Chapter 6: Cry For Help

On Friday night, Kristina went to sleep early hoping to fare better than the previous night. On this particular night, she dreamt that she was being grabbed from under water and then suddenly she was being hurled into the air. She plunged into darkness once more before a jolt knocked all the breath out of her lungs and she was tumbling down a rocky slope with sickening speed. She screamed.

Someone grabbed her shoulders again and she screamed even harder.

“Kris! Wake up! Kristina, wake up!”

The screaming girl was shaken awake. The moment her eyes were open and she realized where she was she started to sob.

Tara was the one who had found Kris having a nightmare and gotten her to wake up. “It’s alright sweetie. You’re okay… you’re here at the house. You’re safe,” she reassured her.

That statement had made Kris cry even harder.

“Shh, it’s over. It was just a dream.”

“It was so real,” Kris cried, shuddering at the memory.

After a short while she had quieted down and she assured her friends that she was ok.

Mrs. Jaysen appeared in the doorway. Moving into the room, she handed her a hot cup of tea. Then the older woman asked her, “How long have you been having bad dreams Kristina?”

Kris looked down at her cup and said evasively, “Oh, uh, a few days.”

“Why didn’t you tell anyone, Kris?”

Tears filled her eyes again and she shook her head silently.

Who would understand?

The house chaperone watched a single tear roll down the young woman’s cheek and frowned.

“It’s okay, my dear,” Mrs. Jaysen soothed. “Do you want to talk about them?”

“No! I don’t. I don’t want to talk about them, I want to forget them. I- I want to go back to sleep.”

The older woman could do nothing but respect her wishes.

Kris was left alone for a few days after that incident and then one of her lecturers noticed how pale and withdrawn she was becoming. She was summoned to his office.

“Are you feeling all right?”

“I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? I mean after your accident it is-”

“This has nothing to do with the accident,” she snapped.

A tense silence followed her interjection.

“It’s okay Kristina, that’ll be all for now.”

She sighed and left after mumbling, “Thanks Professor Finley. Sorry.”

She sighed again when she got an envelope carrying the chancellor’s personal concerns over her well-being.

“Can you believe this?” she fumed to Carrie. “I can’t pass this semester without undergoing at least fifteen hours of counseling and therapy either from Dr. Versha or any other ‘suitable’ practitioner.”

Her friend was quiet for a moment. “Just fifteen hours?”

“It’s going to hurt my time!”

They both knew that she was capable of managing her time to complete her academic work without any stress. “Is that all that’s bugging you about this?”

“What does that mean?”

“Nothing, I just think it’s not a bad idea. A lot has happened to you.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” she cried out.

"I-”

Kristina hardly took any notice of her friend’s attempt to respond. “For chrissakes! Don’t you think I know that? You said it yourself- it happened to me. Why should I dig it up if it has caused this kind of trauma?”

Carrie’s expression held only sympathy and understanding. “What are you hiding from?”

With that, Kristina seemed to deflate. She sat down next to the clothes she had been folding. “I’m not hiding.” She lifted a hand and dropped it helplessly. “I’m not… it’s just that- I’m not hiding!”

Carrie reached out a hand in an attempt to comfort her friend. “What harm can it do, Kris?”

“Maybe it’s best if I do forget. Maybe I don’t want to find the meaning of my dreams, never find out what happened.”

“What happened,” Carrie echoed with concern. “Kristi, what do you dream of?”

Before Kristina could answer her, the twins Ronda and Sandra came into the room and they dropped the topic.

The day before her first counseling session, Kristina arrived home to find Gary and Carrie in the living room having what appeared to be a serious discussion. When she entered the room, they stopped talking.

“Hi guys.”

“Hi Kris,” they both said.

“How are you doing?” Gary asked her as his sister conveniently recalled a phone call she had to make.

“I’m doing okay,” she said casually, sitting across the room from him.

“You weren’t at the Gamma Phi meeting the other day.”

“I had a meeting with Prof Finley.”

“Everything okay?”

“Well it was,” she muttered.

“I can hardly hear you. You are sitting so far away and you’re mumbling.”

She considered pointing out that the room wasn’t that big and that he could move, but thought better of it because it didn’t make sense and was unnecessarily rude. She slowly uncurled herself and got up out of the chair and moved to sit beside Gary.

“You never used to be so distant with me, Kris,” he said quietly.

“Well, I’m sorry I don’t remember,” she said, thinking at the same time that she found it hard to believe if her dreams were anything to go by.

“Don’t you remember anything about me?” he pressed more urgently.

“Well, I know you were at my birthday party,” Kristina lied. She only assumed he was.

“Your birthday party?”

“The one I had before the crash.”

The last thing she expected to see on his face was a frown.

“Did I say something wrong?”

He was quiet.

“Gary, what did I say?”

He was silent a little while longer before saying to her, “I was hoping you’d have remembered something a bit more substantial... and positive” Pause. “A lot more,” he muttered.

Kristina felt her chest tighten as she gathered the nerve to ask him, “Did you- upset me on my birthday?”

An odd look crossed his face. “What makes you ask me that?”

His eyes held her gaze too intently.

She shrugged and looked away. “I don’t know,” she said. “You started it with the whole positive negative thing.”

“Forget I said anything then.”

“That is so easy for you to say,” Kris huffed.

