

Not be in this class.

Well, I am.

I see that, the girl says, widening her eyes at Molly. I’m not blind. I’d rather be blind than as stupid as you though.

More laughter. Molly holds her breath to keep the tears from falling. She turns her head away from the smirk of her partner and closes her eyes for a moment against her palm.

Are you taking a nap now? the girl says. I’m not surprised. I heard you sleep in the gutter at night. It must keep you awake.

Molly keeps her head turned away, her eyes pinched closed to block it out. All she wants is for someone to talk to her in a different way than what her partner is. All she wants is to just have a moment of clarity and peace.

You’re not crying are you? the girl laughs. Oh, you are! Poor little cry baby.

Molly quickly wipes her cheeks and removes her hand from her face. She leans back in her seat at the table and stares towards the front desk to where the teacher is writing on his laptop, oblivious to what is going on around him.

Her eyes drift to a boy on a table across the classroom that is staring at her. Unlike everyone else he doesn’t find the girl’s taunts funny and he quickly looks away. Molly recognizes him from some of her other classes but she can’t remember his name. She knows he is handsome, insanely so; with light hair, muscled arms and features of a perfectly crafted face. She knows just by looking at him, even though she doesn’t know who he is, that he is socially above her and most others.

Seriously, do you want me to do all the work? her partner suddenly demands. She throws the scalpel across the table angrily, and it lands in front of Molly’s hand. Pick it up and do your bit.

Molly’s hand shakes as she picks up the scalpel and turns her chair towards the frog and the grinning blonde girl’s stare sends Molly’s anxiety levels soaring.

Do I make you nervous?

No, Molly says.

So, you aren’t going to go and cry in the toilets after this class?

No.

Bet you will.

Molly looks up to the clock on the wall. She hoped it would inform her that she had only seconds left until the bell rang, but she was mistaken. She has thirty minutes left. Thirty whole minutes of holding in her tears. Thirty whole minutes of her hand shaking and her head pounding.

Thirty whole minutes of pain.

Chapter Three

Molly allows the tears to come when she is alone in a cubical. She has spent half of her lunch break crying and she doesn’t know how much longer she can last like this. She has no one to comfort her. No one to help her. No one to stand at her side and hold her hand. No one wants that burden.

She has to do it alone like she always has. She was alone the moment she was taken from that stage and escorted into the darkest room of her life. There is no point in trying to convince herself otherwise, there is no point anymore.

When Molly finally leaves the cubical patting her cheeks with a tissue, she is greeted with the face of her science partner and her three very attractive friends.

I knew it! the girl shouts. I knew you’d run in here and cry.

You called it, Camilla, another girl says with a smirk. I wonder how long she’s been in here for.

Probably since the class ended, Camilla says. What do you have to cry about? You didn’t even have to do any of the work.

Molly keeps a hold of her bag against her shoulder and starts to move for the door. Camilla blocks it, smiling through her long, blond locks.

Are you going to another cubical to cry? Or would you like us to leave so you can continue?

I just want to leave, Molly whispers.

I heard she’s in therapy, a girl says behind Molly. Like, she’s really messed up.

Is that true? Camilla says, pulling a frown face. Are you tapped up there? Camilla presses her finger against Molly’s forehead and pushes her backwards.

Don’t touch me, Molly hisses.

Or what? Will you go all psycho? Will you get your voodoo doll and curse me?

Everyone laughs and Molly can’t take it. She keeps her head down and pushes past Camilla in haste, making her narrow escape from the toilets. She doesn’t stop to see if they’ve followed her, she just keeps walking, all the way out of the science block and down to the eating grounds.

She bursts through a door, she doesn’t know where, but the fresh air is heaven against her skin. She jogs along the school grounds, passing tables and tables of people that she believes are laughing at her. After minutes of running, she finally takes her place at a bench next to the school fountain.

She hasn’t even eaten and she doesn’t care. What good will food do? Will it take away the hurt? Will it quench the ever-lasting hunger of wanting all of this to go away? Molly blinks up at the strong sun and takes a deep breath.

Inhale, count to five and let every single thing that is hurting you escape when you exhale, Savannah would say. All of it. Out with the air. And when you take a new breath, you only breathe in positivity.

Granted, she would only tell Molly to do this during her intense yoga classes which Molly was forced to participate in at home; but it is still a memorable notion to help her. She uses her sister’s yoga techniques to breathe out the negativity of the morning. But no matter how hard she tries, there is always a little left.

She is so caught up with the thoughts of her sister that she is delayed with the argument happening behind her. Voices, one male and one female, begin to bicker on the adjoining bench around the fountain.

