Psycho
She had been seventeen years old and was grounded as usual. Despite her restrictions, her mother had allowed her to spend the night at a girlfriend’s house. Rene had decided it would be a good idea to sneak out with Tom and Joe, their latest male companions, so the two couples went to the beach with a cooler of beer and a couple of joints. Heather often wondered if her life would have gone differently had she not gotten into the van with her friends that night.
She remembered the sound of the crowbar that rolled around the back of the van every time they made a turn. She remembered the fear of getting back to Rene’s too late and missing her mother’s good night call, exposing her rebellion.
They were headed home when Joe pulled over on the shoulder so that he could jump out and pee “real quick.” She clearly remembered the feeling of the van as it veered too quickly to the right side of the road. Joe had parked in the emergency lane and laughingly took a lumberjack style piss break. When he got back into the van and turned the key in the ignition, there was no sound and no vibration
The guys were drunk and neither one of them knew what to check when they opened the hood. They tinkered with gadgets in the engine but their assessment of their vehicular troubles was as about as mature as two four year olds with a Lego car problem. Rene got tired and went to nap in the van, leaving Heather to flag down late night drivers on her own.
Heather recalled for her doctor how she had stood on the side of the road, waving to anyone who happened to drive by. She practiced apologies and desperate for a ride, hiked up her skirt just a tiny bit. The only car that pulled over was a light purple Volkswagen which the driver parked about thirty feet ahead of the van. Its brake lights turned on and off for awhile and Heather remembered hoping against hope that there had indeed been a driver behind the wheel of that car.
“Do you need a ride?” a man’s voice called out.
Both the Volkswagen and its occupant were motionless except for the brake lights that continued to blink on and off. Heather declined the offer and called out a “thanks, anyway’ before the driver backed the car toward the van and asked what he could do to help. She remembered he seemed to be reacting to some unknown source of amusement. Heather’s instincts screamed their savior’s intentions were bad but she brushed it off.
As Heather spoke the memory out loud for Dr. Angel, she heard the strain slide into her own voice. She knew he could see her squinting as she tried to look more closely at the motorist in her memory. She needed to see him more clearly so she sped up the memory and saw herself walking closer to him, as she had done that night. The man still sat in the driver’s seat and as she neared him in her memory, her heart pounded from her seat on the doctor’s couch.
When the stranger in her mind made his next move, Heather became rigid before her doctor’s eyes. The guy had reached out and grabbed her wrist as he tried to pull her into his car. She fought him immediately but he started to drive away, still holding onto her as he did. Though she tried her hardest to pull away, she realized he was too strong to fight. He badly wanted her in his car.
Her friends didn’t understand what was happening until Heather and her attacker were almost out of sight. With the bad guy in the driver’s seat and the victim attached to his strong hand and moving car, they weaved together down the interstate as he continued his efforts to pull her inside. She’d been forced to run so as not to be pulled in but her legs had become tired and weak. Eventually, her legs just stopped moving and because of their immobility, Heather’s body was dragged over painful cement at too many miles an hour while the maniac still clutched her arm tightly.
Heather thought she had been screaming the prayers within her mind but Joe later told her that he heard her screams. She would never understand how a teenage boy found the strength and speed that her friend did that night but like a superhero at the exact moment of crisis, Joe chased both victim and attacker down the interstate until he caught up. Upon seeing he had company, the strange man let go and Heather’s body slammed onto the unforgiving ground. In the last moment, she made direct eye contact with her attacker and as she sat before her doctor, Heather tried to freeze frame the memory.
She pulled herself back to her current reality and opened her eyes to see Dr. Angel’s gentle eyes staring back at her. She was afraid to speak for fear of