The Stalker's Notebook: Chapter 2: Rev 4

Dickov caught her anxiously glancing around at the box labels.
“This is the child sex crimes unit area.“
He grinned widely as he shrugged.
Dickov sat positioning himself next to the door blocking any easy exit.

One wall was encased with a huge mirror. There was a rush of air and in popped a slim raven-haired, thirty-something-year-old woman in an unflattering geometrically patterned business suit. She swirled in like she owned everything. The door closed on its own behind her. The walls suddenly moved inward. The expression on the woman's face was grim.

“Hi Laura, My name is Megan Reilly,” she said. Her tone was soft as butter and feminine like the early morning dew.
“I am here to ask you just a few questions”. Her tone now shifting to being stern. “This conversation is being recorded.”
Laura noticed a red dot blinking visibly behind the glass as Megan tapped on the mirrored wall with a pen, not bothering to look up as if she did this every day and by route.
Megan than leaned in towards Laura seductively.
“How many times would you say you emailed the doctor? 80? Maybe it was 100?” Laura knew exactly what Megan was asking.

Laura again understood what was happening but it was too late. Like a rabid hungry foolish wild idiot, she had gone for the tin of meat and was ensnared in the hunter’s trap as she continued to speak. She was hoping to find some rapport, an island in the crashing waves. That middle dry ground with Megan. It was a towboat that never arrived.

Laura wasn’t afraid of the truth. She wanted the truth. She believed in the truth.
Megan was furiously taking notes.
“Was this from your home in New York?”
“Yes.
“They took advantage of me. “ Laura's voice began to tremble and finally Laura gave in and began to sob.
Laura was searching for her thoughts. Megan was acting like a lioness playing with its dinner.
“Did you ever contact Altheim's children?”
“What?, No,” Laura's phone interrupted the interview and began to buzz.
“Excuse me while I answer this,” she stuck her index finger up and with that, she felt a momentary sense of autonomy.

Laura had totally forgotten she was due to have lunch with her trainee and his mother, who was in town just for the weekend from Texas. The lunch had been planned for well over a month. She glanced at her phone which indicated it was now already after 11:00 am and that she had been there all morning.
“About what time do you think I might be wrapping this up? I am supposed to have lunch with a friend in an hour.”
Megan nodded her head.
“You can tell them you won't be available any time soon.” This came out in the most sinister way possible. Icicles formed. Laura had just lost a battle to Megan she didn’t even know had been waged.
Laura sank into the hard plastic of the chair at the dawning gravity of Megan’s words. The room now felt crushingly too small. A knot formed in the back of Laura's throat.
“I went to see them because I was abused as a child.”
“Sexual abuse?”
“No.”
‘Why does it always have to be sexual abuse?’
Laura and Dr. Ferrari had once had a very specific conversation about this. It was about how there are other kinds of abuse that were just as emotionally debilitating but less “glamorized”. Dr. Ferrari had helped her understand that emotional abuse alone and neglect are amongst the most challenging forms of abuse to recover from.
Megan was being an idiot. Her questions were unsurprisingly all “surface”. Laura wasn’t going to be able to instantly educate her.

“My father was abusive. It wasn’t sexual abuse. There was a cult and my parents got divorced and I needed help. Laura was sure to Megan she did sound crazy. Please, please. I needed help. And I was asking them again and again for help. Please don’t do this to me.”
Laura knew she was skipping over more than half the story and a thousand details as it could never fit neatly into a 30-minute conversation.
“And they just ignored me.”

Laura threw her hands in the air exasperated at the entirety of it.
Her mind then went blank as her emotions did somersaults. Pain, confusion, trust and all rolling around in her head. Megan’s understanding of therapy seemed to have all the hallmark’s of the sophistication of the Church in the middle ages before people realized the world was indeed round.
Megan was unmoved. “I know you are very bright. Very clever.” She said it in a threatening way with a hint of just enough vulnerability that Laura could sense Megan’s own vulnerability. Laura knew nothing in this conversation had given Megan insight into her intelligence. The randomness of the compliment made it as if she was directly channeling Dr. Emily Altheim with those words.
“How many email addresses do you have?”
“I don’t know.”
“More than the one?”
“Yeah, probably”
“What are they?”

Laura was done with the line of questioning. Done with answering questions.
“Aren’t you the police? You’ll just have to figure that out for yourselves then”.
The truth was also she couldn’t remember all the orphaned and abandoned email addresses she had created over her lifetime.
At a certain point the interview then just ended abruptly.
"Please stand up, you are being arrested"