Why do I need to tell you every detail of my life? the male demands. It is a strong voice, husky and deep. If I want to go out, I’ll go out. I don’t need your permission.

I’m not saying you need permission, Charlie! You do this every time. I can’t speak to you about anything because you think I’m fishing.

You are fishing. I don’t see you for two days and I get hit with a hundred questions.

So? I’m interested to know what you’ve been doing. Why is that so bad?

Molly doesn’t recognize the voice of the female. She doesn’t sound like a teenager, she sounds older. Molly peers around the bench curiously, catching a glimpse of a beautiful woman dressed in a white summer dress standing over a male with light brown hair. He has his back to her, but the dark-haired woman meets Molly’s eyes and Molly looks away sheepishly.

I don’t want to do this here, the male, Charlie, says. There’s a place and time.

Fine. Where and when?

Charlie sighs. Tomorrow.

Are you freaking kidding me? Tomorrow? Really?

I’m busy tonight.

Too busy for me? the woman’s voice drops lower.

Now you know how it feels.

Well I’m working tomorrow. You either see me tonight or you don’t see me at all.

I told you, I’m busy. What the hell do you want from me?

So that’s it, is it? You do what you want, when you want and with no respect for me? the woman demands angrily.

Yep. You’ve finally figured it out, Aubrey.

Asshole.

Where are you going?

Molly slides along the bench as Aubrey storms around the fountain while Charlie gives quick pursuit. Molly has heard many arguments like this one from various schools and various people, but this is the first time she is unsure of who is actually in the wrong.

That’s it, run away, Charlie shouts as Aubrey walks quickly to the parking lot. It’s what you’re best at!

Molly suddenly realises she is staring at him and he realises it too. She recognizes his face, he is the boy from her science class, the one that didn’t laugh along with Camilla’s taunts.

What are you looking at? he hisses at Molly.

Nothing, Molly says.

She keeps her eyes low until he has walked off. The bell rings, signalling the end of lunch and Molly has run out of time. She must now face an entire two hours of gym class with every other girl in her grade. She knows Camilla and her friends will be there and they have most likely told everyone about Molly’s weak moment earlier. She needs to compartmentalize her sorrow, but there is so little strength she has to do it.

Molly slowly makes the journey to the out building around the other side of the school. She joins the back of the line of all the other girls in her grade that are waiting to be let inside by a gym instructor. Across the field she sees the boys enter their outbuilding and she wonders how inappropriate it would be if she was to discreetly join them.

She wouldn’t mind getting changed there, she wouldn’t mind a dozen pair of male eyes on her if it meant escaping the girls.

The door bursts open.

Come on, ladies!

It’s too late. Molly enters the outbuilding and fearfully slides into the changing rooms.

Chapter Four

So what happened? Molly’s mother asked her as she found Molly in tears in her bedroom. This girl called you names?

She said I stole her boyfriend, Molly cried. But she’s lying, momma. And she’s telling everyone.

Molly was only nine at the time and even though she was a popular nine-year-old she was still at the mercy of another girl’s cruelty. She just wanted to be friends with everyone, girls and boys, and she couldn’t understand when that didn’t happen.

But it’s a lie, her mother said. So, you have nothing to feel bad about. You’re a nice girl, Moll, nicer than the ones calling you names. If you want to get back at her then keep being nice to her. It will confuse her. Girls like that just want to test your reactions and it’s your reactions that they’ll remember about you.

Molly stands in front of the mirror of the toilets inside the changing room. She decided to get changed here and so far she’s been left in peace. She wears a V-neck tight shirt with the school’s logo on it along with knee-high sweatpants that makes her bum twice as big. Her curly, dark blonde hair is tied back into a pony tail on the top of her head and her lightly tanned skin looks paler underneath the bright lights of the toilets. She looks into her own hazel eyes at the mirror, blinking them softly. With her hair like this and her uniform like everyone else’s she can almost blend in as normal.

She splashes water against her dry face as she remembers the only other time a girl had made her cry. Her mother knew exactly what to say, exactly what to do, exactly what Molly needed to hear. Her mother isn’t here to help her now.

Molly walks out of the changing room and places her clothes and bag into a locker. She hears laughter all around the room and it makes her paranoid. She wants to leave but she’s scared she will be the first and she doesn’t know who will be next out. She backs up to the cold wall, becoming occupied with her nails.

Jesus, a voice says. You almost look normal.

Molly knows the voice belongs to Camilla but she doesn’t look up. She sees many pairs of sneakers walk past her own and exit the changing room. With Camilla out of the room, Molly looks up with a new breath. After more girls leave Molly leaves too and makes her way to the back door and out onto the track.

