"From the looks of your entries, we have a lot to talk about, don't we?" Dr. Wilson gave me that I'm-inside-your-head look. I had been so frustrated the past few days and the last thing I wanted was to take it out on this woman. For some reason, bursting felt inevitable.
"I guess you could say that."
"I noticed you wrote about a few memories. Nothing to significant, except for the last one? I also noticed you figured out that the voicemail is on your phone. We can talk about that if you'd like. We could talk about things outside of the journal too. We can talk about your friends, about Lilly, about you...?" Dr. Wilson rearranged the pens on her desk, still giving me that look.
"What's there to talk about? With the memories, I mean. I wrote down what they were. They weren't super significant, like you said. The last one was just us kissing." I thought about the way Lilly looked in that dress on my floor. That was almost two years ago. "As far as the voicemail goes, you know where I stand on listening to it. There's not much to talk about with my friends or myself, and I talk about Lilly all the time when I write." I was being stubborn and I knew it.
"Why don't you elaborate on what you've been writing?" Dr. Wilson finally gave me her grandmotherly smile.
"I mean, recently I've been feeling like this is a lost cause. I don't understand why my goal is to work towards listening to this voicemail. I feel like it's not a goal that makes me want remember. You and I both know what my ideal goal is, but bringing her back is impossible. I just feel like I'm wasting time. I keep trying to remember what my life was like before, but I'm never going to go back to that life. Since I woke up in that hospital bed, I knew nothing would be the same, so why should I bother trying to get things to be like they were before?" Dr. Wilson nodded as I spoke. She was silent for a minute, analyzing me as usual.
"What do want to achieve through this? I want you to pick a goal, something attainable that you think is worthwhile."
"I want..." I had to think about this one. It had to be realistic and worth it. "I want to become normal."
"Define normal." Dr. Wilson smiled again, half laughing this time.
"I want to start living a regular life. I want to go to school and think about college. I want to drive my truck to parties and hangout with my friends without getting weird, sad looks. I want to know what happened and be able to move past it and get on with my life."
"Then let me make you a deal. You do everything you can to become a 'normal' person, and I give you full permission to listen to the voicemail whenever you want."
"For real?" I hadn't wanted to listen to the voicemail, but maybe that was just because I wasn't allowed to listen to it. The thought of listening to it now made my fingers itch for my phone. I wanted to know what secrets it kept hidden.
"For real." Dr. Wilson nodded, "you can even listen to it after this session if you so desire."
YOU ARE READING
Remembering Lilly Greene
RomanceWhen Cody Harris woke up, he was surrounded by faces he didn't recognize. He was surrounded by friends and family whose names meant nothing to him. The past few years were gone from his memory. The doctors called it a stress reaction. They said his...
