Lust(10)

     



 

"How old were you?"

"Five or six."

"What happened?" I asked, needing an answer to that question more than anything else.

"I don't remember."

That was a lie. Even if I couldn't tell by the way her eyes darted away  from mine, I would've been able to tell by the change in her tone and  the sudden stiffness in her body. I knew immediately that it was a lie,  and could deduce on my own the real reasons.

"What were you doing right before it happened?" I'd get the truth somehow, someway.

"Taking a bath."

That was the truth, and it told me more than anything she could have  said. It confirmed my assumptions of her being abused as a child.

"Did you slip and fall?"

She shook her head.

"I need real answers, Ivy," I pressed.

"No, Cade. I didn't slip and fall. It wasn't an accident."

"I thought you couldn't remember what happened," I goaded her.

"I do. I remember it all."





My head was spinning. She was finally telling me the truth, but I wasn't  sure I was ready to hear it. I had dealt with victims of child  molestation often in my line of work, but there was something different  about Ivy. If only I could figure out what that was.

"What happened?"

"You wouldn't understand," she said, looking back out at the ducks in  the water as one tear slid down her cheek. I wanted to wipe it away,  reach out and remove the pain, but I couldn't. She wouldn't understand. I  knew that because I didn't understand. I couldn't comprehend the need  to make things better for her outside of what I could do professionally.

"I may not understand on a personal level since I have never gone  through something like that myself, but I do see it in my patients  enough to understand from a different standpoint. I think you may be  surprised by how better you'll feel when you finally do open up and talk  about it." Despite my words of encouragement, I really didn't want to  hear the details of her abuse. But I had to remain professional and  stick to what I had promised her …  that I'd help her in any way that I  could.

"What is it that you think you know? Because I can assure you that whatever it is, you have no idea."

She was angry. Her tone went from desperate to pissed off in a matter of  seconds. I didn't know what to do about it. For the first time in my  entire career, I was at a loss for words. I needed her to remain calm if  we were going to get anywhere, but things with Ivy never stayed calm  for long.

"Then please, enlighten me. If I have no idea what you went through, explain it to me."

She shook her head, but kept her eyes on mine. "Tell me something about  you. You want me to open up and tell you everything that has ever  happened to me, but I know nothing about you. Tell me something." She  needed to trust me. It was common for people as guarded as Ivy.

"What would you like to know?"

Every patient did that very thing-ask about me. They felt the need to  know information about the person they confide things to, and I give it  to them. Well, I don't give them everything. I give them enough to  comfort them and earn their trust. Other than that, no one knows  anything about me.

"What made you decide to be a sex therapist? Out of all the different areas of therapy, why sex?"

I had been asked that question by so many people I could've had a script  for my answer. I could have recited the same thing over and over again.  "Do you know that the leading cause of why relationships fail is  because of sex? People grow bored of monotony. The longer two people  live together, the more comfortable they become with one another and the  thing that suffers the most is their sex life. One or both partners  start looking for that sexual spark again and find it in others. When  people cheat, it's rarely platonic. When people cheat, it's to fulfill a  sexual need that they are no longer getting with their partner."

"But you don't treat couples. You treat people that are fucked up like me. People that have problems and aversions to sex."

"You're right, because I feel I can be of more use to people like that.  Even people with issues regarding intimacy still long to be married.  They still want to achieve their happily ever after. People like you are  at a higher risk of a failed marriage. You may find a guy that makes  you comfortable in the bedroom and you open up to him. But at some  point, he will grow tired of your insecurities surrounding sex, and he  will go find that security somewhere else. It's a shitty thing to hear,  and I hate saying that to my clients, but it's the truth. I don't treat  couples because it tends to be more of an individual issue. So I treat  the individual. And I don't treat married people because of my method of  treatment. Sometimes I'm required to touch, feel, and participate in  things with my clients that would be considered cheating if they were  married. And there is nothing I hate more than cheating." I hadn't  planned to say that last part, but it came out anyway.         

     



 

"Do you ever plan to get married?"

"No," I answered honestly.

"Because you love your job too much?"

I should have said yes. She had given me an easy answer and all I had to  do was agree with her. That would have been the smart thing to do. But  as I stared into her eyes, I couldn't bring myself to do that. The  trance between our eyes left me unable to lie. She was seeing me; it was  as if Ivy was seeing my very soul. "No. It's because I disagree in the  idea of marriage. The whole thing is a sham. To think two people can  stay together until the end of time is a ridiculous notion. Marriage  makes taxes easier. It makes having a family easier. But it's still  asinine, nonetheless." I usually kept my opinions regarding marriage to  myself. People like Ivy that believed in marriage and wanted it didn't  need to be burdened by my cynical beliefs about it.

Her eyes widened on her face as she stared at me in disbelief.

"But …  you just got done saying all of those things about marriage and why you do what you do."

"Just because I don't agree in marriage doesn't mean others don't. I  respect their opinions on the union  of two people until death do  they part, but it isn't something for me. I don't push my beliefs on  people; it's simply what I, and I alone, believe. You're more than  welcome to believe differently. Most people do."

"So you never want a family, either?" She seemed shocked by my confession.

I didn't know how to answer her. The subject of a family was something I  went back and forth on constantly. I answered her as truthfully as I  could. "I don't necessarily want a family. But if for some reason I  wound up with a kid, I think I'd be okay with that. But I wouldn't marry  the mother simply because I knocked her up. I wouldn't share a house  with her, either. I would do my job as a father and take care of my kid.  I have no issues with a family. Only with marriage."

She looked back out at the pond and began to bite the inside of her  cheek. Something was going on inside her head and I needed to know what  it was. I was tired of answering her questions. She didn't need to know  anything else about me. I needed to know about her.

"Now, tell me, what happened that night?" My question surprised her.

She turned to look back at me and I watched as her eyes glazed over with fresh tears.

"What is it you think happened?" She turned my question back around on me.

"I have no idea. I want you to tell me that without any assumptions."

She began to bite her cheek again. "No, I need to hear what you think happened."

I shrugged my shoulders and gave it my best shot. "Well, you said it  wasn't an accident, so I can rule out a slip and fall on wet tile. You  said you were in the bathtub, so I think it's safe to say you were  probably nude. With your fear of being looked at or touched in a sexual  way, I would probably assume you weren't alone. Maybe a family member  was in there with you. Am I right so far?"

She nodded, not taking her eyes from my mouth as I spoke, never making eye contact.

"I would assume it was a male."

She shook her head and the sensation of vomiting took a strong hold on my stomach.

"Who was it, Ivy?"

"My mom," she whispered and her face looked pained.

I gasped and went to say something to her, but she cut me off before any words could have been uttered.

"It's not what you think, though." Her hands went back to twisting in  her lap as she nervously looked down at them, no longer looking at me.  "She didn't touch me or make me do anything. It was quite the opposite. I  wasn't allowed to touch myself in any way. She wouldn't allow me to  wipe after using the toilet, or clean myself in the bathtub. So when I  took baths, she would sit in there and watch me to make sure I wasn't  touching myself. That one particular night, I was really irritated down  there. Looking back on it now, I probably had a yeast infection or  something caused from not wiping after going pee. But I apparently  scratched myself in the tub and she saw. The next thing I knew, she  pulled me out by my arm. The momentum of it threw me into the wall.  That's all I remember. She told me the next morning that's what would  happen if I were ever touched. From then on out, I had spots of red in  my irises. She said it was caused by touching myself. No other  explanation was given. Nothing else was ever said of it again."