Jessica Sorensen - The Forgotten Girl

“Maddie, relax. Take a deep breath and try to clear your head,” Preston advises, taking a deep inhale and exhale himself.

Clear my head? Impossible. How can I, when someone else is living inside it? But I shut my eyes anyway.

Pitter-patter. Pitter-patter. Pitter-patter. The rain from the speakers flows and surrounds me until it gives me a headache.

“Just relax,” Preston says softly through the rhythm of the rainfall. Now he’s giving me a headache. “Breathe in and out.”

I suck in a breath of air and let it out.

In and out.

Over and over again.

Pitter-patter…. Pitter-patter… Pitter-patter… the rain is falling… through it, there’s a spark of light. I’ve seen it before. Heard the voice that whispers help. Seen the flames. Burning… burning… burning. And burning me along with them.

Maddie

“What just happened?’ I open my eyes and rub them with the palms of my hand. I’m still lying in the lounge chair, the sound of rain flowing from the speakers, this strange sense of lost time floating around inside my head.

Preston is staring at me with a quizzical expression, pen in hand, the tip pressed to the paper. “I think you fell asleep.” He scratches his head then reaches over and silences the rainfall sounds. “Do you feel different? Remember anything at all?”

I shake my head, pushing myself up into sitting position, swinging my legs over the edge of the chair, and planting my feet onto the floor. “Nope. My minds still as blank as ever, although I’m tired as hell.” I pause, rubbing my eyes again. God, I feel like I’m hung-over, my head is throbbing, and my eyes feel like they’re on fire. Glancing at the clock, I notice my session has ended. I push to my feet. “Well, this has been extremely great, Preston. Seriously, the powernap was great, but it’s time for me to go.”

“Wait. Are you sure nothing happened at all?” he asks as I pick up my bag from off the floor beside the door. “You didn’t see anything… maybe something you thought was a dream?”

“Nope, other than I got a good dreamless nap, zilch happened,” I lie as Preston gets up from his chair and wanders back over to his desk. “How long was I out for?”

He checks his watch. “About ten minutes.” He lets his arms fall to the side. “Although I’m extremely disappointed, I have to say I’m not surprised. The studies I read through said in the beginning a lot of patients simply got drowsy. Hopefully next time we can progress further into it.”

“Next time?” Sighing, I turn around and face him. He’s standing behind his desk, loosening his tie as he gathers papers on his desk into a stack. “We’re doing this again? Really, Preston? I thought we decided a long time ago that hypnotherapy was not the way to go.”

“I know, but this way is different and I’d like to keep trying it, just for a little while.” Flicking the top button of his shirt, he undoes the collar. His finger must snag the button, though, because it ends up falling off and onto his desk. He doesn’t seem to notice however, taking off his tie completely and setting it aside. “But only if it’s okay with you.”

I want to say no, but I’m distracted by the button. Pick it up. Pick it up! A sickness of mine. The need to pick up every single fallen one. “I guess so,” I mumble, sliding the handle of my bag onto my shoulder, trying to ignore the compulsion to pick up the button. Pick it up, Lily entices. No fucking way, I reply. I already told you, it’s crazy to do that.

Everyone’s crazy in their own way.

“Good, I’m glad you’re on board with this,” Preston says, turning around to search through a stack of papers on the filing cabinet behind the desk while I zone in on the button.

Pick it up. Pick it up. Pick it up.

Shaking my head at myself, I quickly reach over the desk and snatch up the button before he can turn around. I stuff it into my pocket, as always wondering why I do it, but never being able to stop myself.

“This hypnotherapy is a little controversial,” Preston continues, oblivious to what I just did as he faces me with a paper in his hand. “But I think at this point in your recovery, controversial methods might be the only options.”

“Whatever you think. You are the doctor after all.” I point to his PhD on the wall, black bold letters with his name on it. Nonchalant as can be. Like I didn’t just steal a button like a psychopathic button kleptomaniac. “Or at least according to that you are.”

He offers me a small smile. “I’ll see you next Tuesday, Maddie.”

I wave as I walk out the door, keeping a neutral expression until I get outside and into the open. Then I breathe for the first time today, because soon I’ll be at work and I won’t have to try so hard to hide Lily anymore.

Maddie

I once spent an entire day doing research about “voices in my head.” The findings where alarming. Psychosis. Schizophrenia. Multiple Personality Disorder. I’m sure if I told Preston, he’d crack open my head and give me a diagnosis but, that would mean living with the results. I’d no longer be able to hide the insanity—I’d have to accept what was wrong with me. So I try to keep Lily locked up the best that I can, only letting her out when I know it won’t harm anyone. Like when I go to work.

After my therapy session, I go home to watch the channel nine news at 6 o’ clock, a habit of mine that started while I was in the hospital. It’s the local station and living in the small town of Grove Wyoming, not too much goes on. Fire at the old millhouse, lost bike, found bike, car accident down on 5^th Monroe and Maple drive. No injuries, just damage to the cars, which is causing traffic to back up. Alternative route suggestions. Then a quick clip on how to make pumpkin spice cake. Laughs, smiles, laughs. Yeah, get on with the good stuff, Lily whispers. The brief five minutes when the station gives a section to a more global headline, the brief insight to the grimier stuff, well usually anyway. Today ends up being a brief update on the disappearance of a girl, but there’s no details other than she’s been gone for a week and is still missing. “Keep an eye out everyone and if you have any information at all call this number.”

