“What was?” he asked quietly, but I shook my head. He must have realized he wasn’t getting any of that because he changed tactics.
“Did you dream about that time?” he asked. “Did you dream about the video?”
“No,” I said, “just the hole.”
“Your focus when we first met was on the others who were with you when you were captured. Your dreams then revolved around feelings of guilt – that you should have been able to do something to save them.”
“Yeah.” I cleared my throat, and my head began to pound a little under the effort of not remembering. “Not those dreams. None like that this time.”
“You still blame yourself,” he observed.
“I fucked up.”
“You were ambushed.”
“I was the one tasked with not letting that happen,” I said. “I was their officer. I was in charge. I fucked up, and they died.”
“Do you expect yourself to be omnipotent?”
“Yes.”
“Evan,” Mark sighed, “you know that isn’t reasonable.”
“I don’t give a shit about reasonable,” I said. “It’s what I should have done. They were counting on me.”
“I have the files,” he reminded me. “Full investigation. You were found to be completely without…”
“I don’t give a shit about what they said!” I snapped.
Mark’s eyes went wide for just a half-second before his carefully constructed therapist’s mask came back into play. He couldn’t completely hide his shock from me. I could almost hear little gears clicking in his head as he considered this new information. He wrote on his notepad while his eyes stayed on me. I could just imagine the words on the page.
Evan Arden does actually have an emotion in there somewhere.
“Sorry,” I muttered. “I guess I’m a little on edge. Work has been a little hectic, and with the nightmares…well, I’m not sleeping much, like I said. Very sorry for my outburst, sir.”
Mark stared at me for a moment, undoubtedly wondering what he could say to make me explode again.
“What you went through was horrific, Evan,” Mark finally said.
Like I needed to be reminded.
“You’ve come a long way since then, haven’t you? You still work at the gym?”
“Not right now,” I said. “I took a little extended vacation. Just got back into town a month ago.”
“So where are you working?”
“Nowhere at the moment.”
“You just said work had been a little hectic.”
Shit.
“I…ah…” Damnit! What the hell was wrong with me? I never made such stupid mistakes. “I don’t have a real job. I’ve just been helping out a friend.”
“Evan, I can’t help you if you keep things from me. You have to trust me if this is going to work. You know whatever is going on, you are completely protected by doctor-patient privilege. Unless you tell me you’re going to hurt yourself or someone else, it will all be totally confidential.”
Well, that was the problem there, wasn’t it?