The Break-Up Retreat(38)
“Did you sleep okay?” she asks.
“Not great,” I respond.
“Yeah, you look a bit tired,” Anna says.
I don’t think she’s being bitchy; she’s just making an observation.
“What are you reading?” I ask her.
She holds up the book so that I can see the title. The bright-orange cover says Steal My Sunshine: How to Rid Your Life of Energy Vampires and other Ghouls .
“Huh,” I say. “Is it good?”
“It’s really interesting,” Anna says. “The writing isn’t great, but there are some good pointers in there. My ex was really toxic, always trying to put me down, so I’m trying to redirect my romantic energy.” She turns a couple of pages back, and starts to read out loud:
“An energy vampire will try to put you down, in order to feel better about themselves. When confronted, they will deny this, and tell you that you are being insensitive, taking up too much space, or not listening to their needs. In order to free yourself from the limitations others are trying to put on you, you must harden yourself against this oppressive negative feedback. Weaponized feedback is the tool of the cruel.”
She looks up at me, eyebrows raised.
“Right?”
“. . . sure.” I hesitate. “I mean, that sounds a little bit sketchy, though. Right? You have to be open to hearing some bad things about yourself.”
Anna nods energetically.
“Yeah, yeah, of course,” she agrees. “But you can tell when it’s not sincere. Like, my ex was always trying to fuck with my head. Sometimes I felt like I was going crazy. Like, just affirm my sense of reality, you know? I’m just trying to live here!”
“Totally,” I say. “Of course.”
Anna closes the book and makes a little face.
“I mean, it’s not great literature or anything,” she admits. “But at least it’s better than Doctor Martina’s books.”
I feel myself snapping to attention; were I a cat, my pupils would have grown to the size of coins.
“What do you mean?” I ask her.
Anna looks down the hallway, then back to me as she lowers her voice.
“Don’t tell on me, but I just don’t think her stuff is very good,” she whispers. “I mean, she doesn’t exactly live the way she preaches. Sometimes I think that she’s just trying to peddle this crap in order to—” Her voice grows frustrated, but then her mouth snaps shut as her eyes move to something behind me and she sits up at attention.
“Belinda, hey!” she chirps.
I turn around, and Belinda is standing in the doorway with a big cup of something hot in her hand.
“Oh, Isobel.” She smiles. “Good morning. I hope you got some sleep last night after you got back? And how are your feet?”
“They’re fine.” I’m lying. My feet actually hurt quite badly. It’s like having a thousand little paper cuts. I peeled the gauze off in the shower, groaning through my teeth with pain as they had stuck to the dried blood.
“Did something happen last night?” Anna asks behind me.
I linger, looking at Belinda, before I turn to Anna and slap on a smile.
“No,” I say. “I just had a . . . sleepwalking incident.”
“Huh.” Anna scrunches up her forehead. “Weird. I’ve never met anyone here who has sleepwalked. Must be scary, with all these woods and water around.”
I look over at Belinda. Her face is still entirely smooth, not a trace of feeling in her eyes.
You were sleepwalking. It happens all the time.
Not that often, apparently.
“Did you want something, Isobel? They just started serving breakfast,” Belinda says, walking past me and behind the counter.
“I wouldn’t want you to miss out on it,” she says, pure, maternal care in her words as she puts the green tea down in front of Anna. “Not after the night you’ve had.”
“Thank you for telling me.” I show as many teeth as I can, hoping the very width of my smile will convince her of my lack of suspicion.
“I actually just wanted to ask if it would be possible for you all to place a call to my emergency contact?”
Belinda cocks her head to the side.
“Is something wrong?”
The smile is making my cheeks ache.
“Not at all,” I respond. “I just promised I’d get in touch after a couple of days. Let my family know that everything is okay and going well. And since I don’t have any means of doing that myself . . .”
I let the words trail off, making direct eye contact with Belinda.
“That is so sweet,” Anna cuts in. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of that for you.”
“Thank you so much,” I say, and as I turn to leave, I hear Belinda call out, behind my back:
“Don’t you worry, Isobel. We’ll talk to them for you.”
When I look over my shoulder, she’s still smiling. The corners of her mouth stretched wide, her eyes perfectly dull, like pebbles polished smooth by the sea.
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doctormartinahastings I did an interview today (with the lovely @karaolsenjournalist —it will run in the Friday edition of @StockholmDaily , keep an eye out for it!) and was asked what the most common question I get asked by patients is.