"You're back," Dr Reynolds notes with a smile.

"Yep," I respond, a little sourly. Did he think I wouldn't be? That I'm not dedicated to this? I push down my irrational annoyance, knowing that it's brought on by nerves.

He just chuckles at my pique and takes his seat, gesturing for me to take mine. I sit in Edward's place on the couch again, kicking my shoes off and crossing my legs underneath myself.

"That's a rather defensive posture," the doctor notes. I look down at myself, not understanding why it's defensive. It's just comfortable. He senses my confusion and clarifies.

"You've tucked your body up into a little ball, just like a frightened animal," he explains and I look down again. I suppose he's right. I go to unfold my legs but he holds up a hand, stopping me.

"You can sit however you'd like to, Bella," he says with a smile, "but I've inferred from your position that you probably haven't been eagerly anticipating seeing me again."

"Not particularly, no," I reply truthfully. He's not offended in the slightest by my honesty, and I respect him for that, even though I find it a little confusing at times.

"Why is that?"

"Last time wasn't fun for me," I explain, trying to keep the resentment out of my voice. "I started to remember things that I don't like to think about. It hurts."

"Bella, I'm going to be honest with you. That's going to be happening quite often, particularly during our first few sessions when you haven't established a means of dealing wih the troubling thoughts you're having. I'll of course help you in any way I can, but you're going to have to be strong."

I nod, even though I'm tempted to run out of the room and forget therapy for good.

"However," he continues, "would it be worth it for you not to deal with what you've been through and live a life of fear and discomfort?"

I shake my head.

"Post Traumatic Stress Disorder can manifest itself in a number of ways, Bella - some we can predict and deal with, some we can't pre-empt at all. The human mind is a very confusing, intricate place." He says the words with the reverence of someone who has dedicated their life to the study of those exact intricacies. "However, what we do know for certain is that leaving such poisonous thoughts to roam free through your psyche can only harm you in the long run, so we need to get them out now and deal with them as best we can. Do you understand where I'm coming from?"

I nod again.

"I'm glad to hear it. The temporary discomfort of our sessions is a worthwhile price to pay for a life of happiness and normality once you get past it all. And that's our common goal in all this, is it not?"

His choice of words resonates strongly within me... normality. I crave it beyond anything else, and will pay any price he asks for it.

"You're right," I admit and straighten my shoulders up, trying to look more confident than I feel. "What do you want to know about today?"

He smiles at me, looking both proud and reassuring.

"I can't tell you how happy it makes me to hear that, Bella."

That makes one of us.

"Ok," he clears his throat, looking swiftly through the notes he took last week. "Tell me what things you started thinking about when you got home from our session last week."

I hesitate, struggling to verbalise it all, as per usual.

"When they put me in the room... and when Edward arrived."

"What was it like for you when he arrived? How was it different to before?"

"It was better and worse."

"How so?"

It almost kills me to choke out the next sentence.

"I felt... better, because I wasn't alone anymore. That made me feel so, so guilty."

I still feel guilty for thinking like that.

He nods.

"Bella, that's a completely rational response. Did you feel better because you thought he'd be taking some of the negative attention away from yourself? That hopefully he'd be a scapegoat and you could avoid some abuse?"

"Of course not!" I cry, horrified at the very thought of that.

"Then what do you have to be guilty for?" he asks evenly.

"Because him being in there made me feel better!" I cry, enraged and disgusted all at once. "What kind of person would feel better knowing that someone else was going to be going through the same hell they were?"

"Humans are inherently social creatures, Bella," he explains. "It doesn't surprise me at all that you felt, and still maybe feel better for having someone share that experience with you. It's at the very core of your bond with Edward, and will bond you for the rest of your lives, I suspect."

I don't respond.

"You weren't happy to have him there to take away your personal suffering, you were happy to have someone to help you process the aftermath, someone to talk to. That's not a crime, Bella. That's being human. No one, including Edward, would fault you for that."

"But he did..." I murmur dejectedly.

"Did what?"

"He did take punishments for me. All the time."

"Don't call them punishments, Bella," the doctor corrects me. "That's not what they were. A punishment is appropriate retribution for wrongdoing on your part. What you experienced was abuse, and that's an important distinction for you to make."

"He took abuse for me, then," I paraphrase rudely. He ignores the bite in my tone.

"Thank you. Do you think that him volunteering himself in order to protect you is the reason you feel so connected with him?"

"No." I don't think it is, but I'm terrified that it could be.

"Neither do I."

For some reason, despite logically knowing that this man knows almost nothing of Edward, hearing him say that makes me feel a little better. I snuggle down into Edward's seat, wishing he was here with me.

"While Edward may have taken some abuse that was otherwise intended for you, I think that it's only small part of the role he played in your life while you were away together. The larger, and much more significant part, was that of a support system. The two of you experienced it all together, and whether you realised or not, helped each other to survive the experience."

He's telling me something I already know. I honestly doubt I would have survived it on my own.

"And that's why you two feel so disconnected from the rest of the world. Such a pivotal, damaging experience would of course make you feel like no one else understood. It's my job to make you understand that there is a world full of people beyond what you experienced for those weeks, and that you can, when you're ready, reimmerse yourself in it.

"It's also my job to make you understand that your relationship with Edward is not normal."

"It's the only thing that makes me feel normal," I spit at him, abruptly defensive.

"You two are co-dependent, to a point where it's near impossible for you to lead a normal life. I'm talking with you today in the hope that eventually, you can return to a normal life. And that means a normal, healthy relationship with Edward, if that's something you want."