Hurry up, ladies! Come on! the gym instructor, Miss Beachwell, screams. She is a tall, broad woman with hard muscles and enormous thighs.

Molly jogs along with everyone else towards her and they all stand in a huddle at the edge of the running track. Most of them are standing in their friendship groups, even the less popular girls have a friend by their side. Molly is by herself.

You’re gonna be split into two groups today, Miss Beachwell says. Half are doing track; the other half are doing the obstacle course. You’ll switch after an hour.

What groups? a girl asks.

Miss Beachwell sighs and walks towards the front line of girls, she claps her hands together and narrows them downwards, indicating a divide down the middle. She looks to the left, towards Molly’s side. This side is doing track first. I’ll be watching closely so no funny business. For those doing track I want to see thirty laps completed in the hour. Got it?

The track group nod and scatter.

Molly takes off towards a lane, a temporary smile is on her face as she begins to run. She loves running. She is drawn towards the idea that she doesn’t have to be running from anything or towards anything, she is just caught in a moment of looseness.

After her tenth lap around the track Molly stops at a table to take a drink of water. While drinking the plastic cup is suddenly knocked from her hand, injuring her mouth and cheek momentarily. The cup and the water greet the floor and she stares in shock at a red-headed girl with freckles all over her face and arms. This is the first time Molly has ever been physically assaulted.

Oops, the girl says. You should watch where you’re going.

I was standing still, Molly says.

No, you walked into me. Are you calling me a liar?

Molly blinks. Over the redhead’s shoulder she sees Camilla and her friends laughing and smirking. The redhead doesn’t wait for a response, she strolls back over to her group and laughs along. It becomes obvious that Camilla had instructed the redhead to do it or possibly dared her to, they’d do anything she tells them.

Molly can’t understand how this has come about today. Camilla has never really showed interest in her before. There has been remarks now and again but nothing on the scale of what she has suffered today. Molly knows suffering like the back of her hand, even without Camilla’s taunts she could never be happy. Happiness is a foreign concept to Molly. It is something that came into her life for thirteen years, left, and never returned again.

Remember this, Savannah said, just a week before her death. She was standing underneath the archway to the kitchen with oven gloves over her hands. If you’re happy, you’re winning.

I’m always happy, Molly replied while glancing up from her phone to smile at her sister. "Are you happy?"

I’m an adult, I’m hardly ever happy. Oh, what I’d give to be a teenager again. My teenage years were the happiest years of my life.

Really? Molly objected. All that boring study stuff.

"Well obviously that didn’t make me happy, Savannah laughed. But the parties, the boys, the endless searching of who I am. Those were the days. You’ve got all that ahead of you. Your teenage years will be the best too, Mo, just go with it."

Molly laughed. Why are you telling me all of this? Don’t you have burning chicken to take out the oven?

Yeah. Maybe. Dinner’s in five!

Molly snaps back to present day, to where her heart is aching and her legs are trembling. She can’t control when the memories hit her or which they will be, they just come. She looks to her left and imagines her sister standing next to her. Her comforting smile, her wise words, her unbelievable optimism. Savannah would be heartbroken to see her like this. To see her happy, baby sister so lost and damaged. Savannah told Molly that the best years of her life would be her teenage years; ironically, they were her worst because of Savannah. Because Molly lost her.

Molly turns away from the stares and chuckles and she heads back towards the track. She begins to run, with no desire to stop.

After school has finally ended Molly is picked up by Pam and is driven across town for her counselling appointment. Molly has been in therapy for four years. In that time, she has had ten different therapists. They pass Molly’s notes along as though she is a sold animal. Each new therapist knows of her history before Molly has even stepped through the door. They know exactly what to say, exactly what not to say, and exactly how she is feeling even though they’re the ones that ask it.

The only thing they don’t share, what they cannot share, is what is said in the therapy sessions. And that is very little. It had taken Molly an entire year before she had spoken a word in her therapy sessions and then after the deaths of her grandparents it had taken her another year to talk about it. Her new therapist, Helen, is a replica of all the others. She’s good at words but nothing ever changes.

Helen smiles at her as she enters, as always, but Molly doesn’t smile back. She takes to the comfortable green, lounge chair against the wall and stares at the window. Helen is wearing her usual white suit with expensive pants and heels which makes her seem more professional than necessary. The eye-glasses around her face are rounded like the shape of onion rings and are so large that Helen’s eyes look enormous.

Hello again, Molly, Helen says as she sits on a wooden chair near her desk. How was school?

