"It's okay, Ivy. Take slow, deep, even breaths. Calm down. You can trust me, talk to me; I can help you. But I need you to open up to me if that's ever going to happen. I need you to let me see you, the real you. The good and the bad, and the ugly. Let me help you." My words were whispers into the quiet air that surrounded us.
"I don't know if I can. You wouldn't understand. Maybe I can't be helped."
I turned her so that she had no choice but to look at me. Her hands remained on the chair behind her, making her chest protrude between our bodies. I understood what she was saying, and she held more truth in her words than she probably knew, but that wasn't going to keep me from doing all I could to help her. I knew the fears would never go away, the triggers would never disappear, and the voices would never quiet. But the key was to suppress them enough to live as any normal person would. To work around the issues without giving in to them. Take me for an example, I couldn't have sex on a bed without hearing the screaming sounds of pain, so I improvised and fucked on other surfaces. It was all about working around the issues.
"I need you to tell me why you're so scared right now. What about this or me is scaring you? I need to know this before I can fix it. Before I can make it better for you. I need you to open up to me, Ivy. Please, talk to me," I begged in a voice just slightly louder than a whisper.
"You can fix it by backing away."
"No, that won't fix it. That'll only make your heart rate calm and your palms dry up, but it won't fix it. The next time you're this close to someone, your heart will again race and your hands will again sweat. That's not fixing the problem, that's only prolonging it. So tell me, why are you feeling this way?"
"Because you're so close to me."
"I thought you said it was only intimate touching and looking. My hands are on your waist, not below the belt. And you are wearing clothes that cover you. This shouldn't be bothering you. You shouldn't be freaking out like this if you were telling me the truth. So I'm going to ask you again, and I want nothing but complete honesty from you. Do you understand?" I grabbed the sides of her head when she didn't answer and pulled her face until she was looking directly at me. "Ivy, do you understand?"
She nodded, but I waited until she said, "Yes, Cade, I understand."
"Were you ever sexually abused? And to make things very clear, I mean at any time in your life. From the moment you were born until the moment I picked you up for dinner, were you ever sexually abused by anyone?" I spoke slow and clear words, making sure she understood each and every one of them.
"No, Cade. I've already told you, I was never molested. Ever."
"Then why are you so scared right now?"
"It's not what you're doing … it's you. You're scaring me right now."
I wasn't expecting that. I may have been coming on strong and intense, but in no way was it meant to frighten her. I was frozen for a moment, battling with myself on what to do. I should have moved away, released her from my hold, but I couldn't bring myself to break contact with her.
"Tell me why?"
"Because you make me want things I can't have," she whispered in the space between our faces.
My hands dropped from her face to her shoulders, and then traveled down her arms until they were resting on her waist again. "What things?" My voice mimicked hers, quiet and airy.
"Things." She placed one hand on my chest and flattened her palm, as if she were going to push me away but instead stilled, feeling my heart pound behind my sternum. "Things I want but can't have. Things that would make the voices louder. I don't want to hear the voices anymore. I want them to go away, but you make them so loud I can't hear anything else."
For the first time in as long as I could remember, I was speechless. I didn't know where to begin. It felt as if the professional part of my brain shut down and all I was left with was the rawness of who I was beneath it all.
"What voices do you hear?"
She didn't answer or move from where she was.
"Ivy, I need to know about the voices. Tell me."
"I can't with you this close to me." She sounded desperate and pleading.
I forced myself to back away from her. I backed away until I was leaning against a wall, and then slowly slid down to the floor. My feet wouldn't hold me up any longer as I anticipated what she had to say. I had predicted it from the very first moment I met her-she was more like me than I wanted to admit. But I was about to be forced to admit it once she answered me.
"I told you that my mom used to sit in the bathroom with me while I took baths to make sure I wasn't touching myself. But it wasn't only in the bathroom." Ivy slipped down to the floor as well, sitting in front of me with about ten feet separating our bodies. "She used to have boyfriends, but they never lasted long because she would accuse them of looking at me, or touching me."
"Did they?" I couldn't help myself from asking.
Her eyes narrowed on me. "No. Cade, I've already told you that I was never molested. Why won't you believe me?"
"Trust me, I want more than anything to believe you, but I can't seem to understand why you would be so timid and scared when I'm so close to you. Why you would have such a hard time with sex if something that horrible didn't happen to you. I'm trying to understand, but you don't open up to me."
She stared at me in disbelief before sitting up on her knees and pointing a finger at me. "Don't you dare say that something horrible didn't happen to me!" She raised her voice in anger. "My mother always told me that touching myself in any way was bad. I couldn't wipe. I couldn't clean myself. I wasn't even allowed to look there. She fought with her boyfriends about it, when they never did anything wrong. They never touched me. They never looked at me, but that didn't stop her from accusing them of it. She fought with all of them, as soon as I became comfortable having them around, she fought with them and they'd leave." Her voice calmed, turning into a sad and desperate tone. "When I was seven, I took a shower for the first time. One of her boyfriends, his name was Steve, told me to take a shower so I could wash my hair. I never wanted to get out of the shower. The water falling around me, hitting the tub basin, drowned out the noises and the arguing. I found peace in there without my mom watching me. It was six months before I was able to take another shower. And the only reason I was able to was because the drain for the tub was broken and I couldn't take a bath."
"The rain … " I said, remembering her mention of it drowning out the noises after I caught her sitting in it. "That's why you like the rain."
She nodded and I noticed a tear running down her cheek. I moved forward, closing the gap between our bodies and wiped it from her face with my thumb. Her eyes closed as I touched her warm skin, and I saw a vulnerability I hadn't yet noticed before.
"You just have to reteach yourself that there is nothing wrong with touching," I said quietly to her, and then watched as she opened her eyes to look at me. They looked like a storm coming over the horizon during a sunrise. The stormy grey looked desperate and uncontrollable, while the red screamed vengeful and angry. "I can help you, Ivy. But I need you to trust me. Please, trust me."
"She told me I was disfigured. That I don't look like everyone else."
I tried to understand what she was saying. What did she mean disfigured? My heart began to pound in my chest as thoughts of her mother's abuse surpassed what I had already learned of. I grew angry at the thought of her inflicting physical harm on Ivy on top of the emotion and mental harm she caused.
"Everyone looks different, Ivy. No two vaginas are alike. Much like guys, we all come in different shapes and sizes," I tried explaining in a clinical sense, hoping it would ease her worry.
"How many women have you been with?" she asked.
"A lot," I answered, not wanting to give her a number.
"How many patients have you been with?"
"Not many. Maybe two or three a year, and never at the same time."
"What kind of sex is it? Like … how do you do it?"
I knew she was holding back what she really wanted to ask me. I couldn't pacify her and answer her cryptic question even if I knew what she meant by it. I needed to hear her ask me exactly what it was she meant. "You need to be more specific, Ivy."
"Do you make love?"
"No. I have never made love before."
"So you fuck them?" She stumbled a bit on the word fuck, and it made me dick twitch.
"No. I lead them. I instruct them. I walk them through it. Yes, it's sex, but it's emotionless. And it's the last step in treatment. I get them to a place where they can consent to the act, to a place where they are comfortable having sex. And then, if I feel it is necessary, we have sex. But it's nothing like what you read in your books. They're not sweet or dirty words that are spoken. The words I give are instructions and words of encouragement. They tell me how they are feeling; nothing like what you read. They let me know if they are scared or uncomfortable. It's very clinical."