"Of course that's something I want."

"Bella," he says with a small smile, "I'm not trying to belittle or offend you here. You need to know what our goals are if you have any hope of reaching them."

I nod, still irritated. He waits for a few moments then claps his hands together, rubbing them in an anticipatory way.

"Ok, so let's jump right into it. Tell me about the violence."

I choke on nothing. He waits while I try to gather my thoughts, but they seem to be rebelling, flying around my head to quickly for me to harness and express them. Every part of me knows that I don't want to do this, and seems to be helping me evade it.

"I have copies of your hospital admissions, so I have a general idea, but -"

"But you want to hear it from me," I cut him off, pre-empting his words.

He laughs slightly, and nods.

"It was... it was always worse when we'd done something to make them angry."

"Like what?"

"Edward... he liked to argue with them, he gave them alot of attitude. Even while they were doing it, and that just made it worse."

"But they abused you regardless of whether or not you irritated them, no?"

I nod.

"Tell me about the first time they harmed you."

I submerge myself in the memory, recounting it in a mechanical voice as I try to separate myself from it.

Edward and I had concocted a plan to get us out of here.

I was going to start screaming, get their attention, and when they opened the door, he was going to attack the blonde. I would incapacitate the dark-skinned man with a knee to the crotch and we would run. It wasn't sophisticated, or brilliant, but neither were the men, so we had a shot.

At least, that's what Edward believed. I clung to the idea of freedom so strongly that I'd do just about anything to get it, so I went along with the plan.

At first it had worked. My screaming lured them into the room and we had pounced, but we were unaware that they would have other means of preventing us from overpowering them.

Specifically, a taser.

Edward and I were now in chairs, side by side with our hands roughly tied behind our backs. The blonde walked around us in a slow circle, as the dark-skinned man leaned against a table, a pack of frozen peas resting against his bruised crotch. I could see Edward smirking at that from my peripheral vision.

"So," the blonde said slowly and I flinched, knowing it was about to begin. "Did you really think you'd be able to pull that shit off?" he asked.

Neither of us responded.

He walked over to me and leaned over, his lips almost touching my ear.

"Look over there, princess," he said loud enough for us both to hear, directing his free hand over to the doorway. I struggled to turn my head so he grabbed my chin and forced it to move, illiciting a small gasp of pain from me at his roughness.

"Do you see that?"

I struggled to isolate what he wanted me to see as I stared at the door. Abruptly, I realised what he wanted me to see, and a lower whimper escaped as all my dreams of freedom were shattered before me. The blonde laughed lowly as he realised I'd caught on

"You can see it, can't you?" he taunted. A large deadbolt, controlled by a combination lock, held the door shut, meaning that there was no way we could free ourselves without the cooperation of one of the men.

Trying to escape was completely pointless.

Despair sank into my bones, and my shoulders sagged in response, feeling almost physically weighed down. He leaned back and looked at me theatrically.

"You look tired," he noted. "Am I boring you?"

I shook my head slightly, terrified by the lilting tone of his voice.

"I have something that should help keep you focused while we have our chat," he mused almost playfully, then I felt the sting as the volts of electricity shot through me. I screamed, completely unprepared for the pain.

He laughed and removed the taser from my skin.

"Awake now?" he chuckled.

"Fuck you," Edward spat as his hands pulled against the restraints holding him in his chair. "You're enjoying this, you spineless asshole!"

"Oh, is the big man jealous of all the attention I'm giving his girlfriend?" the blonde taunted. I closed my eyes before I heard the low hiss of the taser and Edward's sharp exhale as he tried to cover up how much he was hurting.

I knew exactly what was happening and exactly how much it hurt, but that didn't mean I wanted to see it.

"Did they always put you together when they did things like this?" Dr Reynolds asks.

I shake my head, both in response to his question and to try and clear out the dark thoughts.

"No... sometimes they'd make me watch while they hurt him, or they'd just take one of us but make sure the other could hear it. Edward would come back all bloody and bruised and would try to act like it wasn't that bad, not realising I could hear everything."

I remember it with crushing clarity. Edward's curses, his verbal tirades, then the sickening crunches of physical violence until he stopped yelling under the sheer force of whatever it was they were doing to him. He never once told me exactly what that was.

"Did they often take you on your own?"

I shake my head again.

"No... Edward would usually do something to make them angry on purpose if he thought they'd hurt me. He'd distract them, or offend them, so they'd take him instead."

"Did you appreciate him doing that?"

"No!" I cry. "He suffered so much, for nothing! I could have handled it, if he'd just let me! I was strong enough!"

The doctor pauses for a few moments, letting my words hang in the air. When he speaks again, his voice is lower, contemplative.

"You've never before acknowledged your own strength, Bella."

I sit back, unfurling my stress-riddled body, and think about what he's just said.

He's right.

"Do you truly believe that you'd have been strong enough to take anything they'd given you?"

His question isn't a challenge. He's simply asking me to think about and reaffirm something I've said that he obviously thinks is important.

"For Edward, I would have been."

"Do you still feel that way?"

"Yes," I murmur hesitantly, suddenly shy.

"Then I need you to tell me, out loud. Tell me that you were strong enough to take it then. That you're strong enough to get past it now."

I pause for a long time, turning the words over in my head. Eventually, I find myself able to push them out.

"I'm strong enough."

"Not good enough. Again."

I take a deep breath, then repeat the words.

"I am. I'm strong enough to do this."

Even I can tell how much more resolute the words sound the second time around. Dr Reynolds beams at me. I try to keep a straight face, but find that I can't help it.

I grin back.