When Ana confronts her new neighbour after being kept up all night by his sex noises, she's mortified to discover he's none other than Freddie-the police officer who arrested her abusive ex-boyfriend last month.
The pair interact only when necessar...
"I knew her back in the day," he explains, eyes fond. "She was as protective to your nan back then as she is now."
This makes me smile.
"A kind soul."
Liam continues to tell me stories about Nan and Helen and all the shit they got up to. As it turns out, Liam actually knew Helen before he met Nan. In fact, it's because of Helen how they ended up chatting one night. Nan returns the favour and shares all sorts of tales about me growing up. She even talks about Mum, which I quite like. Usually, I feel sad whenever she's brought up in conversation. Today—for some reason—I don't.
"We should get going?" suggests Liam. "Are you sure you don't want to come?"
"I'm sure," I reply, smiling. "I have some work to do anyway."
I side-eye Nan and receive a warm smile in response. I'm not sure why exactly, but there's something rather poetic about doing Racheal's exercises in the home I grew up in. I'm to dig deep into my childhood and uncover any negative emotions that I might be bottling up. I suspect I have a lot of supressed feelings surrounding Mum's death. In fact, we spoke briefly about it in our session today and I'm now starting to think I didn't handle it in the best of ways.
"Have a nice time you two!" I say, waving them off. "Home by eleven, please!"
Nan—dressed to impress—turns around and gives me the finger. I throw my head back and roar with laughter, closing the front door shortly after. I quickly shove a pizza in the oven and grab my folder from today. I lay all my sheets out on the kitchen table and organise them into categories. I then read over my notes from today, thinking long and hard about everything we discussed. I don't want to repeat what I did with my last therapist. In all honesty, I only booked a session with her because Kimberly had suggested it. As a nurse, I understood the importance of therapy after a traumatic event and being threatened with a knife by someone I cared about was definitely traumatic. But I had done it with all the wrong intentions. I did it to please others. To trick myself into believing that after two sessions, I was magically cured.
I now see the error in my ways and am determined to take full advantage of this new setup. Sure, I'm doing it for my friends and family. For my future with Freddie and Charlotte. But more importantly, I'm doing it for me. Racheal reiterated what Nic had said to me when I first came here. She told me it was okay to want to get better for others, but first and foremost, I should want to get better for me.
And I do. I want to do this for me.
I work through the first exercise while my pizza is cooking and scribble down some notes in my journal. Once it's ready, I plate up and decide to take a break from homework by blasting my favourite songs on Alexa. I'm two slices in when The Spice Girls come on and I completely abandon my need to eat, in favour of dancing instead. I must look like a demented chicken dancing around the kitchen like this, but I don't care. It feels fucking fantastic. I end up busting a few moves to two more songs and it's only when one track is transitioning into the next that I notice my phone vibrating. I attempt to accept the call but am too late in reaching it. I quickly turn the music down and reach for my phone, stomach churning at the six missed calls from Freddie. It's not like him to be so persistent unless the occasion called for it.
Shit!
I'm moments away from returning the call when his name flashes up again.
"Freddie?"
There are voices in the background, all of which sound a little too chaotic for my liking.
"Ana! Did you pick Charlotte up from nursery?"
What?
"No, I'm still at Nan's house. Why?"
He releases what sounds like a sob, making my insides recoil.
"Freddie?"
Nothing.
"Baby, talk to me."
There's rusting on the other end, followed by a sudden bout of silence.
"Someone's taken her," he replies, voice chilling. "Someone's taken Charlotte."
✨✨✨✨
Sorry, Rebecca cannot come to the phone right now. She's currently hiding from her readers! 😈
LOL.
Seriously, don't hate hate me. I'm doing this for YOU because I know y'all love a bit of DRAMA!!
Let me hear your thoughts... WHO has taken our dear Charlotte and WHY?
Speak soon,
Rebecca xo
P.S. You DO NOT want to miss this chapter in Freddie's POV! 👀
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