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Authors: J. L. Monro

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BOOK: The Perfection of Love
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“Why would you need to help yourself?”

 

Fuck.  Slipped up there.

 

****

“Come on Dana.  Just one session.” 
Saz was yanking on my arm like a desperate puppy pulling on its leash because it wanted to go and chase birds. 

 

“Dana, it’ll be good for you.  You need to talk this stuff out and get it out of your system.  None of us know what you’ve been through and we can only imagine but we can’t understand, not truly.”  Mills was adding in her reasonable two pennies and right now she could shove it.  They’d concocted a stupid plan to bring me to some support group for women abused by their partners and husbands after I had specifically told them I didn’t want to do this shit.  How Saz had found the group God only knows.

 

“Well you know what Dana, you can go in there now and see what this is all about and if it’s for you, or we can do this fucking dance every freakin’ week until you give it a try.  I am not going to have my best friend have some mental breakdown in the near future because of what her douchebag ex did to her when we could sort it out now.  No one is going to say we didn’t all fucking try.  If you’re not going to do this for yourself do it for us, the people who love you.  More importantly sort your fucking head out because his bullshit has to have had some effect. Do it for your son because if your history with Mitchell comes to the surface again and you can’t cope it’s going to be him that suffers.  The bitch played the trump card.  She knows there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for Jakey.  He’d been through so much already, I didn’t want to bring him any more hurt.

 

“Fine.  Manipulative Bitch!  I will go.  Pick me up in an hour.”

 

They both hugged me and I glared at them for as long as I could hold out before a tear trickled from the corner of my eye.  I wiped it away quickly but not before I heard Mills sniffle, turned and walked into the community centre.  There were several women inside, the majority hovering round what looked like tea, coffee and biscuits.  There was a group of seats in a circle in the middle and a lady with a clip board was already beginning to take a seat when she caught sight of me in the doorway.  I so did not want to do this.  I didn’t want to talk about Mitchell or any of his shit.  What happened happened and I just wanted to accept it and move on with my life.  Not bring it all back up again.  Fuck.  She was already making her way over to me.

 

“Hi.  I’m Amanda.  Are you here for the group session?”  She was peppy.  By God, I fucking hated peppy people.  There was just no need for it.

 

“If this is for the women who got used as a punch bag for the fun of it and somehow managed to escape and are now quite possibly damaged beyond all belief on the inside.  Then yes I’m here for the group session.”  Amanda’s smile drifted off and then returned but not at full wattage.  Thank fuck.

 

“Come and take a seat.  You don’t have to join in and speak but it’s polite to at least introduce yourself so that the ladies who do want to share at least know who they’re talking to.”  She wandered back to her seat and then rang a little bell, I guess to let everyone else know to take their seats. 

 

I took my seat and looked at everyone sitting in the group.  If some of these women were abused then I couldn’t tell.  There were others though, I could see the scars.  I could also see some cuts that had not yet healed.  Many of them had their hands in their laps wringing their fingers and were looking decisively nervous.  Maybe I wasn’t the only first timer here but I wasn’t like them, I had a stronger character than them.  I looked down to see my hands alternating between squeezing themselves to the point that you could see my blood draining away and picking at my already chipped nail polish.  No. I was nothing like them at all.

 

The session began and we all introduced ourselves.  I always hated this part of group sessions no matter what the point of the group was.  All eyes on you for sixty seconds.  The session progressed with most of the women having something to say but not all.  I listened intently to the stories.  Some had it not so bad as me and some had had it a lot worse.  The most fucked up thing was the mental abuse they all suffered.  Correct that. WE had suffered.  Men were shits.  Apart from Pops, Joe and Jacob, I never wanted another man to step foot into my life in any way, shape or form.

 

At the end of the session Amanda came up to me.  “How did you find out about us?”

 

“A friend of mine made some enquiries I guess.”

 

“How did you find it?”

 

“Um, that’s a good question.  It was good to hear so many different stories.  I guess it puts my own life into a bit more perspective.  Would you believe I did a degree in psychology and I still couldn’t sort my own head out to get away from my situation earlier.”

 

“It’s difficult for us to be objective when it involves our own emotions.  Are you going to continue to come to the sessions?”

 

“I’m not sure.  I have a lot of respect for these women but the whole group share thing is not me.”

 

“I do private sessions with women as well.  Some of the women here go.  Unfortunately those are not free but I do think you would benefit from talking things through with someone.  It might help you understand more why things in your relationship were the way they were.  Here’s my card.”  Amanda gave me a small hug and returned to the small huddle of women that still remained in the room.

 

I called her the next day to arrange a private session with her and saw her for eighteen months every week.  The sessions helped me to understand both Mitchell and myself but I couldn’t help still feeling like Mitchell had ruined a large part of me.  After finishing with Amanda I decided that I was going to channel my work into helping more women out there.  There wasn’t enough support and if I could give back half of what she had done for me then someone would benefit.  And sometimes when we help others, we help ourselves.

****

“I think you’ll find we’re at the end of the tour for today Dr Greenwood.  Tomorrow we can look at some more of the facilities especially the ICT suites as those will be used for a lot of our work.”  I stopped by the university reception to usher him through the door and away from me as quickly as possible.

 

Deacon for a second looked baffled.  Guess he wasn’t expecting my icy turn on him but once again he was smiling with seconds.

