Page 45 of Letters From A Stalker

The possessiveness slips into the thought so naturally that I barely react anymore. That's probably another problem that needs to be added to the growing fucking list.

I should leave. My patient is home. She's physically safe. Whatever happened on the road no longer matters, and there's no remaining professional justification for me standing between trees watching her through a window. I know exactly where the line is. I'm standing on the wrong side of it and yet I don't move. I’ve convinced myself I would rather be the fucking creeper standing outside than risk something happening to her tonight. That argument sounded considerably better, and more sane, while she was driving.

Now that she's safely inside, it collapses under the weight of what I'm actually doing. I'm watching her because I want to. Because knowing she made it through the door wasn't enough. Because seeing her lie down isn't enough either. I want to know whether she'll eat, whether she'll sleep. Whether she'll call someone or whether she'll cry once there's nobody around to see it. I want to know what she does inside these walls when she isn't performing fine for anyone.

That last thought should scare the shit out of me because this is stalking. There’s no way of sugarcoating the situation I would point out in therapy instantly. I would set boundaries immediately. Reject any possibility of justifying it. Am I doing that now? Fuck no. What I am doing though, is standing in the fucking woods outside my patient's house after following her through Minneapolis. Terminology isn't the problem anymore.

The fact that I am aware of what the problem is and still standing here is, in itself, an even bigger issue. But watching her settles me. Watching Julia move, roll onto her back and staring at the ceiling settles me. After a session like the one we had today, she needs someone to look after her. Someone to keep an eye on her after she spent an hour remembering a childhood she had apparently convinced herself she'd already understood.

Tell her.

My brow pulls together inside the helmet, but the thought lingers while I watch her through the window.

Tell her what, exactly? That she isn’t alone? That somebody noticed the way she disappeared today and didn’t believe her when she said she was fine? I have no fucking idea. I can’t call her or text her without doing it as Dr. Blackwood, and whatever this is has already moved far enough outside the walls of my office that bringing him into it feels wrong in ways I’m not prepared to examine tonight. Because that would mean I would have to consider referring her to someone else and I was not prepared to do that.

But there are other ways to tell someone something. The idea of a letter comes and goes almost as quickly as the thought itself, leaving just enough behind that I know I’ll remember it later. Right now, I don’t let it become more than that. Instead, I stay where I am until Julia moves again. She turns onto her side, pulls the blanket higher beneath her chin and, sometime later, the restless shifting stops. Her breathing settles into a slow rhythm I can barely make out from this distance, but I wait longer anyway, until I’m certain she’s asleep. Only then do I push away from the spot I was standing at, and make my way back towards the street, without starting the bike. The engine is too fucking loud, and the last thing I want after standing here long enough to watch her fall asleep is to be the reason she wakes up again.

The ridiculous thing is that I came here because I needed to know she was safe.

Now I know. And somehow, leaving her feels harder than following her here ever did.

9

Julia

The first thing I became aware of after I woke up is that my neck hurts. And not the kind of hurt that elicits concern followed by a dramatic Google search that ends with me discovering I have six hours left to live. It feels more like a very specific punishment your body delivers when you fall asleep on the sofa, apparently designed by someone who believes human necks bend at ninety-degree angles.

I open my eyes and stare at the ceiling for several seconds before the rest of my body starts reporting its grievances. My shoulder hurts, one leg is half numb beneath the blanket, my mouth tastes like something crawled inside it and died, and yesterday’s green sweater is twisted around my torso in ways I can’t even begin to explain.

“Lovely.”

I reach blindly towards the coffee table until my fingers find my phone. 6:17 a.m.

“Oh, fuck off.”

I’ve slept for almost eleven hours.

The last thing I clearly remember is coming home. I also remember pieces after that, but they feel disconnected from each other. Pieces like opening the refrigerator and standing there without knowing what I wanted. Walking into the living room. Pulling the blanket over myself because apparently walking upstairs to my perfectly functional bed was asking too much. And then nothing.

I sit up carefully and rub both hands over my face. I don’t feel terrible, which is almost disappointing considering yesterday’s performance. Mostly I feel wrung out, like somebody took everything inside me, twisted until there was nothing left and then forgot to put me back into the shape I started in. Kind of like when you start assembling IKEA furniture and give up half way because the instructions weren’t all that clear.

I give myself a moment to gather my thoughts, no matter how scattered and murky they feel at the moment because apparently therapy is going great. Second therapy session in and I feel worse than I did before I started. Because I was sure that the only thing worth unpacking and discussing was my father. Mom and I were fine. At least I thought we were as long as she kept to our agreement that we don’t rehash the past and that walks down memory lane were as frowned upon as me going to the gym. No matter how much Tessa persisted because apparently, a sound mind comes from a fit body but I was more than happy to cultivate my personality of a permanently exhausted pigeon.

I take another look at my phone and realize that it’s high time I peel myself off the couch if I want to make it to work on time. My stomach growls the second I stand.

“Yeah, yeah.”

Coffee comes first because I may be emotionally damaged, but I’m not an animal. I shuffle into the kitchen, start the machine and stare suspiciously at the refrigerator while the coffee maker gurgles behind me. Looking at the fridge brings back another fragment of last night, cool air against my legs while I stood with the door open. What the fuck was I doing? Probably trying to eat.

Excellent effort, Julia.

My phone rings before I can investigate whether anything in there can qualify as breakfast.

Tessa.

I answer and put her on speaker while reaching for a mug. “Good morning.”

“Okay, first of all, why do you sound like you've been smoking for forty years?”