Molly just shrugs. Okay I guess.

That’s good. And are you making progress with any of your classmates? You said in our last session that you hoped to make a friend.

Molly swallows down the lie before she speaks it. Yes, I’ve made progress.

Good, that’s good. Is there anything you want to talk about today? Anything specific that has you worried or anxious?

I’m always anxious, Molly admits.

Tell me about feeling anxious. Tell me what triggers it. What do you worry about more than anything else?

Molly clicks her tongue across her teeth as she keeps her gaze on the window. That he’s out there. That he’s watching me.

Who, Molly?

The person that killed them. The monster that took my family.

How often do you feel anxious about that?

Always, Molly says. I know that he’s coming for me. I can feel him. He knows where I am. The weird part is, I kind of want him to find me. What does that make me?

It makes you a victim of severe trauma, Helen replies. Survivor’s guilt is common in situations like this. A part of you wishes that you were there when it happened so your family didn’t have to go through it without you and you didn’t have to be left behind. Is it a fantasy of yours that the killer takes you, too? Because you believe you should have been his victim to begin with?

Molly nods in shame. I should be angry at him right? I should be blinded with rage and vengeance. Yet all I can think about is why he didn’t kill me too. I should have been taken too.

No, Molly. Your family wouldn’t want that. They wouldn’t have wanted you to go through that fear and pain. They would have protected you no matter what. You have so much more to give, so much more.

The only people I have ever loved in this world are dead, Molly says numbly. Every single one of them. I have nothing left to give anyone or anything.

Not everything is gone. Riley isn’t gone. Do you want to talk about him?

Molly stares at her and shakes her head violently.

Okay, Helen says. We don’t have to talk about that. What I’m interested to know is what you want for yourself.

What do you mean?

Well, where do you see these sessions heading? Where do you see yourself in ten years? Do you think about that, your future?

I can’t even think past the next five minutes. Is this normal after four years? To still feel like this?

There is no right answer to that, Helen says. Everyone deals with grief and suffering in their own way and their own time. You were very young and you’re still very young. What you have been through in your short life most adults would find impossible to cope with. Every day you can only get stronger.

No, Molly whispers. That isn’t what this is. I am not grateful to be alive. I am not healing in any way. Every day I endure these random memories of my family. They come to me when I am feeling sadder than usual and they only make me feel sadder. Remembering them doesn’t give me strength, it does nothing.

Because they remind you that they are gone, Helen says. Each memory is a happy sentiment when you are reliving it because you were happy in that memory. But afterwards it hits you.

Like a train at ninety mile per hour.

So maybe that is something we can work on. Reliving those memories without the trauma and sadness attached to them. Your family gave you wonderful memories and putting them side-by-side the darkness will only grow to confuse you and isolate you from the memory of them all together. You cannot allow yourself to forget them, Molly.

It will take the pain away. Molly sniffles while rubbing her nose. Not completely, but if I don’t remember them then I won’t be hurt by losing them.

That isn’t how grief works. Grief isn’t just in the mind. It’s in sound, it’s in smell, something familiar, something like home. Grief is there to remind us that we shared time with that person and that we shared a part of our lives with them. Helen pulls her chair closer to Molly, her huge eyes beaming through her glasses. If all we have left is the acknowledgement of that then why would we want to take it away?

I don’t want to take it away, Molly says. I just want it all to stop. I just want to stop feeling like I’m alone in the world.

You are not alone in the world, Helen says reassuringly, to no avail. You just have to look around. There will be someone there.

Molly dismisses it. She knows there is always someone there but it doesn’t make a difference. The world keeps spinning, people keep living, children keep growing and Molly keeps wishing. Wishing, hoping, that she doesn’t have to be part of it any longer.

She cannot see a life for herself. She cannot see herself married with a loving husband, kids, and a house full of joy. All she sees is coffins. Blackness. Words scribbled onto stone.

All she sees is death.

She takes a deep breath, followed by a quiver of her lips. I don’t want you to think that I’m not trying to be strong. I know you think I am paranoid and mentally unstable. But I am trying my damn hardest to be strong. I am.

"I do not think you are mentally unstable, Helen says. Paranoid, yes. Emotionally detached from yourself, yes. But mentally unstable? That you are not. We have had conversations in this office when you have described to me in detail of what you gain from each day, and how you feel if you do or don’t succeed. You are capable of exploring parts of your mind that have been unexplored for a very long time and that to me is progress."

That isn’t strength.

Forget about strength, Helen dismisses. "Forget it. Shake that from your head, it’s gone. Healing isn’t about strength