 

“Until tomorrow, Miss. Daniels.  Oh, and by the way, did I mention I absolutely love conundrums.”  This time it was me looking baffled.  He winked and turned and walked through the door.  Rat bastard.  How dare he wink at me!  I walked back to my office and grabbed my bag and coat.  I was done for the day.  I was going to go pick up Jacob from his friend’s house.  Go home, fix dinner and relax from this day that I wish hadn’t happened.  As I reached my car there was a loud beep from behind me.  Scared me out of my skin.  Would you freaking believe it was the Porshe that had made me late this morning?  I had my scowl set when the window rolled down. Of course it would have to be him wouldn’t it?  Deacon grinning like a bitch at me.

 

“See you tomorrow, Dana.”

 

He sped off before I had a chance to consider giving him the bird.  Tonight I’m going to dig a shallow grave and tomorrow I’m going to bury him in it!

 

CHAPTER SEVEN

I was on time for work the next morning and I actually had a kick to my step.  I am not going to attribute it to the sex dream I had of me and a certain person who I absolutely do not like,
who I was going to be spending the day with.  I’m going to put it down to the fact that although he may have been pleasuring my lady flower with a feather, Eric from True Blood came and sunk his teeth into my neck and Alcide then fucked me within an inch of my life.  I had taken an elective module in dream psychology in my third year of university.  Feathers can symbolize warmth and the desire to be close to someone.  I could read into it and connect the dots between the fact that I hadn’t been intimate with anyone since Mitchell, and that Deacon had been on my brain all day yesterday and this morning and especially in the shower, or I could sweep it under the carpet and forget about it.  The carpet it is!

 

As I approached my office I could see that my door was open.  What the hell?  He wouldn’t.  The fucker would.  Deacon was sitting at my desk on my chair on my computer.  What the HELL!!!

 

“I’m sorry, how did you get in here?”

 

“Good morning to you, gorgeous.  There’s a cappuccino with a hazelnut shot there on the side for you when you’re ready.”

 

Hmmmmm, a LARGE cappuccino with hazelnut shot.  My favourite.  How did he know?  I narrowed my eyes at him after one last lingering look at the coffee.

 

“How did you get in to my office and why did you bring me coffee?”  Man, this guy pissed me off.

 

“I got in the same way most people get through doors…with a key.  The real question you want to ask me, as it’s perfectly normal to bring someone a coffee, is how did I know what your favourite coffee was?  Am I right?”  Oh my God, did I ever want to smack that grin off of his face.

 

“Look, Dr. Greenwood…”

 

“To you it’s Deacon.  It’s always Deacon.”  He interrupted and he was purring.  The fucker was grinning and purring in my office like a damn Cheshire cat.  I’m not going to acknowledge that Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was one of my favorite books.

 

“Dr. Greenwood, this is my office where I work every day.  You have come in, which you did not have authorization to do, and have taken over my desk.  I had papers on there for my other work that I will be doing along side this project and also once you are gone.  If I have no say in having to share my office with you, then so be it, but you will show me some respect and show my work some respect.  Are we clear?”  My chest was heaving by the time I finished my little rant and I was pretty sure my face was puffing as well.

 

“For the record, Colin gave me a key yesterday but I didn’t get a chance to tell you, so technically I had authorization to come and go as I pleased as of yesterday.  I want to get a few things clear with you before we start our work amongst other things.”  Other things???  “I respect your work more than you know.  I’ve read all of your papers.  Even the ones you only submitted as coursework.  I read your paper on The Perfection of Love long before the university had approached me about coming to work with you.”

 

The Perfection of Love was one of the first psychology papers that I wrote.  At the time I was still with Mitchell, which probably influenced the paper more than it should have.  It was about the concepts of love that women hold onto, where these concepts come from and what their ideas of perfect love are.  It was quite funny to work on the paper.  I was amazed at how many of the concepts of love came from women having daddy issues.  At one point in my life I had thought the love I had with Mitchell was perfection itself and now I wasn’t sure whether I believed in either perfection or love.  If love can go so wrong then why bother at all?

 

“I don’t know how a person can be attracted to someone through a theoretical paper but congratulations honey, you achieved it.  I jumped at the chance to come and meet the woman behind the words that not only educated and inspired me but moved me.  I want to learn more about you and you can bet your mighty fine toosh that I’m going to try and charm you while I’m at it.  You can try and fight it, that will just make it more interesting for me but I am coming for you, Miss. Daniels.”

 

Oh, shit.  When the hell did he get so close to my face?  His breath smelled like Werthers Originals.  I loooooove Werthers Originals.  Dana stop head talking the man has got you caged!  Both his muscular arms were beside my head with his palms pressed against the wall.  When the hell had I backed up like that?  Oh, shit.  He’s going to make me have a panic attack, I need to get out of here.  I ducked under his arms and ran for the door, then bolted down the corridor.  I couldn’t control my breathing.  I headed for the staff toilets that were on the top floor that no one used and locked myself in a stall.  Close your eyes, head between your knees and breathe.  Just breathe.  I kept repeating this to myself until my breathing slowed and the blood stopped pumping in my ears.  I hadn’t had a panic attack in a long time and I hardly ever had them this bad.  Deacon Greenwood was no good for me.

 

****

The key jangled in the door and I jumped.  This was my normal response after a year of living with Mitchell.   As I greeted him coming through the door I tried to gage his mood.  If he was happy then I could work with that and just try to keep him that way until it was time for him to leave for work in the morning.  If he was in one of his less than happy moods
, then I needed to get the fuck out of his way and find something in the house to keep me busy quickly until he either fell asleep in front of the TV or took himself up to bed.  When he was like that I could only pray that he was knocked out by the time I could no longer keep myself occupied and had to go to bed.

BOOK: The Perfection of Love
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