Division Street

"What is the most traumatizing thing that has ever happened to you?"

My therapist shoots me a warning look and unhooks her legs. Her red pumps clack on the tile as she settles them back on the floor. I stare at her shoes, mesmerized by the brightness of the color.

"You know that's not the real color of blood, right? I mean, yeah you probably know that, but I didn't. I didn't think that blood would be so dark. I thought it would be more like that." I motion towards her shoes, so perfectly contrasted by the clean white of the tiles.

"What are you talking about?"

"Well..." I pause, briefly contemplating whether I really wanted to get into this with her. A part of me feels like it's not safe to say what happened. Even more so, it's not appropriate. But lately the lines of what's appropriate and what's not have been blurring. I don't know what to say anymore. The truth? A lie? It doesn't matter. No one will believe me.

"My dad came upstairs to tell us to come get her. My mom. That she was being dramatic, again. My big sister, Mara, she wanted to stay upstairs because she didn't want to get involved with another one of their fights. She's lucky like that. She can turn off her emotions like a light switch and she never feels obligated to do anything for anybody.

But I know that their fights can turn ugly sometimes so I went downstairs. My dad was leaving out the front door, as I turned the corner into the dining room. I could see all the way into the front room and there she was kind of like slumped over her knees on the couch. Her hair was hanging down over her face and her arms were like this."

I slink down in my chair and flip my arms over so that my wrists are exposed and upright.

"It was like she was showing me what she did. Like she was proud of it or something."

I look up and Dr. Sealy's eyes are squinted and focused on me. 'Does she even see me?' I wonder. Because it looks like she's staring right through me. Maybe now she only sees the words that are coming out of my mouth. The images that they conjure up in that overly-educated mind of hers.

"When we first moved into that house it took a little bit of time for us to get some furniture. My parents sank all of their savings into our home so it was sort of a big deal when we got that living room set. Most of the pieces- like the sofas and the curtains were donated from family but we actually bought the coffee table. We all bought it as a family. It was this mahogany piece that was set with tempered glass panels. Anyway, one of the glass panels was missing. A good majority of it was in shards on the floor, so it didn't really take long to figure out what happened.

I brought her to the room and laid her down on the bed. And she was mumbling something, but I couldn't really hear it but the truth is I didn't really care what she was trying to say. So I just ignore her and try to keep her awake by, you know, slapping her a little bit and jerking her head if she looked like she was starting to doze off.

I didn't know how to do stitches so I pull this big roll of duct tape out of the hallway closest and I just do my best to hold the wounds closed and stretch the tape around it a few times. I got a little scared because when I poured the rubbing alcohol over it, she didn't even flinch or scream or anything- she just stared at me with her eyes all big and glassy. But I got the tape over her wrists and checked to make sure they weren't too loose or too tight and just stayed by the bed with her for a little bit until her eyes slipped closed and her breathing was even."

"Did you call the police?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"My parents...they fight a lot. They always make up. If I called the police every time they got into it... well at a certain point it would have turned into a case of the 'Boy Who Cried Wolf'. Besides my dad has this saying "What happens in this house, stays in this house. He's really big on privacy."

She nods.

My eyes once again search out Dr. Sealy's red heels.

"I went to go clean the living room, because like I said it took a while for us to get these nice things and I just wanted to make sure they were salvageable. Luckily, there was no blood on the sofa. There were a couple of flecks on the blinds behind the couch but not much. The floor was covered in it, though. There was a huge pool of blood, dark and chromatic. I grabbed a thick, bath towel and tried to scrub it up but when I went to do that the edge of the pool of blood just creased up and some of it started to fold up over itself. Have you ever boiled milk and left it sit for too long? When you try to stir it, after a while it just curdles up and this layer of film develops over the top. It was exactly like that. I couldn't soak it up with the towel, so I don't know why but I just scooped it up into my hands and it all came up at once, like it was Jell-O. I threw it into the bath tub and mopped up a little bit. I tossed the towel and by the time I went to check on her she was gone. I took too long. She died."

Dr. Sealy worked hard to hide a horrified expression. She leaned forward in her chair.

"I'm so sorry that happened to you, Darlene. I'm sure that must be hard to process. I assume that's why you brought up the question? Was that the most traumatizing thing that has happened to you?"

Surprised, I look up into her searching eyes. I hadn't thought of that.

"No." I say. "Not even close."