To her surprise, Gary laughed. “You have always been so cute when you’re angry Kris.” He stretched his hand out to push her hair away from her face.

“Now that is what your dreams should be made of. Not those screamers.”

Ignoring the tingle in her skin where Gary’s fingers had brushed against her, Kristina twisted her head to stare at Carrie. She hadn’t wanted to tell him anything, but she was sure that because his sister had mentioned the dreams that he would ask. She risked a glance at Gary.

He was looking at her. “You’ve been having bad dreams?”

“Yeah,” she said quietly.

Carrie disappeared again.

“You want to talk about them?”

“Not really,” she said lightly, “I have been assigned time with a quack.”

“You’re going to therapy sessions?”

“After today.”

“Can I ask you something?”

“I might not answer, but go ahead.”

“Okay, fair enough. Do the nightmares include me?”

She hesitated. Of all the questions he could have started with! Kris knew what the answer was but wasn’t sure how to answer him.

But he certainly wanted to know.

“Come on. That’s not a probing question.”

“Yes. They do.”

His eyes widened ever so slightly.

“Oh. Ok.” There was a long pause, then he said, “Well, I have to get going. Let me just go say bye to Carrie.”

When he stood up, Kristina watched him head to the kitchen. He was a good-looking guy, she conceded with regret.

Why regret? Her mind questioned. The answer came promptly, after what he did in your dreams? But he didn’t do anything. One half of her mind protested the logic the other side offered. She couldn’t decide whether he was the bad guy or not.

Voices were rising in the kitchen.

Gary strode out before Kristina even considered going in. When he saw her, he stopped, anger still evident on his face. “Bye Kristina, see you around.”

“Bye Gary.”

And then he left.

****

“Come on in, Kristina,” Dr. Versha welcomed her with a half-smile.

“Good morning, Dr. Versha.” Kristina knew better than to be hostile. It would get neither of them anywhere, except maybe into more sessions being added to her sentence.

They both sat down on the long, plush, suede sofa near a window.

“You’re looking well today.”

“It’s the make-up,” the patient quipped.

Versha smiled and handed the young lady a piece of paper.

“What is this?”

“If you sign this consent sheet, you are simply giving me permission to record our conversations. It helps me concentrate more on what you’re saying.”

Kristina nodded but read it anyway. Taking out a Parker pen, she signed on the dotted line and then handed the sheet back to the doctor. Versha took the paper back to her desk and started the recording machine by remote.

“So what brings you here?”

“Professor Finley and the chancellor,” she told her amicably enough.

“What did they do to you that brings you here?”

Kristina’s brow creased briefly. “I shouted at Prof Finley and then I got the letter from head office.” Pause. “And I shouted because I was tired and stressed out.”

Dr. Versha nodded. “Keep talking, girl.”

“I have been tired and stressed because I keep having these dreams that I think are connected to my accident- which in case you didn’t know I can’t remember.” Kris’s hands were busy twisting the pen in her hands, open and closed. “And then I’m also sick of people wanting me to unearth what happened. Maybe I don’t want to remember!” she finally exclaimed.

“Why not?” Versha asked after a pause.

Kris’s hand put the pen in her lap. “I don’t know! Why should I? What good would it do? I was assaulted and was comatose. What is there to recall? Pain, fright, helplessness and..?” The pen was turning again. The girl shrugged.

“I’ve been told that you can’t remember everything- including incidents prior to your accident, like your birthday party.”

“I have one every year,” came the reply in an effort at a light tone. “One forgotten isn’t sorely missed.”

“But a little?”

Kris nodded, her eyes sliding away from the doctor’s understanding gaze. “A little.”

“Tell me about these dreams.”

Kristina shook her head. “I’m not ready to talk about why I’m having them.”

“Okay. So tell me what’s in them. I won’t require you to analyze anything,” said the doctor.

The patient was quiet for a while. The pen continued to open and close in her lap as she told the doctor about the nightmares full of fighting, fear, the falling, water and Gary’s face. His face was the only one she saw.

“Always?” Versha interrupted.

“Always. I wish I knew why,” she said sadly, looking almost beseechingly at the doctor. She looked down at her hands and the doctor waited. “I’m convinced there’s a reason why but the only one I can think of is that he was there when it all happened.”

Kris missed the frown on the doctor’s face.

“Have you tried asking your family what happened?”

“It’s like they’re afraid to tell me. They say it’ll come back. I had an accident,” she huffed. “Not even my friends’ll tell me. It took me a week to find out that Gary is Carrie’s and Reese’s brother.”

“You didn’t know?”

“I forgot.” She looked at her watch. “I have a lecture in fifteen minutes.”

“So you session is over then- if that’s what you want.”

Kris nodded. “We have enough time to talk,” she said drily. Fifteen hours in total. Surprisingly one hour was already done.

Before the younger woman left Dr. Versha told her, “You should really press your family and friends to help you fill in the gaps of your memory lapse.”

“I’ll keep trying! They just don’t seem bothered to inform me.”

“They could be afraid that it will hurt you.”

“What could possibly be so bad? I am not what anyone would call fragile.” Kris was frowning.

“Don’t expect it to be easy. In fact,” Dr. Versha said, “expect it to be an emotional surprise.”

That statement received a raised eyebrow. “Right.” Pause. “Later, doc.”