Page 18 of Into Pitch

I chew on my lip and peek about at the empty space. This is where I’m supposed to talk about my life. About my past. About things I usually keep folded up and locked away because it’s easier that way. I tell myself again that it’s just one person, and it’s not like I haven’t told Imogen. Only this time the person talking back might have solutions to whatever little problem my mind cooks up on its own.

I glance down to the bracelet at my wrist again, the silver catching the light and the small plague mask charm resting against my pulse. Almost mocking me as its empty black eyes glare back at me as if it somehow knows I’m about to make a mess of things by dragging up the past.

I roll its tiny head between my fingers once, my knee still bouncing as the time stretches almost irritatingly so. Long enough for my thoughts to circle in ways I don’t like.

What does a first session even look like? Small talk? Big questions? Silence?

Hi, I don’t think I’m broken but I’m worried I might be heading there?

That sounds about right.

Footsteps approach from further down the hall and I rocket up straighter in my seat, my hand catching my knee to keep it from bouncing straight into my forehead. A young woman appears at the space ahead of me, a clipboard tucked under her arm and a smile plastered to her face that’s meant to disarm.

“Sadie Morgan?” She asks.

“That’s me.”

“You can go ahead in,” she gestures toward a closed door behind her and my stomach flips hard this time.

I stand, smoothing my jacket like it might give me some semblance of strength I don’t feel. I mumble my thanks and step past her, my hand hesitating over the handle.

This isn’t Pitch.

There are no masks here. No mirrors and no rules beyond honesty.

I draw in a breath and step forward, crossing the threshold.

The door closes behind me and there’s no going back—the session has begun.

I know who she is the moment she steps into the room.

Not because of recognition delayed by time or contact, but because I have already spent weeks thinking about her.

Sadie Morgan is far more beautiful in the light of my office than she was in the reflection of those mirrors.

I had looked her up the night she left Pitch.

I hadn’t planned to, and I don’t usually need to. Most encounters resolve themselves cleanly within predictable arcs with far more predictable outcomes. People come apart the way they always do when pressed correctly, but she hadn’t.

She didn’t at all, and that is the problem.

She survived me and I’m not entirely sure why I didn’t kill her.

That singular fact has been irritating me ever since.

She closes the door behind her softly, careful not to let it click. A habit born from not wanting to announce herself as her steel-green eyes sweep the room before she commits to anything. She chooses the couch across from me, settling near the edge instead of sinking back. Her boots planted firmly and her knees apart just enough to be comfortable but not careless. She doesn’t bother to remove her jacket either. She’s… defensive, but I wouldn’t think entirely closed off.

I stay where I am, relaxed in the armchair across from her, posture open. No barrier between us or authority reinforced by furniture. I can’t help but to take her in again, and she looks so very different without the mask.

Her hair is a summer blonde, cut at the center of her back and uneven in a way that suggests she trims it herself or doesn’t care enough to correct it. It’s messy too, pushed back behind one ear unconsciously. Her eyes are warm, but observant even when she’s trying not to be.

Her skin is pale. The kind that belongs to people who live at night and sleep through mornings. A bartender.

I know, because I checked.

Her file was thin at first; surface-level information from her friend’s files, Imogen Tanners, another patient here. I had no business going through my colleague’s file on her patient, but the moment I realized the connection between Sadie and Pitch, I’d done my digging. Her friend talked quite a bit about her and the world that she was worried Sadie was living in.

When she mentioned her worry for her friend and the fact that she couldn’t afford therapy, I’d found my in.