“Maddie, would you turn that off,” my mother shouts from the kitchen. “I hate it when you watch the news. Please, find something else to watch.” She says this every day. I’m not sure what bothers her about it, but for some reason she seems dead set on me not watching the news.

I click off the television halfway through the clip. It’s nearing five thirty, so I decide to go into my room to change into my go-to-work uniform. It’s a little early for work, but if I leave now I can make a much-needed extra stop on the way.

My room is a very stressful place. My mother decided to put up every single photo of me she could find, hoping it would spark my memory. All of them were taken before the age of thirteen because I got really camera shy when I hit my teenage years, something revealed to me in one of my mom’s stories she loves to tell about me. There are some of just me, some with her, and none with my father. Some of them are torn, like she ripped someone out of the photo. All the photos feel like pieces of paper to me, nothing more. And it makes me uncomfortable that I have to stare at multiple versions of myself every time I step in there, always feeling like I’m being watched by myself.

I turn on some music and then rummage through my dresser for something to wear, occasionally glancing over the walls and ceiling, cringing at how happy I look in most of the photos, all sunshine and rainbows, like there was no bad in the world. But there is. Just turn on the news. Just live inside my head for five minutes. Sometimes the girl in the photos doesn’t even look like me when I stare at her long enough. Like she’s just someone who shared the same face but had different thoughts and values.

After selecting an outfit, I close my dresser and start getting dressed. Slacks and a button down shirt, done up all the way to my chin. Black hair combed and gelled into place, so it’s plastered straight at the side of my defined cheekbones. Minimal makeup so my freckles are visible. No jewelry. Hideous loafers. This was how I dressed before the accident, I was told. And the dresser full of stuffy and boring attire confirmed this. That this is who I am. Maddie Ashford. Boring. Simple. Preppy. Conservative. I am Maddie and I look like a banker.

You were a good girl, Maddie.

You always did what was right.

Always followed the rules.

Never got into trouble.

I glance in the mirror, seeing the girl my mother described to me after I’d woken up and asked who I was yet at the same time not seeing. Honestly, I look confused—always do. Like I’m trapped behind a face I don’t recognize.

I am hiding behind a mask.

I’m hiding behind my amnesia.

I’m hiding.

Lost.

Lost.

Lost.

Drifting.

Part of me wishes I could be that girl she described, but most of me knows that I can’t be that person. Sighing at the thought, I pick up my discarded pants and reach into the pocket, retrieving the button I stole from Preston earlier today. I hate that I do it—in fact it makes me sick—that every time I see a stray button, I have to collect it. Not any fallen button, just one’s off people’s shirts, like some sort of strange OCD habit. It’s not a new habit either, something I discovered one day going through my old boxes of stuff. I came across a wooden box one day that was full of buttons in various colors, shapes, and sizes. I thought about asking my mother why I had it, but quite honestly, it’s something I feel like I should keep a secret. Crazy, like Lily.

Going into my closet, I stand up on my tiptoes and grab the box from the top shelf. Lifting the lid, I drop the new button into it, feeling a brief moment of gratification, but the feeling goes away the instant I put the lid on, as if I’m shutting a door closed that carries secrets to myself. After I put the box back on the shelf, I go into the kitchen, where my mom is cooking over the stove. The air smells like chocolate and cinnamon and there’s dough all over the countertops. She has her apron on, the fabric covered in melted chocolate and flour. There’s even some in her greying hair.

She has her back to me, but hears me come in and peers over her shoulder. “Oh, you’re ready early today,” she says as she skims over my outfit and gives me an approving look. “You look very nice, Maddie.” She walks up and smoothes the invisible wrinkles in my shirt.

I give her a tight smile as she brushes her hand over my head, putting some of my stray hairs into place. “Thanks.”

I sometimes wonder if she still sees her little girl when she looks at me, the one I don’t know, but who she likes to remind me once existed and that needs to be taken care of. My mom’s not a terrible person. She’s nice, caring, giving, although she worries about me way too much and is very controlling. But any faults of hers can be blamed on her twenty-one year old daughter still living with her who can’t remember anything before the age of fifteen. It’s not like I want to be living with her still, but every time I suggest moving out she says I need to act more responsibly. But I feel like I am. I have a job. I can dress myself. Make decisions. Granted maybe they’re not always the best. But I’m not incompetent and I wish she’d realize that. Although, sometimes I think she does know it and she just has issues with letting me go. I’m the only child and my father passed away when I was seven, something told to me in a very rushed story. “He died in a car accident, my mother told me when I asked her once. “That’s all you need to know.” Then she dismissed the conversation by leaving the room, I’m guessing because it’s too painful for her to talk about. So I don’t bring it up, even though Lily tries to get me to all the time.

“Did you remember to pack your scarf and gloves just in case it snows tonight and the car won’t start?” my mother says, interrupting my thoughts. She’s packing a bag of cookies for me like I’m going to school and she needs to make my lunch. “I hate that you work clear out in the middle of nowhere.”

“Yes mother.” The possibility of it snowing is slim to none, but arguing with her does no good, something I’ve learned over the last few years.