Hypnotized(10)

She shivered. ‘Can I go back?’

‘Just tell me who is there with you?’

‘I don’t want to look,’ she cried feebly.

‘There is absolutely nothing to be afraid of. I want you to relax and go deeper into the darkness. Nothing there can hurt you. And when you are ready just take one little look.’

Her lower lips trembled and her legs began to paddle as if she was trying to swim out of her situation. I realized that she was in danger of being torn out of her hypnotic trance, which would be very dangerous. It would drop her into a deep depression, but I simply could not leave it be.

‘Nothing can hurt you,’ I insisted, my voice trembling. ‘Tell me what you see.’

‘I don’t want to. I don’t want to.’ Then she went rigid. Her face was like a mask. ‘The white owl is here,’ she shrieked, her voice so thin and eerie I felt dread like cold water down my back.

‘What is the white owl doing?’

Her eyelids twitched and she began gasping for breath. ‘Watching me. Always watching me.’ Her fingers trembled.

What the hell is going on? I knew memories that were too traumatic and frightening were hidden away and covered over with less frightening images. Even in hypnosis this was the brain’s final attempt at protecting the individual from the trauma or the suppressed memory. The secret that must be protected at all costs. In order to avoid seeing the perpetrator the patient conjures up dream material or animals.

‘It’s all right. You don’t have to go forward. You can go back to the darkness to where the owl cannot see you.’

I waited until she had stopped trembling.

‘Can the owl see you now?’

She shook her head.

‘Good. Describe the white owl to me.’

‘It is big and white with staring eyes. It sees everything… Everything.’ Her teeth showed her lips drawn back in an odd grimace. ‘It hates me.’

‘Why does it hate you?’

‘Because I exist.’

I froze, stunned. It was not at all as I had thought. There was something terribly wrong here. All my assumptions were turning out to be a lie. There was a world of secrets going on behind the façade of wealth, glamor and respectability. She lived in a world of mystery.

It was far bigger, by far bigger than my fatal attraction to my patient. I glanced at my watch. Our time was almost up. I stood at a crossroad. Did I take her on or set her adrift? She was a prostitute. Of that there was no doubt, and yet she was calling out to me to help her. If I made a mistake with the Swanson heir another humungous disgrace awaited me. But I had survived that once and I could do it again.

My life was ruined anyway—this was my chance to do the right thing. There was a cloak of malevolence that enveloped not only her, but me, too. That sin had touched me and if I did not do something I would be responsible for its total and complete warp of her. It was not by accident that she had come to me. Once before I did not see what was in front of me, but this time I would not fail.

The mind buries memories that are too traumatic for it to cope with. It was a mechanism of sanity, preservation. Letting her remember what she had seen under hypnosis could bring harm on two fronts. First, she would have to deal with something she had no idea about. Her prostitution. Second, and perhaps more important, I would almost immediately be accused of nurturing false memories. I needed time to work on her properly. I knew what I had to do.

‘Walk away from the corridor, Olivia. Walk back to the party. Walk back to where there is cake and sweets and jelly and the bouncy castle.’

A smile came into her face. In the blue light she became a child again.

‘At the count of five you will wake up relaxed and feeling wonderful, feeling so much better than you have done for a long time. And you will remember nothing of your journey back into the past. Remember, when I have counted to five you will wake with no memory of what happened during your hypnosis session.’

I paused to let it sink in and then I spoke again. ‘One… You are returning into your body… Two… Sensations are coming back… Three… Feel all of you return… Four… You feel wide-awake, happy and energetic… Five.

She opened her enormous eyes and looked directly at me and I felt an electric current run through me. For interminable seconds we stared at each other. I could not tear my eyes away. My ears buzzed. And then I remembered myself. I pulled my gaze away.

‘How do you feel about your first session?’ I asked, standing up and touching the light switch.

Harsh yellow light flooded into the small room. The space was no longer intimate and bristling with sexual tension.